Refugee camp in Uganda: the ride there

Hi, everyone. I know I promised more posts, but then I went to Uganda for a few weeks. So, you got nothing for weeks, but now you get stories from Africa. Isn't that worth it?

So, originally, I was not supposed to end up in a refugee camp in southwest Uganda; originally, I was supposed to tour vineyards in southern Spain. At first, the trip itself my lovely husband's idea: Two weeks, two amazing friends, anywhere in the world. I'd never been to Europe, and little sounded better to Hannah, Laura, and me than hiking through the Pyrenees, touring cathedrals, and eating gourmet chocolate and cheese every day.

Then the Haiti quake hit, and the aftershocks shook my conscience. Two weeks, two amazing friends, anywhere in the world: Why were we choosing to spend so much money and time on us? So we started sniffing around. Laura's friend Eric Glustrom runs a non-profit called Educate! in Kampala, Uganda. He lobbied hard to convince us to visit the refugee camp, Kyangwali ("chang-walee"). We bit.

I usually collect more information about the food I purchase than I collected about Africa before I left. Maybe it was because I wasn't sure what to read, exactly, or how to prepare. Maybe I just wanted to come to Kyangwali a fresh slate, a learner, without preconceived ideas or stereotypes. Maybe I preferred to learn from people rather than books. Maybe I was just lazy.

Here's what I knew: I needed four vaccinations. There were going to be a lot of kids. And some guy named Daniel was supposed to pick us up from the airport.

In the Ethiopian airport, an information-booth lady spied my American passport.

"Americans don't know anything about Africa," she said.

I blinked.

"Yeah, you know, I don't know very much about Africa," I said. "That's why I'm here. Educate me."

"Well, we don't live in mud huts in the middle of the jungle," she said. "And we're not starving." She handed my passport back with a withering look. I gulped and hopped on my last flight.

---

The next day we found ourselves going 130 mph down the highway, packed into a backseat with Daniel and his friend, Immanuel, who describes himself as Daniel's adoptive brother.

"All of us in the camp are brothers," he said. "Because so many of us didn't have families when we came."

We like Daniel and Immanuel immediately. They are in their late twenties, soft-spoken, ready to laugh.

"How many languages do you speak?" Daniel asked in the car.

"One and a half," I answered. This is probably close to true.

"One and a half? What languages?" asked Immanuel.

"English and some Arabic."

He said something in Arabic I didn't quite catch.

"Yeah, maybe I don't understand the African accent," I said.

He laughed and shook his head.

"But I can say 'salaam aleikum' to you," I said.

"'Salaam aleikum,' is that Arabic?" Immanuel asked.

"How many languages do you speak?" I asked.

"Thirteen and a half."

"Which ones?"

He began listing, counting on his fingers: Swahili, Lugandan, French, Keenyaboysha...

"Which one did I forget?" he asked when he had listed thirteen.

"You forgot English," I said in deadpan.

"Oh, yeah, right. English," he said, grinning. "Thirteen and a half."

"Are you married?" asked Daniel.

"Yes, I'm married," I said.

"How long have you been together?" Daniel asked.

"Well, I've been married about a year, and we dated for three years before that."

"Dated--what does that mean?"

"It means you make a lot of long phone calls. Like, 'Hey, baby, how are you, okay, see you later.' And then you hang up and call right back."

"I see. And are you making any long phone calls, Laura?"

"Nope. Are you?"

"No. But I hope to soon."

"Right now you're just calling and hanging up before they answer?" Laura asked.

Daniel just grinned.

---

It was dark before we reached Kyangwali. The settlement is maybe 25 or 30 miles from the nearest town, Hoima, but it takes about 90 minutes to reach because the roads are so bad. I was sure we were going to end up stuck nose-first in one of the pits on the road, but somehow the beat-up Corolla managed to pull through every time, despite the slick-as-nose-grease mud.

There were, of course, no lights. We used Daniel's and my cell phones for flashlights, and there were a few fires flickering. Above us were the brightest stars I've ever seen, millions of them strewn between the (visible!) Milky Way.

I adjusted my eyes, squinted. I could just make out the shadows of children, mud huts, and, behind them, the jungle, dark and mysterious as the heart.