Day 1 Part Two: Kampala to Mpigi

"If you want to walk fast, walk alone. If you want to walk far, walk with others." - East African Proverb

"Yes, I see that you are very tired. I will make it fast. So, the third stage is called 'bargaining'..." -Monica

"It's about saving life."- Hasa

Brendan and I have been slowly inching his balcony chairs ever further away from the encroaching sun—like an Attenborough time-lapse of starfish meandering across barnacled rocks to keep ahead of the receding tide—when Brendan sees a Toyota Spacio with large rainguards on the windows slowing in front of the building's driveway.
 "Ruth's here. Only twenty minutes late, not bad!" he says. Just then the driver, barely visible through the tinted glass but obviously tall and male, hits the accelerator and speeds off.
 "Welp, that definitely wasn't Ruth," I say, "Dude, what if she doesn't show up? How will I get to Mpigi?"
 "Relax man, transportation is not an issue in Uganda. Taxis go that way all day long," says Brendan supportively.
 "Alright, but I'd rather not be sardine-d into a taxi with 14 other people. Oh well. Whatever it takes, I guess."
 "She'll be here," Brendan replies with confidence.

 Brendan and I are perhaps an unlikely pair to have traveled halfway across the world together. I have a propensity for overthinking things, imagining every way in which the wheels can come off in any situation (no matter how innocuous), and for constructing highly detailed mental narratives regarding the complete and total destruction of everything I have ever known and loved for no reason whatsoever. Brendan, on the other hand, seems to genuinely exist in the here and now—full time. I find myself asking him litanies of very specific questions[19] as I seek to assuage my own anxiety. He is very patient with my talmudic style of reasoning but it is often clear that he cannot follow my mind to the same dark anxious places. He simply no longer speaks that language. Years of dedicated meditation practice and individual therapy have taken him from the depths of crippling agoraphobia and panic to the intrepid world traveler he is today. He is often more patient with me than I am with him. Somehow, we get along famously.

 Upon our return to the apartment, after the sphincter-tightening boda ride, I had changed (for a variety of reasons) into shorts and a tee shirt. It is now 2:45pm and I am thinking that Ruth must at least be on her way so I go into the apartment to get myself together for the trip to Mpigi. I am in the midst of changing back into my quasi-military adventure travel gear [20] when I hear the telltale scrape of Ruth's car making a carrier-landing on the driveway.
 "Ruth's here!" says Brendan from the balcony.
 "Shit. I'll be ready in a minute," I say feeling unprepared.
 "Don't sweat it. She's on our time now."

 I manage to make my way down the stairs without tripping. Fourth time's a charm. Charcoal man continues to fill bags, the DVD boys are now blasting something Latin-sounding, and my coffee cup and paper bag continue to languish in the culvert. We pile into Ruth's car as Brendan explains that he'll need to stop at Vodafone to get his cell phone working. At this point in the trip, neither one of us has a working phone. The Ugandan mobile system does not play well with our American equipment. Ruth advises that Soraya had texted her with feigned surprise that Brendan was not at the restaurant.The four kilometers between the apartment and said restaurant goes by much more quickly in the car than on foot, but about ten times as slow compared with our near-death boda experience. Traffic forces us to a natural stop in front of MF Foods and we see Soraya waving to us from under the awning. I slide over in the back seat as Soraya gets in the car. She introduces herself and reports that she had been waiting there for us since 12:45.
 "We were sitting right there for two hours! Don't even try to tell me you were there the whole time." says Brendan before adding "No fuckin' way!"

 Soraya is sticking to her story but the matter drops away as we discuss our plans for the rest of the day. We are to visit Kaleke Kasome, the charity that Soraya and Brendan are involved in, and meet its founder Maurice Hasa. Then, it'll just be a quick hop up the road and I'll be installed in my village. After several minutes of fighting dense traffic, Ruth pulls the car over to the left hand shoulder and parks next to a sign announcing No bodaboda with a red circle and line through a representation of a motorcycle. Brendan says "I'll be right back" as he exits the car, taking his life into his hands crossing the street. He then disappears into the shadows of a deep awning over the Vodafone store. Multitudes of pedestrians are flowing around the car like a stream around a rock. Many of them perform double-takes upon noticing the mzungu sweating in the back seat of this car. Taxis temporarily park inches from my window, their drivers and hype-men looking hungrily at Ruth and Soraya[21]. The heat is becoming intolerable yet Ruth admonishes me to keep my window up to ward off potential camera thieves.

 While we wait for Brendan, the three of us converse comfortably. I learn that Soraya is a founding member of Kaleke Kasome and was the 1st runner-up in the 2012 Miss Uganda pageant. As these long, balmy minutes tick by, Ruth and Soraya are increasingly speaking to each other in Luganda. I suspect they're cajoling Brendan in his absence as I hear his name interspersed between otherwise unintelligible words. Ruth decides to take a short walk to retrieve some ice cream against the broiling heat. When she returns, the ice cream is shared equally between the two of them. They offer some to me but I politely decline. There is a genuine quality to this interaction that is typically lacking back in the States. Sharing, here, seems to be a way of life and it is offered with sincerity and an expectation that one will partake. For the time being, however, I am being extremely conservative about victuals in order to safeguard against the dreaded but inevitable running stomach. So far, so good but the night is young.

 After what seems like an outrageous wait, Brendan returns to the car. Ruth and Soraya immediately start abusing him for taking so long and attribute the wait to his having been "talking with girls". This may or may not have been the case. Ruth fires up the Spacio and we merge courageously into traffic. We encounter the usual mixture of cars, large trucks, taxis, bodas, and pedestrians as the road begins to leave the city. Most of the larger vehicles are elaborately stenciled with religious or philosophical slogans. By my unscientific count, it seems that there is a roughly fifty-fifty distribution between Christian and Islamic sentiments. The foreboding Masha Allah!, familiar from this morning's near collision, now appears on an enormous petrol tanker. Bismillah is frequently represented as is Jesus Reigns. I am fairly handy with simple Arabic religious expressions but I rely on Ruth and Soraya to translate automotive adornments appearing in Luganda. I take a swing at pronouncing Olokoka ddi? placing the emphasis on the second syllable as is often the case with four syllable English words. Soraya corrects me by placing, to my ear, equal stress on all four syllables of the first word. She advises that this phrase means "When are you getting saved?", firmly putting it in the Christian category.

 The road opens before us leaving the dense traffic of Kampala in the hazy distance. I snap many pictures as we hurtle along gaining speed steadily. A woman in a long skirt is making her way to the shell of a brick building. She has a small child swaddled on her back and is balancing what appears to be a reasonably heavy load on top of her head. I have about one second to compose the shot as we race along. Thank god for fast shutter speeds. I see a round sign with the number 80 in a red circle. Looking over Ruth's shoulder I clock our current speed at 105kph.
 "Was that a speed limit sign?" I ask of all three of my companions.
 "Yes," is Ruth's simple response.
 "Do you ever get stopped by the police for speeding?"
 "Maybe if you were driving crazy but not just for speeding. Everybody does it," advises Ruth [22].

 Every K or so we pass a roadside stand where locals are selling their wares. Intricately woven baskets are stacked hourglass style next to gourds of various sizes. Loofahs hang at the end of tree branches. We pass a small hovel, next to which are parked a Toyota Hilux, two bodas, and the wreck of an old-style ambulance with a red sheet uselessly slung across its gaping interior. The now familiar brilliant white uniform of a traffic officer is dimly visible in the doorway. The Hilux is marked Police and has a blue and red lightbar on the roof. I am in the midst of thinking the phrase it doesn't look like they can handle much of an emergency when another police Hilux goes screaming past us in the oncoming lane. In the short bed of this truck there is a double-sided black vinyl bench. Each side of this bench contains two soldiers (for lack of a better term) rigged for combat. They are wearing dark blue and black urban camo fatigues and helmets. Each of them has a Kalashnikov, muzzle down, resting between their knees. The rear-most soldier, his arms casually folded over the butt of his rifle, looks directly at me as we pass. Having seen this, I strike the previous thought from my mental record. It seems that the Uganda Police Force is ready and able to deploy complete fire teams at a moment's notice. As we near Mpigi, I see several more of these trucks, often with three soldiers on each side of the bench instead of two. The UPF rolls deep.

 Having almost reached our destination, we decide to stop for provisions. Ruth pulls the car into one of the few open spaces in front of a small grocery store. The four of us get out and walk through the open doorway, beside which sits a security guard in a slightly disheveled navy blue uniform with gold epaulettes. He startles mildly and clutches his outrageously long and well-worn Mosin Nagant rifle as if the sound of our doors closing woke him from a deep sleep. Once inside, I am immediately drawn to a pyramid of five liter Rwenzori spring water jugs. I pick up two in each hand, devoting two fingers to each carry handle, and begin the short farmer's walk to the cash register which is a mere three meters away. I am intercepted halfway there by two Ugandan teenagers who pry the water jugs from my fingers and carry them the remaining distance to the counter. They smile at me before dispersing back into the aisles to complete whatever tasks they had been attending to. As I ask the proprietor behind the register—a middle-aged Chinese woman—if I pay here for the bananas displayed outside, I see Soraya coming to the counter with an armload of snacks and sundry items. The johnny-on-the-spot teenagers are nowhere in sight to help Soraya. There is a sort of colonial feeling about the service I received and Soraya didn't [23] that leaves a cold lump in the pit of my stomach.

 The Chinese woman rings me up and explains that the banana stand is not affiliated with this establishment. I stuff my change into my wallet and turn to pick up my water jugs. The teenagers materialize out of thin air and will hear none of it as I explain that I'm quite comfortable carrying my items by myself. I now follow as the lads take my water out to Ruth's car and load the heavy bottles into the trunk. They smile expectantly at me so I divide the coins in my pocket between them[24]. They both trouser the coins in unison and run back inside. Soraya emerges from the store carrying her purchases in two plastic bags. She informs me that she already bought a bunch of bananas from the stand for me. I thank her as we all get back into Ruth's car. Soraya is daintily munching some sort of snack from a thin clear plastic bag. She turns to me smiling and says "Want some?" I say "sure", my peripheral vision identifying the snacks as cashews or something of that ilk. As I reach into the bag, the picture comes into focus and I am somewhat shocked to learn that it contains a few hundred deep-fried grasshoppers. The handful I was about to take drains through my fingers as I decide to eat only one. I pop the little guy into my mouth and begin chewing with a bemused smile on my face. Not bad. A little stale but not bad. "Mmph, turmeric," I say around the masticated chitinous parts of the bug's exoskeleton. Soraya nods approvingly. 

 Soon we leave the relative comfort (if not safety) of the highway and begin trundling along the red dirt roads of Mpigi. As we slowly negotiate craters and channels carved into the road, bodas pass us by at alarming speed, leaving trails of thick red dust rising skyward. Shepherds lead teams of livestock from their daily grazing sites. Clusters of forlorn dwellings give way to larger buildings as we approach Mpigi's small but dense and energetic market district. Ruth heaves the car over to the shoulder at Brendan's request and shuts it down. "I just need to pick up a few things for Hasa," says Brendan as the four of us step out of the car and into the dust and bustle of the market. We are parked next to a boda stage where there are more bodas than riders in evidence. Taxis come groaning down the road, slowing briefly to entice any would-be passengers.

 A deep culvert separates the road from the shops. We cross rickety lengths of gray plywood and flakeboard which are laid across the trench as ad-hoc footbridges before ascending the crudely carved clay stairs that lead up to the shops. There are a few flea-market style tents near the road which appear to have no other purpose than to shelter the townsfolk from the last leaking gasps of the rainy season. The smell of charcoal from several improvised barbecue grills mixes with the dust and odors attendant to livestock to form a sweet and heady olfactory miasma which is, in truth, experienced with all five senses. Lacking any proper innate sense of direction and dazzled by the frantic insectoid motion of this place, I feel pleasantly disoriented [25]. I snap a few hurried photos as Brendan emerges from the shade of a dilapidated storefront carrying a large bag of rice and a stack of chapatis. He explains that these provisions are for Hasa, Kaleke Kasome's founder, who spends many consecutive days at the organization's small center and often forgoes eating if he feels it would delay his work.

 The sound and fury of the marketplace recede in Ruth's wing mirrors as we press on toward the village. Many narrow tracks and cowpaths switchback up and down like tributaries flowing from our hilly road. We stop periodically to allow teams of livestock to pass. The many bodas shooting by in both directions do not defer as we do and near-misses occur frequently. Eventually, as the car climbs steeply up the dusty two-track, a mobile-home sized stucco building appears over my right shoulder. A man in blue jeans and a striped tank top is leading a Sanga cow across the building's lawn with a long frayed rope of impressive diameter. The cow plods on disinterestedly, swiveling its massive horns rearward in lamentation of grazing yet unfinished. We come to a complete stop to allow this duo to proceed before Ruth negotiates a hairpin turn and parks the car in the grass.

 The sound of our doors closing causes several small children to emerge. They greet Brendan enthusiastically and look cautiously my way as I fiddle with my camera. This vanguard is followed closely by two adult men who are presently negotiating the concrete stairs as they come out of the building. One of the men is wearing faded jeans and a blue Rotary Club tee shirt. He smiles broadly as the pair approach. The second man's bearing radiates an intense and solemn energy. His gait is slow and rhythmic. His gaze is steady, evaluative, deliberate. Unbelievably, given the climate, he is wearing a knit winter hat and a thin white sweater over a pink long-sleeve collared shirt. This is Maurice Hasa, founder of Kaleke Kasome Children's Centre. He strides toward Brendan and they embrace. The man in the blue shirt introduces himself as Azariah and we shake hands in the African fashion. Brendan presents me to Hasa with a simple introduction.
 "It is so nice to finally meet you," says Hasa, his words spilling softly around the frozen ropes of his very direct and intense eye contact. "Equally," I respond, shaking his hand. Hasa and I had been chatting periodically via WhatsApp for several weeks before my arrival. The impression I had formed of him, though eminently positive, had not prepared me for the air of earnestness that is now deeply impressed upon me.

 These introductions complete, Hasa says "come" and leads us into the building for a brief tour. Upon entering, we are admitted into a medium sized room with lime green walls. There is a large mural of a man helping a small girl put on a pair of new shoes. Smaller and more numerous posters announce "Let girls learn!", "Girl Power Saturday", and "Men Against Defilement"[26], giving a sort of overview of the Center's raison d'etre. Hasa quietly narrates the purpose of each room as he leads us through the narrow hallway. Large, one meter diameter drums with goatskin heads are clustered invitingly in a corner next to a 73 key Casio keyboard. This is the music room. Hasa's voice is quiet and forceful as he explains some of the other activities that are part of the Center's programming. There is something deeply engaging about his manner. He pauses frequently, inserting "yes?", between every third or fourth sentence. I nod attentively. Azariah smiles.

 Months ago, when he first put me into contact with Hasa; Brendan gave me the briefest sketch of who this man is and what he represents. Maurice Hasa was a very popular Ugandan R&B singer with a promising and accelerating career in the music industry. His hit single Kaleke Kasome, now the appellation of the Children's Center, means "Let the girl go to school" in Luganda. Realizing that there weren't enough hours in the day to sustain his music career and his charitable work, Hasa simply walked away from a life of wealth and fame—a life that most Ugandans can only dream about [27]. Now he is leaning on the concrete wall of his small building, looking pensively out the window. There is something incredibly poignant about this tableau, the late afternoon light filtering through the open window into the tiny unlit room, Hasa's hand resting on the steel security bars that both adorn and defend, his benevolent thousand yard stare contrasting with Azariah's good-natured grin. I try futilely to capture the moment with my camera but it runs through my fingers like sand. A thousand pictures and a million words will never communicate the impact of this moment in time.

 "Come. I will show you the village and how our people are living," says Hasa beckoning us toward the exit. We walk down the concrete stairs and across the lawn, Ruth and Soraya in tow. A boy of no more than ten kicks a soccer ball our way as we walk; it whizzes by us and comes to rest under a creaking metal swingset. Hasa looks over his shoulder and gives the boy a mischievous smile. Azariah kicks the ball back. We continue down the potholed driveway (that had given Ruth some trouble on our way up) and cross the dusty main road. Flattened plastic Fanta bottles and other assorted detritus peak out from under the road's overgrown margins. We step carefully around cow patties camouflaged by the blowing red dust. Children materialize from places unseen and begin to follow. Soon our party numbers in the teens. Hasa reaches into a tall bush and extracts a perfectly straight walking stick. I wonder how or even if he knew it was there in the first place. As our retinue continues down a side street we are taking on the appearance of a flock of sorts. Hasa leads the way, walking stick in hand. Many children follow and frolic around him. I catch up to Brendan who is walking hand in hand with a small boy in a yellow collared shirt. I come up alongside the pair and the boy takes my right hand, his tiny grip holding on to my last two fingers. I have always been uncomfortable around children but the sweetness of this moment disarms me completely. If I did not come here to step boldly and thoroughly out of my comfort zone, then why have I come? I ponder this as the golden hour light sets flame to the western sky.

 The small shops we pass are closing in preparation for the equatorial darkness which falls like a curtain when the sun goes down. Soon we follow Hasa down a singletrack path worn into the grass and dirt by the passage of many feet. He pauses to examine the quality of a large ear of corn growing in a small plot. "We have big plans for this community. A grain mill. If these people are able to mill their own maize then they can feed themselves and have an income. Big plans," he trails off, continuing down the path. Tall trees and jungle-y brush begin to encroach to our sides. The boisterous voices and low thump thump of rap music blasted from shop windows recedes into the distance. Strange bird calls and the buzzes and clicks of a multitude of insects take their place. We come to a stop as Hasa explains that this is the route that girls as young as five years old must take to fill their family's jerry cans with water. A route that, sadly, leaves them alone and exposed to the whims of soulless child predators. Defilement. The word somehow sounds more appropriate, more sinister and evocative than the almost euphemistic language we use in the West. I suppress a shudder and fiddle with my camera settings to cleanse the thoughts and images from my mind. They retreat from the forefront but still they remain.

  Azariah looks down and draws our attention to a writhing sea of large black ants that are not at all pleased with our presence. "Eh! Ants!" he remarks, stomping his feet forcefully to dislodge the many insects that are now rapidly climbing up our legs. On cue, the children all begin stomping their feet and we start moving again, this time more quickly. The children's random stomping footfalls naturally coalesce into a marching unison that gives the impression of a tiny army. I am close to making a joke of this when I recall that armies of child soldiers—no older than these young ones—are an abominable reality in many African countries. Not long ago, the child slave armies of Joseph Kony terrorized the north of this very nation. Unbidden, radio pioneer David Sarnoff's quote enters my mind: "Let us not paralyze our capacity for good by brooding of man's capacity for evil". I look up to see Hasa smiling as he musses the hair of a small boy with his left hand. The other children are orbiting him, smiling, poking, gamboling freely in the calm of his wake. My eyes begin to well up. Not for the last time.

 We arrive at the village well. a muddy concrete structure with several stairs leading down to a shallow pool of water. Brendan is attended by an almost equal number of children as Hasa; among them is a small girl called Maria whose clothing and school fees he sponsors. "Let's get a picture," Hasa says, herding the party down the few stairs of the well. Brendan remains off to one side but Hasa insists he joins the children on the steps. I have to redirect the entire group to the other side of the well in order to take advantage of the remaining light. I snap a few photos and show Hasa on my camera's screen. "Yes, it is good" is his simple response.  We leave the well by a different path and soon we are among the mud huts, pens, and brick houses of the village proper. Chickens roam freely, pecking at the ground and clucking disapprovingly at us. There are many small goats wandering through the village and standing awkwardly on gigantic anthills; the tiniest ones bleating plaintively as they aggressively nose under their mothers to nurse. Several columns of large black ants march with military precision, perhaps feeding the swarm through which we waded earlier. Dogs lounge on the red earth appearing content.

 We come to a small courtyard of sorts, nestled between a large brick house and several mud outbuildings. Hasa proceeds to collect and arrange a series of small wooden chairs and bids us to be seated. I remain standing in order to continue taking photographs. "The young girl who lives here became pregnant and had a child last year," Hasa explains in low tones. "She had been going to school but her grandmother wants her to remain in the village with the child now. We are working with the family so that the girl can continue her schooling." Soraya is now sitting next to the grandmother, holding her hand and conversing in Luganda. The young mother Hasa was describing emerges from the house with a woven mat. She lays the mat on the ground next to her grandmother's chair and sits. "Take a picture," says Hasa pointing to the girl. I compose the shot, feeling intrusive and voyeuristic. The girl looks at me through the lens and does not smile. There is a palpable energy between the girl and her grandmother, like two opposing magnets that repel each other for no other reason than the accident of their orientation in time and space. The girl sees the open door of a better future— just out of reach. The grandmother sees the girl's true and rightful place to be in the village: she is a mother now. Neither is necessarily wrong. Neither wishes anything less than a happy and fulfilling life for the other. Yet they are bound by their irreconcilable conceptions of what the future must be. As Terence McKenna was fond of saying: Culture is not your friend.


 After several minutes, Hasa stands and taps his walking stick on the dirt. This is our cue to press onward, back to the Children's Center. We say goodbye to the girl and her grandmother and continue up the trail, passing small plots of corn and short, broad leafed trees heavy with bunches of matoke. I am walking next to Azariah and we chat amiably. He is a dentist who volunteers his time and efforts at Kaleke Kasome. He asks how I am finding Uganda. I ramble for a minute, trying to aggregate the thoughts that writhe and swarm through my consciousness like the ants we had tread upon earlier. "I love it here," is perhaps the most coherent thought to emerge. "Every single thing I've seen is brand new to me and the wildlife is outrageous!" Azariah smiles warmly and says "that's good to hear". In punctuation of this exchange, a gigantic bird comes to a rambunctious and noisy landing in the top branches of the tree under which we are standing. The bird calls repetitively and noisily, sounding like a mallard on steroids...and meth. I backpedal furiously to get the angle for a shot, simultaneously raising the camera to my eye and trying to focus. Azariah can't help but laugh as I trip on a fallen branch and barely remain on my feet.
 "That's amazing! Look at that thing!" I say gleefully. Now Azariah is really laughing.
 "They are very common," he states, "Actually, kind of a nuisance." the last word broken into three syllables by the escape of a few chuckles.
 "I just can't believe that everywhere I turn, I see something incredible. I love this place!"
 "You are most welcome," says Azariah turning to catch up with the group.

 We arrive back at the center and say our goodbyes with many handshakes and fraternal embraces. Hasa tells me that I am welcome to visit him at any time and says "If you need anything, I am right here" with the same earnestness that seems to characterize all of his speech. Brendan, Soraya, and I pile into Ruth's car as she turns the key. The sun has now set over the western hillside and a dull purple twilight illuminates the red and green landscape as we climb the rutted road. I am surprised that the trip from Kaleke Kasome to the place where I'll be billeted takes under one minute. As the road levels off, I am able to see a collection of barracks-style buildings and large circular huts with thatched roofs. A small sign pegged into the ground on a piece of lath reads People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are already doing it. This is SINA village: Social Innovation Academy.  Despite my penchant for preparedness and the exhaustive research I've done regarding Uganda and third world travel in general; I actually have very little idea of what goes on at SINA. Having determined that it is a safe place to stay with rustic if not primitive accommodations, I simply ended my investigation, thoroughly satisfied.

 Ruth drives past the barracks, the large huts, and an enormous brick building with garish green trim now only dimly visible in the failing light. She parks in front of some kind of elevated platform of obvious DIY construction and shuts the car off. Very few people are stirring and we stand next to the car for several minutes wondering how to "check in" to this place. The echoes of low voices carry across the open field as several small campfires crackle and scent the air with exotic-smelling wood smoke. I immediately notice the aroma to be virtually identical to a pipe tobacco called Latakia which is cured with the smoke of aromatic woods [28]. Savoring it, I proceed to unload my bags and provisions from Ruth's car. A young woman ambles by and we get her attention.
 "My friend Mike is here to check-in. He's registered under my name." says Brendan.
 "Oh ok. Let me go find someone for you," the girl reports appearing a little taken aback. She reverses direction and walks back toward the large circular huts, disappearing between two of them.

 The final minutes of visible light exhaust themselves, ringing the dinner bell for the most dangerous animal in all of Africa. Many of them have gathered stealthily in the shadows. They quickly fall upon us and begin slaking their bloodthirst on our defenseless party. The Anopheles mosquito, the primary vector for malaria, claims half a million lives each year in Africa alone. Modern mosquito nets and programs to distribute them to rural areas are responsible for this relatively low mortality rate. The presence of these nets in the huts where I'll be staying was a major selling point. I swat several of the little buggers as a young woman with very long braids approaches through the darkness. She introduces herself as Majo and beckons us to follow her to my hut. Brendan, Ruth, and Soraya assist me in carrying my twenty liters of water, bananas, and luggage as we walk under the shaky DIY raised platform just behind Ruth's car.

 Majo leads us through a small neighborhood of about ten huts connected with gravel walkways. We arrive at a small, square hut of mud brick construction. Majo produces a key from a pocket and unlocks the brass padlock on the hut's wooden door. I cannot help but feel some disappointment that my hut will not be of the more traditional circular mud-and-stick construction. As she opens the door, Majo advises that the solar electrical system is currently down. She flicks a light switch on and off to demonstrate this. The single light bulb suspended by a length of narrow-gauge lampcord in the center of the hut's conical ceiling remains inert. By the light of my headlamp, I see the hut's simple appointments consist of two steel twin bed frames, one with a mattress and mosquito net, a ten liter blue plastic bucket, a 25 liter yellow jerry can (intended for Diesel but used extensively in Africa for water), and a small three-legged stool-like table which is upholstered in goat skin. I set my bags down and explain to Majo that I have no earthly idea how to operate the mosquito net which is currently twisted and tied in a compact bundle, swaying over my soon-to-be bed. She undoes the knot at the bottom of the bundle and the pink gossamer material spills silently downward reaching the ground. She stretches the ends over the bed frame and expertly tucks the excess under the mattress. I am impressed with her facility with this equipment, so alien to me.

 I am beginning to feel the effects of having been awake for the better part of 48 hours and the bed calls to me seductively. I somewhat rudely preempt Majo's explanation regarding the electrical system's likely rehabilitation and ask her to show me where the bathrooms are. A short walk of about ten meters brings us to a rectangular building with a corrugated steel roof. There are two stalls with creaking wooden doors which Majo advises are "for bathing". The remaining two stalls in this building are the toilets. I peek timidly behind the door of the first toilet to discover the typical African facilities—a twenty centimeter square hole in the tiled floor. Disturbed by my presence, many small flies blow out of the hole and begin buzzing around. The smell is as one would expect but, in my headlamp's small puddle of light, the stall does not seem overly filthy. I am quite pleasantly surprised to discover a mock-up of a western style toilet behind the next stall's door. This was effected by erecting a concrete box over the open pit and mortaring a plastic toilet seat onto its top. An equal if not greater number of flies call this stall home. Many of them are trapped, quivering in the elaborate webs of the many spindly black spiders in the corners of the concrete walls.

 Majo walks us back to my hut. "Please wait here and I will get someone to give you a tour," she says before hurriedly walking away into the darkness.
 "You good, bro? We're gonna take off," says Brendan appearing concerned.
 "Yes. I'm all set. Thanks so much for everything. I'll be in touch as soon as I can," I reply. I had been planning on using SINA's wifi to send messages to my wife and Brendan as needed but the wireless router obviously succumbed to the same fate of the electrical system. I will be incommunicado until either the grid comes back online or I can wangle a local cell phone. More pressingly than this, however, I am extremely disappointed that the light bulb in my hut will not light. I have been mentally preparing for much greater vicissitudes for months but I am thrown for a loop by my inability to get organized in my pitch black hut on this first night. This weighs heavily on my mind. I could, of course, sort all of my gear and provisions by headlamp and flashlight—but, like a child, I want it my way. As such, I sulk, feeling sorry for myself. The intrepid world traveler. Yeah, right. Brendan clearly reads these thoughts on my face as if they're projected, picture perfect and transparent.
 "You sure you're all set? You can come back to Kampala just for tonight if you need to," he says.
 "No way. I'll make the best of it. I think I'm just tired," I report, telling half the truth. If I did not come here to step boldly and thoroughly outside my comfort zone, then why have I come?

 After a round of hugs and general well-wishing; Brendan, Soraya, and Ruth are back in the Spacio. With a salute of closing doors and the sound of the four cylinder engine chugging back to life, they are off. I turn back toward my hut and take a few crunching steps on the gravel pathway when I hear an elated-sounding female voice rapidly approaching out of the gloom.
 "Mike! Mike! Hello!" A young woman of no more than 25 years and probably a little less than 1.5 meters in height is trotting merrily my way.
 "Hi, how are you?" I say, somewhat stunned and rapidly approaching desperation for a good night's sleep.
 "I am well, thank you! My name is Monica and I am very happy to be giving you the tour." she says enthusiastically.
 "That's great, Monica. I don't mean to be rude but I am extremely tired. Maybe you can just show me where to fill my jerry can and we can pick the rest of this up in the morning?" I am acutely concerned about causing offense, especially given that I've been here for less than 30 minutes, but I am having a difficult time imagining myself enjoying a tour of the village, in complete darkness, and under intense air assault from malaria carrying mosquitoes.

 "This is the first time that I am giving the tour to a guest and I am very excited," she says through a smile that could easily replace my inoperative light bulb.
 "Monica, I promise you that I would have much more enthusiasm for this had I not been awake since early Friday morning. Can we please make it a brief tour?"
 "Yes! A brief tour it will be," she says leading me away from the huts and toward what appears to be the center of the football pitch sized area in the middle of the compound.
 Pointing to something that looks like a miniature greenhouse about the size of a dresser, Monica gushes "This is a drying box for matoke. We grow, harvest, and dry our own here!"
  I am having a difficult time matching Monica's effervescence and I'm becoming increasingly self conscious that my lack of patience is being telegraphed by my facial expression and body language [29].

 What I had failed to extract from Brendan and what I had glossed over in my own research was the fact that SINA is somewhat of an intentional community. Though the website is extremely clear regarding the Academy's raison, I had given most of my attention to the Airbnb page on which I had booked my stay. Through Monica's dauntless and fervent orientation spiel, it is now slowly dawning on me that I should have made it clear (during booking) that I am simply availing myself of their spartan accommodations and am not here to participate in the program. I look for a way to break this news as Monica continues.

 "Each scholar has his or her own project and the mentors help us with personal and professional development! They are making clothing out of upcycled materials in this hut!" she enthuses.
 I smile around my involuntarily closing eyelids and between overly aggressive swats at the swarms of malarial insects presently harrying every inch of exposed skin. Now Monica is elaborating at length on the overarching philosophical framework of the organization. I deliver a brutal open-palmed strike to the right side of my neck and am temporarily stunned as my carotid artery, scandalized, takes a second to recover from the blow. It seems I am providing an unsolicited practical demonstration as this violence interrupts my amiable tour guide. "The second stage is called 'anger'," Monica continues, her eyes widening dramatically as my palm comes away from my neck pasted with no less than four crushed mosquitoes.
 "Monica, I am so sorry. I have been awake for 48 hours and I am desperate to get some sleep. Can we please do this tomorrow?" I plead.
 "Yes, I see that you are very tired. I will make it fast. So, the third stage is called 'bargaining'," she carries on, unfazed. In due course, she completes her explication of Kubler-Ross and its implications for the lives of SINA's scholars. It is abundantly clear that her presentation has barely reached operating temperature when she reluctantly accedes to my increasingly despairing pleas for my release. She shakes my hand in the Western fashion and bids me a good night. As her slight frame evaporates into the darkness, she turns smiling and says "See you at morning meeting!"

 I teeter toward my hut, groping my way through the darkness and mumbling I do this shit for a living. I didn't come to Africa to go to morning meeting. My headlamp illuminates the wooden door of my hut as I fumble through my pockets for the padlock's large key. The word Zambia is stenciled in black spray paint at eye level—each hut being named for a country in Sub-Saharan Africa. I turn the key and the padlock gives way. An extremely loud scraping sound echoes through the sleepy village as I push my door open, its bottom dragging on the concrete floor. The light switch clicks uselessly between the on and off positions. Grid down. No light. I momentarily consider organizing my gear by headlamp-light but my exhaustion and childish disappointment sweep this notion aside. I strip off the shirt and pants that I've been wearing since leaving my house in Vermont early Friday morning. It is now Sunday evening and my watch reads 2047. I set an alarm for 0600 having made a commitment to see as many African sunrises as I can during my trip. Grateful that no-one is watching, I make several comedic attempts at parting the mosquito net that Majo had so expertly sealed my bed within. This slapstick concluded, I turn down the corner of the very thick down comforter with which the bed is equipped. Though the air has cooled significantly since the sun's departure, it is laden with the humidity from this morning's rains and, sweating mildly, I decide to sleep atop the covers. 

 Mere minutes ago my eyelids were losing a pitched battle with gravity. Now, as I lay on a foam mattress, on a steel bedframe, under the pink gossamer dome of the mosquito net, in a mud brick hut, on top of a hill in a very rural part of equatorial Africa; huge waves of anxiety erupt violently from the deepest recesses of my being. I am alone. Hopelessly far from my home. My phone is inoperable—I get up and furiously root through my backpack. My hands close around a tiny plastic bottle containing an assortment of OTC medications for a variety of eventualities. I dry-swallow 75mg of benadryl hoping that this infusion will speed the arrival of the morning. Laying down again, my mind is flooded with vivid vignettes of the many abandoned comforts of home. My wife's smile. The plaintive mewing of our cats around feeding times. The warmth and light of our wood stove. The wild caterwauling of the many barred owls which roost and hunt in the thick woods that hem-in our small house. These images and sounds scroll rapidly through my consciousness, each one plunging daggers of homesickness deeper into my gut. I discover that I am breathing shallow quaking breaths and take steps to remedy this. As the minutes slowly pass, I welcome the disjointed hypnagogic thoughts that herald impending sleep. Mercifully, the curtain soon falls.

 My eyes open into groggy slits admitting the soft blue glow of first light that leaks through the open windows of my hut. I am overcome with relief as my eyes widen and take in the brightness of this African dawn. Amorphous shadows sway on the portion of the adjacent hut's thatched roof that is visible through the window. Must be overcast this morning, I think, noting the absence of the typically golden hues attendant to the rising sun. Maybe the sun's not over the horizon yet. I paw around my pillow, find my phone and check the time. I stare at the illuminated screen blinking in disbelief. It reads 2145. My heart sinks. 9:45 pm!? My near heroic dose of diphenhydramine certainly helped to usher me off into dreamland but it didn't take. I have been asleep for approximately one hour. I jump out of bed nearly taking down the mosquito net in my haste. Stepping outside, I am treated to the most brilliant display of vigorously twinkling stars that I have ever seen. The sky is so clear that starlight and a radiant half moon are sufficient to create the shadows that I was so sure implied the dawning of a new day. I should be in awe of this tremendously beautiful sight but I am crushed to be facing the prospect of a long sleepless night. I slip back into my hut, lifting the wooden door as I close it to avoid the ignominious scraping sound. Back in bed, I jam my earbuds in and cue up a playlist of the least overstimulating music downloaded onto my phone. 

 And so the night grinds on. Minute by sleepless minute. I listen to the two most recent Om records, the droning fuzz of distorted bass guitar and funereal quarter-note ride cymbal accents help to guide my thoughts away from the pull of homesick anxiety. Somewhere around midnight I switch to Dan Carlin's excellent Hardcore History podcast and while away several hours as he regales us with the brutal story of Genghis Khan's conquest of the Eastern Hemisphere. When the last episode ends I am too apathetic to play something else. Resigned to my fate, I simply stare upward tracking the movements of mosquitoes and the small beetles that cavort on the outside of the net. I am in the midst of a vortex of self-critical thoughts when my reverie is broken by a voice slowly crooning out a harmonic minor melody. For a second I cannot tell whether this is purely in my head, in my headphones, or coming from outside. I pluck my earbuds from my increasingly sore ear canals and quickly realize that the song is indeed coming from the outside and from some distance away. La ilaha illa allah echoes through the valley, each syllable ululating between semitones. This is Adhan, the Muslim call to prayer. It inspires faith in many, fear in some; but it is objectively beautiful. At the conclusion of my dark night of the soul it means relief. It means dawn has arrived. 


Continue to the next post!

~~~

Life goes on.

Baskets, gourds, and loofahs!

This guy has the loofah hookup. I'm not sure what the banana/matoke leaves are for.

Police station.

The UPF rolls deep.

The cows coming home.

The bustling market in Mpigi. Our driver, Ruth, in the foreground.

Kaleke Kasome. A humble building where many lives are changed for the better. 

Hasa and Azariah. Their lives are a testament to service and self-sacrifice. 

Hasa and kids.

The retinue expands.

Everybody loves Brendan.

Mpigi village well.

Azariah and a girl fetching water.

Outdoor kitchen wall construction. Local materials.

African dog relaxing.

Grandmother and Soraya. Granddaughter, now a mother herself, approaches with a woven mat.

Different futures collide.

Black-and-white casqued hornbill. One of the most exotic birds I've seen. Extremely common and considered a near-nuisance in Uganda.

______

[19]: A very abridged list: "What kind of noises would be abnormal to hear in the village at night—gunfire?"; "How many obviously rabid animals have you encountered on the road?"; "How bad are the toilets, like Worst Toilet In Scotland style, or not that bad?"; "What if I miss my flight?"; "What if I can't find my gate?"; "What if Ruth never shows up?"; "How many mzungus are arrested in one month?"; "Was that over the top?"; "Was that assertive enough?"; "What about eye contact?"...

[20]: As my friend Neil put it: "You finally have a use for all those tactical button-ups!" I was defenseless against this accusation.

[21]: By law, licensed taxis (which can be identified by a border of blue and white blocky stripes around the van's beltline) are allowed to stop anywhere on the road at any time. Each taxi has a sort of "hype man" who leans out the window and flogs rides at passers-by, remonstrates other drivers for failing to show deference to the exalted legal position of the Taxi, and generally hurls misogynistic comments at women.

[22]: In an August 2015 article titled "Kampala-Masaka Highway: Cursed or Flawed?", the Uganda Daily Monitor reports this road to be one of the most dangerous in the world in terms of traffic accidents.

[23]: After all, Soraya was the first runner-up in Miss Uganda and I'm just some asshole from New Jersey.

[24]: I'm really not sure how to feel about this interaction. On the one hand, I am unaccustomed to tipping for a service that I am energetically refusing; on the other hand, I expect that tips constitute a healthy percentage of the youngsters' income. The disparity between their treatment of me and non-mzungu clientele complicates these thoughts significantly. Should I have tipped at all? Was my tip of loose change insulting given my obvious means? Travel to the third world puts one in situations where the ethical territory is terra incognita and there is neither the time nor the information to make the "right" decision—whatever that may be. ...and this was a very, very trivial example.

[25]: I have also not slept properly in 48 hours. A few contorted and claustrophobic naps while a guest of Turkish Airlines has done little more than to temporarily stave off the worst ravages of sleep deprivation.

[26]: Defilement is a term referring to child molestation which, horribly, is an endemic problem to these rural areas for a variety of reasons. More on this later.

[27]: ...or most Americans, for that matter.

[28]: For an excellent idea of what these campfires smelled like, go to a tobacconist or drug store and take a whiff of the strongest "English" blended pipe tobacco you can find. These blends are made with a heavy dose of Latakia.

[29]: I am given to understand that it is not difficult to tell how I'm feeling in this manner.