Safari Njema – 25 May 2009

Days 31-40 – Dodoma, Kahama, Bukoba (Tanzania),  Kampala (Uganda)

Kev in Africa #3 photos
Simba in Africa photos

Night after night in Dodoma, I experience a recurring dream. In the dream I awake to find a zebra grazing outside my house. I look further and see elephants, giraffes, zebras and hippos all living harmoniously in the background. This happy scene is picture perfect and I subconsciously find myself smiling to myself in bed.

One doesn’t need to be a psychologist to conclude that safari was on my mind. The prospect of travelling around eastern and southern Africa with a tour company greatly excited me. But first I needed to get a few things out of the way.

Determined to finish off my time in Dodoma on a good note, my last week was packed full of memories. Minor celebrations were in place after I managed to snare an unused laptop for a week. Such a prize entitled me and Brandon – the American – to our very own office. Humourously, the title of ‘Head of Department of Biology’ remained on the door, while all we were doing was chillin’. (Not actually that true; I still had quite a bit of annoying work to do, such as proofreading a 20 page document written in broken Tanzanian English. By the end of my edit there was more red marks on the page than black text). In other St John’s news, the photocopier machine broke for good, more than 20,000 books were donated from the States, a 500 million shilling grant was accepted and the entire government body resigned in a bloodless – yet fiery – meeting. My temporary presence had evidently been felt.

Outside of the university, Dodoma continued to amuse me. One night, when Brandon and I were walking home via the dark Dodoma streets, we could have potentially been in great danger. However, with a bow and arrow in his hand, and a spear in mine, one would have had to have been pretty brave to confront us. Despite not knowing how to operate my weapon of choice, we averted danger, however a few nights later the story was much different. In a confrontation with a man we nicknamed ‘Strong man’, an angry guy threatened to pick a fight with a group of volunteers that I was hanging out with. Looking back on the encounter it was probably more humorous than dangerous, considering that there were seven of us and just one of him. And he wasn’t really that strong anyway. Just angry.

Not all trips outside of the university were marred with paranoia. When a nice man from the local cathedral invited me to his underfunded university I was treated to my first meal of ugali – a tasteless mixture of porridge and maize flour. Before I arrived in Africa I was told that ugali would be a daily meal. How wrong those travel guides were. In other pleasant news I was appointed the drummer of the church choir; playing the djembe after a month of banging tables with cutlery was a great relief.  Furthermore, just before I left I visited my fifth and final village church. However, with hardly any food provided and absolutely no music I got the sense that rural Africa was starting to grow on me.

Finally, my home life provided plenty of unexpected quirks. The street seller returned once more, this time wanting to trade back the watch I had bartered him a fortnight earlier in return for the replacement watch I now wore on my wrist. I also managed to smash multiple plates and glasses in an unfortunate washing accident, in addition to losing the spare house keys. With that in mind, it was probably a wise time to move forward.

Before I left Australia, my brother comprehensively assessed my trip and concluded that the most dangerous component of my 8 and a half months would be my journey from Dodoma to Kampala. Being one of the only times in Africa where I would be travelling alone, his prediction was certainly justifiable. And as it turned out, I did run into some trouble. Nevertheless, the worst was avoided. Otherwise I probably wouldn’t be writing this blog.

Unsurprisingly, the 23 continous hours that I spent on a bus from Dodoma to Bukoba, in addition to the 8 hour journey from Bukoba to Kampala the next day, did not reach the heights of the Tanzanian bus journey I had taken a month earlier. With limited leg room, ridiculously tiny seats, no fans and a terrible in-bus movie playing out the front, there were numerous reasons to be frustruated.

Thankfully, the Tanzanian landscapes continued to impress me, and helped my mind focus on the positives. Upon leaving Dodoma large rock formations puzzled me, vast countryside mountains made me believe I was in Europe, while dusty red dirt roads had an intriguing Arabian feel to it. But by far the best scenery was evident up north when we passed Lake Victoria. Driving at a high altitude, I was able to look down on the enormous lake from one side. On the other, a series of mountains and valleys took centre stage, which were most remarkable due to one factor; out altitude was so high that we were driving above the level of the clouds.

My first pitstop was Kahama, a town so small that not a single travel guide I could find managed to mention it. Here, I was given the ultimate privledge of sleeping the night on a bus. Being a hot night – and being in a shoddy bus – meant that sleep was hard to come by; for much of the night I had to entertain myself with books and mobile phone games in order to finally find some slumber.

Bukoba – my next stop – was far more pleasant in terms of sleep, however I can’t say that it was any more enjoyable. Disregarding the opportunity to admire the stunning Lake Victoria, my experiences in the small border city were forgettable. On my way to dinner I ran into a young man who, like many Tanzanians, was very welcoming. The conversation quickly turned , however, when I realised that he was after money. From the onset, his tale of poverty, unemployment and desperation was not very convincing; there was no way that I was going to give him the 10,000 shillings he asked for. Being the sympathetic person I am, though, I offered to buy this man dinner. Food in Tanzania cheap and it was the least I could do. However, just before the man and I sat down to eat our meals I received a text message from the local tourist guide. Word for word, his message read ‘Hi Kelvin. Take care that guy is Con Man! Last 2 weeks he stole things at our campsite’. With that I hastily made up a lame excuse and fled the scene. My carelessness had seen me already spend 3,000 shillings on this guy. So, along with my 40,000 shillings I escaped and made my way back safely to my hotel.

My last two solitary days were thankfully less eventful, in spite of being located in Kampala – the capital of Uganda. While the scenery when crossing the border from Tanzania to Uganda was indistinguishable, Kampala completely exceeded my expectations of eastern Africa. After being stuck in city traffic for more than an hour, I quickly found the town to be overwhelming and chaotic. Unlike other cities I had visited thus far, Kampala was non-stop busy; it seemed that here, every hour was peak hour.

Hence, my first day of exploration was spent in one of the smaller towns near my hotel. The only confronting there here were the little children that followed me. Amazed at my sight, the kids stalked me with wide eyes, screaming “Mzungu! Mzungu!” (“White person! White person!”) as I walked past them. Such an experience allowed me to imagine the outrage that would follow a corresponding scene in Australia. I wondered how much media attention would be given to a small white child yelling out “Negro! Negro!” to an innocent black traveller?

After my negative first impressions of Kampala, I could have easily spent the next morning in my hotel. Nonetheless, I was determined to explore the city, so my instinct took over once more. My perception of the city didn’t really change after my subsequent encounter. In the market place an eager salesman tried desperately to sell me weed. Not that I’d want to buy any, but if I had a shilling for every time I almost got hit by a car/minibus/motorcyle I probably would have been able to afford some.

That evening I watched as the Tucan Travel bus bustled its way up Old Port Bell Road towards my hotel. With that sight a smile grew on my face. My next adventure was just minutes away from beginning, and I couldn’t have been more relieved.

Since my safari began, I have visited two countries and got within metres of another, taken a boat cruise past the world’s largest concentration of hippos, and trekked the world famous mountain gorillas in the Virunga volcanoes. These have been some of the most amazing experiences of my life so far, but will not be elaborated on just yet. You’ll just wait to wait for the next blog…

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