the nile river

Well there have been many more fun memories made in the last couple days, but I am going to skip straight to the good stuff. Rafting the nile was something I wanted to do when coming here after Meg told me how intense it was. She was hesitant to go again, but cowgirled up and joined the adventure. We rafted with Nile River Explorers who Meg used the time before. The river has changed due to a dam that was put in so our trip would have 4 new rapids to go through further down the river from the headwaters. Make no mistake this does not tame the river it just controls the flow. Kayakers from around the world come to hone their skills on this river. One of our guides was actually one of six individuals invited to London 2012 to do a trial run on freestyle kayaking and whether it would join the Games in the future.

We arrived at the river and got a nice comedic safety talk from the head guide who is the one mentioned above. Grouped into teams we got in our rafts and Hassan was our guide. It seems that most of the guides were kids that grew up in villages on the nile and are incredibly familiar with every part of it. We do the standard paddling cues, boat flipping and re-entering the boat. Now we are ready. We started paddling towards our first Class 5 rapid: Overtime. This one proved to be one of the funnest for me. I was sitting in the front of the raft with Meg behind me and Elisa from Belgium behind her. Sidenote: Meg having already done this and being slightly fearful for her life showed her courageous spirit and joined my raft rather than the "safe" raft that didn't flip once because they never went through the main rapids. Before each rapid Hassan gives a breakdown..."this rapid is Class 5 rapid with grade 2 waves, I will say paddle hard then GET DOWN and jump to the right side of the raft and then you will stay down and paddle into the waves" okay we got it. These directions generally finished when James who was in the front next to me were already entering the rapids so the last part was always a bit hairy. Overtime starts with an awesome 8 foot waterfall where it was clear from the beginning that we were about to submarine under. I fell in love right there! I have done rafting once before and it was supposedly Class 3. Whatever the case, Class 5 in Africa would be a Class 15 on the river I was on. These waves and drops were HUGE! We popped back up and paddled hard, got down, shifted right, stayed down and paddled through the waves. At the bottom we began retrieving members and paddles from the other raft that went through the rapids as they seemed to successfully flip every time. We quickly dubbed them the flippers. One of their team was asking later which side she was supposed to go to when told "left side" hmm.

The next rapid came quickly. We believe it was called Retrospect. This one had similar instructions to the first and was just as much fun. We entered the rapids and about the third wave our raft decided it didn't want to stay upright any longer. We flipped over and in the process you are supposed to grab the rope that runs around the edges and hang on. We flipped right side over left which meant I got boosted out over James and their was a brief tangling of bodies. I rode the rest of the rapids holding the rope and found I was the only one so started re-flipping the raft and pulling bodies back in. This flipping, gasping for air, finding lost paddles and dragging folks back into the boat became very familiar throughout the day.

Fast forward past more flipping and reapplication of sunscreen. We are told to paddle to the side and we are getting out. The Dead Dutchman rapid lies ahead and its a Class 6 that is illegal to run in a raft. Wow, the waves and power of the current through there was crazy. Death would for sure knock on your door in a raft so we were happy to sidestep that one. Then we are informed about the rapid we are immediately going into was The Bad Place. Really, you name a rapid The Bad Place... that does not sound like the place you want to be. Hassan briefed us on our 3 options, stay right we don't flip, go straight into the Bad Place wave or hit the V line, which after a right banking wave, shoots you into The Bad Place wave. I didn't offer my opinion much throughout the trip because I knew our raft was less keen on the idea of flipping and the potential to drown. However, with English not being Hassan's first language there was some confusion. The raft voted to go right. After which I said the V line sounded fun and asked about it with Hassan (where the confusion happened :). I was not excited about missing the main part of The Bad Place, but turns out Hassan assumed the V Line! Paddle Hard, Get Down, Hold ON! It was in this moment that I knew we had taken the V Line.

I started to take a deep breath and the Wave flipped our raft with such power that I launched straight out and was sucked straight down. The whole trip we were told to keep our feet up down stream if we fell out because of rocks. That breath I mentioned above, yea well that was mostly filled with water from the Nile (negating all of my previous water treatment efforts). I am under the water being spun where ever the rapids pushed me thinking really a lot of things because it was one of those time-slows-down-moments. Stream of conscious: "Take a breath..oh no breath just water..feet down stream...air... swim up...which way is up...open your eyes to look stupid... still can't see anything... still need air... oh wait I think that's the surface... swim up deep breath.... nope that was just a mouthful of water... get thrown around like being in a powerful washing machine... still hoping for some air... finally a little breath before shooting back under... and ultimately coming up and hearing a safety kayak call me. I happily swam over and grabbed his kayak.

After feeling like a two year old walking into the wave pool at Wild Waves I was grateful to be breathing again. Phew, I am out, amidst my coughing up what felt like a couple liters of The Nile, I noticed a Pink Helmet sitting on his lap and he was wearing his own helmet. I quickly realized there were only two pink helmets, Meg's and Stinky's. Oh wait, I should introduce Stinky. Lets just say I could smell him before I saw him. This guy was rancid. He felt compelled to sit in the front of the big bus-like truck we were driving out in, which to the pleasure of everyone's nostrils reminded us why showering was important. Okay, back to the pink helmet, I knew this was Meg's helmet and was immediately very concerned. My wife was being tossed around the same as me if not worse and somehow her helmet strap broke. Not good. I finally stopped coughing up water and looked downstream to see if I could pick out Meg's hair on a raft. Wondering if I was going to have to find a new wife, I was relieved that I saw her a hundred yards down stream in our raft. Needless to say Meg was definitely shaken up, but did some positive self talk and stayed in our raft rather than going to the safety raft. Personally I think she couldn't bear to ride with Stinky for the remainder of the day who occupied the safety raft.

We hit more rapids, followed Hassan's directions and managed the next few rapids well.We even had a rapid where our team worked together really well, as our guide fell out the back at the beginning while steering. The part about a rudder steering a big ship is true because in this case we were heading straight towards the rocks, but managed to dodge them. Alas, we arrived at the grand finale: the Nile Special. This was our last rapid and the longest rapid of them all. This rapid has a standing wave that professional kayakers and recreationalists train and play on. It is the third wave into the what Hassan called the Wave Train. Well the first two waves went great and then we shot up the third wave. Well, more like as we shot up the wave, it broke on us. Our whole raft flipped, and all of us were once again in the washing machine. Thankfully there were opportunities to grab a breath on this one. Then we were all flushed out into a calm part of the Nile and collected our raft, paddles and people. Wow, that was a fun day. The rapids here are amazing, and I am a little bit envious of these guides that go down them every day.

We finished with a meal at the takeout spot and thanked Hassan for his amazing guiding. Then we headed for Kampala once again. This morning we are about to leave to go and trek Silverback Gorillas outside of Bwindi in the Impenetrable Forest. Apparently it will be a pretty intense forest based off the name.

As I sit here writing this Meg is informing me of new bruises she is finding on her body: proof of a good day!

village life

Meg and I are just back from the little village we stayed in, Ibulanku. Life is very different there and I felt blessed to be able to experience a place so close to Meg's heart. A quick disclaimer: I will probably butcher many of the spellings of various things.So many different things happened along with feelings, yep that is right I said feelings, and experiences that I hope I can successfully portray just a fraction to you.

En Route to Ibulanku I was happily enjoying the chaos, sometimes the smells and views from the window. Much of the way it seemed we could glance right and catch views of Lake Victoria. We arrived in Kampala and sat on what seemed to be a school bus having paid our 12,000 schillings unknowingly committing to a long wait. It was quickly apparent that we were not leaving any time soon and that all the seats needed to be occupied (there are also seats that fold down into the middle aisle) to entice the driver to turn the key and have this ancient bus rumble to life. As you sit there people are continuously getting on the bus to sell something. No thank you, I do not need a solar panel to charge my cell phone, a loaf of bread, a beanie to keep my head warm in this 90+ degree weather. The other common topic was about our kids...oh wait we don't have any. This fact blows their minds! One man, "do you want to buy a belt?" Me, "no thank you" Man, "where are your kids" Me, "We don't have any" Man, "you are weak man" as the bus laughed he told me he would happily give me some tips. Just had to laugh at that one. The one item I almost bit on many a time was Orange Fanta. That stuff is delicious! I resisted. And we sat.

Alas, the bus started and Meg and I almost cheered! We sat next to Alfred and his sister Rita who between the 4 of us in the back row shared 3 seats. At each stop sticks of cooked chicken, water, bread and many other items were stuffed in the windows for a potential sale. We made one additional stop when one gentleman yelled a request to the driver. Quickly we realized it was a chance to relieve yourself in the sugarcane field. I took full advantage not knowing when the next chance would come. I felt sorry for Meg as I got off the bus.

Soon we arrived in Iganga where we are again at the moment writing this and where Meg got the chance to buy a delicious Pineapple she had been craving.

I had arrived at the point where I get hangry (Hunger+Angry) and sadly took some of it out on Meg. I felt like a lost traveler uninformed of where we were going next trusting Meg who had been here before. My only worry about this was thinking back to her natural prowess with directions when I would ask during a hike which way to the car...right. However, in this instance she relieved all my worries and knew exactly where she was going. From Iganga we got on a Mutatu. On the door of the toyota van it said vehicle approved for 11 persons. If there is one thing that Ugandans are efficient with its impressive packing of humans into a car. It reminded me of a photo scavenger hunt in Middle School where 8 people had to fit in a VW beetle. They put that to shame! Once for no particular reason I decided to count the bodies, 22, and I am pretty sure this wasn't when it was the fullest! These were all adults mind you except the 8ish year old next to me. The other impressive feat is the proximity driving. These dudes know how long their car is, how wide it is, how tall depending on how much is stacked on top. I kept thinking, they would be amazing at driving the fire engine where every inch counts.

Finally, we arrived in Busesa where we would catch Boda Boda (motorcycles) to Ibulanku. Definitely the best part. Riding behind this dude I don't know cruising down the dirt road with the wind cooling me off making me forget about the sweat and 48+ hour travel time to arrive in Meg's beloved village.

Sulaimon was happy to see Meg and showed us to a guest house. We had it to ourselves for our two nights. Meg informed me I was getting off easy because there were toilets in the house. We then walked into the village and immediately felt like I didn't belong and it was uncomfortable. One, I didn't know anyone except Meg. Two, I had never been to Africa and my first time I was taken directly to the bush. Another reminder that I wasn't from there not that I needed any was that every kid in village would excitedly yell Mizungu (white person). I thought to myself, I need to work on my tan. Meg knew where she was going though and we went and saw her friend Patrick where she stayed before.

Then we walked across the street to Mama Aisha's place. Meg and her had a great friendship before that was clear to me know. Meg despite the language barrier had spent much time with Mama Aisha and her children. When Meg left last time she gave Mama Aisha her gomez (traditional women's outfit; in bright green below). Mama Aisha had not forgotten and before we had been there long her oldest daughter walked up holding a chicken.

Through Patrick it became clear that it was a gift. He subtly informed Meg that it was African culture and she was to accept the gift. It is in times like this to know you need to accept the gift even though Meg and I already have more than enough. It is even harder when you see how many children she has to feed, that they live in a very modest home made of brick roughly 8x20. Here I saw someone giving out of their gratefulness from a previous gift while living in extreme poverty. It made me ask myself how I am giving to others in my wealth relative to this nice Ugandan woman. We then returned home. Below are pics of when we had the chicken for lunch the next day:

Rob + Kakanga

Mama Aisha prepping the chicken

Some of Mama Aisha's family

Meg + Mama Aisha in her gomez

Later, I had a shower consisting of dumping some refreshingly cold water from a pitcher on me, soaping up and repeating the pitcher series to rinse off. Wow that felt good! I questioned even bringing a sleeping bag here and should have followed my gut. I barely had the sheet covering any of my body. One of the easier lessons I have learned so far.

A quick thing about my amazing wife. Meg is clearly detailed oriented, organized and has a great memory (Any time I debate with her about the past I walk away asking myself what I was thinking and remind myself I said I wouldn't do it again the time before). Anyhow, Meg has brought with her pictures of her friends from last time, candy for their kids and small gifts along with handwritten letters that are classic Meg. She remembered her friend Susan and 5 years later recognized her at a glance even though Sula who works there often didn't know her name.  Meg and Susan:

In the morning Meg and I wake up and go to the same Hotel (what they call a shack you can't stand up in where you sit and eat chapatie bread that this guy cooks fresh. Nice and greasy:)

 

Then we meet in my opinion the most impressive and amazing woman in the village, Mama Millie.

 
Clearly there was a great connection between Meg and Millie the time before. She refers to Meg as her daughter. She thanked me for marrying Meg, which we were hearing from everyone who knew her. Millie is the chair person for the Iganga subcounty she lives in for Heifer International as well as a self appointed care taker and mother to many many an orphan. She finds homes for these orphans and attempts to help provide a way for them to be cared for and survive. Throughout the day we learned more about her role as the chairperson and that the whole project she is trying to improve is being stunted because they have no male goat in their subcounty. 53 families who have goats are no longer able to continue raising goats over the long term due to this problem. I asked Millie how much a male costs and she says 500,000 schillings. Knowing Meg and I wanted to do something before we left that would be sustainable Meg and I decided that was our best option. 200$ US to help so many was a no brainer and how often do we in America spend 200$+ and not think twice about it on something fleeting? During the morning we were asked to sit in on a meeting about Pediatrics and Malnutrition. Though we could not stay for long it was clear how hard so few are working to create positive change in there community. Below are some pics from when we went to Millie's home:

Another family that loved Meg wanted to host us for dinner. James and his wife Meg wanted Mega (what it sounds like when they say Meg's name) had us sit with them and eat a feast. Here is where another cultural thing is interesting to me. They serve you food and sit and watch you eat without joining you. They take much satisfaction in your enjoyment of the food. It is another humbling moment for me. It is clear we don't miss many meals and they are graciously serving you and even about to send someone to town to buy a soda for you. Below is the family, and Meg + Meg:

While waiting, their son came and joined us who is named Bishop Sikoyo Richard. When he learned my dad was a pastor he asked to show me his church. We agreed and walked to his church where that night they were preparing to host up to 200 guests at an all night prayer/worship time. Theme: Cast Satan Out. Their where many chairs in this field waiting for a guest to sit in them. He then took me in his church and asked me to pray for him, his church, and community. He repeatedly said he was so blessed to have had us come by. I again felt so humbled by yet another situation. It seems to be a theme developing.

We met up with Uganda Village Project today and  had the opportunity to visit the well that Meg raised money for in Racing for Relief with her Ironman training. Finally we reached the well and it was truly a great experience for Meg to see something tangible of how she helped make a small change in the world. The caretaker of the well was there as well as some of the community.  They were truly grateful for the well and talked about the difference it made for them.

I have learned that being uncomfortable in life often times leads to growth. If this is the case I hope that I continue to be in tune with those feelings of being uncomfortable and embrace them as they approach. So far the trip has been great. We are excited for what is to come.

 Off to dinner with Sula (below) and rafting the Nile tomorrow in Jinja.

Rob

africa arrival

We arrived in Uganda last night at 10 pm. Walking off the plane reminded me of the first time I went to Hawaii. The smell of a warm climate and instant humidity hitting the skin and making it a little bit sticky:) We are just getting going and preparing to head out to the village. We don't anticipate internet out there. We stayed in Entebbe's Backpackers last night and are excited to feel like we are really starting our trip. Now off to Kampala and on to Ibulanku.

Rob

deutsch detour

Expectations: they will get ya! We expected that by now we would be close to touching down in Uganda to sun, 85 degrees and the beauty of the pearl of Africa. Sigh. Turns out we are currently in a VERY cold Amsterdam for a total layover now of 24 hours. Our flight in Seattle left two hours late, so we had a super tight connection. However, Rob and I straight up sprinted to our gate. Only to find out that while they were still letting passengers on and there were still tons of seats, they wouldn't let us on because they changed our next flight while we were in air. Nothing like some good old fashioned nonsense at 3 a.m. PST time to really make your day. So after some very long lines with service desks, two tired and frustrated travelers, and a hubby with a big headache... We shuttled to an airport hotel.

Going into Amsterdam would be a bit of a shuttle circus and Rob is fighting a cold and currently enjoying some zzzzzs. So we are going to re-set and hope for the best tomorrow! Direct flight from Amsterdam to Entebbe, so that is good. I have a good feeling it will go smoothly.

So, all that to say, we will be 24 hrs 'late' in our arrival to the village... So basically on time and already operating on African time. :)  Thanks God for the reminder that we aren't in control (even when you run your heart out).  

bye bye, pacific nw

Mom and Dad treated us to PBay this morning. So yummers and the perfect send off meal!

Packed pretty light. Rob is training me well. :) 

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adventure awaits

God is GOOD. Sitting at SeaTac with our backpacks and tummies full of portage bay French toast... Ready for a long couple of flights! Headed to Amsterdam then to Nairobe, then to Entebbe. Hard to believe 5 years ago I was flying to Uganda with no expectations and an open heart. Fell in love with the people, "Raced for Relief" in 2010, and am headed back today with my husband and best friend. We are ready for an adventure... In just two days we will be in ibulanku, where we are sure to find some pineapple, greasy and delish rolexes, my dear friends and hopefully a warm welcome. To God we are grateful for this opportunity, and to Him be the glory as we head out on this adventure!