January 2011

We began January 2011 with a very interesting New Year. We went to a street party at cClub Silk. The night started well when we were stuck in traffic jam for ages adn then our driver managwed to crash into another taxi while tryign to manouvre himself around. Great! When we eventually arrived lots of Uganda's top singers and performers were there - Jamal, Cindy and Chameleone to name a few. All the acts were really good and when Chameleone came on, we ended up somehow getting lifted/pulled onto the stage with him. We were thne left up there alone as he went off crowd surfing!!

So, after a few days in Kampala, a group of us set off to Zanzibar via a trip through Tanzania (another group had set off the day before through Kenya.) Our plan was to get a bus to Mwanza - on the opposite side of Lake Victoria - straight through Tanzania. However, after about an hour on the nus we realised it was going the wrong way and we would soon be passing by my house in Kitega - on the Kenya Road. The bus, we discovered, was going to Mwanza via Kenya. This is a quicker route but was bad for us as we had to buy a transit visa for Kenya =(We eventually entered Tanzania at about 2am - the bus took about 19 hours in total! The seats were comfy though so I slept well and the journey was very pretty as the route skirted the edge of the Serengeti National park. So, we spent a night in mwanza before moving on to Dodoma. This was another interesting experience. The bus left at 6am but we got up at 4am to make sure we had time to get there via public transport. Lucky we did, as there were no taxis around and it was a long way to walk. Luckily again, we managed to hitch a lift with Mwanza Police force in their pick up truck!!! Again, we only stayed for one night in Dodoma - as altugh it is the official capital of Tanzania, there is abotu as much going on as on a typical day in Dumfries. Unfortunately for Blai, he nearly got stuck for another niht there as the bus started to pull away withut him, because he'd made a last minute trip to the toilet!

As the bus began to get closer to Dar Es Salaam we could feel the temepraturee gettign hotter and hotter and by the time we arrived we were all sweating pretty basly! Yum! By this time it was gettign fairly late and it took us another hour of working out how to, getting to and sweatign some more to arrive at the YWCA where we had planned to stay. Unfortunately, for us it tuirned out it was already booked up so we had to trek over town to find soemwhere else. Despite the fact it was now dark, it was still baking hot. On our search for anoither place, Sarah, Naomia and I ended up having to go into the verrry posh Kilimanjaro Hotel to ask for directions. This was a bit of an embarassing trip as all of the residents looked at us in disgust as we rocked up in our skanky old clothes looking like we hadn't washed for a week!

Eventually we found somewhere to stay and the next day we decided to wash some clothes. This turned into another pretty disgusting experience. It was so hot by the time we had finished it looked like we'd just been for a shower. Grim. So, anyway I wasn't feeling very well on this day, but despite this we all set off to Wet'n'wild water park in Kunduchi, about 20km outside Dar. This was an interesting experience, once again after travelling through the heat of Dar we were all dripping with sweat when we arrived. Mmmm. The water park was pretty cool, but also completely empty of people other than us and a couple of very white children. So, we spent a day being children running up and down the stairs to get to the slides and then shooting down them very fast! Fun times...

tbc