Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
After safari I was taken back to Kisumu and headed for the border of Uganda.In the meantime on the bus, the riots were going on in London. A Kenyan I was talking to me asked about it, I'll never his question. He said 'how can a superpower like the UK have such civil unrest. It gave me an insight into the Kenyan opinion of the UK, a superpower! I also had decided that I was only going to do East Africa rather than try and make it to Cape Town. It would have been such a rush as I wanted to back to Australia for the harvest.
I arrived at the border by noon and was a little nervous as this was my first land crossing of the trip. I shouldn't have worried it was easy, just one form, $30 and I was in. Uganda didn't feel that much different to Kenya but on my first bus minibus ride, I realised things were different. We were stopped by a military post and when the guard saw me he asked for my passport straight away. Now I'd heard all the lessons of avoid giving your passport but my Englishness took over and handed it to him. After about 5 minute with the guard staring at it, it was clear he couldn't understand anything in it. He handed it back and we were on our way again, but the driver turned, looked me straight in the eye and shouted 'that is the last time you give anyone your passport in Uganda, no has the right to ask for it.' I was a little sparkled but felt very looked after.
Soon after, I started up a conversation with a local guy sitting next to me. He was very apologetic about his fellow country and we had a real long chat about it. His English was really good and I was really surprised when he told me he was unemployed, he said he had been made redundant and couldn't find any new work. I felt quite sorry for him as he was so well educated, he knew a lot about politics and would have made a great public speaker.
I arrived in Jinja which is known as the capital of adventure in East Africa. You can white-water raft, kayak plus do loads of other stuff. I was up for this as I found straight away Uganda to be a lot cheaper than Kenya. So it was a really shock when I saw the price of the white-water rafting, £120 for one day. I'd only paid £35 in Nepal for the same thing so it just didn't seem worth it. This was the theme for the whole of Uganda, to eat, live and move in Uganda is dirty cheap, $15 a day but as soon as it comes to doing anything the price go silly. In Jinja you can also see the source of the Nile which connects with Lake Victoria. For a half a day boat ride the guy wanted £50! I got him down to £5 each. I've come up with a new rule for haggling, if I am offered a fair price ill just pay it and not try and get them any lower, but if it's clear he is trying to rip me off, ill haggle hard!!!
I met a great girl in Jinja called Jo, she was from Poland, we had a great night together and dance the night away in our hotel with the local Ugandans. I was learning fast that Ugandans like to party!
Jinja is a great place to chill and there is some good food with bars to hang out!! The ex-pats are there in force and it was nice to have a bit of luxury for a bit!!
- comments