A Whirlwind Week

We headed back down to Kampala on Tuesday morning to pick up the newest member of our team, Meredith Camp, and to continue on our quest for the Excalibur of letters that will finally cut through all the red tape in one fell swoop. On the way back to the capital, Akra successfully navigated our Corolla through all the dusty traffic, trading centers, and potholes in record time. While our ride wasn't the most spacious, especially since we were joined by Luca, the Italian pediatrician from Lacor, our discomfort was probably nothing compared to what these soldiers felt bursting out of the back of a lorry.

After spending the past 2 1/2 years in the Dominican Republic, Meredith just finished the Peace Corps. in October. Before she could make New Haven her new home, however, she has decided to bring her skills of thriving on limitations to this side of the world for the next month. Despite her long travels, the only rest she got that day was in the backseat of the car as we raced around town for meetings and gathering paperwork. The big meeting of the day was with the Secretary of the Uganda Human Rights Commission (UHRC), who granted us permission to now interview all the potential characters for our film but still wants us to hold off on actually using the camera until somebody high up in the Ministry of Health (MOH)gives consent to the project. He explained that he's a bureaucrat, and though he thinks our project is "benign," he doesn't want to be held responsible if our film "paints the current government in a bad light." With the help of some of my friends, we were able to schedule a meeting at the MOH two days later, and the ultimate letter we've been hoping for seems to be within our grasp. We are hopeful to get it by early next week, which means I have another 4 hour trip to the capital coming up soon.

While we had a some time off in between meetings, we ventured to Jinja and enjoyed a day on the Nile river. Only an hour and a half drive from the capital, it's the perfect oasis from the nonstop hustle and bustle of Kampala.

We made record time on the way down from Gulu, and we also made record time on the way back. This trip, however, was the longest it's ever been. 2 hours into the ride, I noticed a little orange glow coming from behind the steering wheel. I turned to John, who was sitting next to me in the backseat, and asked "Do you think that is the check-engine light, or is something wrong with the battery?" To which John then asked Akra if he was worried about the illuminated warning sign shining underneath the broken speedometer. Akra simply replied, "No problem." So we thought to ourselves, if he's not worried, we're not worried. Well... even if worrying wouldn't have done us any good, our initial intuitions, that the car was indeed trying to scream for help, were correct. About 15 minutes after I noticed the new glow in the car, the car puttered to a stop on the side of the road. After we tried all kinds of creative pushing and pulling methods, and hypothesizing the significance of some fluid spots under the car, Akra hitched a ride to the nearest petrol station 3 km away to look for a mechanic.

When we left Kampala, it was close to 5pm and I was a little nervous about starting the journey so close to dark. Now, I was really regretting it. While our driver was gone, the rest of us tried to keep ourselves entertained by engaging the local livestock (until a bull became made some aggressive steps towards us, then we kept a safe distance across the road) and by trying to predict the eventual outcome for our evening. To make a long story short, Akra showed up 30 minutes later with several mechanics who disassembled the engine by flashlight and diagnosed a problem with the belt. We spent 3 hours in some small town while the car was being fixed, and $40 later we were back on the road. We reached Gulu by around 1 AM. As our hotel's doors were closed, we knocked numerous times and called the main desk phone, which we could hear blaring some loud obnoxious ring tone. I felt bad thinking that I was going to wake up the other guests. But, despite all these efforts, nobody came. Then a guard patrolling the outside noticed our fatigued groans, and came to our aid. He merely walked to an open window, and said in a modestly forceful voice, "Boy." Less than a minute later, a semi-conscious young man unlocked the glass doors and guided us to our room keys.