The Place of Little Birds

After seeing Rwanda’s past, it was exciting to experience it’s present. In the short time that I was there, everyone I spoke to managed a curiously peaceful outlook on what the genocide meant in the context of their daily lives. It seems to be an evil that they learned from and that’s that. Forgiveness over animosity, bitterness and hatred. But, beyond the cultural implications, it made the rest of the trip feel like an interactive history lesson. When we left the big city for Lake Kivu, we noticed that most places where mass killings happened were turned into museums, memorials or learning centers. It was amazing, but truthfully, we went to Kivu for a completely different vibe. 

We spent an afternoon getting lost in countryside in a cramped, sparsely cushioned bus. Tucked back into the nooks and crannies of Rwanda, we found Lake Kivu with a dozen steel blue fingers stretching into that patchwork landscape I loved so much. Despite the sudden downpours we had become accustomed to, we decided to hire a boat for a day trip around one of the many islands dotting the water. Amohoro or “Peace Island” they called it. It was pimped out with a restaurant, lodging, a private beach and even monkeys. So we saved our appetites for fresh tilapia and gathered our books and swim suits for a relaxing day on a deserted island.

Upon arrival, we quickly learned that the restaurant was abandoned, the lodging was destroyed, and the ONE monkey we saw terrorized us by baring his teeth and then, proceeded to masturbate in front of us. I guess he either hated us or really liked us. It got weird, but at least it didn’t rain. In the end, we managed to scare off our predator and relax in the sun for a few hours, so it's all good.

In a few days, Lake Kivu shrunk in the rearview mirror of another crowded bus as we crossed back into Uganda to visit "the place of little birds", or Lake Bunyonyi. A boat picked us up in the graying evening and took us to Byoona Amagara, our little bird paradise. Every time I turn over a new stone in this world, I swear it’s the most beautiful one I’ve seen. But, this one will be difficult to top. It lived up to its name with colorful gems of birds flitting about, filling the otherwise silent air with their lovely layers of song. Our first day was spent rowing a dug out log canoe between islands splayed out before us as if a handful of rocks was accidentally tossed into this giant pool and left there to grow wild. Perfectly reckless, as only nature can be. And on the second day, we hiked all over those wild islands, through hills terraced with banana groves and visited the massive families that tended to them.

 

 

 

 

I left this land of lakes with a head full of golden silence. I could have lived out the rest of my days hopping around those islands, but instead I’ll keep them with me and relive it when real life gets too loud.

Photos:

1. Kibuye Genocide Memorial Church where 11,000 Tutsi's were killed in 1994

2. A lone fisherman on Lake Kivu

3. Rwandan shores

4. Kat on Peace Island

5. Monkey on a boat

6. Buns and a braid

7. Monkey in a tree

8. First impressions of Bunyonyi

9. The good life

10. Fellow rowers

11. Exploring a far off island

12. Our view for breakfast, lunch, dinner and beers

13. The other side of our island

14. Into the bananas

15. Under the bananas

16. Hey, Mom

Breathing 101

It’s incredibly easy to point out the gaping holes in the American education system. Our US-centric way of thinking infects our classrooms, keeping them void of foreign language, global geography and even an accurate world history. The arts are deteriorating, collateral damage in our power hungry, left brain race with China. And don’t even get me started on the quality of extracurriculars and electives. But last year, we ranked 35th, 25th and 28th in the areas we strive to perfect (proof). It doesn’t make any sense! Yet still, some mixture of guilt and gratitude hits me as I walk into schools in Walukuba, the village where my organization works. 

You can hear their chants from the road outside. Each classroom has an off key chorus: weirdly melodic, yet just plain sweet, layers of tiny voices reading the words written on their chalkboard. The charm, however, is deceiving. What those songs really mean is regurgitated information, uniformity, mindlessness. Teacher writes the lessons on the blackboards and the most adorable robots you’ve ever seen read them back with one voice. One thought process. No room for individuality, no space for thinking differently, no real understanding. 

The kids don’t know any better, they’re honestly just happy to have enough money for school fees. But I do. I know. It makes my blood boil and it makes it difficult for me to do my job effectively. We teach them one way of thinking and every hour of their day they’re hammered with the opposition. And these kids are sharp, masters of practicality. When I pass eight year olds tending to their family plots or taking care of their infant siblings, I often marvel that they’re tougher and wiser than me in so many ways. Yet, they can be silly. They can be artistic. And man, they’re insightful at times. They just don’t understand how that could ever relate to their education. And I'm overwhelmed. I mean, how do you teach creative thinking? I feel like I'm teaching people how to breathe. But each moment I hang my head in frustration and disbelief and heavy helplessness reinforces how badly our program is needed. It’s not perfect; we’re constantly adapting our curriculum as we see fit and I won’t lie, I think there’s a lot of work to be done. Expansion, depth, all elements of growth, really. But it’s the least I can do.

As easy as it may be to leave things status quo and spend the year galavanting around collecting foreign friends and photographs, I can’t walk away from this knowing I could improve it. I can’t walk away from these tiny, little human minds that deserve to develop properly in a country that deserves to develop properly. Because they’re the way it’s going to happen in the long run. I mean, if you want to truly tend to the garden, you’ve got to start with the seeds. 

Yes, I know I’m an optimist. Yes, I know that I’m young and dumb. Yes, I know that I haven’t been in Uganda or development long enough to really understand how tiny of a drop I am in this ocean of resistance. But, I like it that way. Let me dream.

Photos:

1. Part of the Day Star Academy campus

2. Everyone's curious when we come around

3. Masese Co. fourth graders and the famous Ugandan crane

4. Getting Day Star students pumped up on the first day of lessons
5. Trying to find shapes in the clouds. They thought we were insane.
6. "Portrait of Miss Kate" by Patience 

Welcome to Jinja Town

It’s always difficult to put a place into words. Places are meant to be seen, you know? To be felt, to be listened to. To be interpreted with your own senses and mind. I can’t really describe the layers of bird songs that are the soundtrack to my days. And if I can’t depict this unpredictable chorus of wild things, how can I describe the light? The vibrancy of the colors? The thoughts I’m filled with as I ride down Main Street on the back of a motorbike? These are the ineffable things that surround me and swallow me whole. Pictures sure as hell don’t do real life any justice. If anything, they make us feel as though we know a place when we don’t know a damn thing about it. And a false sense of knowledge is a dangerous thing. So keep these ideas in mind when reading anything I write about Uganda or the places I venture off to while I’m here. Know that this is just my flawed, human attempt at putting an entire unique and irreplaceable world into the limited words of a single language.

I guess I should start from the beginning of my three weeks here. This will be a cliff notes version if there ever was one, but it’s better than nothing when attempting to keep hearts and minds back home at ease. 

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As most people who have traveled around any developing country will tell you, the real fun begins the moment you get into your chosen mode of transportation. While my shuttle was more predictable than other options, the journey was surely a proper welcome to my new life. The roads here are a rich coppery red and their dust seems to permanently hover in the air, kicked up from the parades of motorbikes, bicycles, running children, women with baskets and bushels balanced on their heads and pickup trucks with beds stuffed full of sweat drenched men. After a bit of driving, we could feel Kampala approaching; once unpaved and one laned, the roads now widened to reveal an epicenter of movement. A mess of sound and color under a hazy sky that makes Los Angeles look fresh. To avoid the tangle of trucks and vans, we ducked into the winding roads of the nearest slum weaving in and out of wooden shacks teeming with the disarray of daily life. Chickens and goats roamed freely between big mamas in radiant dresses cooking local dishes over black smoke barbecues with naked babies wrapped tightly on their backs. Packs of children entertained themselves with bike tires and sticks, rocks and ropes and whatever else they could find; after spending a year in Orange County where I often saw brats on the beach, backs turned to the tide with iPads in hand, the simplicity was refreshing. 

I didn't take the following photos of Kampala due to major exhaustion and a certain timidness and respect that I wish more people had when whipping out cameras on this continent, but I thought for the sake of breaking up some words and showing you what the city looks like, I'd include them anyway.

After a while of this sensory overload, we made our way into the rural area between Kampala and Jinja. Long grass and banana trees lined many of the miles we drove, but we passed a few villages, too. I sat in the front seat of the shuttle, and my pale skin sparked some interest in the kids who played in front of their homes that evening. Eyes  grew wide and hands waved as they shouted “Muzungu!” which means foreigner. I have mixed feelings about this, because as cute as they are, and as much as it’s a sick sign that I’m out of my own world, out of the majority, out of America, I never really know the motive. Is my appearance simply a novelty? The way kids here in Jinja grab fistfuls of my hair and closely investigate my freckles would lead me to believe that. But there’s also their idea of what white skin means. Candy, money, fancy cameras they can see themselves in instantly. And it bums me out to think that may be why they’re cheering. Because they think I’m another tourist who doesn’t understand my place. But if they’re getting rowdy because some white skinned weirdo is passing by in a big van, that’s another thing. I’ll gladly be a sideshow if it’s something funny in their day. Either way, I didn’t quite feel deserving of the welcome.

Life since my arrival has been more mellow than most of you would imagine, I’m sure. The primary schools are still out for summer, so my work days are relaxed and I spend a lot of time getting to know the town. Some days are spent lounging at resort pools, and some are full of wandering around the local market which consists of endless rows of cramped wooden stalls stacked high with everything from four cent mangos to soccer jerseys to machetes. Nights are dollar beers at bars on the banks of the Nile and family style dinners or movies with my hilarious roommates. I live in a tiny room tucked back into the garden of the main house, surrounded by exotic flowers, palm fronds and creatures of every kind. Electricity and hot water aren’t ever guaranteed, clothes are hand washed and hung to dry, and the internet is used only when necessary. Life is simple and I couldn’t be happier. 

Jinja itself is a busy little town, streets filled with motorcycles and missionaries. Like many other African countries, Uganda is a place where time is a figment of the imagination, and no two minds imagine things exactly the same way. While frustrating at first, the change of pace reminds me that all the organization and stress of our Western ways sucks the life out of us. We lack the ability to relax and roll with the punches of hour late busses and receiving a meal completely different from what we ordered. At home, these things are the cause of tantrums, but in Jinja we just laugh and say, “Uganda always wins”.