Tengeru and the volunteer experience

The organization that Laura and I are volunteering with is called the Green Foundation. I believe this foundation was just started in 2005 and has not had many volunteers. The organization was started by a woman (Mama Gladness) who also started the Tengeru Cultural Tourism program. The tourism program provides coffee tours, lake tours, and town tours to tourists. The volunteer organization basically places volunteers with orphanages in the area and provides a home and food for the volunteers. The volunteers stay in a dormitory like home with the son of Mama Gladness, Lema and a friend of the family, Babu. Lema's role is to deal with the volunteers for any needs they may have. Babu's role is to keep the home clean, help volunteers with specific needs like transportation or getting around town, and serving meals.

Laura is working in an orphanage which has kids aged 3 months to 4 years old. There are about 24 kids at the orphanage. There are 10 mamas who do the basic needs like prepare food, wash clothes, etc. The volunteers spend their time playing with the kids and helping the mamas with whatever they need. The orphanage has very basic stuff... clothes for the kids, diapers, rice and beans. That's about it. There are hardly any toys, not many nutritious food, no baby wipes for cleaning up messes, etc. So, you're left to being innovative with your time. Many volunteers have contributed supplies like coloring books, crayons, formula, baby wipes, etc. So, summer time is probably good for these kids because quite a few things are provided by volunteers during this time. Our winter time probably isn't so good. One of the kids that Laura has gotten attached to, Baraka, looks like he is about 6 months old when in fact, he is 1 year old. These kids are getting a rough start to life.

I'm working with a tree nursery started by Mama Gladness. The woman has a beautiful home full of various kinds of trees. It's the place tourists are taken to join their coffee tour or Lake Diluti tour. The tree nursery is located on the main road between Arusha and Tengeru. My mom and Greg would love to take a tour through the nursery. There are a lot of tree species that I haven't seen before as the focus is to pot a number of indigenous tree species. My job is to get up and water the plants every morning and keep the general nursery area clean.

I know for sure that the trees in the nursery are sold to the public. What I'm not sure about is whether or not some of these trees are donated to schools, churches, villages, etc. They've told me that they are but I'm quite skeptical; I get the feeling the organization is set up more for profit that not for profit. That's a big reason why I have been quite disappointed by this volunteer opportunity. I feel more like the people are in it for my $20 per day than they are for doing something great in the community. Hopefully, that feeling changes.

Four more volunteers are joining us this weekend. All of them will be going to one of the two orphanages. Unfortunately, I'm left to fend for myself at the tree nursery. It'd be nice to have somebody join me!!

This weekend, Laura and I are visiting a Maasai boma. The Maasai are a unique tribe that live in the plains around Kilamanjaro and Meru. My next post will give more specific information and have some pictures.

A perspective on African public transportation

I thought I'd use this blog entry to describe what some things are like from my perspective in Africa. Specifically, public transportation is quite an enjoyable topic. Laura and I have taken 4 large travel buses, many taxis, many moto-taxis, and dala-dalas to get around. Each one has its own special story but I thought I'd just generalise the experience.

First, we've taken large buses to travel to the major cities we've gone to. We've been in Nairobi, Kampala, Kigali, Arusha... each city being in a different country. These buses are like the greyhound of the US but they have about 2 or 3 competitors. The clientel vary from business men to tourists to people traveling to see family. The bus is staffed by 3 men, a driver, a ticket checker, and a cargo guy. They never leave on time; everyone is at least a half hour early but it takes africans at least 1 hour to get on the bus. I have no idea what they are doing but it is immensely confusing. So far, every arrival time quote has been about 3 hours too early... which means bus trips are at least 3 hours longer than expected. What makes the bus so late? Well, the roads have to be the number 1 issue. There are potholes everywhere in the country and the driver needs to keep his pace slow enough to avoid them. The second issue is the random stops made along the way. The cargo guy is a busy guy as each stop, he's jumping out of the bus, dealing with some people, opening cargo doors... who knows what else he does. This happens at all hours of the day. From 3 am in the morning to 4 pm in the day. Very shady stuff... but our bags have somehow always made it with us. For the riders, we get a travel break every 3 hours or so which allows us to relieve ourselves and during the day, we have a lot of market people selling plantains and bbq kebabs right at our windows. Quite good food despite the probable danger of stomach aches afterwards.

Upon arrival by bus, the mzungus (white people, which on the bus has only been us) are attacked by taxi drivers. They are best avoided due to their incredible mzungu prices. The moto-taxis (all called pigi-pigis or boda-bodas) are the most fun but of course can only carry one person with any cargo that person is willing to try to carry. No helmet, just hang on and go for the ride of your life. An awesome experience but rough with a giant backpack on your back.

Finally, we arrive to the dala-dalas. These look like old volkswagen vanagons. These are the cheapest mode of travel and almost all of the public uses them to get around. They are staffed by a driver and a guy who sits next to the van door collecting payment, letting people in and out, and getting customers. They cost about 30 cents to ride. They hold 14 people total. There are 4 rows of 3 (one row squishes in the door guy) and the front seat holds 2 next to the driver. They never leave empty... so it will sit there until full. Amazingly cramped. The drivers are amazingly bold on the roads. They can hold chickens and all kinds of small wildlife. You never know what you're going to get. They can definitely be dangerous as a future anecdote will describe.

We spent our last day in Kampala at Oweeno market. This is the craziest market I have ever seen. They have top of the line products like Nike sneakers, Merrell boots, levi jeans, etc. all enclosed in these tiny booths. Prices are insane... 20 dollars for a pair of new Merrells, 5 dollars for a pair of levi jeans. Mzungus are mobbed in the dark aisles of Oweeno as vendors compete for their money. The aisles are as thin as an airplane aisle with vendors on all sides. They are constantly reaching out to grab any part of your body they can to get your attention. The market is just huge... you can easily get lost in it. Laura and I were so intimidated by it, that we basically walked very quickly by all the vendors just to get a glance but so that we wouldn't be stopped. Once stopped, you're in trouble!

As for us, we took a bus from Kampala to Arusha. Total time was 25 hours. The only interesting anecdote is we were stopped about 7 times just in Tanzania for some kind of police stop. The police patrol the inside of the bus ... I have no idea what they are looking for but for 4 hours driving time in Tanzania, 7 stops is quite a lot. We also had 2 border crossings, Uganda to Kenya and Kenya to Tanzania; these are always immensely entertaining.

Upon arrival to Arusha, Lema (our coordinator) was their to greet us. He had been waiting for 3 hours for us (bus was late). He greeted us, took us to our home and fed us, and told us to rest up from our travelling. The accomodations are interesting. It's a home with about 6 bedrooms. There are 2 guys who staff the home. Lema who is our volunteer coordinator and Babu who prepares the dinner table and shows us things around town. When we arrived, the place was full of volunteers, probably 10 total. Now, we are down to 4 people as many have completed their time. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are brought to us from Mama Gladness's home. She's the person who started the green foundation in 1998 and has been running it for some time. Lema is her son. The home is located in a town called Tengeru, about 12 kilometers from Arusha.

Laura and I spend our mornings learning basic Swahili from a man named Martin. Laura goes to the orphanage in the afternoon. I go to Mama Gladness's home to tend to the tree nursery. There are two nursery plots that need tending. So far, I've just seen them and been educated on the types of plants but haven't actually done any work with them. We work monday thru friday with weekends free. I'll talk more about the work in subsequent blogs; we've only worked on Friday so far.

I've spent some of my free time running up towards Mount Meru. It's amazing how the mountain community greets a mzungu along the way. Everybody greets me and wants to stop to talk with me, maybe to practice english, maybe just to talk to a white person, maybe to get me to buy something. So far, I've been invited into a home for tea and avocado, I've been taken to the local waterfall hidden in the forest, I've played some soccer at a school, I've been shown the family's bull and cow. It's really been a highlight of living in Tengeru.

This weekend, Lema took the 4 remaining volunteers to Arusha and then to Snake Park. Arusha is the major tourist center of Tanzania. Mzungus are constantly approached by street vendors trying to sell you a safari or trek up Kilimanjaro. It's actually quite awful compared to the other cities we've visited due to these street vendors. They are really aggressive and annoying. We spent our time in Arusha just purchasing basic toiletries and food products, then we got out.

On our drive to Snake park, we arrived upon a massive number of people gathered at a scene of an accident. Lema pulled the car over and we all walked over to see what was going on. The accident was MASSIVE!! A dump truck with a huge bed had collided with a dala-dala, the public transport vans. The dala-dala was crushed and the dump truck was upside down. Next to the destroyed dala-dala lay about 15 to 20 dead bodies. I've never seen more dead bodies lying in one place other than on the news. It was an awful scene. Many of the people's heads were crushed and bodies mangled... I'll leave it at that.

A somber mood brought us to Snake park which is a snake/crocodile/monitor zoo. There we saw the famed black/green mamba, known for it deathly venomous bite. The mambas are a danger in the town that we live in so we've heard quite a bit about them. We were given a tour of the zoo by a Maasai guide, who described the reptiles of Africa quite well. Unfortunately, during a part of the tour where he described how his people lived, he was told that a guide at the zoo and his entire family were in the dala-dala during the accident. The man and his family had died in the accident. The guide had a difficult time with the news but managed to keep giving us the tour after some time. A strange day indeed...

Murchison Falls, Uganda National Park

We got back from our Murchison Falls trip yesterday. The trip was really incredible. The first day was basically a 6 hour drive up to the Red Chilli Camp right at the gate entrance of the park. They've got a fully stocked bar and a decent menu for being in the middle of the nowhere. Here's the bar/restaurant area.


Here's Laura next to our accomodations.



Greeting us along the entrance road were hundreds of baboon groups and a few warthogs... just a sampling of what we were about to see.


The next morning we got up early and headed across the nile river on a ferry. The southern part of the park is just the entrance; the park is located on the north side of the nile (as it travels east-west from Victoria Lake). We took the game drive van we had arrived in across river on the ferry, then started off on our game drive. Almost immediately, all kinds of deer-like creatures are hopping all around us. The van was full of 10 people, 8 tourists, 1 guide, 1 driver. All of the tourists listened to the guide as he described the park, the wildlife we would see and many other things. The top popped off the vehicle so everyone was standing to get good pictures. We saw everything murchison had to offer, giraffes, elephants, hartebeast, igutis, lions, etc. The terrain was very much like you would imagine the serengheti to be. There were quite a few more trees and the river was the backdrop to everything (quite a few fishermen on it also). Here's a tiny sample of the animals that we saw.


Our game drive lasted until 11 am so we went back to camp for lunch, then it was back to the ferry landing for a boat ride up to the falls. The ride lasted about 3 hours. It was the guide and 8 tourists. It was just about impossible to look in any direction and not see wildlife... hippos especially. They were everywhere and always getting spooked by the boat engine. They were massive cows of the water. There were all kinds of birds diving into the nile for fish which was really fun to watch.


We saw the falls from probably a distance of 100 yards by boat. The waters were too rough for our tiny boat to get any closer. We got some good shots and headed back to camp.

That night, I was awakened by a very strange noise. It sounded to me like a person washing clothes in a bucket. I could hear water swishing and something grinding. At first, I was pissed because this person had awoken me, but then the noise began to approach our tent... very closely. Laura said "Jeremy, are you up? What is that?". I got out from under the mosquito net to discover a massive hippo shadow in front of our tent. He was grazing right next to us. Hippos are quite dangerous, temperamental creatures so I just enjoyed the view of his fat butt from my tent. These creatures reach greater than 5000 pounds and he had to be right up there. I watched him as he cruised down to better grazing land at other tents. What an experience!

The next morning, we were off to hike at the top of murchison falls. We got great views and our best pictures of the falls. The falls were named after a guy who headed a company that was searching for the source of the nile. The name was changed during Idi Amin's tenure and then changed back. There are two main falls, murchison falls (right in picture) goes through a large gorge and the water bangs back and forth between the walls on its way down. Uguru falls (left in picture) is a falls which sometimes dries up during dry season but is much more of a traditional waterfall. Some amazing rapids lead up to the falls so just an incredible amount of water.

From there, sadly we had to head back to Kampala where we are staying now. We're taking a bus from Kampala, Uganda to Arusha, Tanzania to start our volunteer work. It starts on the 20th of June. The ride will be a quite enduring 24 hour ride. Not looking forward to it but we've got plenty of time to recover in Arusha.

Next post from Arusha, Tanzania!

See Laura's pictures at her blog. Check out the Rwanda genocide blog for picts.

Rwanda's genocide and beyond

When most of us hear the word Rwanda, the next word that comes to mind is genocide. We took the Kigali city tour which focuses on the 1993-1994 genocide and then the future of the city. The first stop on the tour was the building of the Rwandan Prime Minister in '93-'94. Her death, along with 10 UN peacekeepers, represented the beginning of the massive genocide. The memorial contained 10 pillars representing each of the UN peacekeepers killed. Also, the original building where they were killed by the Hutus. This building had hundreds of bullet holes and a few grenade holes where the peacekeepers were killed.


Just outside the city is the Kigali Genocide Memorial. There are over 250,000 bodies just from the city of Kigali buried in mass graves on the grounds of the memorial. One mass grave is yet to be populated and another is only partially full. Since bodies are found frequently during new building, the bodies are brought to the memorial for burial.


The memorial building contains a downstairs describing the events of the genocide. The upstairs contains a history of previous genocides in the world. The memorial is heavily visited by both tourists and Rwandans. The Rwandans go primarily to remember their lost loved ones. The memorial described that 90% of teh Hutus supported the extermination of the Tutsis (the Hutus were about 85% of the total population of Rwanda). That means that more than half the people I was walking by on the street participated and supported the killing of the Tutsis.... just amazing to think I was standing next to people who lived this event. I pushed and prodded the tour guide with questions like:

1) How can you forgive so quickly?
2) Do people still know if they're Tutsi or Hutus?
3) Why did so many people support the genocide?

Although this blog is focusing on the genocide, the guide focused more on how the city and country are recovering. First, educate your children. Second, have multiple media outlets for multiple perspectives. Third, invest in city/country infrastructure. Finally, remove Hutu/Tutsi from ID cards.

Kigali is by far the most beautiful, friendly place we have been in East Africa. The way Rwanda has recovered from the genocide so quickly makes me think that soon this city will explode as a tourist destination. The city is clean. The people have invested in a new airport and large shops for tourists. The city is surrounded by unique national parks. This is what the people of Rwanda want, an African center of business and tourism.

We've now arrived back to Kampala complete with Laura's bag. It did arrive at Kigali airport and we were able to take a buda-buda to pick it up (that's a motorcycle-taxi or mototaxi). Upon our arrival to Kampala, we took both our backpacks and camera pack onto 2 buda-budas... complete with no helmet. I've never been on a better amusement ride. I'm sure my mom's not proud but man, it was fun. On to Murchison Falls tomorrow.

Sorry again for the pictureless blog but it looks like this is going to be the norm. When I find a place to upload pictures, I'll upload pictures to my other blogs and let you know. We've got some great ones of the memorial. I'm off to the Nile for a few days now!

Rwanda, land of a thousand hills

We had our toughest day on June 10th. We hopped on a day bus to Kigali, Rwanda from Kampala, Uganda. The bus ride was much smoother than the previous one... we had paved roads. After about 6 hours, we arrived to the border crossing. For me, it was the best border crossing of them all. I didn't need to pay a single dollar and the guy just stamped my passport. For Laura, it wasn't so easy. With her lost luggage, she had printed out a visa to enter Rwanda. This visa is required for entry. Due to the lost luggage, we didn't have it. So, after 15 minutes of interrogation, they gave her a 18-day visa to enter Rwanda. I was worried our bus would leave without us but luckily, they hung around for her.

Upon arrival to Rwanda, the first thing on the agenda was to collect Laura's bag at Kigali airport. We wheeled and dealed with taxi drivers to get a $15 ride (which actually is really expensive) to the airport. The airport was practically closed when we arrived there (not good). There was a baggage guy there who allowed Laura to search through the lost luggage... nothing to be found. Eventually, he gave us a few more phone numbers (I think we have 10 now) to call the following day. Needless to say, Laura's getting sick of my T-shirts.

The lessons learned:
1) Pack your guide book in your carry on idiot!
2) Split up clothing in both bags so each person has something.
3) If you have the option, lose the man's baggage.

We got back into the taxi we had taken to the airport and they brought us to a hostel we had been recommended. We went in and of course, all rooms were taken. We moved on to the next place (having no guide book makes you really have to rely on the scum taxi drivers). The next place at least had a room and then the taxi driver charged me an extra $10 for "helping me". I was pretty close to going postal at this point and making my first appearance in a Rwandan jail.

The following day started off much better. We first exchanged money, we collected our gorilla permits, we visited Kenya airways and got a phone number of somebody who is actually helping with the baggage. Things were really looking up. After visiting portions of Kigali, we hopped on a bus to Ruhengheri, Rwanda, a beautiful mountain town close to Volcano National Park. Huge 4000 meter volcanos were set in the backgroud of impressive green farmland.

We arrived in Ruhengheri around 5pm and began our march down the main street looking for a place to stay. Along the way, we found a municipal sports park where I dropped my bag and joined some Rwandans for a game of basketball. Ah yes, sports are universal!!! A crowd of 50 to 60 people gathered around the court to watch us play. I think many of them were disappointed that Michael Jordan wasn't there but they got to see a slow white guy run around for 30 minutes! It was really fun for many of the kids to talk to Laura in English. By the way, I think I scored the most points in the game.


Further down the road, we ended up at Hotel Muhabura, named after the largest volcano in the park. This hotel was by far the best place we have stayed in (with the exception of no hot water; cold showers are the norm for 3rd world). Great food, great accomodations, all for $30. That night, we called a driver (we've got a cell phone here because of all our baggage issues) and organized our ride up to Kinigi for 6 am the next morning.

After a restless night of thinking about gorillas, we jumped up at 5 am, ate breakfast, and drove up to kinigi. This was a $50.00 12 kilometer ride... they really ride the tourists on this one. The guide book and people had told us the roads were horrendous to get there and we would need to hire a special driver... even the tourist office told us this. I could have biked up this road. It was in better condition than most any Vermont or Colorado state road. At least the driver was more like a guide telling us about the area and he did wait for us before returning to Ruhengheri.

There were 7 gorilla families available for tourists. The most famous being the Susa family of 39 gorillas that Diane Fossey studied (watch "Gorillas in the Mist" if you haven't already). We visited the Sabiyinho family of 9 gorillas. The impressive things about this family.

1) They have the oldest, largest silverback in the entire park, 220 kilos (440+ pounds), 36 years old.
2) One of the females just had a baby. It was 1 week old.
3) There are 3 females, 1 silverback, 1 adult male, 3 juveniles, and 1 baby.

As we began our 8-person, 2-guide, 2-guards hike to see the gorillas, we all planned on at least a 1 hour hike into the jungle mountains. Turns out that was not the case. About 15 minutes in, before even entering the park, we were stopped on someone's farm land. The guides told us to drop all of our backpacks and get our cameras ready. In rare instances, the gorillas come out of the park to eat sugar from Eucalyptus trees. They peel off the bark and lick a sweet sap from the tree. The gorillas were outside the park on some farm land. As we approached, we almost immediately saw the silverback. He was MASSIVE!!! We got about 10 meters from him and after about 1 minute, he took a full grown Eucalyptus tree and snapped it at the base... took the whole tree down. Very, very impressive.


The family was very active during this time period. It seems that they know they are out in the open and need to eat and go. They moved a lot and we followed them the whole time... always within 10 meters of one of them. At one point, Laura and I were at the end of our group of people. One of the juveniles came up behind us and charged quickly near us. It appeared to us like we were being attacked but what actually was happening was that he wanted to play. He didn't actually touch us because the guides jumped between us and the gorilla but wow, it was really cool. They were totally comfortable with us with the exception of the mother with the baby. She kept her distance and it was very difficult to get a view of her tiny baby.

I can't put this experience in words but that 1 hour was worth every penny, all the heartache, everything. It was fantastic. Here are a couple of our 100+ photos from this experience.

Now, it's time to visit the Rwandan genocide museum and then on to Kampala, Uganda for a trip to Murchison Falls. Ahhh, I'm living the hard life! Hope you're all having fun at work.

Into Africa

We've made it! We're hanging out with some resident monkeys (not a joke) at the Red Chilli Hideaway, Kampala, Uganda. We've gotten here without Laura's baggage... it was lost in transit to Nairobi and has not arrived for a couple days now. We are supposed to find it in Kigali, Rwanda tomorrow. I hope so... a woman without her "stuff" isn't fun to deal with.

Unfortunately, no pictures today. We don't have access to the computer to load our pictures. Hopefully, this doesn't become a habit throughout the trip but it very well could.

We arrived in Nairobi at 10 pm at night. We took a taxi to a hotel and hit the sack hard. The city had a lot of noise but what really woke me up was the 5am mosque music that played to the entire city. I've never been woken up by a mosque so that was a first. We decided to spend the day in Nairobi hoping that Laura's bag would arrive during the day. It didn't so we hopped on a 12-hour bus ride to Kampala, Uganda. The bus ride ended up taking 15 hours and was a true body test. I've never been thrown from my seat more times than in this single ride. The rodes were horrendous and our bodies payed dearly for it. The driver was not afraid to hit them hard and hit them all (so it seemed). Needless to say, almost no sleep all night in the bus.

The bus had a number of stops along the way but none more interesting than the border between Kenya and Uganda. This border was completely chaotic with nobody giving you a clue as to what needed to be done. To add to this, the town idiot was running around to everybody and laughing sadistically in everybody's face. He actually spooked me a bit until some random guy just punched him in the chest... ahhh, border wars.

Once daylight broke, we were able to see the Ugandan countryside. Not even Vermont is this green. Beautiful countryside but laden with poverty. I've never seen more shantitowns in my life and children running around with no shoes or even clothes. Lots of people worked the land.

Eventually, we landed in Kampala where we got a room at the Red Chilli Hideaway. This place is awesome. We got a power nap to deal with how tired we were. Then, it was off to the streets of Kampala.

There is a world of difference between Kampala and Nairobi. Nairobi has all the traditional big city stuff, big hotels, internet cafes, nice restaurants, etc. Unfortunately, the city has a really unsafe feel to it. We've been surrounded by safari-pushers and lots of people staring us down. Eventually, we made it to city park which appeared to be a nice place. Then, a "Church of Latter-Day Saints" guy stoped us and told us not to go near the park at night... people die there!! Great...

Kampala has been much more inviting. The people greet you with a smile even though you stick out like a sore thumb.

Tomorrow, it is back onto the bus to get to Kigali. Laura's bag is supposed to be there. Then, on the 12th, we will see the mountain gorillas!

Cheerio.

Arrived to Orleans, VT

We left Colorado at 6 am on May 29th and drove our Subaru Forester 2,049 miles to Orleans, VT. We arrived in Orleans at 8:30pm on Thursday May 31st. I wouldn't recommend a 3-day, 2,000+ mile drive to anybody but we wanted to be able to spend time in Orleans prior to leaving for Nairobi. We decided to take our driving break at Niagara Falls which was spectacular.

Our route was:
Niwot, CO to La Salle, IL - 921 miles - 14 hours
La Salle, IL to Niagara Falls, Ontario - 600 miles - 10 hours
Niagara Falls, Ontario to Orleans, VT - 528 miles - 10 hours

We spent about half of our trip in Canada driving just North of the great lakes. We drove through the heart of Toronto and Montreal where we found the worst traffic of the trip. Here are some interesting stats regarding the drive:

Total Gas Gallons: 83.0
Average Price/Gallon: $3.50
Average Miles/Gallon: 24.6 mpg
Most Expensive Gas (price/gallon): $3.99 (Quebec)
Most Expensive Gas (in US): $3.49 (Michigan)
Number of different state license plates seen: 33 of 50 states

Niagara Falls is an absolutely wonderful place to visit. We saw it from the Canadian side (much better than the US side). We took a short trip behind the falls (via tunnels) which gave an amazing look at the force of the water. The falls were amazing both day and night. Multi-colored lights highlight the falls at night for a spectacular view. Check out the photos.