4th September - So life in Uganda has been interesting so far. We started our journey from Rwanda to Uganda in something like the Mystery machine in Scooby Doo. These are my new buddies for the next 16 days.

The promised three hour journey actually took 8 (this was a sign of things to come, there is English time and African time...)

The journey was broken up by various stops but the most enjoyable was we the Mzungu (or white people) came to town and scared the school kids. This picture took lots of coaxing and almost getting myself run over to show the kids their photos in the camera before we got them to agree to come near us.

We arrived at the Golden Monkey Lodge ready to start the real adventure in the morning. 

5th September - today, in the morning, we were taken to see the local eco-community project. This is a project to teach the community that are not farmers to make their gardens into mini sustainable fruit and veg patches and grow indigenous trees in the garden, this will be cheaper and more sustainable than buying produce in. We also saw how the Ugandans used to live 50 years ago and they brought out two men who lived in that era to show us. I love their suits!

 

In the afternoon we were taken on a boat trip to see 'punishment island', this is where women pregnant before wedlock were sent as a punishment (no points for original names) to live with no food or water. Many died of starvation, others made a swim for it back to the mainland  and if they made it their punishment was cleared but many died from drowning. Others were sold to the ugly men who wanted a wife and child and dowries were paid and the women ‘escaped’ their punishment by being married off to someone from another country, usually the DRC. This punishment was stopped in 1902 and the island was closed.

I saw a women's collective making raffia mats and bowls When you see what it takes to make the bowls you realise just how hard the women work so £5 isn’t a lot to pay for it and the money goes to the women's charities in the area.