The Flat Head 3001 World Tour

[tigerformula]

Dkatz, I posted measurements a couple pages ago.

[dkatz]

Helloooo from New Jersey...

edit: and they fit...!

[beatle]

so the legend continues

[BAerts]

YES! Great to see they made it on time.

[dkatz]

A fairwell-for-now-fit of the Tellason Strummers

And on to the Tours

Enjoying the slightly looser fit (probably a size too big for me in the waist). Comfy comfy. Though the thicker denim's gonna be a bit rough on the equator...

My last afternoon in America. Doing a bit of reading about my turf

Sidewalks. Enjoyable outdoor seating. Good beer. Good sandwiches. Oh, America.

Apparently the sandwich was called...

Aaaand back to dirty dirty Kampala. Running a friend around to do some errands on Nasser Road (where all the print shops are). Quiet on a Sunday.

And back home.

Off to Arua tomorrow. Where I expect these jeans to travel with me for the next couple weeks

[beatle]

may the next leg begin

[-Z-]

aw man this is gonna be good!

[ranonranonarat]

this is a great beginning of your leg of the tour!

[aho]

can the jeans last?!?!? looking forward to find out

[dkatz]

Monday: errands around town, to the office in late morning, on a bus to Arua at 1

The first couple hours of the bus-ride, emailing away. The lady in front of me kept kinda fingering my hands/phone/book/whatever was within reach. It go old.

On the roooad agaaaain

A favorite snack

Looks like Africa out there.

In to Arua town at 9pm. Dropped my bags at the hotel and straight to the little hole-in-the-wall Ethiopian place I found last time I was here. You can tell it's an Ethiopian restaurant from the sign.

Flat Heads and ambiance.

So incredibly impressed with myself for remembering to take a picture before devouring this. Not a bad meal for 5,000 Shillings (~$2.40)

One of the great frustrations/confusions of ex-pats in Uganda is how, being so (relatively) close to Ethiopia, Uganda managed to completely miss the interesting-cuisine-boat.

Okay, now I've encountered this a couple times in my stint in Uganda. Why... why the fuck would you make a bed sideways?

The next morning, had my two-hour meeting (no pics... and was actually wearing Outlier "Workwear II" pants, to look a wee bit more professional). A little taste of Arua town, whilst speed-walking back to the bus

Bus-stop

[dkatz]

Truck-load of dinner. I'll have to get a close-up of one of these trucks some time... they could turn you vegetarian right quick.

The hawkers descend. They're like gnats. As soon as I'd stop moving, they'd descend on me ("Muzungu! Buy meat! Give me money! Muzungu! You give me money now!"... charming), so I pretty much walked circles around the bus for 10 minutes.

And on the road again

16 hours of bus-riding in two days, all for a two-hour meeting, was a bit much.

Tomorrow I'll be driving the couple hours to Masaka, where I'll stay with a friend for the night. Then another fourish hours West to Mbarara on Thursday morning, for another meeting, and hopefully back to Masaka that night. Stay tuned...

[tvshooter]

savin up rep for you dkatz. this tour has gone waaay next level. i can't believe i actually wore those for a day. . .

[salaami]

believe it my dude i was with you i'll vouch!

[Medine]

just wondering how hot it is over there??

[ThinFinn]

^so curious as well...

isn't it somehow a strange feeling to be the only "white guy" on the bus? have you got into some trouble cuz of that fact or how do they "handle" the situations you're in sometimes?

i for myself (if i was white and in your situation!) think would have a bit of a "strange" feeling, how people would see me and how they were thinking about me and so on...

I'm half afro american btw. so please don't get this wrong!!!

[dkatz]

Medine- it's actually fairly mild here, considering the proximity to the equator. Most days are between 70 and 85. Humidity can get a bit gnarly during the rainy season, but even so it's not as bad as, say, the Summer in the Northeast

TV- I'm honored to know my crotch-stank is mixing with your crotch-stank right now.

Thin- nothing wrong with discussing such a significant issue (I think we in the West tend to hyper-cog issues of ethnicity/culture/skin-color, which leads us to avoid discussing very relevant issues). Yes, it's weird being the only white guy around so frequently. To most people (particularly in towns), I'm nothing terribly interesting - they're very accustomed to having us white buffoons trouncing around. However, I do, get a lot of attention I'd rather not get, mostly from either A) kids who can think of nothing more entertaining than mocking the white guy, adults who can think of nothing more entertaining than mocking the white guy or C) anyone who wants money. You know how cartoon characters' eyes turn into dollar signs when they see someone they think they can get money from? Yeah I think this is how most people look at me most of the time:

Yes, it gets old. VERY old. Very quickly.

[beatle]

next level...

[Medine]

Theyre eyes turn to money signs and they dont even know about $300 Japanese denim

[dkatz]

Today was a fucking annoying day. So I'm gonna tell you all about it.

2:00am: two hours after getting in bed, brain finally quiets down enough for me to fall asleep.

Spend the morning hours cracking out some wok from home. Around 10am a lovely representative from Umeme - the national electricity company, which charges some of the highest rates in the world - knocks on the door to deliver the bill. He seems to see nothing wrong with the fact that today is 3 November, and the bill clearly states the due-date for payment is 1 November. Yes, it has happened before that Umeme has come to disconnect our electricity for non-payment before we actually received the bill. Pretty clear on which department Umeme chooses to focus more efficiency-promoting resources.

Phone call with an apoplectic member of a partner organization (which shall remain nameless), spewing about how members of another partner organization (which shall remain nameless) stood the party of the first party up for a meeting. And apparently it's my job to manage all communication (why couldn't he just call them directly?), hold hands, wipe butts, put out fires and apologize for everything constantly, particularly when it's not my fault and has almost nothing to do with me.

Wash the kitenge shirts I recently had made by a local tailor and discover that one of the sleeves on one of the shirts is a solid inch shorter than the other sleeve. Naturally.

I'd carried stuff back to Uganda from the States for seven other people. Five of them, I share an office with - easy enough. One of them came over to my flat at my convenience on Sunday to pick up her stuff - very considerate. The seventh called me this morning asking me when I could drop her things off to her. I contained my annoyance and asked where she was.

"I'm at a meeting at the Serena [a hotel], but my driver just called and I'm leaving right now, so...."

heavy sigh "where's your office?"

"My office is [doesn't matter - it's hard to figure out where anything is in Kampala, though] - just call me when you're close and I'll come out and find you. Thank you sooooo muuuuch!"

"Nooo problem."

Off to get a couple new tires on the whip. Drop it off at City Tires - one of the shining beacons of effective and efficient business in Uganda - and walk down to the Crane Bank branch nearby to get cash to be able to pay for the work. Spend 45 minutes, in cooperation with the branch manager and a friendly phone-support gentleman from Schwab, discovering that the ATM's broken.

On the walk back, have a phenomenally frustrating phone call in which I discover that a partner organization (which shall remain unnamed) had not actually hired all the project staff they'd agreed to three weeks ago, and which are supposed to be present at a meeting tomorrow.

The lovely Industrial Area of Kampala

Wind up driving one of the City Tires staff guys with me to another bank - in my neighborhood - to get cash. On the way, get flipped off for honking at someone for cutting me off. Get the cash, send City Tires dude on his way, thanking him for not sucking. In line at the bank to pay the Umeme bill, an irate customer comes in and starts yelling about how he withdrew 5 million Shillings (~$2,400) and discovered an hour later that he'd actually been given 2.5 million. Proceeds to yell at the "young girl" on the other side of the counter about how "you people cannot steal during the daytime" (so why should he have bothered counting?) and other such tidbits of timeless wisdom. She yells back bits along the lines of "you should have counted! Why did it take you an hour to come back?". I couldn't decide if I was more irritated by him yelling his head off in the middle of the bank, by her for having the complete lack of customer service sense to at least whisk him somewhere they could have a proper conversation (not through bullet proof glass) or say something along the lines of "let's try to resolve this calmly", or by the teller who was processing my payment moving at the speed of molasses in January (in the Atlantic Northeast, not Uganda - they don't have molasses here). It probably also didn't help that I'd discovered earlier that I had coffee but no food at home.

It starts pouring rain while I'm in the bank. I've now come to the empirical conclusion that 50% of drivers completely lose all capacity for any sort of rational, efficient or safe driving as soon as water starts falling from the sky.

Took a short-cut to a supermarket which involved driving my petite 4-wheel-driver through some gigantic puddles, bumps and holes in a big dirt-patch in the rain. Giggle like a maniacal school-girl the whole way through.

Grab a few things at the grocery store. Order a sandwich from the butchery-department.

"I'll have a ham sandwich please."

"We're out of bread."

"You're what? How? How do you run out of bread?"

blank stare

I walk six feet to bakery-department, pick up a loaf of bread, walk back to the butchery-department and put it on the counter.

"I'll have a ham sandwich."

"You have to go pay for this first."

"I'm not going to walk all the way over there, stand in line, pay for the bread, bring it back over here, hand it to you, wait [while you move at the speed of molasses in the North's January], then walk back all the way over there again, stand in line again, and pay again. I'll have a ham sandwich." Aaand I walk away.

Another empirical fact that I've unfortunately learned in this country: if you say something authoritatively enough and then walk away, it will happen. I would have come flying over the counter with a stapler in my right hand and some cow-tongue in my left, aiming straight for jugular, if someone had talked to me like that while I was working at Saul's Delicatessen. Then again, I also would have walked the six feet to pick up a loaf of damn bread my damn self to make the damn sandwich.

Acquaintance who was waiting for her package-delivery calls.

"Just wondering when you'll be by to drop off my package?"

"I'm in the middle of some errands. Probably be by in 45 minutes."

"Well... I'm about to go out to lunch, so... can I just give you detailed directions and you can leave it with reception?"

in my head "I muled your crap back from the States for you, you can delay wait to eat your damn lunch to make me driving my ass over to drop it off to you a bit easier"

out loud: heavy sigh "Fine. Text them to me."

Drive to the offices of The Uganda Safari Company ("TUSC" - cute), another shining, shocking beacon of effectiveness. When we had been safariing in Kidepo, I had had a stroke of creative brilliance (iiiif I may say so) and left my camera strap with one of the guides, to bring back to a lady in his village to bead up and beautify, Karamjong-style. It had always bothered me how nerdy-techy the strap looked. I told him I didn't care what colors or patterns, I trusted their judgment). It had taken a while, but the strap was finally done being beaded, had hitched a flight South and was waiting for me with the wonderfully efficient Onzi at reception.

Was (except with white where the red is):

Is:

AWESOME!

Hopped across the road and picked up a couple books at the dirt-cheap book-exchange place. Exchanged a book I'd bought there + 3,000 Shillings for another book, and bought a second for 6,000 Shillings. Love it.

Send some strongly-worded text messages to partner organizations.

Crawling in traffic through Kisemente when I feel a resounding thump. I look in the rear view mirror and notice that the little white car I'd previously been able to easily see in my mirror now seemed to have disappeared. I believe the exact words I exclaimed, aloud, to myself were "You've got to be f#%*@%ing kidding me" (except replace "#%*@%" with "uck"). Sure enough, the dude behind me had mistaken his left for his right and planted the nose of his car firmly and tightly into the rear of mine. Fortunately, my car is significantly higher than his. Also fortunately, I have a spare tire on the back of my car. He smudged my tire-cover, though. Jerk. I took his insurance info anyway, just in case, and apologized for his broken headlight, accordianed hood, fractured bumper and probably radiator damage. Oddly, the interaction with this guy was probably the most pleasant of the day - there was no question about who was at fault, and a clear path of protocol to be followed.

Spend 115,000 Shillings ($55ish) on a tank of gas.

Make a couple phone calls in order to do a partner organization's (which shall remain unnamed) job for them. Send a strongly worded email.

FINALLY got on the road to Masaka

And got to eating that sandwich

I call it... "Composition in Indigo and Sandwich-crumbs"

[dkatz]

On the road, Westwards, towards a meeting I'll be having on the 4th. Jury's out on whether the comfort, music and speed of driving myself trumps the nerve-wracking nature of driving in Uganda. Why not put speed-bumps on highways? Why mark them? Why mark grievous changes in road-material (beautifully-newly-paved tarmac followed by a curb-sharp drop onto loose gravel)? Why fix those potholes? Why make the one road that serves an entire region of the country more than one lane each direction? Why not allow tractor-trailers to crawl along that road at 10kmh? Why enforce any traffic laws? Why not cut off the muzungu in his Rav 4 with your bus on a loose-gravel road and crack his windshield with a rock your tires fling up?

Let me fill in the missing parts of the phrase on the back of this matatu:

"[i'm] Christian [but] time is everything [so I drive like a fucking dickhole]"

Road construction

Bush mechanics

Road construction. Bored yet?

Shitty road. Hopefully road construction coming soon.

Another highlight: I've been seeing these wonderfully colorful local stools from bus-windows along this road for a year now, and never had the opportunity to hop out and snag a couple. Like a riot of flowers displayed on wood racks.

"10,000 each"

"If you give me a good price, I'll buy four. If you give me a bad price, I'll buy two."

Four stools for 20,000 ($9ish).

Another highlight: Eddie Van Halen telling me and the whizzing-by world around me, at ear-splitting volume, to "Hang 'em High".

I say "let's fuckin' do it, Eddie!"

And I figured this was the sort of spot the 3001's should have their travels memorialized

Arrive in Masaka. Pick up homegirl. While waiting at an intersection for a break in traffic when I feel a resounding thump. I didn't even bother with the "#%*@%" this time, I just started laughing. Hard. The driver of the taxi, with eight people jammed in his sedan, the nose of which was planted firmly and tightly into the rear of mine, probably thought I was out of my mind as I walked towards him with a gigantic grin.

"Second time today!"

He totally smudged the smudges on my tire-cover. And nicely dislodged his bumper and headlight.

The first rear-ender-car fared worse.

Finally reached where I'd be spending the night. 6:26, decided a run would calm me down and help me shake off the day. I quickly lost count of the number of people - children, adolescents and adults who have no excuse for their total lack of any sense of propriety - yelled at me, ran after me or laughed at me. I finally gave up and went home.

A final highlight: the call to evening prayer over the loud-speaker from a nearby mosque. This has never gotten old to me, and will be one thing I genuinely miss once I've moved away from somewhere with a significant Muslim population.

I wonder what special moments tomorrow holds for me.

[dkatz]

addendum:

At least the day ended with beers and pork at a local pork joint. 17000 all told ($8ish) for the two of us.

Also: there's no way in hell I'll be able to keep up this pace of updating. I had to word-vomit on my blog after this day 'cause I was so irritated, so I just pasted it over here. I'll try my best though!

.

[ranonranonarat]

holy crap man, that was a really really rough day. thank you for the painstaking effort you put into the post. i would have just wounded up pissed, annoyed and vulgarity spewing at the end of the post myself. hope the shit picks up for you man.

[morse9443]

who's had better tour update's than dkatz? great stuff man! really interesting..

[beatle]

amazing pictures..crazy stories

[dkatz]

Ranon - by the end of the day I was pretty cursed-out. I was pretty much just laughing at everything. Thanks for the reps, all!

[dkatz]

Yesterday was (THANKFULLY) much less eventful

Stoked to see that my car was still there in the morning

And back on the road, from Masaka to Mbarara

Unsurprisingly, the West - where Museveni is from - has the nicest, most amazing roads in the country

It took me about 2.5 hours to get from Kampala to Masaka, and 1.75 hours to cover the equivalent distance from Masaka to Mbarara.

The West is also the most fertile - and wealthiest - region of the country. Green EVERYWHERE.

Arrive for my meeting 5 minutes early. One other person is on time. The other two are an hour late. Love it. Camped out and did some work while I waited.

and back to Masaka.

Stopped in at the market when I got back in to Masaka town

Some political rally going on

Picked up these two rugged canvas military-looking bags for 6000 Shillings ($2.75ish) together, and a bunch of veggies for dinner.

Off to Sesse Islands today for the weekend, so probably no updates 'til I'm back

[BAerts]

dkatz: This is some next level shit. Best updates of this two year tour!

I don't even know if I want to follow this: "Today....I went to some meetings, then I sat in the studio all day recording....then, I ran on the treadmill, then I went to bed" No way. Keep the damned jeans. :-)

[dkatz]

In the year I've been in Uganda, I've only ever recreationally visited two places, because work makes it near impossible for me to make plans, or have any free time for that matter. Buuuut last weekend, homegirl and I pressured each other into actually taking some R&R. Supernecessary, supergoodidea.

On the road to Sesse Islands, part of Kalangala District

In line for the ferry. My favorite is the little black sedan missing a front-left wheel.

(GO BEARS!)

Waaaaitiiiing in the dirty dirty Rav. Actually I think I was reading Ranonaranonarat's PM on the iphone.

Traveling by sea in the lap of luxury, Uganda-style.

Interestingly, because this ferry serves essentially as a substitute for the "road" to the islands, it is free (as a public road would be)

Beautiful scenery

Kinda embarrassing... can't remember the name of the island

Welcome to the Jungle

Let me know if the road-photos get old.

Arrived at the side of the island with a few accommodation-spots and proceeded to visit every single one before finally settling on Sesse Palm Beach Hotel (I think). Not a bad spot for 80,000 Shillings ($37ish) per night for a private little self-contained cottage. And we were the only guests in the place for the entire weekend.

Popped down to the beach for sunset

[beatle]

beautiful pictures...

[dkatz]

hundreds upon hundreds - maybe thousands - of sparrows dipping and diving all around us through dusk. One of the more remarkable things I've seen in a while. We could hear their collective wing-beats as they'd all upstroke synchronously, and the whoosh of the air being pushed out of the way by their collective mass.

Where we spent most of Saturday

And why I'm still lobster-red. Why do I never learn?

A nice pre-dinner beach-lounge

The 3001's and I made a friend

Sunday morning tea-to-the-face on the bungalowporch

And back across the island to the ferry. I'll spare you all from more on-the-road shots.

Okay just one. Because it's supercute:

Grabbed a snack as we waited in line for the ferry.

Psyche! More on-the-road pics! Back to Masaka

More soon (been to Mbale and back since then, and off to Arua again today...)