Elephants, instant best friends, food poisoning twice in one week, Jinja, and my future career

I loved this week. Amazing. This was my vacation, the only break I've taken while I'm here, and it was spectacular. I went on a three day safari and then to Jinja (super touristy/fun/safe city famous for being the “source of the Nile”) and then white water rafting. It was too much fun to even describe fully here, so I'll save most of it for when I'm back home and can tell you in person. (oh, and my food poisoning wore off before I left which was a God send!) The main lesson I learned this week is that 75% of "western" people travelling in third world countries are the best and most friendly people you will ever meet. I made a lot of friends in just 5 days and felt a genuine comradare with most of them.

As I said last time, I was headed to gorgeous Murchison Falls national park for safari, but I was a little nervous to start because I was going alone. Obviously I had checked out the company before hand and it was totally safe, in reality I was more scared of being a total loner and eating by myself in the corner for 3 days straight. But it turned out I had a great group of people! I travelled with an American family with a son and daughter both around my age who pretty much adopted me and a British/Bulgarian couple (along with the husband's dad) who were very smarmy and British and hilarious.

The first day we drove up to Murchison (7 hour drive) and then went on a hike up to the Nile and the Murchison waterfalls when we arrived. It was beautiful and so intimidating; I cannot believe that that much water even exists. It is hard to describe, when I get back and have decent Internet connection I'll post some video I took so you can really get an idea what it was like. Supposedly it is the densest waterfall in Africa (most liters of water per sq. m) so it was very loud and awe-inspiring. Because it gets dark at about 7pm here that was pretty much the first day; we went to back to "base camp" and had dinner and crashed because we were going on safari at 6:30am the next morning!

The second day was busy and even more amazing. We crossed the Nile on a ferry and started our game drive bright and early. We got to see so many amazing animals- hippos, baboons, monkeys, so many beautiful and rare birds, a million types of deer/antelope, herds of giraffe, elephants, water buffalo, a glimpse of a lion, and about a thousand warthogs. The only thing I was disappointed with is that the car in front of us got to see a lioness and her two cubs (very briefly) before they ran away and hid. My car was like 2 yards behind and we JUST missed them, so that was a bummer :( . Everything else was brochure-level perfect, we even got to get out and "stretch our legs" about 30 yards from a group of giraffe. After lots of pictures and about 6 hours driving around the preserve we headed back to camp for lunch and then went out again for a cruise down the Nile to Murchison Falls.

Think relaxing boat cruise but... on the Nile! with hundreds of hippos! and crocodiles! and baby elephants! and the densest waterfall in Africa! In summation, it was great. Half the time I was just kicking back relaxing looking at the beautiful scenery and the other half I was super excited clicking a million photos and freaking out over elephants. Probably the best way to spend a summer afternoon that I can think of. Again, with the sun setting at 7pm and after a long day we were all ready to head back to camp and eat. Which we did, around a campfire, which was really fun. Because the third day we didn't have to get up until 8:00 am (yipee!) everyone wanted to stay up and party for a while. The safari camps in Africa tend to be really fun hang-out spots with very easy-going staff and visitors, and in addition to my group there were about 4 other groups of 7 or 8 people. So everyone was just hanging out, telling great stories and drinking $1 beers around the campfire. I made really good friends with the Bulgarian woman on the trip and learned so much about Bulgaria and the EU (which she works for). It is so amazing how close you can feel with someone after only 2 days! Another bonus of this- her husband is a professional photographer, and he is going to post all of his far superior photos on his website! I wrote down his info somewhere and will definitely post it later so you can check out some really beautiful safari pics if you're bored. Because he's a professional he sells his photos rather than sharing them on Flicker or something :( , but I'm hoping because we hit it off so well maybe he'll give me a discount if there are some really good ones!

And so began the third and final day. We left Murchison at around 9am and drove until noon to get to Ziwa rhino sanctuary where we were going to track rhinos. We didn't get to end up tracking the whole herd because there were some uh romantic interludes going on, instead we went after a mama rhino and her baby. It was sooo cool (about the 50th time I’ve said that I know, I’m sorry). The baby rhino was named Obama (they LOVE him here, there is even a cologne named after him) and I'm blanking on the mom's name, they were like awkwardly adorable tanks. It was surreal seeing these animals in their natural habitat and thinking- holy crap this is an actual animal that nature came up with. They just do not seem real. We got within about 20 yards (that's really really close by the way) and then had a brief charging false alarm and the guides made us run away for a bit. But we got to come back and watch the rhinos for another half hour. It was an amazing experience and I am so grateful that I got to see these animals in their natural setting instead of just at the Henry Doorly Zoo.

After getting rained on as we walked back, we all got back in our car very sad that the safari was over and headed back to Kampala. Unfortunately, the nice mzungu restaurant that we were supposed to eat lunch at was closed and we had to stop by a roadside place for food, which was later to haunt me. After getting back to Kampala the American family I met took me and a British girl they also semi-adopted out to an amazing Indian restaurant. We all ate a full Indian dinner and it was delicious. This was by far the nicest restaurant I've been to in Kampala and it was a really pleasant way to end the week and say goodbye to new friends. (Oh by the way even though this place was CLASSY- my whole dinner cost $8 USD). Little did I know I was going to regret overindulging very very soon. Because I was taking the company's free shuttle to Jinja the next morning and I had just come back from safari, I cashed in on a free night at the hotel so I wouldn't have to make my host family pick me up and then drop me off again 9hrs later. After saying my goodbyes to my safari group I headed to bed only to wake up at 2am with a very unpleasant sensation. A lot of vomiting up a lot of Indian food later I went back to bed and vowed to never eat anything from this godforsaken country ever again.

Surprisingly, I was almost fully recovered by 8am the next morning in time to catch the free shuttle to Jinja in order to meet up with a friend from Pomona. All I ate that day was toast and banana bread, but still a pretty impressive turn around for food poisoning.

I would highly recommend Jinja to anyone who ever goes to Uganda. Which will be approximately 1 or maybe 2 people who read this blog. But still. It was very laid back, basically the opposite of Kampala. Think going from Harlem during rush hour to a farmer’s market in Portland. I am attempting this analogy because I want to convey Jinja’s, abundance of: white people, rich white people, NGOs, craft stalls, grad school students (aka rich white people), and overall pointless money wasting diversions. In summation, it was great. I got to hang out with Claire (my Pomona friend) and people from the NGO she’s been working with and we relaxed, went out to eat and did our souvenir shopping. I was fully prepared to repeat that schedule the next day, but Claire and about 200 other people kept telling me that I HAD to raft down the Nile if I was in Jinja (they had just done it). Of course, this was always prefaced by how terrifying it was and how many times the enthusiast’s raft had flipped, so I was getting some mixed signals. After some nervous debate and flip-flopping I decided to sign up for all-day Class 5 white water rafting on the Nile. Yikes!

I could not have had more fun rafting. I met a great group of 3 people on the bus ride to the launch site and we instantly became friends, they actually knew people who had just graduated from the Claremont Colleges! Also joining our group was a random Belgium guy and a Dutch couple, and to top it off our instructor Rich. To put it lightly, I was pretty much obsessed with the Nile and within an hour I was basically bff (that’s best friends forever for you old people) with our guide, who is an Oberlin grad that teaches English in Bulgaria during the school year and is a rafting instructor in the summer. At one point he told me I should consider coming to work there next summer and then let me navigate the raft. I completely sucked and had no idea what I was doing- but it was awesome and I learned four basic navigation strokes. Not going to lie, the possibility of rafting on the Nile every day for a summer and getting paid for it doesn't sound too shabby. Not to worry mom and dad I won't actually do this...probably (they also need horseback safari leaders…)

I was “pace setter” for a good chunk of the trip which means I was in the front left seat and everyone paddles on my cue/keeps pace with me. It was really cool, but is also a pretty vulnerable position. I fell out of the raft in Class 5 rapids twice and it was SICK (which is a good thing for those not familiar with California lingo). The nice thing about rafting in the Nile is that unlike the rivers in the US (think Colorado) the river is really really deep. As in 50 feet deep throughout most of the river, it’s also a half mile wide in a lot of places. This translates into no scary rocks that you’re worried about smashing your head against. So when you fall out in the rapids there is A LOT of water, I’m talking 10-foot waves, but they’re created by rocks 40 feet under you, so there’s absolutely no danger of hitting them. So if you keep calm you’ll be thrown around by waves for a bit, but you’ll always pop right back up! On the last rapids I went flying and was probably under for a good 6 seconds. Which doesn't sound like long- but you try holding your breath through rapids.

I loved every minute of it even though today my body is screaming out in pain. I cannot remember the last time I was this sore, they really make you paddle for about 4/7 hours. Rafting was seriously as fun as the safari though, and if anyone reading gets the chance- do it!!

Sidenote: The only thing I disliked about this week, I am COVERED in mosquito (Luganda= insidii) bites. They are driving me insane, I think I have 50 on my legs alone. Good thing I’m taking anti-malarial meds!

Much love and I’ll see you in a week (already!!! I can’t believe it!!!)