WEDNESDAY, MARCH 14, 2007

This is try number 3 to post this bad boy. Makes the apology in the next line all the more important.

Sooo. Its been a while. Sorry to all the anxious types waiting to see if I am alive. I am, just have been travelling.

I'm in Kampala, not Fort Portal as I was supposed to be two days ago, but I'll get there tomorrow... I hope.

After London I caught my nice long flight to Dubai. Not crowded at all, I had a row to myself, until some damned brit came and sat at the other end. The row of 4 seats he was sharing with someone was too close to the pantry, so instead of spreading out completely to sleep on the plane I dozed uncomfortably with only two seats instead of 4! I know life is rough. ;) But for some reason I can no longer sleep through flights. I am in this wierd jet lagged zone of insomniac uncomfortable bleary eyed dozing with no sleep watching bad movies. We've all been there, I just can't get out of it.

Plane crash in Dubai. Not mine but apparently and air Bangladesh plane skidded to a stop during take off, an hour before I was supposed to land. They circled us over the gulf for an hour and then diverted us to Abu Dhabi (yes back to Abu Dhabi for Mark). Off the plane into the chaos of an airline basically shut down (shutting down Dubai for Emirates is roughly equivalent to shutting down Heathrow for British Airways. I think they'd just give up and go home). Eventually I was herded through customs, onto a bus to get me over to Dubai by land, only an hour away. Then came the madness of the ticket line, designed as a last-minute businessman changing his ticket line, not a 1000+ tired and confused passengers rescheduling line. Got through that and then had to go through two more lines to get myself into a hotel, there were different people doing the bookings and doing the vouchers. Finally though I got a hotel for two nights and meal vouchers.

Enough of that, I had a day in Dubai as was confirmed on the Wed flight to Entebbe, but me being keen to get to work I went standby at 0530 for the Tues flight to Entebbe. I got the last seat on. Wandered back to my seat (BTW Dubai airport is huge and when you are only given your ticket at the check-in counter 45min before your flight it requires a solid jog to get to your gate before they close the holding lounge 15min before take-off!). So IO wandered back to my seat and lo and behold someone was sitting in it, with a ticket printed with the same seat number. I told the stewardess I would wait in the back while she sorted that and got the other guests settled (I wasn't going to get things done any faster hanging out in the middle of the aisle). She was uber glad for that offer and then it turned out the guys seat had been changed, I was in the right spot but he wasn't. It wasn't just that his seat was changed but they wrote the new seat number on his boarding card, so it is is fault. I volunteered, to expedite things, to take his seat. Seemed like a good idea, he was settled and the guy with his boarding card was two rows behind him so I assumed he was travelling with people. Also he had a B seat and I had an D, B being an aisle and D being in the middle. As I walked towards 10B I reached 15, the last economy row (or the first depending upon your perspective) and was suddenly in the land of champagne before take off, flowers on your dinner tray and a complimentary socks. Yes I had traded for business class. The stewardess came forward and saw me and promised not to say anything. I can just imagine the headache she was looking forward to of getting the guy and moving him, and all his bags, with the plane already late. In the end I stayed in Business Class (yes I am capitalising it, they have seats that actually recline, that deserves caps) for the not uneventful trip to Entebbe.

I arrived Entebbe, a day late, smelling horrible and with that same hazy sleep. Thankfully I had a bed in Dubai, but with jet lag I still woke before the 0500 wake up call, and couldn't get to sleep (thankfully Hope Floats was on, the only thing on in English, and that helped). I arrived, paid my fees, I mean got a visa, and wandered over to see the beautifully hand written names of the people whose baggage would not be arriving with them, mine included obviously.

The problem with this is that Emirates doesn't deliver in Uganda, and Kampala is a 40 000Shilling trip each way from the airport. So I was stuck in Entebbe for the night, no change of clothes, and I had, foolishly, packed my toothbrush in Dubai. I got a ride with a fellow Canadian who was visiting family in to a hotel to save the stupid cab charges. Made it, slept bad, woke late, called and was told my baggage should arrive, went to the botanical gardens for the afternoon to wait for my bags to get to the airport at 1600.

So the botanical gardens are quite cool. Made by some random brit it is quite stunning and has been re-worked. Medicinal plants from across Africa, and then other important species from as far away as Madagascar (not so far from here, but still a bit isolated). More importantly, to make mother jealous, were the ridiculous numbers of monkeys and birds. There were two species of monkeys (one was, I believe Vervet, black with white tails, the other an uninteresting, to my local guide, brown one running around in troops with babies), then I was watching a plethora of herons, egyptian geese, fish eagles, kingfishers, some yellow bird called sunshine at some point in its name, hornbills, some bird that looks like that crazy dinosaur with the giant horn on its head, some random white birds, something blue and black... and yes at that point that's all I can remember of their names. Yes, they were all running around wild, no cages, just hanging out on the beach with the guys up to their waist in the water fishing with line or nets, the kids swimming and playing, the farmers feeding their goats etc.

My bags arrived today, I got a nice guy to take me on the back of his scooter to the airport (a common form of taxi-like transport). Passed through security three times, once to get a badge to get into the terminal (for which I had to leave my passport) and twice with the perfunctory bag search, yep its a bag, yep, its got a camera in it, and the wand search, which in spite of it beeping they didn't seem to concerned and they only gave me the most cursory of scans, missed the feet etc.

Got the bag, then grabbed a cab and headed up to Kampala, a busy bustling town, reminds me much of Kathmandu, a tropical and busy city. Dirty and cramped shanty atmosphere, but lively. I wandered a bit and saw the mix of guys playing dice, and random meet shops, people just hanging out, the usual big city stuff.

Anyways, I think they are closing here so more later... But I'm matched!