On Vistas

Due to the rare combination we have had this afternoon--working internet and a couple free hours-- I will add to the many posts of the last couple hours. 

Yesterday, after a full morning of assisting students and teachers and Katarara Primary School followed by a slow, bump ridden drive in a "buggy" down a puddle and broken-pumice filled village road which sees far more foot traffic than anything else, and is far more used to seeing old bicycle and bodaboda (small motorcycle) traffic than car traffic, we arrived at the small elementary school run by Grace. We entertained the kids as best we could for a few hours, but when the school day ended and all the children but the little girl incessantly asking Mr. Aavatsmarck to take her home with him had left, Grace fulfilled true on a promise to me that she would lead us up the hill (on which her house is already half way up) to the lake.  Though time was a little tight and we didn't wish to have to travel back to the Golden Monkey Hotel in the dark again, the rest of the group humored myself and Nate and were willing to ascend the steep hill despite their understandable wish to return to the hotel and the massive quatities of rice and "Irish potatoe" they new would be awaiting them.  It was Uganda, after all, and the view would be amazing.  So, after dropping our bags off at Grace's house, we followed her and a few other teachers from the school (one of which with a baby on her back) up the switchback trail to top of her hill. Here we delighted at the view, laughed at a group of little piglets tripping over themselves, and began to get a sense of what the countless, well maintained hills actually looked like up close.  Grace informed us that this was not really the view she was going to show us, however, and after just a few mumbles regarding the further distance we were going to walk, we began to follow a winding, well trodden footpath around many different plots of well maintained gardens filled with, among many other things, sweet potatoes and bananas. We passed a man walking his pig, a family grazing their large group of cows (land being all fairly communal), and, after passing through a more wooded area from which we could hear shrieking children screaming, arrived at a spectacular view of a lake surrounded by mountains with a looming backdrop of far larger volcanic masterpieces in the background.  And as we climbed up the slope behind us to get  above the few trees inhibiting our view, the vista just got better and better. And better. The pictures I will attach cannot even begin to do the scene justice. 

My other viewpoint is from that of a middle class American touring and working in a country the way few people have done before. I wanted to note that, though our car packed with outsiders does get some scowls, it's gets far more surprised looks, and more still smiles and bemused waves. I have been impressed with the people I have seen and met, their good nature, kindness, and their ability to work hard. From farmers up in the mountain hoeing their gardens to Grace doing her best to provide as much help as she can to as many people as she can in her small school to the kids set in determination as they struggled to remember how to copy and paste, Uganda has amazed me. As we played hours of cards with Paul (one of three workers here who asked to join our various card games) he giggled from excitement as he won a pile of cards, saying "I am start getting it now."  After that, however, he shuffled his cards and played the next one upside down (neither of these things correct for the game) and we corrected him (again), the whole table still laughing hysterically.  He, like me, still had much to learn.