Despite the disturbances at night, I slept for a long time. Because of the constant rain, I had a little chat with the boy at the hotel in the morning. He comes from the north (Arua) and has been living in the hotel for 2 years without coming home. He couldn’t attend school for longer than 4 years because school here is fee-based.
It was too cold for him on the terrace at 23 degrees because he thought it was winter. And it’s hotter in the north of Uganda anyway. Well, how you take it 🙂
There are many refugees from South Sudan in his area because the border is not far away. They are only provided with makeshift food by the UN or something. There are probably a lot of Sudanese here around Kampala. They are said to be large and can be recognized by ritual cuts on the face. I’ll keep my eyes open!
Around midday I headed to the botanical garden, which is on the other side of Entebbe. 5km walk in the tropical heat to the entrance, but here you mostly walk. Or hop on a taxi motorcycle. I did it once yesterday, but I felt pretty naked without a helmet. The botanical garden only costs 5 euros to enter but doesn’t have much to offer. It is beautifully situated on Lake Victoria and there are more or less the same trees in the park as outside. There are no labels either. But I could see some funny birds and almost ran into a spider. Now I take a closer look at what’s hanging around at my eye level. I also went to the zoo, but it was more or less closed. With an entrance fee of 15 dollars and animals in cages that were too small (which is what the internet says), it didn’t seem so interesting to me anymore.
So I continued walking to the mall in question for dinner. Today I completed my step target well. The reward was a tilapi fillet with a pineapple-mint smoothie. The tilapi is probably the Nile perch, which occurs in large numbers in Lake Victoria. Released in the 1950s to feed the growing population, it is increasingly displacing the large biodiversity of native cichlids. It still tasted good. The ride home was again by taxi, I used a kind of UberApp. For 3.50 euros I can’t complain and it’s definitely safer than the motorcycle. Tomorrow my stopover in Entebbe is over and I’m off to the capital Kampala.
Day 4: Today we’re going to the capital Kampala! Since I wanted to save the 30 euros for the taxi, I used Uganda’s public transport. Minibusses, which are called “matatus” here, took us to the capital, an hour away, for 1 euro and with 15 passengers. Since the traffic is chronically congested, it took 2 hours. At the last stop (sidewalk on the left) I was met by many helpful hands who either wanted to load my luggage onto the motorcycle or wanted to arrange a taxi for me. Since that was 3x as much as in my app, I decided on the latter after some discussions.
When I arrived at the hostel, I was able to move into my small single room straight away. The view needs improvement, but the people are very nice here.
Since the day is already advanced, all I have planned for today is the Uganda Museum. Certainly not the most modern example of museum didactics, but the only one in Uganda and the oldest in East Africa. I was the only visitor in the house at the time. I almost played in the museum at night because I was suddenly locked in the monkey wing 20 minutes before closing time. By shouting and banging loudly, I was able to convince a Taxi driver that the exhibits weren’t enough to last the whole night. And I didn’t want to meet mountain gorillas that had come to life either.
Afterwards I went back to a nearby mall, mainly to eat. Somehow the most reliable restaurants are there. Even if I avoid the ubiquitous KFC. The walk home through the darkness was ok, but unusual in a big, strange city with a lot of people.