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| Mum and dad enjoying a Ugandan sunset at Jinja |
On day 1 of the holiday with my folks, I had hired a car and driver to take us on a trip to Sipi Falls. The driver was 2 hours late to pick us up and, despite my paying for his car to be serviced a few days before departure, 2 of us were seatbeltless (which wouldn’t have been quite so worrying had we not been stopped by police for speeding, twice) and the car breaks weren’t really breaking (which, aside from being a death-trap, also meant an impromptu, time-consuming detour to find a garage). I can only assume that our driver paid himself to service his car, and that this involved putting his key in the ignition to check the car would start. The frustrating dealings we had with this chap/ opportunist continued throughout our 3-day trip, and for me, the whole situation was all too familiar. What was different this time, though, was having two like-minded people on Team Phoebe, with whom to roll eyes, laugh, or (almost) cry with.
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| Mum, me, and dad at the beautiful Sipi Falls |
Following the Sipi Falls trip, and before heading off to Kenya with the parents to see the sea, I returned to work for a few days with a much improved morale. I even managed to see the funny side when, whilst changing a student’s unravelling violin strings, a cockroach crawled out of his peg box and on to me. I especially liked my pupil's response - ‘is that a bad sign?’
On a side note, thank you to Stringers, Deborah, Cecily, Richard and Sam for your donations of shoulder rests, sponges, strings, and music. And thanks to my mum and dad for transporting it all here! The shoulder rests/ sponges are improving the posture of many KMS violinists, and the new strings are not only helping to develop nice tones, but also seem to discourage insects from setting up homes in my pupils’ instruments.
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| Dining with friends from UK who are now living in Kenya |
So then last week my parents and I went to stay with some friends in their home on the coast of Kenya. And, as if a white-sand beach holiday on the coast of Africa wasn’t enough, their daughter – one of my best friends - flew out from UK to join us as a surprise!
I thought Kampala was hot, but nothing could have prepared us for the surge of all-encompassing humid heat that greeted us off the plane at Mombasa airport. Luckily, there was a slight sea breeze and our friends were well-equipped with electric fans. Still though, it was far too hot to do anything. We were forced to just sunbathe, swim and read books for 7 days straight. Poor us.
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| Working hard in Mombasa... |
Lastly, Uganda has been in the press a lot recently concerning ridiculous and harsh laws against homosexuality... I am told it is now illegal to even have a discussion about homosexuality, unless you are damning it. Another fantastically crap law that was almost signed would have made it illegal for women to wear anything above the knee (its 30 degrees for goodness sake!) or ‘dress provocatively’. Worryingly, although the law was not passed, there is still widespread support from the general male public to implement anyway. For example, some hooligans have started publicly shaming ladies they deem to be inappropriately dressed, by ripping their clothes off. Thank goodness these awful men are being arrested, but still, I've become a little paranoid about my wardrobe. I feel a shopping spree coming on.
*Boda-bodas are the motorcycle taxis that swarm Kampala. When there are traffic jams here, which is all the time, boda-bodas are the only way of getting from A to B. By law, boda-boda drivers must wear a helmet and only carry one passenger at a time. There are some hilarious interpretations of a ‘motorbike helmet’ – I’ve seen everything from horse riding caps to builders hats – and in terms of passengers, most bodas tend to carry at least 1 family (with babies tucked under arms), a couple of chickens, plus a cluster of bananas tied to the back.
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