Greetings from Uganda

Hello everyone,

I have been in Uganda for a week tomorrow and I figured that it is time to fill you in on my newest adventure.

I was offered an opportunity to join the Finnish Refugee Council in Kampala in December as their new information officer and humanitarian worker. It took me a little while to decide whether I was willing to uproot my life again, move back to Africa and establish a new life there. My main aim, career-wise, is to work for the UN in human rights policy and enforcement capacity or to return back to the International Criminal Tribunals to promote international justice. It was a hard choice to once again leave my family and friends behind and to trust that this position will again take me to the next one which will be another step towards my career goals and hopefully, Europe.

I had a fantastic month in Finland, received so much support from my family and friends and got to really spend some quality time with the people who mean the world to me. So I decided to embark on this fabulous adventure with FRC. Travelling to Uganda, you should know that most airlines prefer you to have an e-visa ready or at least a return flight within 3 months. This costs 50 USD but can easily be obtained online in 3 days. I arrived in Kampala last week Thursday, had organised my accommodation beforehand (through Facebook housing groups) and headed towards the city. Entebbe airport is quite far from the city itself but you can get to Kampala between half an hour and an hour on the expressway depending on traffic. The journey will cost you 40 USD which is around 100 000 UGX (Ugandan shillings). Many locals will always ask you to pay in dollars but luckily, they other charge tourists and locals the same or a very similar price. This might vary a little on bigger market areas especially if you don’t know the original prices well. It is significantly cheaper to buy market food and locally produced things than, for example, eggs or yoghurt. This is going to require me to adjust my usual shopping habits but I am looking forward to all the pineapples I get to eat.

I live quite close to the city centre in a nice, calm area which is safe to walk even in the evenings. This is a really nice change from Cape Town: not that you couldn’t walk in certain places but the distances were too vast as well. My work is around 3 km away and the restaurant streets around 2 km. However, Kampala is very hilly and humid so the walking takes much longer than it would in, say, Finland.

Oddly, Kampala reminds me more of Vietnam than other places in Africa that I have been to. The expat community is quite tight, there are motorbike taxis and street food stalls, you are able to walk around but there are rarely walking paths. While Kampala is rather safe and there is rarely violence on the busy streets, I did witness a pickpocketing on my first night out. Therefore, I would not recommend taking valuables with you just in case. The lovely thing about Uganda is that the temperature does not vary at all: during the warmest months the average temperature is 28 degrees and it only drops down to 25 for the coolest months. There are some rainy periods like April but otherwise, the weather is quite reliable.

I have already joined a mountain/ rock climbing club and am about to participate in salsa dancing tomorrow. It seems like there is a lot of entertainment in this city and all the expats are praising Kampala’s good nightlife and food. One of the local favourite snacks in called Rolex: the word seems to originate from ‘rolled eggs’ which is a chapati pancake with fried eggs and tomato rolled into it. Uganda has the funniest way of naming things. For example, the word Kampala originates from ‘the camp of the impala’ because the area used to be a famous sight for hunters to camp in when they were hunting impala antelopes.

There seems to be a good bus network in Uganda to transport tourists between the several national parks, but many expats have warned me that actually experiencing these destinations is very expensive. Tourism is quite new in Uganda and consists mainly of old, rich people. For example, the gorilla experience at the Bwindi lake costs 600 USD. Instead of travelling around Uganda, most people I have met recommend Rwanda which is much cheaper and apparently stunning. Funnily, it seems that all locals dislike travelling in Tanzania and say that it is not worth going. Hopefully, I will have enough time and money to explore some of these options and to fill you in! Luckily, I will be able to see quite a lot of Uganda through my work trips to the West and the North to refugee camps, but the nature of these trips will be rather different.

Here are a few things I am planning on conquering during the next weekends in the Kampala surroundings: The Ugandan Museum, Kasubi Royal Tombs, Lake Victoria and the Ssese Islands, The National (Old) Mosque, Lubiri Palace and the Nakasero Market.

Best wishes,

Mira

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