Running in Kampala
I mentioned the other day how the schedule for this medical mission looked exhausting. Well I sure feel exhuasted now, but for today at least I only have myself to blame…
But first to backtrack a little to Sunday. We spent the morning at a church service at KPC which was great. Their worship team and massive African choir is phenomenal. Most of the songs they did were western worship songs, but I don’t know many except for a couple of Hillsong tunes. Even so, they were all brilliant. The message was interesting too, taken from Nehemiah, but with a lot of local cultural and political references which made it all the more interesting. Generally there’s nothing too exotic or zany in a KPC service (speaking from an Australian Churches of Christ point of view) but one thing that was a little different was where the whole congregation (of about 2,000 or so - one of four such services at their central campus alone) gathered in groups of 3 or 4 to pray for the family of a prominent lawyer and church member who had died in childbirth just a couple of days earlier, leaving her husband to care for her other children and this brand new baby, who will never know his mother. For some reason I felt particularly touched by that situation, but it also shows that even being wealthy doesn’t necessarily guarantee your health in a country like this.
In the afternoon we visited the craft markets and then the main shops at Garden City. Me and the other doctor, Jess, took a short cut there on boda-boda motorcycle taxis, to the apparent disapproval of some of the older women on the team. But I’ve done it many times before and will continue to do so - it’s fast, cheap, and pretty safe.
When we arrived back at the hotel a few of the younger members of the group went out for a walk, up to the Sanyu craft shop, which is about 5 minutes walk from our hotel. Then we had a look in the beautiful Anglican cathedral, St Paul’s, a majestic building that has stood on the top of one of Kampala’s main hills since around 1915. Three previous cathedrals had been burned or blown down prior to that but this massive building is not going anywhere. We then continued to walk around for a while longer before dinner. It’s great this time to be with people who are more interested in getting out and exploring the city.
St Paul’s Cathedral - Namirembe
Residential area near Old Kampala
Sign for a Kampala “restrunt”
Today we bussed out to Bbira Watoto Village, where we had a good tour around, and started to get organised for our clinics this week. We also ended up seeing about 30 or so of the Watoto children in the clinic, but most of them are pretty healthy, coming in with viral illnesses, cuts and scrapes. It will be a different story when we begin to see some of the villagers from the surrounding communities tomorrow.
Since we arrived back at the hotel fairly early a few of us again decided to venture out into the city in the couple of hours before dinner. Some were going to walk, and a couple were going to run. For some crazy reason I joined the running group. One of these women runs marathons but they went at a nice slow pace and initially I kept up pretty well. Surprisingly quickly we found ourselves smack in the middle of Kampala city, trying to weave between cars, taxis, bikes and pedestrians. Being on a boda-boda is safe compared to jogging near the Kampala taxi parks. No-one seems to jog in Kamapala so we got a few odd looks, and had a couple of kids try and race us. Most of the way was downhill but the last section into the city was uphill, as was much of the way back. I stayed with them until I was sure they could find their way back to the hotel, and then I elected to send them on their way and walk the rest of the way myself. This has definitely firmed my resolve to think about maybe considering re-joining the gym this summer when I get back. On returning to the hotel I remembered a fact with which I can console myself a little - Kampala, and most of southern Uganda, is at an altitide of over 1000m above sea level - so running here is kinda like the altitude training elite atheletes do. Plus the pollution in the city doesn’t help either. Now that I have had a shower and recovered I feel pretty good. I will probably run again. I definitely feel more motivated to do some sort of exercise than I have in the last few years.
But we’ll see how much energy I have tomorrow afternoon, after the first of our clinics open to the community…
Categories : Africa, Personal, Travel, Uganda | 0 Comments
