Baggas’ Blog

Plot to kill Queen foiled - World - theage.com.au

It may sound silly but this story almost makes me feel proud - Ugandan security services foiled an Al Qaeda plot to attack the Queen in Kampala last year. I must say in my own dealings with the Uganda Police force last year I was not exactly inspired with confidence in them, but obviously those charged with protecting the Queen were a bit better resourced than the rank and file officers we dealt with. Anyway, good for Uganda - the newest ally in the war on terror!

This video is of a stand-up comedian called “Pablo” who performed at the concert we went to in Kampala, Uganda, in October. I think it’s the sort of thing that’s more funny for locals or at the least visitors to Uganda, but take a look and see what you think. In this clip he’s discussing the genesis of various styles of music…

Back in July I posted about when Luke wanted to give some of his toys and food to a little child begging with his mother in Kampala.

Here’s some video of that, plus a general view of the traffic in Kampala as seen from our hotel.

I’m gradually working my way through some of my video footage from the last 6 months, so expect to see more of these YouTube clips over the next few weeks. Working with iMovie on my Mac makes it so easy to produce these - it literally took only about 5-10 minutes to put this clip together, whilst watching a DVD with the kids. Otherwise life is way too busy at the moment. Work is getting fairly hectic, lots of other functions on, plus we have Owen’s surgery this week. Tomorrow is our church’s big Aqua Carols event at the local aquatic center -  swimming, eating, and just generally having fun whilst our church music team provides the entertainment. I’m playing and singing in about three different bands - rock, acoustic, and country style! Should be a good day

One of the news stories that has been sadly neglected in the midst  of our current Australian election campaign is the Commonwealth Heads Of Government Meeting (CHOGM) which is taking place in Kampala, Uganda, at the moment. I was hoping to see reports of our Prime Minister attending and some news coverage of Kampala, but sadly John Howard has more pressing issues on his mind. At present the Queen, Gordon Brown, Canadian PM Stephen Harper and a host of other world leaders are descending on Kampala. To date I’ve seen one story in the Australian media, who are understandably pre-occupied with our own election tomorrow. Might have to check out BBC news later to see if they have any stories. Anyway, here’s a view of Kampala that the Queen and other CHOGM delegates will most likely never see - the view from the back of a boda-boda motorcycle taxi. These are the quickest and easiest way of getting around Kampala and weaving through the often chaotic traffic. Although on this video, filmed by Watoto team member and lab guru Dennis and myself, the traffic is pretty mild. You will get to see some of Kampala’s nicest streets in the CBD, cleaned up “getting ready for CHOGM”

This is my first video edited on my MacBook Pro in iMovie (is it just me, or does Apple seem to have copyright on the letter i ?) Took me a little while to get the hang of it, but I’m pleased to say there was not a single crash or even a significant delay in the whole process, which is a huge contrast to my efforts with Windows Movie Maker a couple of weeks ago on my Vista PC. I’ll be playing around with the video capabilities of my Mac more over the next week or so as I upload more of my Uganda videos. 

As promised, here is the first YouTube video from my recent Uganda trip. It’s a demonstration we had when we visited the equator - water really does go down the drain in opposite directions in the northern and southern hemispheres!

More videos coming soon. This one was made using Windows Movie Maker, and although the quality is not too bad it crashed about 11 times in the process. I don’t think it handles the Quicktime files that my camera produces very well. Can’t wait til I get my MacBook and see how good that is…

It’s been a long day thus far but finally I find myself in the lounge at Johannesburg airport. I woke up at 3:30, expecting to be picked up to be taken to the airport at 4am, but my ride didn’t arrive until 4:50. I was just about to try and get a taxi when they finally showed.

When I arrived at the airport I discovered that, since my paper ticket originally was for a different date, I was unable to check my bags right through to Sydney for my flight this afternoon. This meant that I had to go through South African customs and collect my bag, only then to be told that I had to wait another 3 hours before I could check in for my Sydney flight and get through to the good departure lounge.

When I finally did get through, feeling sore in the neck and mid back I saw a shop offering seated massage for 120 Rand (around $20). After being pummelled by a middle aged African woman for 20 minutes I can now say that instead of being sore in those spots, I am now sore all over (wish I had my sports therapist friend from our medical team here!). So some Voltaren gel from the chemist and an excellent glass of red from the Diners lounge are my next strategy.

OK, now thats today out of the way - let me go back to discuss something much more fun - last night. Five of our group decided to go to a concert by one of the singers from KPC church, called Enoch. Actually it was not just his concert. His band was the headline act but was well supported by a bunch of other performers - soloists, dancers, rappers, an a-capella group, and a Ugandan comedian! We were expecting it to be some dingy hall or club but in fact it was a beautiful modern theatre. And the concert was fantastic. All of the artists were good, especially Enoch and his band, who were great musicians - particularly the lead guitarist and bass player. I got a lot of video of it on my digital camera so I’ll endeavour to post some on here in the next few days.

Only a small group of us went which meant for me I was able to avoid the goodbyes with most of the other members of the team. I’m not one for goodbyes so that suited me. But it was nice because the four that I was with last night were the ones that I connected with the most during the trip - friendships born out of a similar outlook on life, interests, sense-of-humour, musical tastes, and a little bit of adversity thrown in (especially in the case of my two partners in criminology, Emma and Mairin). I’m not always strong at making friendships, so aside from all the mission and medical aspects of the trip, connecting with these guys was one of the highlights for me. There were plenty of other great people on the team too, but with these guys we just clicked, which was great. The other cool thing about our team this year was that it was more multidisciplinary in nature. In addition to two doctors and a bunch of nurses, we had a physio/sports therapist, speech pathologist, and a couple of lab scientists. I was doubtful going in to the trip how much they would have to do, but they really added a huge amount to what we were able to achieve.

Anyway time to go grab some more food, and drink - and then maybe a shower before I board the plane…

My last day in Uganda today, and I’ve decided to get some downtime in order to pack and get organised before leaving tomorrow. The rest of the team went out to have lunch in one of the Watoto villages after church whilst I elected to remain at the hotel. Good thing I did, it’s taken me over 2 hours to get sorted.

Yesterday we went rafting the Nile River at Jinja - one of the best white water rafting spots in the world I am told, with plenty of big grade 5 rapids and falls. And what a great day we had. I was with a fantastic group - four of the more adventurous members of our medical team plus two English guys and a Dutchman.We decided from the outset that we were going to go hard - for every rapid if there was an easy option (aka “chicken”) or a risky one, we would take the crazy route. Consequently I think we ended up being flipped or thrown out of our raft more than any other group and with plenty of cuts and bruises amongst us, but it was well worth it. I can’t wait to see the DVD of the day’s action. The only time we didn’t manage to go the hard core route we flipped before we even reached the rapid - we were paddling hard to the left, where the faster, bigger rapid was, but the current pushed us hard up against a big rock on the side of the river. Our boat flipped and got sucked under the rock. Two guys ended up going down the difficult part of the rapid on their own, minus the boat. I found myself in an air pocket underneath the boat, and then we managed to flip the boat and scramble back on, just in time for the current to take us down the right, easier option. Another time we put the lightest member of our crew (Dr Jess) at the front on the boat whilst the rest of us crowded at the back - as a result when we hit the falls our boat went vertical and high. We managed to remain afloat though thanks to the efforts of Jess who was hanging on for dear life even as she was flung sideways in the air out of the boat. If she had’ve let go our boat would have completely flipped, but hanging on she provided the counterweight allowing us to land right way up. Ours was only one of two boats to try this crazy manoevre, and the only one to come out intact. Once again, can’t wait to see how that looks on the DVD.

Tonight we’re off to a concert featuring a musician from the church here amongst other people. I’m looking forward but hope it doesn’t go too late, since my transportation for the airport leaves at 4am tomorrow Then my itinerary is a morning flight down to Johannesburg, then several hours in the airport lounge probably, then leaving at 5pm for a flight across to Sydney. This arrives at 2pm on Tuesday, and then I have a 5pm flight back across the continent to Perth, arriving at 8:45pm. I rang the airline to try and get an upgrade for the Jo’burg to Sydney leg but it just wasn’t possible. I expect my next update will be from Johannesburg tomorrow - hopefully if the net is fast enough I can post some pictures.

And so it ends. Finally today after two full weeks of clinic, we saw our last patient. Actually my last patient was a home visit to a mother with HIV/AIDS who was in pretty bad shape. Hopefully they will get her to a hospital for some more intensive testing and treatment and she will be okay. Her case illustrated another obstacle to adequate HIV treatment - superstition. She, like many other people, was in denial about her HIV status, rather believing that she had been cursed by a witch or something along those lines. Just last night I was reading in my book “The Shadow of the Sun” by Ryszard Kapuscinski, about how prevalent such beliefs are in Africa. Even amongst Christians, they still hold on to a lot of these traditional beliefs as well.

Now that I’ve mentioned this book, let me just say that this is one of the best books on Africa I’ve read thus far. Kapuscinski is a Polish journalist who spent over 40 years in Africa as a correspondent. The book contains a series of vignettes - portraits of everyday Africans and everyday African life from all over the continent - combined with brief historical lessons and philosophical musings.  It’s amazing how much of what he writes rings true, especially reading it whilst over here. And he really gets into the unseen life of the African populace like no other author I’ve read. Not just touching on the shakers and movers, he visits the homes of the millions upon millions of people eking out a meagre existence and ponders why? For anyone who has ever been to Africa or has any interest in the place, this is a must read book.

As I said, today was our last clinic. I think we probably saw over a thousand people in the last two weeks, and I believe we made a difference in the lives of many of those. If nothing else we showed them that somebody cares. Tonight the girls on our team are at a Women’s Conference at KPC church, whilst the two of us men caught a boda boda to the shops, did a little shopping, had a nice pizza, and then discovered that the “best” internet cafe in town was again not working. But not to be deterred we walked down the hill into Kampala central and found an ever better one - the most productive half hour I think I’ve ever spent on the net in Uganda. Tomorrow we are heading off to Jinja to raft the rapids of the Nile, Sunday it’s church and then a concert in the evening, and early morning on Monday I leave on my journey home. Can’t wait to see my family again. This trip has been great, but I have missed them so much.

This is my second attempt at using the internet today. The first was at the “best internet cafe” in town and I sat there for an hour with no connection - but at least I got my photos backed up and the last blog entry typed. This time I am at a cafe near our hotel that has failed me several times before, but actually seems reasonably quick tonight. Just shows how totally unpredictable the net is here in Kampala.

Anyway here’s a few photos from the past few days…

The view from the front of our clinic on Suubi mountain - breathtaking!

Some of the crowd outside our clinic - we saw over 160 patients today.

Two brothers we saw - no parents in sight. Very common for children of a young age to care for their siblings here like this, and very common to see boys wearing dresses - they can’t afford any other clothes.

This is the boy I discussed in my previous post, not long after he was brought in with a seizure on Tuesday.

And this is the same boy with his new shirt, given to him by our physio Mairin - looking much happier!

The view from our hotel the other night when we had a massive storm - you can see the Old Kampala Mosque in the foreground and the Kampala ’skyline’  in the background.

Kampala is a very religious city. You see plenty of posters like this advertising various “crusades” (I hate that term- conjures up images of some of Christianity’s darkest moments) - anyway many of the look shonky and we found this one for “Pastor Augustine” particularly amusing - can’t decide if he’s a pastor or a hip-hop artist

Some of the many shops we pass on the road outside Kampala, with big piles of green ‘matoke’ bananas out front.

Well that’s all for now - time for me to head to bed. We went for an appreciation dinner with Watoto tonight to Kampala’s best Chinese restaurant- the food there is always tremendous and it’s a beautiful setting. Tomorrow is the last day of the medical clinics and I can’t say I’m sorry to be seeing the end of it. It has been quite exhausting work, although still very worthwhile. I’ll update again on the weekend if I get time.

Another hectic day in the clinic today - much of the same stuff  - otherwise treatable chronic diseases compounded by poverty. Many of these would be eminently more manageable back home - diabetes, hypertension, arthritis, epilepsy - but the people here just cannot afford ongoing treatment. And the backbreaking hand to mouth, one day at a time lifestyle contributes to it - men, women, and children all do their share of the physical work required for these rural households to survive. And this is in a beautiful, fertile land where there is plenty of rain and plants and crops and animals can thrive. Imagine what the more desolate, inhospitable areas of northern Uganda and much of the rest of Africa must be like.

But as is well known, the current number one scourge of Africa is HIV/AIDS - a more serious disease, but nevertheless one which is quite treatable with modern medications. My first patient of the day was a lady I had seen late the day before and ordered an HIV test on. I had to break the news to her of the positive result, encourage her to travel to the city to seek treatment in a public hospital clinic, and to arrange for her husband and 5 children to be tested. The husband will hopefully be coming to see us tomorrow. As for the children, they apparently live far distant from here, with another relative, and she could not envisage being able to get them either to us or to the city HIV clinic. In fact it is doubtful whether she can make it there herself. Probably only about 50km away, but a vast distance for someone with no form of transportation and no money.

Another patient was a lady who previously had had a positive test, but had not accessed any treatment. It transpired that the reason for this was that she was newly married and was afraid to tell her husband the result. She was looking for a way to access the treatment without him finding out, an even more tricky proposition. We encouraged her to tell him so he and the children could be tested but didn’t have much hope of her actually doing so. Another person, maybe even a whole family, who may die unnecesarily from this disease.

HIV is not the killer here - it is poverty and ignorance. The treatments themselves are not that expensive - the UNAIDS program supplies large quantities of anti-HIV drugs and Uganda now even has their own factory to manufacture them. It is the lack of infrastructure and the difficulty in getting the drugs out to the people outside of the cities who need them that kills. Like all problems in Africa, it is one to which there is no easy solution….

Kampala last night was a crazy, choatic, wonderful combination of torrential rains, thunder and lightning, traffic jams, crashes and floods. The weather pattern I’ve generally noticed here is an early morning storm before dawn, usually dry days, and then sometimes a thunderstorm at night. The previous night we sat on the balcony for a long while watching a spectacular lightning show. But nothing has compared to the storm we had yesterday afternoon just after we arrived back at the hotel. Within minutes of the rain starting to pour and the lightning started to flash, the streets around us were flooded, drains overflowing - one of the most amazing storms I’ve seen.

The chaos from the storm continued long after the rains had eased. A few of us squeezed into a taxi and drove across town to a beautiful Belgian restaurant in Kabalagala, Le Chateau. Was great to get out and escape the hotel food again, and the dinner was a treat. I had a beautiful steak with mushroom sauce for the main course, yummy Belgian ice-cream for dessert, and for the entre we shared some frog-legs and escargot which were delicious. A great night out after a busy day working in the community clinic (I’ll update on that stuff later, when I get a chance.) But on the way home traffic was at a standstill, accidents everywhere - one of the worst traffic jams I’ve seen even here in Kampala. In the end as soon as our taxi was in sight of the hotel we decided to get out and walk through the traffic in the rain since it was moving so slowly.

Ten minutes remaining on my net time (if it works - things have been really unreliable here this week) so I’ll update on the mission stuff. This week we’ve been out at Suubi village, a beautiful spot on a big hill quite a way out of Kampala. We set up a clinic in one of the Watoto buildings for the people in the surrounding community. Over the past few days we’ve had hundreds of people through. Once again many common conditions, infections, rashes, ulcers etc - and a few more serious ones - a baby with HIV, a child with a tumour, malaria, and a poor epileptic boy aged 13 whose family had basically given up on him. He had been having seizures since the age of 6 months, poorly controlled on meds, when his family had been able to get them for him. He was brought into me having had a seizure whilst waiting outside. I got some history from his mum - he didn’t go to school, didn’t play, didn’t even do any work around the home - basically he was a big embarassment and burden to the family. Back home, such a child would usually be able to attend school and have a pretty normal life, but here a treatable condition has left him severely disabled and neglected. We got him a good supply of better meds, and when we saw him again today one of the girls on the team gave him a new soccer shirt that she had, which lit up his previously dulled face with a huge smile. She demonstrated to the mother that this child did have the capacity to interact and even quickly learn new skills. Hopefully even these simple measures may go some way towards improving this poor boy’s quality of life.

Anyway, time’s nearly up. I’m quite worn out from the clinics, especially after today when I saw over sixty patients. Two more days of this to go, then we’re rafting the Nile on Saturday, church on Sunday, and then I leave for my 2 day journey home early on Monday morning (and I can’t wait to see Jenni and the boys again - missing them heaps). I’ll try and get on and update more, including some photos, if I find the time and the bandwidth between now and then.

A welcome change of pace today. The two doctors on the team, myself and Jess, went over to the Watoto Babies Home - Bulrushes, to do some checks on a few of the babies, whilst the rest of the team went back out to the villages to do various things.

The Bulrushes babies are in pretty good shape, considering these are orphans who a few months back were abandoned, some in terrible conditions. Like all Watoto children, they are well taken care of. Nevertheless, put 40 to 50 babies in the same building, especially ones who may have pre-existing illnesses, and various health problems are bound to develop. We saw about 15 or so this morning, most of whom fortunately had fairly minor problems. After that we spent a while just hanging out and playing with the babies which was fun. One of the babies I saw today I remembered from when we were here briefly in July. His name was Junior and when he was first taken in as a premature baby he was very sick with HIV and PCP pneumonia. Well, three months later with a bit of feeding, some antiretroviral medication, and a lot of love and good care, and he is doing well - gaining weight, smiling and in good health, as you may see in the first picture below. I continue to be incredibly impressed with the standard of care provided in the Bulrushes.

After we were finished there we took a walk along to the Garden City shopping mall for lunch and shopping. A call to the rest of the team revealed they are hours away from meeting us here so we decided to take a walk down the hill into the Kampala CBD before coming back here to the internet. Here’s a few photos I snapped on the way around. They’ve really been working hard preparing for CHOGM, the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting, which is happening here in a couple of weeks - so much that asking a person if they are “ready for CHOGM” is a standing joke around here. From the state of most of the works though, I doubt if they will be ready on time. I’m not sure if our Prime Minister is still planning to attend CHOGM in the midst of the current election campaign, but I hope he does, if only for the chance to see a bit of Uganda on Australian TV back home.

The bottom picture is yet another local restaurant sign

Finally, I’m going to try and upload a few pictures from the clinics during the week, which I will add to that blog entry, so go back and take a look at that.

Quick update on the last few days. The internet here is horrendously slow at the moment so I shall have to be fast.

Tuesday I shall leave for another time as the story of Tuesday will be quite long and I’m not sure if it’s legally appropriate for me to discuss it yet but be warned you’re in for an interesting story…

So moving on to Wednesday, when I went out to a clinic at the Watoto village where we saw some of the village kids plus a lot of people from the surrounding communities. As a rule they didn’t seem quite as sick this year as last year - we have yet to encounter a bona fide case of malaria - but there was still plenty to do. Lots of ulcers and infections and STDs. A few people had known HIV and many others came for testing, as we have lab facilities available. Only one of the ones we tested came up positive though.

Thursday was a similar story, but this time we relocated our clinic to a building in the community up the road. Once again, very busy indeed and once again very few seriously ill people. Lots of chronic diseases and mild to moderate infections. The clinic worked very well. Our team is really doing a great job and from my perspective things went quite smoothly. Friday - the same story but an even smoother, faster clinic. Despite some organizational hiccups we managed to see more people in less time, including our first confirmed case of malaria, a little girl that I sent around for a blood test to the delight of our lab guy. Also the local ‘doctor’ working with us diagnosed a rare case of trypanosomiasis in an old lady who had the most massive spleen I have ever seen - the lab guy was pleased with that too. Sadly we have had two members sick who are out of action which is a real shame since they have travelled all this way and can’t participate much at present. But they seem to be turning the corner which is good.

Tonight a few of us have decided to break the shackles of our cooped up hotel and go out for the evening. First stop has been a bit of shopping at the main Garden city mall, where I’ve picked up a few Ugandan books (as always) and some T-shirts from the one shop I’ve found that sells decent quality Uganda souvenir shirts. I got a couple for the boys as well as a small pink one for our little baby who we are expecting in March. The highlight of my week has most definitely been hearing from Jen and seeing her pictures that she emailed me from the ultrasound

Right now it’s nice to be sitting drinking a decent cup of coffee at last whilst using a steadily improving speed net connection. After this we are going to head off and try and find somewhere good for dinner.

Overall the week has been good. We’ve achieved a lot, seen and helped a large number of people and had a few adventures along the way.

Finally, here’s  a picture of one of my favourite Ugandan advertising billboards, on the way out to the villages. I’ve been trying to catch a good pic of this ever since the first time I was here and now finally I have it…

Here’s a great quote from Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni relating to recent floods that have troubled this country. I think I get his point but his theology isn’t quite coming out right :

I advise the religious leaders not to pray early for the rain to stop. They will confuse God. I know God is all-knowing but don’t confuse him.  (Sunday Vision - Oct 14, 2007)

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…

Yet again I find myself back in Uganda. I arrived last night after a pleasant flight from South Africa. The place we are staying seems quite good. I have a big room to myself, which is air conditioned. And it’s a quite central location so just a short drive or boda-boda ride into the CBD.

Today we went over the the main Watoto office at Kampala Pentecostal Church (KPC) for a meet and greet and to go over the general plan for the medical mission. I must say, I look at the schedule with some degree of trepidation, remembering how exhausting some of the clinic days were last year. This year they seem to have even more planned, with very little down time. It’s okay for the nurses who make up the vast majority of the team and hence can do other things like hospital teaching, or just exempt themselves for a day if they get tired. As one of two doctors, I don’t really have that luxury, as the clinics can’t run without us. But it’s all not about me anyway so I’ll do my best for the next two weeks to cope. I do think there is the potential for us to do a lot of good work here.

As for the team, everyone seems nice. It’s a fair bit bigger than last year - mostly comprised of Australians and Canadians with a couple of people from the USA and UK. After lunch today at Sam’s restaurant (I had an enjoyable Ostrich steak) we took a drive to the southwest for an hour or so through the beautiful Ugandan countryside and stopped at the equator. A guy there treated us to an interesting demonstration of how water spins in opposite directions either side of the equator, and just drains directly down when you are on the line itself. I got some video of it on my camera so may upload it onto YouTube after I get home.

Just about to go and have dinner, and tomorrow we are off to church at KPC in the morning. The medical mission begins in earnest on Monday so pray for safety, energy, but most of all effectiveness. Hopefully we can go some way to helping the physical and spiritual needs of some of the people here. Will update again soon.

I’m heading off tonight for another trip to Uganda, for the second annual Watoto international medical team mission. This time we have at least one other doctor to share the load, as well as plenty of nurses and I believe some basic lab facilities. It will be interesting to see how it all goes and what we accomplish.

However I go with some degree of mixed feelings as I’m leaving Jenni and the boys for nearly three weeks, and will miss Jen’s major 19 week ultrasound of the baby next week. I had a listen to the heartbeat last night and it sounds great (like a choo choo train) but it’s not the same as being able to see the baby on a video screen.

Not sure yet as to the schedule for the medical stuff, but my basic itinerary for travel is as follows :

• 10 Oct - fly Perth to Johannesburg  - 2355 - 0525 (overnight)
• 12 Oct - Johannesburg to Entebbe, Uganda - 1400 - 1710
• 29 Oct - Entebbe to Johannesburg - 0725 - 1040
• 29 Oct - Johannesburg to Sydney - 1750 - 1435 (overnight)
• 30 Oct - Sydney to Perth - 1750 - 2045

As you can see the return trip is unneccesarily long, but flying via Sydney was the only way I could use my frequent flyer points to pay for the trip. And I have a solid day and a half to kill in Johannesburg when I arrive tomorrow morning. At this stage my plan is to try and dump my luggage at the hotel I have booked for the night, grab a rental car and do some exploring of this city. One of the places I’ve discovered on the net is a Lion park where you can play with cubs as well as see the bigger lions and other animals so that might be a good way to spend a few hours.

Anyway, wish me luck and any prayers would be appreciated. I will do my best to update this blog regularly, time and internet access permitting.

I couldn’t leave the blog on such a negative note so let me share with you a quick episode from our last day in Kampala yesterday….

We were up in our (spacious, air-conditioned, retrospectively wonderful…) hotel room taking it fairly easy and getting packed for our trip to England. Luke was looking out the window with Jenni and they noticed a little boy, maybe 3 years old, begging with his mother in the street below. And then our three and a half yar old Luke decided he wanted to give that boy some of his toy cars - and he picked out two cars, also got hold of some biscuits and got Jen to walk him downstairs and across the street to give them to this little boy, along with a little money. Jen couldn’t understand what the mother said in response but it was quite noisy and happy.

In taking our kids to Africa I’d always hoped they might start to learn a bit of a lesson about generosity and developing a heart for the poor, but I’d thought that woul be a gradual thing, and that our boys (especially Luke) were too young to really get it just yet. But perhaps I underestimated the effect that such an experience can have, even at such a young age. Even if that were the only reason it makes trips like this worthwhile. I was so proud of my little Lukey

Yoweri Museveni - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Yoweri Kaguta Museveni (born c. 1944,^[1] Ntungamo, Uganda^[2]) has been the President of Uganda since January 29, 1986.

Museveni was involved in the war that toppled Idi Amin’s (1971–79) rule and the rebellion that subsequently led to the demise of Milton Obote’s (1980–85) regime. With the notable exception of northern areas, Museveni has brought relative stability and economic growth to a country that has endured decades of government mismanagement, rebel activity and civil war. His tenure has also witnessed one of the most effective national responses to HIV/AIDS in Africa.

In the mid to late 1990s, Museveni was lauded by the West as part of a new generation of African leaders. His presidency has been marred, however, by involvement in civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and other Great Lakes region conflicts. Rebellion in the north of Uganda continues to perpetuate one of the world’s worst humanitarian emergencies. Recent developments, including the abolition of Presidential term limits before the 2006 elections and the harassment of democratic opposition, have attracted concern from domestic commentators and the international community. [..read more..]

The last two days we have spent at the Bulrushes Baby Home in Kampala, which is part of Watoto childcare ministries. I hesitate to make any sort of comparison between Bulrushes and Sanyu Baby home, where we were earlier in the week, as Bulrushes really stands in it’s own league.

We were really blown away by the care and organisation at Bulrushes. The staff there are excellent. The building is beautiful. It is a very well run facility and the babies are lucky to be there - they are so well looked after. Not only that but the big difference here is that these babies will have a clear hope for the future as they eventually “graduate” to be raised in the main Watoto villages where they will be placed in a loving home with an adoptive mother and given an excellent education. This is not just a babysitting facility watching over these babies until they eventually (if they are lucky) find a home elsewhere - this is the beginning of a whole lifetime of care.

Whilst there Jennifer again assisted in care, and I was able to contribute medically, giving check-ups to a number of the babies on both days and advising on treatment. In general most of the babies were in pretty good health, a testament to the excellent care they have been receiving. Apparently when it first opened in January many of the babies were quite sick. Now most of their problems are relatively minor, although I did see one little fellow with tuberculosis and another premature baby with HIV and pneumocystis pneumonia which is quite rare in this setting.

Also today I was asked to do some education of the staff there and so I threw together a brief talk on hygeine and infections, viral and bacterial. Afterwards I took questions. They were intially a little retiscent but once the ball was rolling we had a good time and I was able to answer a load of questions related to baby and child care and health issues. I will be back here in October with the Watoto medical team and we can follow-up on this educational stuff then as well.

One more day in Uganda tomorrow, where we will get a bit of downtime and re-pack our bags ready for our next flight on Saturday morning to London. It will be a little sad to leave Uganda again, but also nice to have the comforts of a western country again. It’s good to know it’s only a few more months before I’ll be back here again…

We really haven’t taken many photos at all during our stay in Kampala this time, but here’s a few snaps from this week..

Ruwenzori Range - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Ruwenzori Range, now officially called Rwenzori Mountains (the spelling having been changed in about 1980 to conform more closely with the local tribal name) is a small but spectacular mountain range of central Africa, often referred to as Mt. Rwenzori, located on the border between Uganda and the DRC, with heights of up to 5,109 m (16,761 ft) at 0°23′09″N, 29°52′18″ECoordinates: 0°23′09″N, 29°52′18″E. The highest Rwenzoris are permanently snow-capped, and they, along with Mount Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya are the only such in Africa. The Ruwenzoris are often identified with the “Mountains of the Moon” mentioned by Ptolemy, but the descriptions are too vague to make this definite.

The range is about 120 km (75 mi) long and 65 km (40 mi) wide. It consists of six massifs separated by deep gorges: Mount Stanley (5,109m), Mount Speke (4,890m), Mount Baker (4,843m), Mount Emin (4,798m), Mount Gessi (4,715m) and Mount Luigi di Savoia (4,627m).^[1] Mount Stanley is the largest and has several subsidiary summits, with Margherita Peak being the highest point. The rock is metamorphic, and the mountains are believed to have been tilted and squeezed upwards by plate movement. They are in an extremely humid area, and frequently enveloped in clouds.

The Ruwenzori are known for their vegetation, ranging from tropical rainforest through alpine meadows to snow; and for their animal population, including forest elephants, several primate species and many endemic birds. One zone is known for its six metre high heather covered in moss, another for its giant lobelia. Most of the range is now a World Heritage Site and is covered jointly by The Rwenzori Mountains National Park in Uganda and the Parc National des Virunga in Congo. [..read more..]

Back in Uganda again. I still really love this country - the courteous chaos of Kampala’s streets, the green hills, the friendly people. After very long 24 hours of travelling to Uganda via Johannesburg, we finally arrived at our Hotel in Kampala around 9 o’clock on Sunday night, all exhausted from the trip. The 37km drive in from Entebbe was even slower and more congested than it was when I was here last year. There’s road and construction work everywhere, presumably in preparation for the Commonwealth heads of government meeting (CHOGM) in November this year. At this stage I’m afraid the place actually looks worse for wear - they’ve got a lot of work to do if they want to spruce the place up in time for CHOGM. I’ll be interested to see how it compares when I come back again in October.

Monday morning, after a quick boda-boda ride into the CBD to get money and hiring ourselves a car and driver for the week, we headed off the the Sanyu Babies Home. Within minutes I was instantly captivated again by these beautiful Ugandan babies. How anyone could abandon such cute little things I cannot comprehend. Most of the babies that we remembered from our visit last year were still there, only a few had been fostered out, which is quite sad. And the overall number of babies there had grown from 37 to 50, straining their already stretched resources even further. Our two boys were even more engaged with the babies than they were last year, both actively playing with them. Owen was the recipient of some great big cuddles including one sleepy baby girl who wouldn’t leave him alone - but he loved it. Afterwards Owen gave us a list of about 6 of them that he wants us to adopt, but we had to explain that it’s just not that easy. Makes me even more frustrated that there are so many babies in need of love, and so many potential families for them in the Western world, yet due to a politically correct, under-resourced beaurocracy (both in these countries and especially back home) it’s just not a viable proposition. In Western Australia, for example, it takes over 12 months waiting just to be able to attend an information seminar about adoption, and this is before the rigorous application process begins. Very frustrating indeed, to hold these little ones in your arms and think of how much more we could be doing to give them a better life if it weren’t for this sort of restrictive red tape.

Later on in the afernoon we took a dip in the hotel pool and then went over to Kampala’s main shopping mall, Garden City, to pick up a few things. Whilst there we visited the Aristoc bookshop (a really world class shop) and I found an excellent looking textbook on African Medicine that I couldn’t resist picking up, despite it adding an extra couple of kilos to our luggage. One of the advantages of our trip passing through the USA though is that we each get 32kg instead of the usual miserly 20kg so weight is not a big issue for us. As well as hanging out in the hotel, watching movies and swimming some more, we took a walk up the road to a pharmacy where I bought a big garbage bag full of medications to take to the babies home.

Yesterday Jenni and her mother went back to help in the babies home again whilst I stayed with the boys. Although it was good taking them to the orphanage yesterday and they enjoyed it (Owen is begging to go back) I don’t want to overexpose them, especially since some of the babies are quite sick. Even just a brief visit there has to be a good lesson for two spoilt little boys from Australia. In the late afternoon we visited the local craft market here in Kampala to pick up a few nick-knacks, and the boys got to play some local instruments.

Today I am heading with Jennifer to the Bulrushes babies home, which just opened earlier this year and is operated by Watoto. Not entirely sure what to expect there, as it was only late last week that our visit there was confirmed, but it may be that this visit will be more medical in nature.

As always , internet access here is patchy, but I’ll endeavour to update again before the week is out.

John Hanning Speke - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

John Hanning Speke (May 4, 1827 – September 15, 1864) was an officer in the British Indian army, who made three voyages of exploration to Africa.In 1844 he joined the British Indian Army where he served in the Sikh War under Sir Colin Campbell. He spent his leave exploring the Himalaya Mountains and once crossed into Tibet.

In 1854 he made his first voyage, joining the already famous Richard Francis Burton on an expedition to Somalia. The expedition did not go well. The party was attacked and Burton and Speke were both severely wounded. Speke was captured and stabbed several times with spears before he was able to free himself and escape. Burton escaped with a javelin impaling both cheeks. Speke returned to England to recover and then served in the Crimea War.

In 1856, Speke and Burton made a voyage to East Africa to find the great lakes which were rumoured to exist in the center of the country. Both men clearly hoped that their expedition would locate the source of the Nile. The journey was extremely strenuous and both men fell ill from a variety of tropical diseases. Speke suffered severely when he became temporarily deaf after a beetle crawled into his ear and he had to remove it with a knife. He also later went temporarily blind. After an arduous journey the two became the first Europeans to discover Lake Tanganyika (although Speke was still blind at this point and could not properly see the lake). They heard of a second lake in the area, but Burton was too sick to make the voyage. Speke thus went alone, and found the lake, which he christened Lake Victoria. It was this lake which eventually proved to be the source of the river Nile. However, much of the expedition’s survey equipment had been lost at this point and thus vital questions about the height and extent of the lake could not be answered. [..read more..]

Uganda - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Republic of Uganda is a landlocked country in East Africa, bordered on the east by Kenya, the north by Sudan, on the west by the Democratic Republic of Congo, on the southwest by Rwanda, and on the south by Tanzania. The southern part of the country includes a substantial portion of Lake Victoria, within which it shares borders with Kenya and Tanzania. Uganda takes its name from the Buganda kingdom, which encompasses a portion of the south of the country including the capital Kampala.

Uganda became an independent nation in 1962, with Edward Muteesa II, the Kabaka (King) of Buganda as the President and Commander in Chief of the armed forces, and Milton Obote as Prime Minister. In 1966, Obote overthrew the constitution and declared himself president, ushering in an era of coups and counter-coups which would last until the mid-1980s. Obote was deposed twice from office, both times by military coup.

Idi Amin took power in 1971, ruling the country with the military for the coming decade.^[7] Idi Amin’s rule cost an estimated 300,000 Ugandans’ lives. He forcibly removed the entrepreneurial Indian minority from Uganda, decimating the economy. His reign was ended after the Uganda-Tanzania War in 1979 in which Tanzanian forces aided by Ugandan exiles invaded Uganda. This led to the return of Obote, who was deposed once more in 1985 by General Tito Okello. Okello ruled for six months until he was deposed after the so called “bush war” by the National Resistance Army (NRM) operating under the leadership of the current president, Yoweri Museveni.

Museveni has been in power since 1986. In the mid to late 1990s, he was lauded by the West as part of a new generation of African leaders. His presidency has been fouled, however, by involvement in the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and other conflicts in the Great Lakes region, as well as the civil war against the Lord’s Resistance Army. [..read more..]

Less than 3 weeks to go now until we head off on our trip, or to put it another way, 13 more days of work. The first, and most important, stop on our journey will be Kampala, Uganda, where we will again visit the Sanyu Babies Home.

It’ll be good to get back to Uganda again. My enthusiasm to see the country again was piqued last night when we finally got around to watching the Last King of Scotland DVD which was filmed almost entirely in Uganda. In addition to the film itself we watched an excellent featurette about Idi Amin, and the movie’s treatment of him. Much of the countryside, architecture, and some of the city sites were very familiar. Can’t wait to be there again.

As for the movie itself, it was very good. Forrest Whitaker’s Oscar winning performance as Amin was superb, and James McAvoy (aka Mr Tumnus in Narnia) was excellent as the central character Dr Nicholas Garrigan. Having read the book on which it was based though, I must say I was a little disappointed. In many ways the plot deviated significantly from the book - many key events and characters were left out entirely and certain events were completely changed. There’s always a challenge in making a movie out of an excellent book and while this movie certainly is very very good, I’d have to say the book is much better. If you haven’t done either I’d say watch the movie first, and then read the book - that way you might not find the movie to be a bit of a let down. You can read my initial thoughts on the book from last August here.

Aside from that the weekend was pretty good. Owen’s soccer match on Saturday was an intense, high standard game (well by 6 year old standards it was), and we spent the afternoon shopping before watching the classic movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Sunday at church we had an excellent sermon preached by Pastor Julie and then went up to our nephew Jason’s 4th birthday. Almost a shame to be back at work but I’ll just keep counting down those days - 12 work days to go after today…

Just thought I’d update on something I posted about a while back. As you may recall I was having some trouble booking flights using my surplus of QANTAS frequent flyer points for my mission trip to Uganda in October. Initially there were no seats available at all and I was expecting to have to pay for my tickets. Then I downloaded a program called Frequent Flyer Friend which sits on my desktop and automatically checks airline websites for reward tickets on the days I want. Initially no results but a few weeks later a big smiley face appeared informing me flights were available. So I booked the tickets, happy that I wouldn’t have to pay, but still not entirely happy because the trip was cut short by several days (seats on my ideal days still weren’t available) and because I had to fly back to Perth from Johannesburg via Sydney.

Fast forward another few weeks to early June. The software still sitting there, checking daily and sending a report on it’s findings to my email. Most days the smiley face alert appears on my desktop telling me about the same flights I’ve already booked or other, even worse, ones. But then one day a whole crop of smileys appears - it seems a bunch of new reward seats have been released, and for much better days. I quickly phoned up the airline and got my flights changed, at the cost of only a small penalty of 2,500 points but I was happy enough with that. So now I’m leaving on the day I had originally planned (October 10) and returning on October 29th - which means I will be there for the whole duration of the medical team mission instead of missing a few days. I’m still returning to Perth via Sydney, but I can live with that.

Since then I haven’t bothered to load Frequent Flyer friend, but I just happened to click on the icon today, and guess what? All the good flights are gone. There’s now no flights at all to South Africa and only a couple back (via Sydney) several days after I want to return. So thanks to Frequent Flyer Friend I was lucky enough to find the small window when those seats were available and book my tickets. A very handy piece of software indeed

It’s seems that every other day is an “International Day of …” something. The last couple of weekends have seen the passing of the annual international midwives day, and international nurses day, both of which were commemorated at our hospital with posters and balloons. I’m still waiting for them to celebrate “International Doctors’ Day” - I don’t even know if there is one at all. Maybe us doctors are just too busy or simply just don’t crave that kind of attention or recognition…

Anyway, at least some of these International Days are worth paying attention to. I didn’t know it, but May 18th is International HIV Vaccine Awareness Day (note this is different to World AIDS day on December 1.) The development of a HIV vaccine is possibly one of the most important scientific challenges in the world today, and one you rarely hear about in the media. The following is a good article from Uganda’s Daily Monitor newspaper looking at the current state of affairs…

Monitor Online | Health | Uganda: 10 years of HIV vaccine tests

I don’t think I have yet posted a full itinerary for our big trip in July, but it’s mostly locked in now so I’ll get onto that soon. But over the last few days there’s been some interesting new developments - I’ve had some emails regarding our Uganda Medical Team in October, and it transpires that many of the babies in the new babies home in Kampala are not doing so well and some have even died. It’s unlike me but I got a bit upset when I read about that. We will definitely make this a focus of our efforts in October, but I’ve decided to visit the Bulrushes babies home in July with Jenni for at least a day or two to see if I can offer any help. This will be in addition to Jen’s time in the Sanyu Babies Home that we have already planned.

The other thing I’m really excited about is that it is looking very likely that we will be visiting Gulu, in the north of Uganda during October. Gulu is the epicentre of the refugee crisis in northern Uganda due to the 20 year civil war with the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army. Many many thousands of people, especially children, have had their lives torn apart by this horrific struggle. Many have been killed, maimed, or been psychologically scarred by abducted and forced to become child soldiers. Many more have had to leave their homes in fear and lost any hope of an education or future happiness. Ever since I first heard about this catastrophe I have felt a strong pull to go there. October’s visit will be for only a few days but hopefully we will be able to minister to at least some people and sow the seeds of more work in the future. Despite this I feel a strong urge to want to do more. I find myself tempted to buy lotto tickets so that we can afford to move over there for a few months or longer. Haven’t won a cent so far though Nevertheless it will be interesting to see where this all takes us in the long term. At present it’s all still too unclear.

A few weeks back I was complaining about how difficult it is to use frequent flyer points. At the time I was completely unable to find a way to get to Johannesburg and back using my Qantas points. Not long after that I downloaded a little program that’s been siting on my desktop ever since - Frequent Flyer Friend. This nifty program automatically searches daily to see if tickets become available on the flights you want. When it finds flights it flashes up a message and sends you an email.

Since I installed it the results have been consistently negative - no flights… until today. A big smiley face flashed up on my desktop saying a flight back to Australia from Johannesburg was available. Sadly the flight I originally wanted to take to Jo’burg (which was available 3 weeks ago) is no longer there - but I found one 3 days later.

So I now have succesfully booked flights using my award points to get to Africa and back in October for the Watoto medical team mission in Uganda. The flights aren’t perfect for a couple of reasons, but at least they are better than having to pay the full cost (the money I’ve saved could more than pay for a VG stratocaster, for example…) First imperfection is that I get there 2 days later than I want to and I leave to come back 2 days earlier than I want - but it still gives me a solid 10 days in Kampala. Secondly the return flight is not to Perth, but to Sydney! So I’ll have to fly over Perth, to the other side of Australia and then catch a flight back from Sydney to Perth that day. And it cost me an 20,000 points more than if I had been able to fly directly back to Perth.

I’ll keep the Frequent flyer friend running and if better flights come up I can always ring Qantas and change my booking. But at least for the time being I have locked in some flights to get me there and back.

Last week we watched an incredible documentary abo