There’s nothing like waking in your own bed except that I lift my head off the pillow and felt violently sick. The sensation carries on throughout the day. Looking up makes me feel woozy and I almost fall over, more than once. I blame the potholed road for upsetting my sense of balance.
I slept early. The drive from Kampala took its toll on me this week. Large sections of the road to Fort Portal are being repaired and we drove in the heat of the day. The journey passes quickly if you chat but my friend’s thoughts were elsewhere.
The journey’s highlight was the sunset boda boda ride through Kiko tea plantation before Fort Portal. It’s another world in there: the lurid bright green of the tea bushes contrasts with the winding dusty roads, (we took more than one wrong turning) but the cut through Kiko got us through Kibale Forest before darkness fell. Baboons were still at their vigil on either side of the road. Forest raindrops caught us as we sloped down the steep slippery track towards my home at Sunbird Hill.
Waiting for my boda at the Kiko turn-off, I watched three cows amble towards the busy main road. A young man threw a stone at one. It turned in the other direction. He picked up a branch and ran towards them. It was a comical sight to watch him sprinting after the cows, his white gumboots flashing as he lifted one leg after the other! After hundred metres, the cows now safely away from the main road, he turned to walk back to the laughing boda drivers.
A third boda boda pulled up with three individuals on it, one of them being a tightly trussed-up pig! My heart went out to this poor little piggy yet I admired the deft way the animal was attached to the boda. (It’s amazing what you can do with a bit of string if you put your mind to it!)
I had not wanted to travel far from my home on the edge of Kibale Forest, but work commitments beckoned. I felt I put life on hold by leaving so soon… and how long am I back here for this time?
Back home, as the kids unpacked sacks of beans and posho from the vehicle, Hope said “Auntie Charlotte, I have a surprise for you” as she passed me a refrigerated plastic container. I removed the lid, intrigued. Was it edible?
MAWAY!
“I assume it’s dead… ?”
Whenever we find reptilian roadkill, we slam on the brakes and pick up the remains. Our freezer is full of snakes (and beetles)!
