Hey, stranger, wanna come along into the heart of Africa?
Let me take you to the shore of an extensive mountain lake that lies in Uganda and spreads its marshy limbs towards our neighbouring country, Rwanda. Lake Bunyonyi and the stupendous region under the volcanoes have been my home for the last 15 years, or possibly forever.
Because places call you, and all you have to do is listen and not fear.
It is peculiar that my sweetest childhood memories originate from a wild lake in Slovenia that is not unlike Bunyonyi. I’m reading a book in a boat surrounded by reeds, my grandfather is fishing and my grandmother is getting a napkin-covered sandwich for me from a bag; tremendous peace is in the air. Our boat is a dugout canoe, uncannily resembling the ones of Lake Bunyonyi…
Is it impossible that some force we don’t understand wrote that moment into my soul, setting me on a journey that led deep into the continent where everybody’s roots fundamentally are? I don’t think it is. And I don’t overthink it. I’m just happy and peaceful because I am where I belong.
Peace. Peace is the key word. I love my peace. It not just about the chatter of birds and the sound that a eucalyptus tree makes in the wind, it’s about the vibrations I feel. I’m a strange human antenna, I can sense when people around me are disturbed, and that can be too much to take. With Ugandans it is easier. There are fewer layers of pretence here, there is almost no stress in the minds of locals, everybody seems to be more plugged into the primal matter we all come from.
Yet peace also means the absence of noise… That might not always apply here.
Our villagers have discovered the allure of generator-powered sound systems hired from the nearby town and whenever somebody dies there is a multi-day, trans-night gathering with music that makes you want to get buried too. Or there are visiting preachers who believe God is too old to hear well and they shout into their microphones to the high heavens. Or there are wannabe DJs; I will share a story about them tomorrow.
Everyone in our highlands has a mobile phone—those who can afford it and those who can’t—and many think that talking into one is like shouting from one hill to another. Do not be shocked if somebody decides to have an endless conversation in the middle of the night (it’s cheaper then) next to your window. Then there are the local wooden brooms… As hardworking hands dance with them early in the morning, the staccato alarm could rudely suck you out of your cloud of dreams.
So let me whole-heartedly advise you to throw some ear plugs into your backpack before you travel with me. It may prove the most essential piece of your Uganda kit. Rwanda is different, more controlled and subdued, but even there the human factor can always surprise you. Be prepared.
text: Miha Logar