Boda, Baby...

Today was a relatively uneventful day. Got to work by 6. Extracted a ton of DNA. Got home by 5. Everyone wanted to know what I did this weekend. When I told them I had to take along boat trip to Ngamba Island, without fail, they horrified-ly asked, "Weren't you afraid of the water?!" I found that hilarious because you really can't tear me away from the water. I think if they saw some of the conditions I sailed in back home they might have actually keeled over and had a heart attack.

After dinner I took a boda boda into the suburbs of Kampala to put a deposit down at a backpacker's camp on a safari trip I am taking this weekend. None of the boda drivers in Kololo had any idea how to navigate Mbuya, so we kept having to stop and ask other bodas for directions. Those motorbikes are a ton of fun, but I do think that if I spend any considerable amount of time here I will buy myself a helmet. Not just for safety, but also because the roads are so dusty-- it gets in your eyes.

On Friday I am going into northwest Uganda to a place known as Murchison Falls National Park. It was once a heavily inhabited area, however in the late 19th / early 20th centuries there was a massive outbreak of sleeping sickness. The only way people knew how to deal with the illness was to completely evacuate the area. It was turned into a national park in the 1950's. One of the largest attractions there are, of course, the Falls, which are fed by the Nile and are a 141 foot drop. You can only imagine how excited I am.

I'm posting more pictures from the weekend because I didn't have anything to photograph today. That is me in my bumblebee sunglasses in Ngamba, as well as one of the high ranking male chimps. He looks so fluffy because he was upset-- like hackles on a dog. Then a picture of Lake Victoria from the island. Danny, I think we could fit a 36.7 in there..! Lastly, a photograph of a baby vervet monkey. That is it's mother behind, going through the garbage. We don't have them in Kampala, but they are plentiful in Entebbe.

xo...G.