[flagallery gid=1] The Facebook message read: “Mama, we are at lunch. Matoke and peanuts. Come.” It didn’t matter I was thousands of miles away from Uganda, I really wanted to be there and sit around the table with my long-lost friends eating matoke topped with peanut sauce, which is a staple food in the country….
“Tourists don’t know where they’ve been, travelers don’t know where they’re going.” Paul Theroux is an American travel writer and novelist, who has spent more than 50 years wandering the globe. “It is a stimulating way to live my life,” he has said.
Gone forever are these 12th-century manuscripts from the Centre de Recherches Historiques Ahmed Baba in Timbuktu / Photo by Laura Watilo Blake These delicate pages of text survived for centuries in the dry desert air in Timbuktu, a remote outpost of the Sahara Desert in Mali, which was once a wealthy trading center. Today, the…
After 17 years of working with chimpanzees at the Kaniyo Pabidi eco-tourism site, forest ranger Sauda Birungi knows a lot about their behavior, which makes tracking them in Uganda’s Budongo Forest easier. “Sometimes people think they have moved, but they are really staying quiet until the threat has passed,” she says to me and my…
a.k.a. A Near Miss on the Nile Deep breath. I was suddenly under water with bodies coming down on top of me. I am not sure how I managed to stay calm in all the chaos, but it was crucial to surviving. There were five of us in the same boat; a raft to be…
“We’re going to cry when you leave,” said Patricia, the 13-year-old girl with the beautiful singing voice. I was touched and started to tear up. She, Gorrett, Erin and I sat together on the cement stoop on the back porch of the parish house under a light that was swarmed by flying termites. It was…
The rain has come! If there’s anything needed more than clean, safe drinking water, it’s a good downpour. The rainy season in Uganda usually starts in August, but the country has been going through a year-long drought that has ruined crops and driven prices up, causing people to conserve on even their most basic needs….
[flagallery gid=1] Bananas are not created equally. There are many kinds that grow in Uganda, but one is an important form of sustenance and a cultural symbol to the Buganda tribe, which dominates the central part of the country. Bitooke. Most often, it’s mashed and steamed inside of banana leaves to make matoke, the national…
Three male teachers surround us in the school yard, just as thirsty for information as the kids they teach at the primary school. “Why don’t you drink our water? Is it not as clear as yours? Yes, it looks clear, but there are microscopic things you can’t see in it that causes illness, we explain….
Local teacher Teddy Mwonyonyi and Erin Huber, the director of Drink Local Drink Tap were featured on Cleveland news channel WEWS this week talking about the trip to Uganda we’ll be taking this summer. The goal of the trip is to help raise awareness (and funds) to build a well in a small community in…
