Safari: The most enjoyable part of any visit to Uganda is the couple of days of safari which we now build in as a standard part of the trip. Our drivers allow us to climb on top of the van and sit on the luggage rack. This time we had the bright idea of filling our rucksacks with towels and clothes so we had a much more comfortable ride over the bumpy savannah.
The Murchison Falls game park is considerably bigger than Wiltshire. We travelled 80 km in our first evening. Lions, elephant, giraffe, hippos, Cape buffalo, wart hogs, hyenas, – and later on – four grazing rhino were all visible from close up. We even went off road to see a pride of nine lions with the cubs playing in the grass like kittens. Exhilarating as it all was, it is the people who will live longest in our memories.
The hardworking Godfrey – vicar, pig farmer, geography teacher, school governor, and on top of all that, Diocesan planning officer.
The hard pressed staff at the Sanyu Babies Home. Visitors are asked not to pick up the babies, as they have to get used to living without being held. That shows how tight resources are. It was good to see volunteers from a number of countries, spending a few months with the children. But they will go home again. The nurses in Sanyu will stay, receiving babies picked up from the road-side and caring for them until a home can be found.
The intelligent and slight young vicar – Revd Isaac – running his small school and huge parish on the edge of Lake Choga, confronting sexual abuse of the poor by the wealthy. “Is it dangerous to oppose these people?” I asked. “Yes, it is very dangerous” he replied quietly, determined not to be intimidated.
Beatrice, the headteacher at our school in Bwaziba, full of fun and life, travelling over dangerous roads for an hour each day on her motor scooter. Her knee was damaged in a crash last year.
Bishop Eridard Nsubuga, a man overflowing with hospitality and brimful of vision. This is a country where construction is continuous and the church is often at the heart of it. Homes, schools, churches and offices are going up everywhere. But they go up very slowly – first the foundations, then as money comes available, up to the level of the ground floor windows, and so on.
And finally the outstanding Kiwoko hospital and our guide Denise.
Dr Wilson will finally leave his job as Medical Superintendent of Kiwoko hospital to return home to Northern Ireland later this year. It will be a wrench for the family. The aim is that when he leaves, his place will be filled by a Ugandan doctor. It feels like a great note on which to finish.