Chimpanzees hate me

Hi all, hope everyone's doing well. I'm writing again from Fort Portal, in western Uganda. I've spent the last several days visiting a few national parks in the area. First off, I hate speed bumps. As my parents will attest, I've said for years that if I was ever dictator of the world the first thing I would do is outlaw speed bumps. Uganda is speed bump crazy. You get sets of five in a row, separated by only a foot, and than sometimes they add an enormous one that makes you come to a complete stop. They're everywhere, and I detest them with an exceptionally strong passion. The other thing I'd like to complain about to start out this post is how dangerous the minibus drivers are. On my way back to Fort Portal from one of the national parks I felt so unsafe that I just tapped on the ceiling, the signal to stop and let someone out, in the middle of nowhere about 30k away from Fort Portal. I really thought I might die if I stayed in the bus, and although it took me over an hour before I was able to stop someone to take me to Fort Portal, it was well worth it.
Having said my piece on the drivers and speed bumps I would like to state that I think if Herzl had visited Uganda (did he? I really have no clue, but I'm assuming he didn't) he would not have turned it to down as a Jewish homeland. The country is beautiful, has huge amounts of water, and has really friendly people. Having said that its neighbors, Sudan, DRC, and Rwanda, amongst others are maybe not that good of a trade off from Israel's current ones, and I'm not sure how friendly the Ugandans would be if they lived in a Jewish state. Regardless, I've only been here for a week and half, but the country has made a strong impression on me already.
So, the first national park I visited is called Semiliki NP, and it encompasses the only true tropical rainforest in Uganda, which is also the easternmost stretch of the Congo rainforest. It's technically part of the Ituri rainforest, but that rainforest is just an extension of the Congo. The park is between the Semiliki river, which is also the border with the DRC, and the Rwenzori mountains in the east, which can reach 5k meters in height. The views going there are amazing, and there are some cool geysers and hot springs in the park. It's too hot to go in the water, upwards of 100 celcius, but you can get right to the edge. I just went hiking there for a long day, and although there are forest elephants, forest buffalo, chimps, lions, leopards, etc... I didn't see a thing. It's not expected that anyone on a casual hike will as the foliage is pretty dense.
After Semiliki I spent two days at Queen Elizabeth National Park, which is a few hours south of Fort Portal. It's a savannah landscape, and one of the best places to see animals in Uganda. On the drive into the park I saw buffalo, a big group of elephants, and other antelope, small game stuff. The park is bordered also by the Rwenzori mountains, and through the middle of the park are Lake Edward and George, connected by the Kazinga channel. Lake Edward is also the border with DRC in this area, and where the Semiliki river starts. The channel between the two lakes is where you can take a boat trip to see the gazillions of buffalo, hippos, crocs, birds and other small game along the shore. I also saw a few elephants and a hyeena. It's cool to see these animals, but I still prefer plants. At night in the park its pretty cool though because you hear the hippos going nuts and other birds, and there's just a ton of noise in general. The next day I tried again to see chimps in a small gorge in the park where there is a habituated group. Again, I spent hours going through the forest, but saw no chimps. The guide thinks they had left the gorge and went on to the savannah to find fruit. I seem to be particularly bad at seeing chimpanzees. I've got some good pictures, and when I get to Kampala I'll upload them to some albums.
Before I head to Kampala I'm going to spend a few days in an area with some crater lakes, which is supposed to be nice. The hiking is supposed to be great, and you just wander from lake to lake and pass villages on the way. My favorite hikes are the ones where you just wander through rural areas with small farms and villages, and where the kids love to come out and see the mzungu. So it should be some nice hikes around the lakes, and I'll probably stick around there until the end of the week when I'll head east to Kampala.
The place I'm staying at in Fort Portal is really an NGO helping AIDS orphans and children with AIDS, and they run the hostel to support the organization. The women in charge is originally from Maui, and has been exceptionally nice to me. She's given me all sorts of advice and helped me get to these parks without paying a fortune. She also has this amazing library, and I've been reading quite a bit. She had another Elechi Amadi book, The Great Ponds, which is very good. He's a Nigerian author who I randomly bought one of his books in Zambia and really enjoyed it. I also read Chinua Achebe's Anthills on the Savannah, which is excellent. I ready his most famous book Things Fall Apart in high school, which is very, very good. I read The Hours, which is an amazing book, and when I get back to Israel I'll have to get the movie on DVD, and finally I read a book called We wish to inform you that tomorrow you will be killed with you families. It's a book about the Rwandan genocide, and its very difficult to read, but its very, very, very well written. I highly recommend it if you want to learn about the genocide. He also goes into the aftermath of the genocide as it affected the DRC, which is the part of the story that nobody really knows a thing about. I would try to finish a different book tonight before I leave the place, but there are two really good soccer matches on tonight in the Euro 2008 tournament.

Well, I'll post again once I'm in Kampala, when I hope to have links to picture albums available as well.


tchau, B