Wednesday 27th October – Kampala to Soroti ……..Not Quite!!!!

Wednesday 27th October – Kampala to Soroti ……..Not Quite!!!!

Something I should have mentioned before. At each of our overnight stops we never leave any cases or boxes on the bus. So remember that 640Kg of luggage we started with at Birmingham, including the generator and two cement mixers, more of those later? Each overnight stop that luggage must unloaded from the bus and carried to our rooms and in the mornings must be loaded up again. The benefit is that at each stop we leave some cases and boxes behind.

At 7.30am we load up the bus and leave the Guest House and head towards Gertrude’s Guiding Star school. The traffic on the main roads is gridlocked, many times Charles is stopped and switches the engine off for 5 or ten minutes at a time. At one horrendous junction with the “ring road” Claire, who has spent some years, on and off, living here, chirped up “This used to be quite a ‘dicey’ junction”. She has a talent for the understatement.




We drive around Kampala and gradually enter areas of increasing poverty; huge shanty towns where the lucky ones have a one room hut made of wood and corrugated metal to give them shelter, I hesitate to use the words “to live in”. Gertrude was not pulling any punches when she said she worked to help the “neediest of the needy”.

Then in the middle of this poverty, we turned down a dirt track with potholes so big you could lose a bathtub in them and from there we turned into the gates of Gertrude’s school, “Guiding Star” whose motto is “In God we Can”. The buildings were functional, in need of some maintenance, but the 485 children all had a uniform, some of the clothes had more holes than material, but the children wore their uniform with pride.

Assembly was a remarkable affair, all the children in straight lines, quiet; then taken through some physical exercises before being taken off to the school hall where we would be formally greeted.






In the hall the children were seated and gave a huge cheer and applause as we entered. They then greeted us with songs and dancing, separate forms doing different songs. What a remarkable experience; the rhythm, African drums and musical ability was astounding.



Barbara then introduced us and then Rachel led us in a story of Eli and Samuel, getting the children involved throughout. Throughout all this noise and entertainment a little ‘dot’ of a girl was fast asleep in her chair on the front row. Not even an earthquake was going to wake her up.






After this we went for some refreshment of fresh pineapple and water melon with Gertrude as we passed across the things that had been donated by people in the UK; educational books, clothes for the children and women’s prison and, especially useful, baby clothes for the mothers in the women’s prison. Gertrude was delighted she was almost skipping and dancing around the room.

Afterwards we visited class P7 who sit their PLE (Primary Leaving Exam – the equivalent of our 11+) next Tuesday 2nd November. We split into groups and gave them encouragement through prayers and words. The key words that Gertrude keeps telling the children is “Everything is Possible”. The walls of the P7 classroom was covered in hand drawn educational posters covering all four subjects that would be part of the PLE:- Maths, English, Science and SST (Social studies), each topic a different exam paper.



When we left the room we headed to the bus to leave to find that, in the playground, the front offside wheel had been taken off so that the track rod end could be replaced prior to our long journey to Soroti.






Whilst this was done we played with the children, sang songs, juggled, Tig, etc. (This was Plan B.) What a wonderful time, the thought keeps crossing my mind is “How happy these children are when they have so little and how grumpy we can be when we have so much!”

Cath and I stood on top of the underground water tank that had been built for the school by Graham Clark, a friend of ours who sadly died in February this year. We had heard so much about “Graham’s Tank” that we both got emotional standing there thinking about our friend, such a fine man.

Because of the repair the bus was late leaving the school so we would be arriving in Soroti after dark. However Paul was ‘hatching’ plan C, an overnight stop at a town close to Soroti and finish the journey in the morning.

We left and were on our way and had got about 8 miles when a ‘tappety, tap’ sound started coming from the engine. Charles quite rightly stopped and after some diagnosis decided that the oil pump was broken and that to continue driving would cause the engine to seize up. So we waited in the bus, at the side of a busy road while Charles organised a mechanic to come, on a Budda Budda, from Kampala and he duly arrived some 2 hours later carrying his tool bag. In the meantime Luke needed the loo, and it wasn’t a number one!! So Paul and he walked the half mile or so back up the road to a garage we had passed. They had toilets the conditions of which Luke was able to describe in the graphic detail which only an 18 year old can.

Charles had been doing some investigating and decided that he could reach a garage about half a mile ahead without using the engine by coasting down the hill and up the other side and onto the forecourt. (Plan D) SO, Charles took the brakes off and the bus slowly picked up speed down the hill so that it was able to move out into the line of traffic. We nearly made it to the garage before the bus stopped and the alternatives were for us all to get out and push the fully laden bus up the hill, in Kampala traffic or run the engine at ‘tick over’ and limp into the garage. With much relief Charles chose the latter (Plan E).

The garage was a 24hr one with an excellent shop, permanent armed guard and, most importantly, wonderful toilet facilities, Luke was so so upset by this.

We now had to do what all Ugandans are good at, wait. The Mechanic duly arrived and started work dismantling the engine to find the problem. Paul, meantime was on the phone trying to hatch Plan F.

Plan F turned out to be one of major coincidences: Paul knew a lady, Mary Mills, that lived in a town, Mukono, just 8 miles further on. On contact with her he found out that she had been out that day in a 14 seater minibus and would, once she had dropped her passengers off, bring the bus to us and ferry us and the luggage to a hotel in Mukono.

By now someone had turned the Sun off and it was very dark. So we waited. The mini bus duly arrived at about 7.30pm and we met Mary with huge smiles and sounds of appreciatioin. However we and our luggage could not all fit into the bus so Plan G was to split the party, Dr Tom and Dave staying behind with Charles to look after the bus and the luggage, the others to go ahead and get a hotel sorted out. This agreed, the minibus set of to Mukono.

As Dr Tom and I waited a lady with a HUGE smile approached us, it was Gertrude. Having heard about our plight she had used public transport and taxis to get to us as quickly as possible. She insisted on staying and proceeded to hatch Plan H – our transport to Soroti in the morning as it was clear her bus would not be repaired in time, which she did with amazing speed.

So around 8.40pm the minibus arrived back, was duly loaded with cases and boxes and Dr Tom and I said goodnight to Gertrude and Charles. Gertrude also made arrangements with the armed guard that he would protect our bus as well.

We got into a hotel in Mukono which could take our party and Mary used her local contacts to get the best rate she could for us.

During all of this we had phone calls from the Building Team in Rukingiri who were making huge progress; ceilings had been painted, the water tank had been bought and transported to the site on the roof of the Global Care vehicle and the guttering was more or less complete.

So we eventually all got to Mukono just after 9pm, a final call to the building team to let them know we were safe, a quick buffet supper and off to bed.

Tomorrow we would be up at 7am and planned to have the bus loaded with luggage etc and be on our journey to Soroti by 8am. Would we need a Plan I?

What a day of experiences, the highs, the lows. We are all shattered, the heat and travelling taking its toll on us, not to mention no opportunity to wash properly so 14 semi-washed bodies all in close proximity AND on top of that we have Dr Tom’s trainers to contend with – but that is another story to tell sometime.

As I get into bed and start to drift to sleep Ron Newby’s words keep coming to my mind “You cannot do everything but you can’t do nothing.” So the more I see the more determined I become to help just one more child – just one more.