The economy in Uganda has been growing by 7% per year and you can see new Mercedes cars and BMW's cars being driven by Africans who have made it. Yet the real reason for the fastest growing economy in Africa is the return of the East Indian community that was kicked out by Idi Amin in 1972 (40,000 were forcefully expelled and their properties taken over by the state and given to friends of Idi Amin and the government, something that ruined the country economically). Today their sons and daughters have returned and reclaimed the properties and brought in new capital. Many of them come from places like Toronto and Vancouver, Canada, London, etc.  Out of those who left in the 70's there are actually only 500 returnees but since 1986 over 15,000 Indians have come from India and some of them came with money, but most came to make money working as managers in stores, restaurants and hotels and all other kinds of business.

Lately the Chinese have been arriving in droves, there are more Chinese restaurants here than in most places in the USA, or Europe.  They are heavily investing their money in all kinds of businesses from furniture stores to herbal clinics.  They are opening stores, hotels, restaurants and investing in Ugandan businesses.

Downtown, everything looks like things are becoming prosperous, were it not for the street kids that accost you as you stop for a traffic light. (Kampala now has three) Go beyond downtown to the slums and you will find the real Kampala that has not changed. That remains in poverty, where life and death intermingle daily. Where survival is the word of the day. Where eight to ten people live in a small room, where the rats are the size of cats and where there is a shortage of everything but misery.

The Ugandan, in such a place if he or she has a job, makes very little like 25 to 50 dollars a month. Money for which he or she puts in long hours. The typical waitress or waiter  in a restaurant in Kampala comes from such slums, wearing their nice uniform they look well off, but they never get to eat the things that they serve and many of them make between 25 and 60 dollars a month for 12 hour shifts, (women often get less) working six to seven days a week. (Staff is served a bowl of Ugandan food in back of restaurant). 

Take the house-girl that works all day long, seven days a week for 30 dollars a month, or the security guard that makes 60 dollars a month for 12-hour shifts seven days a week.

Life is hard in Uganda and similar to other African countries, even though services like doctors cost only 15 dollars a visit, when you only make 40 dollars a month you think twice before going. Traditional healers who live in the villages and slums are making a real comeback and even Christians and Muslims often go to such seeking their counsel and advice.

Health is a big issue in Uganda with Aids blowing its unmerciful winds across all economic and social lines. In fact Aids started amongst the elite of Uganda first and literally wiped out whole families. Now it is sweeping through the slums and villages touching almost every family. One thing that is often absent in Uganda are older people unless you go to a village. A whole generation of Ugandans has been deeply touched. In the last five years 500,000 people have died of Aids and Aids related sicknesses and that are the documented cases, countless more people die of the disease and it is not recorded as such. 

I spoke to Tito who lived in a home I worked with. He had lost his mother a week earlier. I asked him how his mother died and he gave me a common Ugandan answer. "You know that Baganda (tribe) witchcraft." That often is the answer for someone who dies of Aids, witchcraft. His sister had died of the same thing as the mother. There are more orphans from Aids than came about during the various wars that have taken place in Uganda during the last 25 years.

Malaria is still the biggest killer in Uganda with over 150,000 people dying every year from this dreaded tropical disease that relentlessly affects everyone. Especially the young. The primary medicine, chloroquine is proving ineffective and new treatments are not as readily available or are costly and most Africans will simply go to the pharmacy and get what they feel will work best since you do not need prescriptions.

In the slums and small villages the simplest of illnesses, like diarrhea will take their toll amongst the children and many of them die from such things. Medical care at hospitals costs money and people have to bring their own mattresses, toilet paper, and food. I have seen people simply sleep on the springs of a military bed. Often no doctors are available when you go at night and you have to give a bribe to get treated. Doctors who themselves are trying to eke out a living, steal hospital medicines and sell them in private clinics that they run in various places. It all comes down to survival.

Education, since 1996 is supposed to be for all and free and the government has allocated money but it is not enough and many children simply do not learn. When it comes to education the job of paying the school-fees, uniforms, books require many family-members to pitch in share for the cost. The Swahili word "Harambee" which means pulling together best describes this unique African concept of helping each other.

When you add up the cost of school you can see why people help each other. Primary school will run between 20 to 50 dollars for a three month term, on top of that you have to buy a school uniform that is between eight to ten dollars, add things like books, paper, pencils, besides the student has to bring a broom for cleaning and several rolls of toilet paper. I have spoken to a student who was denied toilet privileges simply because he did not have toilet paper. Many students have to pay for lunch, which is a dollar a day and then there is the cost of going to and from school which is in a crowded taxi, actually a mini-bus. That can cost between 80 cents to two dollars a day depending on where the school is.

The government has made education free for Ugandan children, yet many Ugandans want private schools thinking that they are better and that of course means more money to spend.

Food is for sale everywhere. You can see the produce neatly stacked on the ground everywhere in makeshift markets. Chickens are either tied down or in cages. Beef hangs out in the open, covered with flies, slowly some butchers are adding some kind of refrigeration. Green Banana stalks (matoke) are sold to hagglers. Everything here is bargained for including the caskets that are transported on the back of bikes. (Entebbe road has a section where most caskets are made. It is shocking to see the many small caskets for children.) Rarely is anything bought here without a bit of bargaining.

When it comes to food. The main staple is matoke, which is a green banana that is mashed and steamed in a pot over a charcoal stove covered with banana leaves. There is also posho, which is a corn meal that is made into something that looks like grainy mashed potatoes and to me tastes like glue. Meat is expensive, since a chicken costs around four to five dollars, and beef is about the only meat that people can regularly afford. (Beef is sold by pound with no choice of cuts) Many Africans hardly ever eat meat since it simply costs too much and stick to posho, matoke, kidney beans, ground peanut sauce, cassava, and sweet potatoes.

Faith is a main part of Ugandan life. You will rarely find agnostic or atheist in Africa (I found one). Most people have a real faith in God. Churches and Mosques are filled with worshippers during services and people embrace their faith in a very serious fashion. Moslems and Christians in Uganda get along reasonably well and there is a tolerance for each other

Church services last for hours, literally all day long. A church near our house has church everyday and ministers to 2000 people who have Aids, some of which have been healed through prayer (?So the local newspaper reported). On Friday evening most churches have an all night prayer meeting. Sunday morning many churches begin singing and never stop until late in the afternoon and then they start again with an evening service. Even most devout Westerners would have difficulty adjusting. Faith, for many Ugandans is the hub of social life. When you have little else, it becomes the focus and provides a needed outlet for the pain of heart and soul that so many feel. They take their faith very seriously and their devotion to God is carried out in daily life. President Museveni has said that for many jobs he would only like to hire born again Christians or devout Muslims since it would reduce the level of corruption that is prevalent in Africa.

Church attendance often numbers into the thousands. There are many churches that have over 5000 in attendance on Sunday mornings and evangelism has become a way of life. There is no separation of church and state as known in the West, but people in all walks of life freely speak of God and take it as normal to do so.

In the northern part of Uganda, things are stabilizing after 2 1/2 million people were displaced and shipped in Internally Displaced Persons Camps. 30,000 Children were abducted, thousands maimed both physically and emotionally. The Kony rebels, (Lord's Resistance Army) were at one time trained by the government of Sudan  creating havoc for over 20 years . It was their desire to overthrow the government of President Museveni who has been in power since 1986. They wanted to establish a state that functions according to the "10 commandments." Their methods were not so Christian since they took students at gunpoint into Sudan to train as rebels while the girls became concubines and cooked for them.

Those who were not abducted lived in fear, many of the children of the north became night commuters and slept in the towns under verandas, in hospital and school grounds wanting to keep safe from the raids of the Kony Rebels also referred to as the LRA.  Two and a half million of the north fled their homes and settled in camps in order to avoid the raids of the rebels.  Now they are returning home, but home is not what they left and much rebuilding is needed.  The good news is that rebuilding is taking place.

Now stability has come to the country during the last two years since there was a cease fire with the Lord's Resistance Army under the leadership of Joseph Kony who claims to be possessed by the spirit of a dead Italian and who continued what had been started by his aunt Alice Lakwena who claimed the same source of power as does Joseph Kony.  Alice Lakwena now lives in exile in Kenya as a refugee and has urged Kony to make peace with the government and the final agreement has not been signed.  Alice Auma Lakwena has died - read her amazing story.

There might be a cease-fire in the north of Uganda, but the war of twenty some years has had an effect on the people who live there, their hearts and soul tattooed with fear of being abducted, that will take years to change.

Yes, Slowly peace has returned to the north, but economically it is in sad shape, there is no infrastructure and not much medical care available, the life expectancy in places like Gulu and Pader is 29 and 32 years, while in Kampala it is 53 years.  Schools are opening up, and commerce activities are returning

This rebellion was also one along tribal lines, since most fighters for General Kony are Acholi who feel that the government in Kampala has neglected their needs in the north. It is true that the north is the place of those who have not and it has to do that two of the former leaders came from their. Idi Amin who died in Saudi Arabia, and Milton Obote who was buried in Uganda. Both caused havoc amongst the people and tribes of the rest of the country. are under indictment by the International Criminal Court in De Hague, Netherlands for crimes against humanity.  Yet, many Acholis believe that the real solution is amnesty and the ritual from their culture referred to as the bitter drink, where two who had opposed each other sit down and partake of the bitter drink as to not to return to the broken relationship of the past.

Today Joseph Kony has shifted his troops to South Sudan, Central African Republic and to the Democratic Republic of Congo.  There he has continued to raid villages and abduct people.  He also did not show up at a peace signing in Juba, South Sudan.  One can only hope that things would change for the best.

Joseph Kony is not seen as a villain by many Acholis. but as a sort of Robin Hood who stood up to the government in Kampala that has neglected the northern region of Uganda.  Today Kony and a few others are under indictment from the International Criminal Court in De Hague, Netherlands.  It is for that reason that Kony has not signed any peace agreement with Kampala and many here want that indictment rescinded.

In regards to the government, the ruling party is the National Resistance Movement led by President Yoweri Museveni who has ruled the country since 1986.  In 2005 he the constitution was changed and removed term limits, now President Museveni is in his third term and already there are plans for him to run in 2011.

President Museveni has provided stability for Uganda and good economic growth, on the other side one sees some things that remind one of hanging on to power.  There is much criticism of him in newspapers such as the "Monitor" and "The Observer,"  often written by Ugandans living abroad.  The real question is, "Who would take his place?"  The opposition grumbles and complains but there seems to be no one present today who could lead Uganda into a better future.

In spite of it all the average Ugandan has a tremendous sense of humor and lives in the here and now. The little pubs and restaurants where barbecue chicken and goat is served on skewer are filled people listening to music as various as rap, reggae often a blend of western and Ugandan styles.

There is an appreciation of the here and now, of the moment not knowing what tomorrow will bring and a desire to forget the pain of today and yesterday. Laughter and joy is the common denominator amongst the common people of Uganda. You do not see the empty stare of a person in poverty like the street people of the West. There is a determination to live in spite of the way things are .  Lastly, Uganda is a great place to visit and is my favorite place in Africa.  I love going to Nairobi, Mombasa, Kigali but at the end of the day, I love the pearl of Africa-Uganda, to me it is the heart of Africa...jon

Ugandan Picture Gallery