Installment #1--Travel, Travel, Travel

I have made it safely to my almost last stop! On June 21, at about 3:30 p.m. I left my good friend Scott at the Jet Blue gate and headed over to the International terminal at JFK Airport in New York. After sitting for a while, I ran into John Magee and Danielle Davies, two of the people who have made the trip to Africa with me. The three of us chatted for a while and hung out, and the rest of the group slowly drifted in. By 8:00, we were checking in to our Emirates flight to Uganda. At 11:30, we were in the air and off!!! I have to pause for a moment though and say, the seats on an international flight that lasts thirteen hours should definitely take into account that a sizeable portion of the U.S. population is over six feet tall and can’t fit comfortably into 20 inches of legroom. All right, I’m being unfair, 22 inches of legroom. As Murphy would have it, my seat assignment was, of course, in the middle of the middle section of the plane.

Finally, after two movies, three meals, two naps of two hours, and several conversations with two friendly, but equally large seat neighbors, our plane landed in Dubai. As a group, we cruised through customs with ease (that is except for one of our teachers who wears dreadlocks and has two arms full of tattoos—he was treated to a royal strip search care of the Emirates airport security). We caught a shuttle to the Emirates Airport Hotel and found our rooms. By the time we dropped our bags, it was 9:45 p.m.—23 hours after we left NY (but only 15 hours real time). That doesn’t bode well on a body. Still feeling like it was 1:45, our group headed out to the very eloquent and ornate Emirates mall, home of the world famous “Ski Dubai”—an indoor ski hill. Five of our group took the opportunity to ski on the slopes while the rest of us enjoyed a nice stroll through the ridiculously large (supermarket included) mall.

After the stroll, it was back to the hotel for a few quick hours of sleep before hopping on the plane again. Or, at least, laying in bed and listening to your roomie (who is hilarious, genuine, and one heck of a guy, and who also has a blog—check it out here www.mageeinuganda.blogspot.com) sleep happily (while sawing some serious logs—redwood style). We got to the airport, hopped the plane, flew three hours to Ethiopia, sat on the tarmac for an hour to drop people off and pick a few others up, and took off for another two and a half hour flight before we landed in Uganda.

We were met at the airport by Amy Cordileone (the IC Teacher Exchange Coordinator), James, and three mutatus (special hire taxi-vans). We loaded our luggage and an hour or so later, arrived at Backpacker’s Hostel in Kampala, Uganda. Most of the group was pretty tired, and our bodies, our internal clocks, our digestive systems were all out of whack, but the excitement was unbearable. Five or six of us kept saying over and over, “We’re in Africa! We’re in Africa!” I’ll admit it; I did even let out a little Woo Hoo.