this rocky hill looks like a medieval castle!

here's a closeup of petrified wood - if we took some home, we'd be cursed!

from boulder, utah, we took the burr trail into capitol reef national park

the dirt road was empty, beautiful, and in surprisingly good shape

(especially given this forbidding sign the the start)

it began with a dozen or so miles through the "long canyon"

(red cliffs on either side of the road)

we slithered/strolled into a surprising slot canyon just off the burr trail - cool!

(this is ryan's trusty taurus, all dusted up from the trail)

exiting the long canyon, the burr trail drops off into a valley

and enters capitol reef national park

the gorgeous, snow-capped henry mountains

in sharp contrast to the stop-and-go roads in zion, the burr trail was all ours

the henry mountains once again, as seen from a scenic pass on route 12

a fresh april fool's day snow had everything looking especially frosty

including the red hoodoos in the canyon

erosion can be a rather impressive thing

see? it can build a bridge

this animal friend was calm and enjoyed eating leaves

(vastly preferable to those who leap into moving vehicles)

zion is potentially cool, but was seriously overcrowded when we went

we enjoyed bryce and the capitol reef area much more

we began our great southwestern national park tour at the grand canyon,

which is quite a bit more exciting than your average hole in the ground!

on a wednesday, we drive into the desert!

joshua tree national park greets us with boulders

the rocks are surprisingly grippy and pretty easy to climb and scramble upon

like clouds, they beg our imagination to assign a likeness

the joshua tree, a real desert hero

joshua pose!

cholla cactus garden, a spiny, prickly place...

the san gorgonio pass wind farm is home to hundreds of whooshing windmills...

...quite a sight to behold

you thought he was gone, but no!

just enjoying a long cold winter in a furry ushanka.

a cold february day on the great wall of china!

this is a "wild wall" portion of the greater great wall

(thankfully touristless)

"wild" because many sections of the wall in this area were in ruin...

...and in some cases, completely overgrown

it's mind-boggling how the wall clings to the terrain across intense elevation changes

further evidence of my visit!

when you see something like this on the street in a foreign country...

i find it's best to do something like this!

when someone like me sits down to eat alone at a restaurant in beijing, knowing not a word of mandarin, it can be comforting to see some english descriptions of dishes on the menu. however, ripe with the finest chingrish around, these translations can cause more confusion (and tears of hilarity) than clarity. enjoy the following selections from a place i visited for lunch.

poor piggy

for those in a hurry

you might be too if you were scalloped

a vegetarian dish, perhaps?

?!?!?!

...

"sheep's leg greedy bullfrog (do the boiler...)"

i guess that's what the bullfrog gets for being greedy

BONUS: "jumbotron" description from an acrobats performance

"bounding vigorously - ball catching"

(what this turned out to be was a mind-blowing juggling show)

my last major excursion in cambodia was to the eastern province of mondulkiri, a mountainous region where nights are cool, ants are many, and elephants are man's best friend.

my main goal was to travel by (elephant) foot into the forest,

which was pretty easy to do with twenty bucks.

i was only "saddled up" for half the day (i walked back alongside the elephants) because the "basket" in which we were seated was so small that my knees were tucked into my armpits for about the whole ride. not comfortable. but fun anyway.

we ended at a waterfall and swimming hole, where a group of kids were launching themselves into the water below. it would have been pretty interesting to have had access to such a playground as a kid.

after a much-needed bath, our elephant took a few minutes to scratch an itch...

this was how we moved (note the child "driver")

for five relaxing nights, i stayed in this simple little cabin -

an excellent way to wrap up my time in southeast asia

a short boat ride form the southern coastal town of kep is "rabbit island",

where we stayed for a couple nights in bamboo bungalows.

all along the beach were small groves of trees with hammocks strung on every available limb

back on the motorcycle again, we set out to reach the top of bokor hill. it's a very eerie place, featuring some palatial old houses, hotels, a church and a casino, all long ago abandoned and in ruin. at the top of the hill (1000m), we were among the clouds, which added to the spookiness of the place. the main access road is under construction and usually off limits to anyone but organized tour groups. however, it was luckily open for a few days because of the chinese new year; we happily took advantage!

i suspect this was a concrete water tower in its day

here is the casino building, perhaps the largest structure on bokor hill.

every part of the building is still accessible.

behind the casino is a cliff that tumbles off into the whooping, chirping, cackling mountain forest, on this day almost completely obscured by the clouds

i was only in vientiane for one day, during which i visited a couple used bookshops and loa pdr's very own arc de triomphe style monument. form the top, i could see most of the city, which looks like little more than a town. it must be the calmest capital city in the world...

on the road from luang prabang, there were some incredible rock formations and mountains...

...which i tried to capture out the window of our van

i learned to ride a small motorcycle and made myself busy cruising around the

villages west of vang vieng town

the mountains are riddled with caves and i squirmed through child-sized crevices and tunnels on my stomach until i realized they are certainly not made for giants. i spent the rest of my time in daylight.

with sunset approaching, i rode back to town, which has turned into an alarming, spring-break-esque party capital of southeast asia. i really don't know how a scene like vang vieng comes to be, but it is fairly shocking (seemingly oblivious to the local population)...and thankfully avoidable with some effort :)

a gilded pagoda alongside a bend in the mekong river

peaceful mountain sunset...

...diligently captured by a frenzied gaggle of other point-and-shooters

on a bike ride, i came upon this nice view of town from a mountain pass

here is the street where i stayed for the first 3 nights

(i had to move because of babies and ringtones)

riverside gardening, with stylish hat

monks out for a stroll

turquoise pools, in a jungle...

(throngs of tourists, not pictured)

it's a bizarre thing to have now visited two countries where an unimaginable genocide was perpetrated so recently. tuol sleng is a former prison in phnom penh where khmer rouge officials interrogated, tortured, and killed their captives. today it is a museum dedicated to telling the story of the brutal years of oppression suffered under pol pot and the khmer rouge.

prison cells, barely wide enough for my shoulders

a torture cell for those accused of leading opposition efforts against pol pot

the enormous, amazing angkor wat.

angkor wat is the most famous temple in the region, which

is home to dozens of ancient temples in varying degrees of ruin.

i imagine one could spend weeks here and not see it all.

a "finger dancer", one of countless etchings in the stone

one of more than 200 stone faces at the temple bayon, in angkor thom

a headless statue in preah khan

(all the statues with heads still in tact have been moved to museums)

nature vying to reclaim the east gate of ta som...

...as well as this inner chamber of ta prohm

banteay srey is small in comparison to other temples in the area, and remarkably well preserved

(with evident assistance from conservationists)

the carvings here are perhaps more intricate than those of any other temple...

...with a level of depth and detail that is hard to fathom

kbal spean is a series of carvings along a river in some nearby hills

known as "the river of a thousand lingas", kbal spean features, well,

thousands of stone phallic symbols called "lingas"

the lingas lead to a waterfall...

...where some local kids were cooling off

we ended our three-day templing spree at phnom bok, a ruined temple atop a large hill

with an impressive view of the surrounding countryside

cycling some timber...

...perhaps to build a house like this one.

i thought it was interesting how most houses in rural areas here are built on stilts.

it obviously helps during times of high water, but i've been told the design

helps keep the house cool - a useful thing in this muggy climate.

very common traditional housing in busia, near lake victoria

most people in uganda have a place where they live and work, though it is almost always different from their village "home." in fact, given the proximity of these villages homes to the nearest employment opportunity, such a distinction is unavoidable. so whenever you ask someone where he/she is from, you should specify what you mean - do you want to know where they live or where their village is?

when the christmas holiday approaches, people begin migrating back to their village homes, where they will find children, grandparents, spouses, and siblings. transport prices double and in some cases triple as people shift from one part of the country to another. kampala (uganda's only major transport hub) slows to a frustrating crawl amidst choking throngs of pedestrians and trapped vehicles under an unusually thick haze of pollution. i had to travel through kampala several days before christmas last year and swore i'd never do it again. it is complete and utter madness - kind of like a giant, filthy mall.

this year, i happily accepted several invitations to visit friends of mine at their village homes, staying far away from the capital city and relying almost exclusively on the kindness and curiosity of several ugandan strangers who picked me up along the road...

* * *

neighbor's compound is situated in the midst of several enormous mango trees, around which sit five circular huts. the dwellings are modestly constructed out of crumbling, exposed brick and are more or less half-finished. i believe they might appear quite differently if this were the site of their original home, a permanent place built up over many years. but, sadly, her family was forced to flee from that established setting during "the insurgency" in 1989 during which soldiers commandeered the area, cutting down trees, destroying houses, looting the place and stripping it of all practical value. when neighbor came back more than a decade later, there was nothing left. her family decided to start over in a new location less than a kilometer away, which is where i visited.

a mango tree is rather impressive, like a wide, dense, towering cloud of leaves and branches whose ceiling is conveniently about six feet off the ground. it serves as a great shelter and allows most people (excluding yours truly) to walk comfortably underneath. to have one of these trees in your family's compound, let alone three, is a blessing, especially when they are producing. i was given a bowl of five ripe, juicy mangoes after lunch, which i enjoyed thoroughly. actually, i've eaten so many in the last couple weeks that my lips are raw.

it was coming to dusk as we sat drinking hot cocoa from mismatched mugs under one of the three mango trees, which had a pile of firewood - for cooking - stacked at its base. i almost didn't notice the hen as it approached, but my curiosity piqued when it hopped up from one piece of firewood to another until it was halfway up the tree trunk. once there, it stopped, looking befuddled. i asked my neighbor what was going on and she told me, very matter-of-factly that the chickens were getting ready for bed. they have been trained to sleep in trees! i think it's actually a regional phenomenon for this to happen and some chickens do it instinctively - up in the limbs, they are safe from predators and less prone to disease. as an added bonus for me, it's hilarious!

within minutes of my question, i saw a whole gaggle of hens climbing the mango tree on the opposite edge of the compound. one by one, they hopped up into its branches not to be seen again until morning. all were safely nestled above except for the rooster, who is apparently too heavy to hop to such a height on his own. but he's not left to his own devices on the ground; one of the (five) wives of the compound picked him up, walked him very calmly over to the edge of the tree's canopy, did a full-body wind-up, and threw him full-force into the mango tree! the rooster squawked and flapped and unsteadily came to rest amid his leafy evening surroundings. good night, delicious bird.

from a clear patch of night sky a half-moon was shining, the light of which was enough to illuminate the compound and allow us to do most of what we needed without a lantern. nights like these are neighbor's favorite; she can sit outside until very late, conversing with others and still able to observe the entire village. on this evening, as our yawning grew more and more contagious, we noticed dark storm clouds organizing themselves in the moon's glow from the opposite direction.

i entered one of the huts, which i shared on this night with the head of the compound and husband to the five wives. we settled in and, moments after we laid down, we could hear the first fat, heavy drops of what promised to be a solid rainfall. after several false starts, the sky opened up on our iron sheets, increasing in intensity until it was deafening. despite its alarming volume, this sound can be a very relaxing thing, conjuring a feeling similar to that of being warm in bed while cold winds are howling outside. just knowing that the crazy outside cannot touch the cozy inside amplifies this comfort. i was consciously appreciating this when i thought i felt something hit my leg... then my arm... and then my eyelid. the weather was no longer being held at bay by our roof - it had forced its way in and began raining onto my bed! i was too tired to react (nothing could be done, nothing at all) so i just pulled my sheet up and tried to settle in the dry spots. it was likely a wind-related issue, because my indoor rain stopped after only about ten minutes while the outdoor rain continued long after i fell asleep.

over a dinner of freshly roasted chicken earlier in the evening (the only bird who didn't make it up into the tree that night), i was informed of various "chicken customs" among the tribes of uganda. the common thread among all of them is that a chicken must be slaughtered for a visitor. but beyond that we find deviations: some cultures force the visitor(s) to eat the entire bird on his/her/their own while other cultures send the visitor away with a live chicken and any remaining cooked chicken from the meal. in the particular region of uganda i was visiting, the hosts customarily join the visitor(s) in the meal (which i think is a healthy practice) and then send a live chicken with the visitor when they go. the following day, i had the pleasure of carrying a living, pooping chicken on my 3 hour journey home, along with a guitar and a backpack stuffed with sweet potatoes, maize, freshly picked oranges, and an untouched change of clothes.

* * *

$25 per person bought each of my friends 12.5 kilos of meat this year

yes, christmas in uganda is a pretty big deal. as one friend said, people begin planning (saving) for "their christmas" from the first of january. it is a time for people to come together...to come together and eat meat. groups of friends and colleagues pool resources and pay their share slowly, bit by bit, throughout the year to save enough money for a cow/bull. our college staff had organized such a group and held their slaughtering party on the 23rd. music blared from a boom-box while the meat was cut, weighed, and distributed in the blazing midday sun. on this day, it turned out that each $25 share bought 12.5 kilograms of beef for the share owner to carry home to his/her family. as a lucky bystander at the slaughtering party who grilled up four extraordinarily fresh charity steaks on the 23rd and as a guest at two of the homes, i had more than my fill of beef this holiday season. moving through villages on the road to my counterpart's home, he said (just as i was thinking the very same thing myself): "these festivities are smelly, as you can see..." it was in the air, the smell of raw, not-so-fresh-anymore meat. needless to say, by the end of it all i was just craving an apple and a celery stalk.

season's greetings, phonetically speaking

somehow, there is only one page left on the 2009 calendar mom made for me last year and i have a feeling it's not gonna last long; i'm caught in one of those pockets where time just runs like mad. our students finished their final exams today and head home tomorrow morning for the long holiday. while i welcome the peace and quiet this change will bring, i'm less excited about the implications. the school year is now over and following soon after is my peace corps service. between now and january 14th, i'll be tying up the loose ends of all my projects and will hopefully be able to post something meaningful about what has been going on recently. i'm really pleased with how things are winding up and couldn't be more grateful for this opportunity i've had here. more to come soon...

watedo nangin (we're cooking clothes!)

there is a thing i usually say to people whenever i'm complimented on my local language skills: "afwonjere moth moth; kis ndelo amedo wach achiel..." which basically means, "i'm learning slowly, each day i add one word." this, sadly, is a lie. i have not consistently dedicated the time needed to advance my vocabulary on a daily basis, but this stock saying serves well in response to random praise from strangers. keep in mind, this praise is often triggered by the simplest things, like greeting, which i have been doing since week one.

having said all that, i love picking up new words in the language and try to seize every opportunity i can. i recently learned an obscure and somewhat depressing word: chwarino (bed bugs). i wish i could say i had no particular reason to ask, but i suspected them of having infiltrated my tiny ugandan home. i had been waking up fairly often with bites in suspicious patterns and finally decided to put my foam mattress under the sun. having never seen a bed bug before, i wasn't sure what to look for, but i did notice some conspicuous insect activity on the underside of the mattress. not certain whether they traveled outside with the foam or hopped on once it was under the sun, i chose to err on the side of caution. i've heard the horror stories and do not want to become another victim!

i quickly organized an extermination plan, which included a college maintenance staff member applying chemicals to my bed and wooden furniture on a tuesday. as we discussed our plan of attack, i jumped at the chance to employ some clever dhopadhola:

chwarino tye i ot paran...jorach maaa.

(bedbugs are in my house. they are so bad.)

wanyalo neko chwarino saw'adi?

(we are able to kill bedbugs at what time?)

as it turned out, 3pm was a good time. to give our poison a chance to dissipate afterward, i spent a couple nights in tororo town, 5km away - i had hoped the body count would be high but was not willing to be among the dead. the next step (which i grossly underestimated) was to come back home thursday morning and boil my clothes. to do so, i needed to first explain myself and request a big saucepan from the cooking staff upon my return:

tich aryo, waketho yath i kitanda paran.

(on tuesday, we put poison on my bed frame.)

konon, amito moro pii i sapik ma dwong t'atedo nangin jie.

(today i want to boil water in a big saucepan and cook all my clothes.)

i am by no means a dhopadhola specialist, but i love feeling conversational...especially when it allows me to say ridiculous things. in this case, i got to say such things while moving almost completely out of my house and then back in again over the course of a day. several students thankfully came to my aid in the boiling and poison-blasting effort. it's hard to say what effect this may ultimately have on the suspected invaders, but it was a pretty amusing and exhausting experience. so far so good - i've been sleeping soundly and bite-free. but just typing that makes me feel like i'm foolishly tempting the chwarino gods...

our peace corps post in uganda was thriving under the direction of larry brown, someone who is sincerely concerned about the safety, support, and effectiveness of each and every volunteer in the field. he is the best example i can imagine of a country director acting in the best interest of volunteers in the country he was serving. it certainly felt like he was indeed here to serve us. larry understood his reason for being here as a commitment to support each and every volunteer living and working in uganda and, by doing so, better serve the communities in which we live. put quite simply, he was an enthusiastic, outspoken advocate for us.

it was energizing to have an administration encourage us and pledge support so seriously. under larry's leadership, we felt empowered. not in a rebellious way, but in a positive way, we were urged to take personal responsibility and be proactive. he believed, quite correctly, that this post wouldn’t exist without the volunteers. larry gave us a voice, compelling us to personally invest in the future value of peace corps uganda. in my opinion, this is exactly the role a country director should play.

it is extremely disappointing to know that his efforts were not only ignored by those in a higher position, but that they may have ultimately lead to his termination. if the peace corps administration in washington does not exist for the purpose of supporting posts, volunteers, and the communities in which we live and work, then what purpose does it serve? i cannot imagine. but i do know that the decision to remove larry brown from his position as country director was not made in the interest of supporting myself and my fellow volunteers here in uganda. in fact, it has been a significant disservice to us.

although there has been a fair amount of speculation about larry brown’s removal, we volunteers have received absolutely no official explanation for the decision. perhaps more disturbingly, for three weeks we had not received a single piece of correspondence from peace corps administration, washington or otherwise, informing us that any decision was made at all. we all learned of the momentous development through a haphazard string of volunteer-to-volunteer cell phone calls, text messages, and speculative emails. as i write this, my country director has left uganda for his home in the us, and no one knows why. all signs on the ground suggest that the situation was severely mishandled and should be investigated.

i am confused and saddened by the departure of such an energetic and inspirational country director and disappointed in those who made this bewildering decision. the responsible person or group of people has clearly lost sight of the peace corps agency’s purpose – to act in the best interest of volunteers serving worldwide, and the communities in which we live. peace corps was created for that purpose and in this case i feel that it has failed. we deserve better.

carrying what... local brew? paint? water? petrol?

my money is on the brew :)

it must have been a huge revolution when bicycles first reached tororo (around 1980 by some local accounts). it is difficult enough for me to imagine this area without the now ubiquitous motorcycles, but without bicycles? it would be an almost unrecognizable place. a significant portion of uganda's population gets around on two wheels these days; you can find bicycles, motorcycles, and their taxi incarnations (bodas) in even the smallest village trading centers.

a common means of generating income - the bicycle taxi

(note: a real bicycle taxi has a colorful, padded back seat...with tassels)

in addition to their drivers, bicycles and motorcycles are often seen carrying a mind-boggling variety of cargo, including: humans (several times, i've seen six people on one motorcycle), crates of soda and beer bottles (both full and empty), jerrycans of pretty much anything, enormous sacks of grain or charcoal, numerous bunches of green bananas, firewood, live animals (snorting pigs, wailing goats, clucking chickens, stupid turkeys who defecate on my veranda), less road-worthy bicycles on their way to be repaired, bed frames, couches, coffins, even a merchant's entire inventory displayed in a flimsy, ten-foot-high, plywood kiosk. it's rather incredible; if something needs to be transported, odds are good that it can be moved on two wheels. personally, i have been adventurous enough to strap my backpack, my guitar, and a jerrycan to my bike. but that's child's play here.

a shoe merchant transports his wares through mukono

(how does this work?!?!)

(note the driver's winter attire...it's 85 degrees!)

despite all these fancy, two-wheeled options, when it comes to moving around in uganda, nothing is cheaper or more readily available than your own two feet. this is how people got around for centuries; the adoption of wheels as a daily means of transportation for the masses has been a surprisingly recent development. even today you will find people walking prodigious distances to and from the nearest town, health center, a burial, or a workshop, simply because it is a free and reliable means of transport. and as with most things here, time is not often a big concern. maybe someday, as western influences and transport options permeate ugandan culture, the notion of "african time" may lose some of its authority. but this much is clear: for the slowly growing number of people with a little disposable income and/or a busy schedule, the quicker, two-wheeled alternatives are gradually becoming "the new feet."

it makes sense. every year, two teams face off for the chance to be called super bowl champs. and every year, one of them emerges victorious from the fray, immediately and miraculously wearing t-shirts (so soon??) announcing their superiority to the world. logistically baffling, you say? indeed! but each year, as most people know, t-shirts are printed for both the winning and losing teams before the game is even played. then, whenever the winning team is known, its players can immediately be given their championship shirts. no waiting, no hassle, no messy clean-up. that is, unless you consider cleaning up after all those loser t-shirts. they cannot possibly be permitted to see the light of day and confuse the issue of who's really the best of the best. no, those loser shirts must be packed, sealed, and shipped to the deepest, most remote location in the world where they'll never be seen by an NFL fan. a place like kitgum, uganda, for instance.

while eating lunch one day on a recent trip to northern uganda, my friend, lisandro, noticed a super bowl champions t-shirt. as peace corps volunteers here, we're tuned to a slightly different frequency; things like this excite us and make us look more closely. lisandro called the young man over to get a better look at his shirt and found that, yes, it really was a loser shirt! after two years of searching, we had finally laid eyes on one! and it's not just any loser shirt, but a patriots "perfect 19-0 season" from super bowl 42. in reality of course, they lost the game and their perfect season to the giants that year. subsequently, this beautiful, xxl t-shirt which was so eager to broadcast that piece of history from the chest of a victorious lineman, was sent to a village in northern uganda only to be bought off the back of its owner for $2 by a giddy volunteer who promises to wear it non-stop the next time he goes to boston. good eye, lisandro, good eye.

as if...

i am reclined on the veranda of a luxury bungalow watching the sun set behind a canopy of trees along the eastern bank of the nile river in jinja, while monkeys meander casually across a closely-cropped lawn in the low evening light to collect leaves from the landscaped foliage surrounding the buildings and pathways of this resort compound. it is a moment both uncommonly peaceful and frustrating, unfolding and ending of its own accord whether i'm ready or not.

this is my close of service conference for peace corps. the fifteen or so incredible and inspiring volunteers in attendance are being generously (and deservedly) put up for a few days in a luxury resort which would otherwise be well beyond the reach of our modest budget. the food has been outstanding, the atmosphere relaxed, and the mood optimistic if not a little apprehensive. two years in a developing country sounds like a long time, but it is not forever; our service here is winding down and it is now time to look forward to whatever may come next.

of course, this is not at all how i expected to reach this point and there are still numerous challenges to face before i say goodbye to our beautiful host country. if all had gone according to plan, i would have been in this position six months ago, alongside the stellar volunteers who went through every day of training with me way back in march of 2007. but things do not always go according to plan. i got sick and was sent home to the usa early in my service as a volunteer. i questioned the wisdom of fighting to come back to a place where i had encountered such misfortune and worried that something bad might happen to me again should i return. i grew weary of the reinstatement process, which took months longer than expected; i was literally two days from giving up entirely and moving on when i was finally cleared to be a peace corps volunteer in uganda once again. exhausted, anxious, and uncertain, i was thankfully (in hindsight) willing enough to take advantage of the second chance i had been given.

the purpose of this close of service conference is to help peace corps volunteers reflect on their service to date and make a work plan for their few remaining months in country. yes, there are projects to wrap up and administrative loose ends to tie, but there is also an intimidating set of cultural concerns to manage as we begin the process of easing out of our communities, both materially and socially. this will not be anything like moving out of my apartment in baltimore and i am thankful for the guidance we've been given and the time i now have to make a responsible plan.

the perspective i have gained in the last several months has been invaluable. i witnessed dozens of my colleagues go through the process of saying goodbye to their friends and communities as they close their service and move on to exciting travel adventures and, in some cases, uncertain futures. i am acutely aware of the fact i am present here and now...but will not be forever. in fewer than six months, i'll likely be packing my bags to leave uganda indefinitely. this time will pass on its own, completely independent of my will; all i can do is stay true to the promises i have made to myself and my community and consciously appreciate how lucky, blessed, and extremely proud i feel to be in the position i'm in. none of this has been particularly easy, but the rewards have been satisfying and rich beyond expectation.

as the glow fades to gloaming, i stroll down the walkway on my way to one last delicious dinner before packing my bags and mentally preparing for all of the work waiting for me at site. tomorrow will be an adjustment, as i say goodbye to these several days in a luxurious fantasy land and re-enter the real world of work and struggle, all the while respecting the uncertainty of what comes after all this...which will undoubtedly be a much bigger and jarring transition.

i almost stepped on this fella right outside my house.

about an inch in diameter and covered in spikes, this caterpillar is punk rock.

("real" posts are coming soon, i promise.)

currently seeking oil (hopelessly?) in saudi arabia's empty quarter

* today's poo fly is dedicated to the porters - thanks for the support :)

not long after pitching our tent at lake nkuruba...

...we looked up to find a tree full of colobus monkeys!

they resemble jumping tree skunks and have very long tails!

i thought they had a rather villainous appearance and was amused

at the furious pace with which they devoured leaves.

i think there were just as many vervet monkeys as well,

who occasionally wrestled with their colobus friends.

my favorite colobus monkey skill is jumping between trees.

as they grew tired of the leaves on one tree, they leaped one by one

to the branches of another. awesome!

almost every day in bwindi impenetrable forest, a group of white people who have parted with silly amounts of money are led through dense jungle forest by seriously skilled guides and trackers to locate the incredibly rare and amazing mountain gorillas!

we were tracking habinyanja group, the largest of the habituated gorilla families at bwindi.

this was our first poop sighting - exciting and very well-formed!

we were on the right track...

after three hours of hiking, we finally came upon the habinyanja family lazing about in a small clearing. space was limited, but we were able to see some funny and just plain excellent things in our brief hour together.

intersting note: gorillas, much like humans, release gas.

i think our fellow tourist randy said it best:

"oh, they're a bunch of fartypants!"

here is an elder female intently eating tasty leaves.

kicked back with a foot in the air, this gorilla is stripping a branch of its outer layer so that he/she can enjoy the spongy, white marrow inside.

this one's for you, lisa! a baby gorilla, 8 months old!

(there's also hilarious video of a baby climbing/swinging...)

we were apparently very lucky to find a silverback out in the open. normally, they stay rather hidden to supervise and keep watch for the family. in our case, he sat up right in front of us for a good 5-10 minutes. sweet!

walking in and out of the forest on an exposed ridge, you can easily see where the protected forest begins and cultivated land ends. agricultural/logging encroachment has been a problem and the goverment has only recently put a stop to it. some programs are now in place to keep the national park and the public happily co-existing; hopefully they are adequate and sustainable.

there is a national park near naivasha, kenya, called hell's gate. it is pretty unique in that visitors are allowed to rent bicycles and guide themselves around the entire park (which even contains a few predators!). the day after climbing mt. longenot, we decided to check it out. pictured above is hell's rather gorgeous entrance!

i actually meant to capture some zebras with this photo and missed entirely.

we saw ostriches and lamented eating their meatballs a few days earlier.

animals were everywhere in and around the road...

...so it was pretty easy to get up close and personal with things

i'd previously seen only in cartoons or on crackers!

i think my favorite were the giraffes...

...who were pretty scared of us...

...but were kind enough to pose for a few nice photos.

near naivasha, kenya lies an old volcano called "longenot" which is covered in zebras.

inside longenot is a massive crater, around which you can walk to reach the summit.

we walked around all 360 degrees, which was windy, sandy, long, and beautiful.

behold the crater in approximately half its majesty, as seen from longenot's peak!

there is a restaurant in nairobi called carnivore which became famous for cooking almost any animal (even the ones you see on safari!) and serving the meat to guests...crazy! you only live once, so we decided to check it out for lunch. nowadays carnivore has stopped serving the very "exotic" meats, but we did get to try ostrich meatballs and crocodile meat (along with excellent grilled beef, lamb, pork, chicken, and turkey). not surprisingly, i had no room for dinner that night. it was, by far, the most expensive single meal i have paid for in africa - about $30.

every table has a revolving sauce and salad bar, on top of which is a white flag.

the meaning of the flag is quite simple - as long as it is still up...

...carvers will keep on bringing the meat!

until your plate becomes too crowded...

... and you have no choice but to surrender!

(note: i was fairly pleased with my meat-management skills throughout the meal -

my plate was almost clean at the end!)

these are the rooftops of lamu town on the kenyan coast. there are no cars here, only donkeys.

here is our isolated patch of sand, where we hid from the blazing sun before enjoying a fresh fish barbecue on the beach!

this was my first encounter with real coconuts. friendly.

i was given no instructions and challenged to open a coconut. to everyone's surprise, i succeeded.

apparently, the furry insides are used as toilet paper. surprisingly soft!

the text of the billboard reads: "family planning is the way forward: have a small family that fits in a [14 passenger] taxi." really? believe it or not, a "less than fourteen people" guideline may be a step in the right direction as far as family planning in uganda is concerned. this country, which i love, has one of the highest birth rates in the world. i have met people who tell me they have eight, twelve, twenty, sometimes even thirty children. culturally speaking, i can understand these numbers. polygamy is common and there is a belief that having many children signifies power, wealth, and success. in fact, family planning campaigns are occasionally received with hostility among locals who think it's an outside attempt to reduce their power and influence, or even a racially motivated tactic to slowly eliminate africans. keeping in mind cultural differences, these feelings are easy to understand. it is a very delicate matter to offer advice to people on the number of children they should have, and when this advice comes from outside one's community, or even continent, skepticism should be expected.

looking around, however, one can easily see the strain this country is already under: jobs are scarce; trees and forests are disappearing; many unfortunate children go uneducated because their parents cannot afford to send them to school or cannot afford supplies for them; arable land is largely saturated with crops. if population growth estimates hold true, the number of people living in uganda could quadruple in the next two generations. that number is not just surprising, it's scary. i hear about peoples' struggles here every day, struggles that exist because of the current scarcity of jobs and resources. i don't even want to imagine how difficult life could be here in forty years if four times the number of people are competing for essentially the same resources. sadly, this rich and beautiful piece of land in east africa cannot get any bigger to accommodate a rapidly growing population. for the good of all ugandans, i hope the idea of responsible family planning gains widespread acceptance...and soon.

...that's the way you have to mop!

sometimes it's best not to challenge methods of doing something that have been developed and tested over many years. mopping a floor in uganda is a perfect example. as you settle into your new place here and go out to purchase household items, you may be tempted to bring home what seems like a perfectly reasonable thing: a mop. you've perhaps seen many ugandans bent over at the waist mopping their floors and decided that you'd rather stand up, relax, and mop the way we all do back in the good old usa. but take heed! you'll wish you could have those 5000 shillings back. ass-up mopping is simply the only way to get your polished concrete floor fresh and clean! just follow these easy instructions:

pour some water in your plastic basinmix in some lemon-fresh vim (complete with "clorex bleach")grab an old t-shirt, dunk it in your vim-water, and wring it outbend at the waist, making sure your ass remains highslap your wet t-shirt on the floor and begin mopping up the filth (this process involves side-to-side sweeping motions with your hands as you shimmy backwards, one cheek at a time)when your shirt has become intolerably soiled, rinse, wring and resume the position!i can assure you, there's nothing quite like the feeling of bare feet on a cool, freshly ass-up mopped floor. happy cleaning!

freezing in regina, saskatchewan, pondering his next move...

...moose jaw?

...swift current?

wazee aryo (two elders) in the village...

we met for the first time well over a year ago in my old trading center. i was hanging out with the bicycle mechanic and a "saloon" (barber shop) manager when an old man came strolling down the main dirt road strumming the most weathered, beaten-up guitar i've ever seen in operation. he was wearing a new york giants baseball cap and a humble, self-satisfied grin as he sang a song in dhopadhola - something about riding a bicycle, if i understood correctly. the whole scene shocked and thrilled me; i had spent months in the area without ever seeing a guitar aside from my own, let alone someone who could play. it was therefore easy to forgive his immediate request that i bring him new strings from america (being constantly asked for things is a pet peeve of all volunteers). in this case, however, i was not so annoyed; i saw a lot of potential for friendship and exchange and so the following day i left him a set of very nice, long-lasting guitar strings in the trading center.

mzee's original guitar

(i could barely play the thing but he somehow made it sound good!)

his style is a happy, finger-picked blues, playing songs in many languages from the immediate local vicinity to the wider region and even a few vaguely familiar european and island tunes. he plays almost exclusively in the key of C and gets a surprising amount of mileage from the three major chords it offers. his brother also plays, but has clearly absorbed a very different set of influences. having lived in kenya and the seychelles and traveled extensively while employed by a tobacco company, he picked up a variety of styles and his playing conveys occasional hints of spanish and reggae. the brothers live about an hour from my site by bicycle. i visit them fairly often, usually once a month, to jam and learn new local songs. my favorite so far is definitely nyir ma nagongera:

in dhopadhola:

nyir ma nagongera kibeyo de be

odikin g'othieno jochomo yo town

nyor'aromo g'alowo ka chamo samosa

alowo, alowo, ango mumienin?

in english:

girls from nagongera(*) are not very good

morning and evening, they run off to town(+)

yesterday i found alowo(#) eating samosa

alowo, alowo, what's wrong with your head?

(*) nagongera is a town believed to be the center of the original jopadhola settlement

(+) town refers to tororo town, i.e. "the big city"

(#) alowo is a common girl's name

after trading guitars

an adhola school of rock...

when joining the peace corps, a person must understand that there will inevitably be some (many) things that are beyond one's control. one of those very important things is the volunteer's site, their home for these two years of service. i've unfortunately seen some very bright and capable volunteers struggling at sites that really just don't fit their skills or interests (or tolerance for corruption). thankfully, mine is not such a site. i certainly did not expect to be living and working at this teacher's college, but my expectations are not necessarily based on things i can control. i was unable to do anything about the fact that my site was shifted away from a place i really loved to one i was initially unhappy with after my improbable return to service here in uganda. but thankfully i was able to recognize that, while starting over again would be frustrating, there would likely be many more work opportunities here than i had found at my old site.

i suppose sooner or later i would have thought of beginning a guitar education project here, at a school which already has a music department. countless times, i was knocked over the head with the possibility as students and community members repeatedly asked me to teach them. my answer to their requests was always the same: "i'd love to, but without a guitar to practice on, you'll not be able to learn properly." after saying that enough times, it dawned on me that i might be able to help them after all if i could only do something about the lack of instruments here. so i wrote a project proposal to begin a small guitar school which was generously funded by my former jazz guitar instructor. through patience, networking, and some hard bargaining, i was able to turn the project budget (for the purchase of only two guitars) into nine guitars - a blend of old and new from a range of kampala music stores, second-hand markets, and departing volunteers.

six of our nine guitars are shown here, including:

- one with the words "j. page led zeppelin" on it and

- one with a built-in speaker and tremolo control (!)

i am still trying to organize my newfound fleet of instruments and restore some of the more badly treated of the lot. i imagine that a significant portion of them will be kept here at the school for use by the students and college staff, while a few others may go to a youth center or other appropriate community location which can provide security for the guitars and allow students to come for regular practice. in the meantime, i am teaching at the college and inviting aspiring musicians to join me here for training. i have teamed up with the head of the music department at the college, who is working closely with me to learn the basics of guitar playing and maintenance. he commented excitedly as his nyap (weak) beginner fingers gradually became tek (strong) with regular practice. he plays often for his children at home, and one of his sons is quickly learning how to play.

the head of our music department singing

"he's got the whole world in his hands"

individual lessons

word is beginning to spread about guitar lessons here and my students are increasing in number. in every case, they are not only excited by the opportunity, but motivated to make the most of it. they have practiced harder than i would have ever expected and come back to me having not only mastered the assignment i gave them, but frequently having made additional discoveries along the way. for example, more than one student has taken a few chords i've taught and used them to play songs they know from church or school. essentially, they come back teaching me songs!

one student of mine is a painter who recently decided to give the guitar a try. like my other students, he is a very determined person and is not discouraged by a somewhat unique struggle to fit several of his very large fingers onto a relatively tiny fretboard to form the chords i'm teaching him. he just fights through it, succeeds, and moves on to the next challenge. when i see investment and dedication like this in my students, it's not hard to imagine that they are chasing something beyond simply making their A chord sound right. not long before christmas, this student gave me a painting of his which ventures to depict the way he feels while playing the guitar (which i think any musician can relate to) - he feels like a different person, like he's temporarily escaped reality to become someone else.

timothy's painting of the masked guitarist

124 degrees!

i'm not complaining. i was just surprised last weekend when i decided to put my alarm clock thermometer out in the sun to see how hot it actually was. a few moments before this photo was taken, it read 127.5 degrees! this is winter on the equator, and that's ok with me :)

...but not for too much longer.

the holiday malaise is lifting as students return to school and work shifts back into high gear. there has been a lot going on in terms of planning and organizing for the coming school term and i'm excited for the opportunities it will bring. [uganda has 3 school terms beginning in february, may, and september.]

i apologize for the lack of content recently; i've been pulled in many directions and my time online has been brief and sporadic. however, i promise some more news from the work front as my projects develop. in the meantime, enjoy photos from my recent trip to rwanda!

on the gorgeous, hilly road to rwanda

changing ugandan shillings into rwandan francs

nyungwe: a dense, enormous, mountain rain forest

hacking through nyungwe in search of chimps!

view of lake kivu on one spectacular hillside drive

old man slowly moving up from the kisoro-kabale road

the virunga volcanoes on the border of uganda, rwanda, congo

"if you live in uganda, you must agree to swallow dust."

- boniface

it's been at least a month since the last significant rainfall and i am seated next to boniface, who is deftly maneuvering his late model mercedes, perhaps a bit too confidently, at 160 km/hr through a dizzying gauntlet of potholes, motorcycles, roadside tilapia vendors, petrol tankers, and oncoming traffic. i am seriously beginning to question this particular alternative to public transport when a stall of irish potatoes piques his interest and he quickly pulls over.

for a moment, i can relax.

this is not the first time we've stopped to purchase food; the road from mbarara to kampala is lined with periodic clusters of stalls featuring a particular type of item. one region offers stunningly fresh fruits and vegetables, another potatoes, another fish, yet another beef. it is a veritable "some assembly required" drive-through feast. there was even one stretch of road several kilometers long lined with enormous bathing loofahs jabbed onto the ends of bare tree limbs.

roadside meat vendors await drive-thru customers

boniface had earlier stopped to buy meat, but decided against it after several minutes spent anxiously eying the dozen or so animal carcasses hanging from a wooden beam because he felt like they were likely covered in too much dirt. i guess that's just the additional price you pay for anything on the roadside in this country. where there's traffic without rain in uganda, anything within 50 meters of the road gets coated in a layer of orange dust. green trees turn a ruddy brown, cattle resting lazily on a roadside garbage heap squint and flap their ears against the airborne onslaught, while innocent people choke on the polluted blend of powdered earth and nauseating emissions from poorly maintained diesel engines. this is quite simply not a nice time to move around the country, especially with the windows down, but that's what boniface and i do all the way from mbarara to kampala. i take a few shallow breaths and enjoy the relative comfort of my self-imposed hitching holiday from public transport...

this past weekend has been alarmingly productive on many digital fronts (ones and zeroes everywhere!). i completed a remix of radiohead's "nude" this afternoon and am very pleased with the result. have a listen on myspace:

http://www.myspace.com/johnnyawesomeoats

(you'll go to hell for what your dirty mind is thinking...)

as some of you already know, i was recently blessed with enough free time to dust off my audio gear and do some good, old-fashioned bedroom recording (sorry, no video). i am thrilled to finally cross this project off my to-do list and my newly finished, eleven song acoustic album is now available for download at the following convenient location:

JAMENDO:

http://www.jamendo.com/en/album/25013

separation makes it easy is a creative commons release. it is free to you as a special unlimited time courtesy and you are encouraged to take it, listen to it, enjoy it, hate it, cook with it, run from it, love it, forget about it, and/or pass it around. so go for it. you've got a friend in johnny awesome.

MYSPACE:

http://www.myspace.com/johnnyawesomeoats

FACEBOOK:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Johnny-Awesome/21938209952

turning a corner on my way back from the bathroom at chronic town hookah lounge in state college, pa, i overheard a trio of young females discussing the evening's entertainment. "so i think the main guy is on next. his name is james vanderslice - he's pretty famous." oh my. i had to laugh to myself at the way she not only incorrectly referred to the "famous" john vanderslice as james, but that she also went out of her way to emphasize the james. brilliant! a dawson's creek fan, perhaps?

having missed jv's lancaster show last night, i decided to make the two hour drive northwest to state college and catch him up there with my brother. simply put, that turned out to be a very wise and fortunate move. had i attended the lancaster show, i can guarantee i would not have been able to see such a high caliber performance in such an intimate setting, while leaning on a pillow on the floor right in front of the stage. it was seriously as if john vanderslice were playing in my living room.

the live manifestation of his songs was fascinating. stripped down and re-arranged to suit the palette of sounds available on stage, each one took on a whole new color and feel - much more so than most bands i've seen perform. nearing the end of an extremely tight and energetic set, vanderslice shared his thoughts about the pretension of encores. so, instead of pretending to say goodnight, he and his band grabbed one acoustic instrument apiece and moved to the floor, where they continued their set with four completely unplugged songs as we all circled around.

i've witnessed countless performances in my life, but i would have to say this, my first john vanderslice show, was one of the coolest. and while i was watching him play and sing, i felt a stab of recognition threatening the tip of my brain. about halfway through the show, i was able to squeeze it out. i might be crazy, but john vanderslice reminds me of jim adkins from jimmy eat world! not at all in the music he writes or the way he looks, but in the way he carries himself on stage. the two have very similar mannerisms, hair-management maneuvers, head-tilts, and guitar stances. i'm not sure what this means, exactly, but i now feel compelled to be a tad more forgiving of any james slip-ups.

It's Jimmy (L) Vanderslice (R)!

whenever i tell people i'm from lancaster, i'm almost always asked if that means i'm amish. of course, i am not. but i guess the question makes a certain amount of sense, given that i come from an area boasting the second-highest amish population in the country (ohio is first). what bothers me about the question is in the wording. the correct way to ask is this:

"so...have you ever ridden in an amish buggy?"

because now my answer is yes!

last week, i paid a few dollars for a wet, chilly, bumpy ride along the shoulder of several roads buried deep in lancaster county (bird in hand, to be exact). and quite honestly, it was fantastic. our driver was very friendly and talkative, and i could smell the horse (authentic). we got passed not only by horseless carriages, but also by a speed-buggy which may have broken 10 mph. it felt like we were standing still!

behold! the mighty snow plug!

behold! the real thing!

in peace corps, we learn all about coping mechanisms. you've gotta know how to creatively handle difficult situations and any accompanying stress. for example, if you are a volunteer who has been abruptly sent home to a cold, unforgiving winter in the northeastern united states, you might choose to make a snow-replica of your favorite geological feature from uganda.