LEAVE ON SATURDAY, ARRIVE ON TUESDAY
By Bob Van Leer

  (KAMPALA, UGANDA, EAST AFRICA, Oct. 26, 1993) - Betty and I arrived here today about noon after the most complicated trip we've ever had to get anywhere overseas. Uganda is a small land-locked African country south and east of Kenya. It's about the size of Oregon with a population (1989) of 17 million. The country is struggling to get back on its feet after a couple of decades of government mismanagement and civil war. 

  The trip started on Saturday, Oct. 23, with a drive t o Medford to catch a plane. On the way over we were able to stop at Valley of the Rogue State Park to watch Gold Beach High School runners race in a track meet including grandsons Rob and Chris Johnson. We flew to San Francisco on United Airlines and caught a night flight to JFK Airport in New York. We rented a hotel room for the day to get some rest. Airport hotels manage to rent out some of their rooms twice a day. In the evening we met with the rest of our party to take a night flight to London on British Airways.

  This is a study mission sponsored by the National Newspaper Association, an organization representing weekly newspapers and small dailies. There are 18 in our party plus our tour leader, Lois Wolfe, a retired publisher from Kansas City. The people on the tour come from coast to coast, Oregon, California, New York, North Carolina, and points in between. After another night flight we spent Sunday in a hotel in London. Sunday evening we took still another night flight on British Airways to Entebbe, Uganda, with a stop at Nairobi, Kenya. This flight was 9.5 hours southeast from London passing over Switzerland, Italy, Egypt, Sudan and finally a landing late Tuesday morning in Nairobi. The flight was a Boeing 747 and Betty and I were assigned seats on the upper deck which is like a small plane to itself with 54 seats. We were able to get off the plane and look over the airport before departing on the final 50 minute leg to Entebbe.

  The countryside around Nairobi was parched brown, but southern Uganda was green. Entebbe is right on the shore of Lake Victoria, which we were told is the second largest lake in the world after Lake Superior in the U. S. and Canada. The airport is new but adjacent to it is the old airport made famous by the rescue of some 250 Israeli citizens hijacked to the airport with the assistance of then Uganda dictator Idi Amin. The temperature is warmer here than we're used to, 83 degrees in Entebbe, but we are right on the equator. Nairobi is just south of the equator and Entebbe is just barely north of it. From Entebbe we drove a few miles north to Kampala, the capital city.

  Nairobi is a city of a million and a half people but Kampala is much smaller, with a population of about 330,000. Uganda has had a tortured history. Cut loose by the British in 1962, Uganda had a measure of democracy only until 1966 when Prime Minister Milton Obete suspended the constitution. In 1971 Obote's government was ousted in a military coup led by Idi Amin who ruled for eight years. During his rule, estimates of a minimum of 100,000 Ugandans were murdered. Amin started a war against neighboring Tanzania but was repulsed. The Tanzanian force moved into Uganda and captured Kampala Idi Amin fled and is now living in Saudi Arabia. After a series of weak presidents, Obote took power again in an election in 1980 and didn't do any better than the first time. He was deposed again in 1985.

   A force led by now-president Yoweri Museveni seized Kampala in 1986 and still rules. The current government has put an end to some of the human rights abuses of earlier governments and is generally recognized, including by the United States. After checking into our hotel, we were taken on a drive along the north shore of Lake Victoria. Muslim influence is very apparent even though the majority of the people are Christians. The muzzein's call to prayer is broadcast by loudspeaker throughout Kampala. We stopped at a state-owned dairy farm east of Kampala, an experimental farm that was set up to improve dairy herds in the country. It suffered terribly in the conflicts. Damaged by artillery fire in the 1979 war, it was completely destroyed in 1986 when used as a camp by guerilla fighters. All stock was lost but has been built up to 200. The milking machines were destroyed in the conflicts and have not been repaired. Milking is by hand. This was not the most popular stop. One woman in our group said, privately, she didn't come to Africa to see milk cows, there were plenty of them in Ohio where she lives.

  We drove on crossing over the Owens Falls Dam at the outlet to Lake Victoria. Many consider this the beginning of the Nile River, which reaches north to empty into the Mediterranean Sea through Egypt. Light was fading and we had just time to look at Bujagali Falls, a series of impressive cascades a few miles down the Nile. Our group was folding up and we returned to our hotel, the Fairway, for dinner and bed. Tomorrow is to be a workday starting with a meeting with the Uganda Journalists' Association.