hey muzungu

So far I have been on a plane with a broken engine and had to turn back to Schiphol, traveled to Entebbe the next day, spent the evening and night drinking beer in the garden bar of my hosts, went to the local market where a live chicken was selected, butchered and prepared (I played no part!), and tried to get over a culture shock. It seems you can’t really prepare yourself for Africa.

The people are very kind, both my Dutch hosts, their expat friends and the Ugandans I have so far talked to. The country is exceedingly beautiful, and very very poor. The contrast between the cozy expat life here and the lives of Kampala locals just a few streets away is harsh.

I wrote a very long text in my Finnish blog and am now kind of out of words. So you’ll get some hipshots from the nearby market and a promise for more details later.

Here’s who I’d want to be

I’ve been working on my part-time job (photo editor at Ydin magazine) and ran into Laura Junka. Her career is something I’d really want for myself: she has managed to succesfully combine academic studies in international politics, journalism and photojournalism. So at the moment she is finishing her dissertation, writing, and photographing in the Middle East. (And she is one year younger than I am. Grrrr…)