My Life as a Driver

Since I (Lorenda, of course) have stopped being at babies’ home everyday, my tasks and responsibilities have been very varied. One day last week, I was the driver for the maintenance team.
Getting around in Kampala is much different than at home. In Canada, in order to be a tradesperson with a service company, you would be required to have a driver’s licence. Here, many people do not have a licence and most people do not have cars. An organization like Watoto has drivers that take people to where they need to be. However, the number of vehicles/drivers available isn’t always adequate to meet the needs so sometimes you need to wait for hours for transport. Of course, that makes Greg crazy to have his guys sitting around waiting for transport to one of the other sites. For that reason, Greg found a way to get a vehicle for the maintenance department- that helps to get the team to where they need to be. Sometimes, they need to have people in different places in one day so we also use our vehicle as a maintenance transport vehicle at times. That’s what I was doing last week when I was driving some of the team members around the city.
Greg has a great team of guys and it has been a real joy getting to know them during our time here. Most of them are young enough to be our children and we refer to them as our “Ugandan sons”. Last week Ed and Grace (the “men in black” from the pictures a couple days back) needed to be transported to a site near the guesthouses and our apartment. Since I was going that way, I was to drop them at the site and go back for them a few hours later- no problem. You need to know something about my relationship with these two young men- they really are like my sons, they are quite comfortable with me and we laugh and joke with each other all the time.
As we were about to drive out of the parking lot, we were flagged down. Two welders from Suubi (Katamba and Moses) also needed to go to the same location and wanted to hop in with us. I have met Katamba only once before and had never met Moses. As these guys would find out, they were in for a very interesting ride!
At this point I need to give you a little information about Ugandan culture and demographics. Half the population in Uganda is 15 years of age or younger. The life expectancy is 50-53 years with only 2.1% of population being 65 years of age or older. Age is treated with great respect here- when you see a younger person being introduced to an older person, the young person will kneel to shake the older person’s hand. Keep all of that in mind as I tell you my adventures!
I knew the route to our destination, but at certain times of day or certain days of the week, some routes are better than others so I asked which way I should go- big mistake! I would get to a corner, Ed would tell me to turn, Grace would tell me to go straight, then they would start to “argue” about it and the other two just sat there looking on at the madness. I just took my normal route and ignored them and their banter.
If I were to compare Ed and Grace to my kids, Ed would be Courtney and Grace would be Charissa (and on this day, the other two would be Carlen- just sitting back and watching). When we are going to the vehicle, Grace always gets there first so he can ride in the front and give me instructions on how to drive- “You’re going too slow. Get in this lane. Cut this guy off. Go, go, go!” Fortunately, I have the skill of being able to ignore people very well, but the looks on the faces of Katamba and Moses was hilarious- no one talks to their elders that way! Grace knows what he can get away with and knows that I will give it right back to him- we have a great time, but in this culture, it is seen as him disrespecting me.
As we were driving along a little further, we started to have a conversation about age. I really don’t remember just what we were talking about, but it was something related to age. At that point Grace comes out with a comment that I think was supposed to be a compliment (they aren’t always easy to spot here). He looked at me and said, “You don’t look old, but you are!” When I responded, “You’re lucky I’m driving right now or I would beat you down”, Grace gave me one of his big, glowing smiles, Katamba and Moses looked like they were ready to get out and walk, Ed just laughed- he is used to our exchanges!
We arrived safely at the destination and I told them I would be back for them at 1:00. Since they would be working over lunchtime, I decided to make lunch for each of them. I made them each a sandwich and bought a Pepsi and a small pack of Gorillos (kinda like cheezies) for each of them.
Time for another short cultural lesson. They do not eat sandwiches here- they may have a piece of bread with jam on it, but they don’t do meat sandwiches.
When I got back to the site, Katamba and Moses finished their work first so I gave them their lunch and they enjoyed it. Grace was next to be done so he ate his lunch while we waited for Ed to finish up what he was doing. Since we were now running a little behind, Ed had to eat his lunch while we drove. I wasn’t really paying attention to what was going on in the vehicle until I heard Ed say, “Grace, stop looking at me!”
I informed them that they sounded like my kids when they were five years old, “Mom, Courtney is looking at me.” They all laughed, but Ed said he knew that Grace was going to try to steal his lunch. Predictably, my next line was, “If I have to stop this car…” Of course I had to explain to them what that meant, but then they all laughed.
Ed managed to finish his lunch without Grace nabbing it. He thanked me for the lunch. Then a few minutes later I heard Ed say, “Lorenda”- you need to know that Ed is quieter and not nearly so sassy as Grace. When Ed said my name, I responded, “Yes”. Rather tentatively he asked me, “What did I just eat?” Everyone in the vehicle was quiet- they were probably all wondering the same thing!
My response was, “Do you remember the cat that has been hanging around our compound that I don’t like?” They all laughed. They don’t always get our humour/sarcasm, but they all understood that.
I then proceeded to explain the sandwich to them and realized that there was nothing about it that they recognized. I had bought multigrain bread and had sliced it nice and thick. There was mayonnaise, ham and salami- all foreign to them, but things that we take for granted. Greg took Grace out for lunch a couple of weeks ago and for the first time in his life, he had a burger. There are so many cultural things that we don’t even think about until something like this happens.
In my first two visits here, I never thought I would get to the point where I could possibly consider driving around Kampala as fun. But it is- because of the people that I get to hang out with. Part of me really wants to “pull back” and stop getting to know people better because it is going to hurt so much to leave here. Of course I know that is wrong, but when you start to love people this much, it is going to make it so much harder to leave.