Today Aggie and I and our friends Benon and (his wife) Betteth travelled to Jinja, the next largest town in Uganda next to Kampala, and about 80 km (50 miles) the east. We were going to a wedding, to see Jinja, and to see the source of the Nile River. On the way, we almost went to see THE Source! We hired a special taxi with a driver for the day, and we had entered a forest area about 3/4 of the way to Jinja when we hit a big pot-hole in the road, and I thought "Maaaaaan, that's SO bad for the car!!". I heard a noise like a wheel out of balance, and was wondering if I'd heard it before, when a couple of minutes later one of the rear tyres blew out. We went straight into the oncoming traffic lane and then fish-tailed back towards our lane and I thought "MAN I hope we don't go into those trees!", and then in the other direction again and I thought "MAN I hope we don't go into that ditch!", and then we went sideways and started to go into a spin and I thought "We're GOING into those trees!!". Aggie yelled out "Yesu!" in Luganda, Betteth yelled out the word for Jesus is in her tribal language, and I yelled out "Jesus!", and we stopped, in the middle of the road, facing the opposite direction. This all began at full highway speed! It was a miracle that we stayed on the road, a miracle that it didn't happen about 2 seconds earlier when a truck went past in the opposite direction, and a miracle that there wasn't any oncoming traffic, or traffic behind us. On top of it all, Betteth is pregnant! We were pretty shaken up afterwards, as we changed the tyre and proceeded on to Jinja, thanking God for protecting us, and reflecting on life and how it is in His hands! (I reflected more on that as we
returned back to Kampala at the end of the day on the tiny "doughnut" spare tyre, still at
full speed!).
returned back to Kampala at the end of the day on the tiny "doughnut" spare tyre, still at
full speed!).
I guess that's the dramatic highlight of the day, but the source of the Nile was beautiful! The source is Lake Victoria, the 2nd biggest freshwater lake in the world, and where we went was where the river begins. Men were out fishing in long wooden boats, the water was a deep, clean green, and there was a beautiful cool breeze blowing. It's estimated to take water 3 months to complete the trip from that point to where the Nile empties into the Mediterranean sea! Wow!
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1 comment:
Wow! I am so happy to hear that everyone is alright after that near accident. Nothing like your life flashing before your eyes to bring you back to the most important reason for being here in the first place, huh? The pictures look so beautiful and interesting, even the photo of the blown-out tire... I imagine this is because Uganda is a very photogenic country. You can point the camera at anything there and the photo comes out spectacular! You look really happy, too. All my best to you!
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