The lost review

Sorry it’s been a while since my last update and I’ve no excuse other than the fact that there hasn’t been much to update on. Other than moving out of Hostel where I had become part of the furniture over the past few weeks. I miss it, but it’s no good for the wallet having a bar and restaurant on tap a few metres from my spacious single room. Plus it was always good for the banter and meeting the various people staying for shorter periods. I almost didn’t move out as on my way to pick up the keys to the flat. In mild traffic in Nakasero, Carl, unbeknownst to me, decided to show off the power of his Boxer motorbike and from a standing start popped a wheelie. I’m not sure how I didn’t end up flat on my arse.

Anyway I’ve now moved to a bijou one bed apartment in a large secure compound in Bukoto. Despite what Google says it’s not Vicross nursery and day care centre. I’m on the ground floor of a two-storey block of four flats that isn’t on Google Maps it’s that new. Still new doesn’t always mean everything’s fine. The water heater works fine in heating water, but less well on giving up the hot water through the pipes. In fact even the cold water struggles at times due to a general water problem, and we had the same problems at the Hostel on the other side of town.

You could fit 50 homes in the area of my compound in the top right

Location wise it’s much more convenient for everything apart from work, still it’s only 15 minutes or so on a boda, probably about 2 hours in a Matatu. There’s a Nakumatt supermarket within a 10 minute walk, Café Javas, Gusto, all of Kololo, Shoprite and Game are about 5 minutes on a boda. Plus there are a few local shops, a pork joint and a rolex guy at the top of the road. The other night there was even a lady selling freshly grilled corn. I picked one up for 500 UGX (12.5p), it was interesting. 1 out of 5.

I ate it sat on my porch gazing out on the fancy buildings of Kololo whilst immersed in the sounds and smells of the neighbouring slum, which I can’t see from the flat due to the high walls of the compound. To be honest as slums go, it’s not too bad, there’s electricity (most of the time) in many parts, and at least one stand pipe is just outside the compound. My existence in this part of the world gives ample entertainment to the local kids that congregate near the water pipe. There are plenty of animals around. I saw some pink (dyed) chickens, plenty of goats and even some ducks the other day. The one thing I hope I never get used to is the intermittent smell. Waste disposal, human and otherwise is something that is very easy to take for granted. Here at lot of it, or at least what can, burns. The aroma isn’t pleasant.

Yes those are dinosaurs

Anyway that wasn’t the lost review. A few weeks back I found myself at Garden City again. My laptop charger had blown, and so I needed a new one pronto and after a brief RFI on Facebook I decided to go to a shop in Muzungu central of Garden City. I could have braved Kampala’s equivalent of Tottenham Court Road, but I always end up getting stung when I go there so decided to play it safe with Kampala’s equivalent of PC World (one tiny shop mind).

 As I had no plans for the day I headed up to the cinema to see if anything was showing anytime soon. Sadly not, I turned up when both Iron Man 3 and Fast and Furious 6 had just started. They’re still showing many weeks later so I’ll probably get round to going to them sometime. Disappointed, but peckish I braved the food court at Garden City to get a bite to eat. There’s a fair bit of choice and it’s different than this pictured I nicked.

After being proffered menus the thickness of War and Peace from each establishment, I decided to go for tried and trusted Lebanese as the Shawarma they had on the skewers looked pretty good. The only name I can find for this place several weeks on is ‘Lebanese Food’ Leaving numerous rejected waiting staff from the other establishments I took a seat in the food court with a good view of the nearby golf course. Eventually I settled on the Chicken Shawarma platter and a Coke for about 22000 UGX (£5.50).

The Lebanese Food place is now right at the back

A healthy amount of time later and my food arrived. I had a plate of chicken shawarma, houmous, pickles and mixed salad, a plate of chips, and a pot each of chilli and garlic sauce. As I was liberally dousing the chicken in the chilli sauce, my waitress arrived with a basket of two flatbreads. Visibly shocked by my nonchalant (my word of the week) approach to the chilli, she exclaimed “No, no, it’s too hot”. I calmly reassured her that it’d be alright whilst thinking to myself surely that’s the point. Chilli sauce dealt with I did the same thing with the Garlic sauce, but didn’t receive any plaintive cries of “No, no, it’s too stinky”.

Nicer view than at Westfield

The chips went first, pretty disappointing and greasy. I keep wanting to say ‘nothing to write home about’, but as I pointed out last time that is pretty much what I’m doing. So dear reader, I need your help. I need other suitable idioms, if I get more that two suggestions, I’ll do a vote or something and the winning entry gets a surprise gift from Uganda.

And so on to the meat of the review and the chicken shawarma was pretty good, easily at a Massis (Has this ever reopened?) standard of marinated grilled chicken, but not quite in the Antepliler (Upper Street) league. The salad and pickles were perfunctory. The houmous was OK, a bit too much Olive Oil drizzled on, but the flatbreads were great. I used one to eat bits and pieces along the way and used the second one to construct a kebab.

Just like at the Natural History Museum

As I was working my way through the first part of meal and making the brilliant kebab, I started sweating from my brow. A bit strange I thought, but this is open air, after 12pm and another wonderfully warm day in Kampala. A short while later my lips were tingling and my moustachioed top lip was also sweating. By the time the waitress came over to offer some greaseproof for the wrap I’d obviously got a grain of dust in my eye as a few tears were coming out.

In my admittedly limited experience, Ugandan’s tolerance for chilli heat can be best described as non-existent. Even the mild stuff I’ve brought in to the office have been criticised as being way too hot, so it was this in mind that I decided to pay no heed to Ugandan waitress’ warning. It was surprising how gradually the heat built up, there was nothing unpleasant in eating it until I obviously tipped over the capsaicin edge.

Despite that it was still pretty tasty and I enjoyed most of it. A solid 3 out of 5. The next day was nowhere near as pleasant, but at least I didn't need to worry about a boda on the way back