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I have felt a bit feverish this week, probably due to the inoculations I received last weekend. I have also had some head and joint ache, which I attribute to Lariam, a malaria prevention medicine I am eating on a weekly basis. Some of the side effects listed in the man pages—that is to say, the leaflet—include »psychiatric reactions such as depression, mood changes, anxiety, confusion, hallucinations, panic attacks, restlessness, forgetfulness, psychosis, paranoia, emotional instability, aggression, and agitation«. This seems suboptimal for a drug commonly taken prior to and during a visit to Africa. You are also supposed to ingest the tablet along with food and rich amounts of water; this, again, seems suboptimal.

Apparently, It is too late to inoculate for rabies and tuberculosis, so I will have to be extra cautious instead. I am only somewhat reassured by the fact that the rabies vaccine would only have given me 24 additional hours after exposure to seek medical attention before being doomed.

Receiving the inoculations at Cityvaccin was as charming an experience as ever. My first session was with a nurse who, well… I guess the proper way of saying it would be that she must have had an extraordinarily bad day at work. She refused to answer any questions about any of the diseases for which I was being inoculated. No, “refused” is not quite right, since there is a way to politely refuse an enquiry. There was not anything polite about her replies, at all. However, I am willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. Besides, she did sound almost bitter about it, so I suspect she might have not been at liberty to give me any answers for liability reasons or other such rubbish. I did get another nurse for the second session, and she performed her duties quite well, and with a decent sense of bedside manners to boot.

A while back I was walking past a bulletin board, and I saw a poster announcing opportunities for voluntary ICT work in developing countries. I decided to apply on the spur of the moment. I did not expect to actually receive the position. I did, however. My first thought was, of course, “holy crap, I’m going to Uganda!”

My second thought was to find out some stuff about this country. The biggest ethnic group is “other” (29.6%), half of the population is 14 years old or younger, and the most popular religion is Christianity with 84%, with the largest subgroup being Roman Catholicism (41.9% of total). A former British colony, Uganda is a member of the Commonwealth, the official languages being English and Swahili.

So, in my head I now picture a country full of Catholic children speaking British English. Something tells me looking at the demographics will not bring me closer to knowing this country. Let’s try infrastructures:

There are six cell network providers in Uganda: MTN, Airtel, UT Mobile, Warid, Orange Uganda, Essar. Between them, they manage to provide GSM, CDMA, CdmaOne, EDGE, UMTS, HSDPA, and WiMAX. However, only 30.78% of the population has any coverage according to Wikipedia. However, MTN states 80% of Uganda is covered by their service. Interesting. I should look into buying an external antenna for my cell phone, just in case.

The electricity is unstable, and surges occur often when the power goes back online. So, a heavier-duty surge protector would be useful.

And now some test video.