Embracing... The Baha'i Temple, The Heart of the Buganda Kingdom, The Hanuman Chalisa, and Northern Uganda

Tuesday, July 26th, 2022

To be completely honest, I haven’t had the will to write something for the past week or so. It’s been an extremely busy few weeks, and I’ve been coming home wanting to sprawl in front of the TV and dissociate from reality until it’s time to go to bed. But emotions and experiences have been building up— and I don’t have too many people here that I can be my *unfiltered* self around.

And so, I’m back. Here’s a quick summary: On the data front, I have collected n = 14 interviews! I’ve been growing tremendously as a researcher and I sincerely cannot wait to share my findings with you all in a future post. But for now, I want to shine a bright light on the many cultural excursions I’ve embarked on lately, and all that I’ve learned from them.

Since I last wrote to you all, I’ve visited the Baha’i Temple, the National Museum, the Kabaka’s Palace, the Hanuman Chalisa Bhajan at the Hindu Temple, Gulu Town, and the Murchison Falls. Maybe it’s because I’m knee-deep in collecting qualitative data right now, but I’ll summarize each of these in separate themes.

Theme 1: Embracing a Piece of Home

Home. Home is complicated. It means a lot of different things to me, and that’s something that people around me here are picking up on. Today a colleague told me that when I say “we,” he never knows if I’m referring to Indians or Americans. I smiled and said “both.”

Monthly bhajans have been a part of my life since I was 10 years old, and they’ve bonded me to my best friends who are like my sisters, and their families who are like additional sets of parents and siblings to me (Ramya, Asha, and Swathi <3). So when I learned that the Shri Sanatan Dharam Mandal, the Hindu Temple in Nakasero, Kampala, hosts weekly Hanuman Chalisa bhajans on Saturday evenings, I decided to start attending. And it was an incredibly beautiful experience. I stuck out like a sore thumb— as the only 20 something year old attending alone— and people immediately approached me, asking me who I was and how I got here. They handed me a book of the Chalisa and we spent a full hour chanting. It was almost trance like. I felt out of place for the first 10 minutes or so, but as we continued, I immediately flashed back to the first Bhajan I attended at Ramya’s house one day after dance practice. That experience rooted me to my own culture, and I found an opportunity to do the same here in Uganda too.

Home also undoubtedly means Michigan. And so when I walked into the Uganda National Museum, I was pleasantly surprised to be greeted by a large poster of Henry Ford and a Model T Display…. was I back in Detroit??

It turns out, the Model T was the first car gifted to Uganda by the British Crown upon becoming an independent entity in 1962. It was a small, humble reminder that we are all more connected than what we think. A piece of Detroit, Michigan was on full display in the only museum in this country.

Theme 2: Embracing A Peaceful Oasis

I always talk about the hustle and bustle of Kampala, but there are surely pockets of peace throughout the city. You might recall my discovery and love for Endiro Coffee in Kisementi, for example.

But the heart and soul of the Buganda Kingdom, the largest tribe in Uganda, is peace. And I only realized this when I visited the Kabaka’s Palace (Kabaka means King in Luganda). The palace is flanked by marble statues of lions— but they don’t symbolize the physical strength of the Buganda King Muwenda Mutebi II. They symbolize the resilience and metaphorical strength of kingdom. It has withstood tyrannical attacks by former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, who tainted the palace with bloodshed when he tried to overthrow the then Kabaka Edward Mutesa. Nonetheless, the Kingdom survived, and since then, no King has slept inside the palace. This cultural rule, that a Buganda Kabaka must not sleep in a place where blood has shed, is one way that the Baganda (the people of the Buganda tribe) acknowledge and uphold traditions of peace. Additionally, the Baganda are known for their religious and tribal tolerance. It was a Buganda King that commissioned the construction of the first Mosque in Uganda, and it’s coincidentally built right next to the Royal Kasubi Tombs where members of the Royal Family are buried. The very fact that everyone, and I mean literally everyone, has immense respect for the current Kabaka taught me this too. While Central Uganda is traditionally the Buganda territory, it has opened its arms to the various other tribal groups across Uganda including the Banyakole, the Basoga, Bagisu, and others. This is partly due to the fact that Kampala is the economic epicenter of the country, but it’s incredible that people outside of the Baganda embrace Luganda, the local Buganda Kingdom language, and ethnic foods like maatoke, posho, and others.

Situated away from the heart of the Buganda Kingdom is the Baha’i Temple. It sits in the Kikaya (pronounced chi-kaya) neighborhood of Kampala. It’s atop a very large hill overlooking the entire city. And once I reached the top, I felt so small in stature and so at peace with myself and everything around me. I walked inside and recited a short Baha’i prayer on protection.

Theme 3: Embracing Northern Uganda

I don’t have anything creative to title this theme; I think I’m still reveling in all that I did this past weekend. I travelled to the Northern part of the country, which is culturally, ethnically, and linguistically so different from central Uganda. It’s almost like visiting a completely different country. The people look different, the Acholi language is unlike any other language I’ve heard before, and it’s a region of sharp, stark contrasts.

On one end, you have Gulu, a city about 40 km south of the South Sudan border. It’s a small town that is still experiencing the economic and trauma effects of a civil war that happened between 1986 and 2002. Since then, the region does not have adequate representation in the Ugandan parliament, and continues to suffer from food insecurity, water shortage, and stifled infrastructural development.

But every single day I am reminded that people are different from politics. The smiles, glistening eyes, and warm encounters I met in Gulu were no different from what I’ve become comfortable with in Kampala. People spoke of their small town with so much pride, and demonstrated that resilience is what defines a group of people or a territory, not so much their history. I met so many people committed to rebuilding Gulu Town, through establishing schools, creating small businesses to facilitate tourism, and so much more. Gulu Town is small, but mighty.

And on the other end, you have Murchison Falls National Park, one of the most beautiful things I have ever witnessed in my entire life.

I went on an African Safari and I cannot adequately and eloquently summarize what that experience was like. And I so wish I was a better photographer and I could have taken better photos of what I saw there. So please appreciate a few bullet point summaries.

• I saw giraffes, elephants, and hippos grazing along the Lake Albert Nile. The backdrop was the Democratic Republic of Congo (yes, the other side of the river was another country), and the most magnificent sunset ever. It was like a scene out of the Lion King.

• I captured the elusive King of the Jungle, admiring his queen in her deep slumber. They were surrounded by skeletal remains, and had just finished hunting prey.

• I was surrounded by agitated elephants, who were still traumatized by Idi Amin’s violent military rule. These elephants are resistant to any loud noises, and began circling our safair car when we approached. Thankfully, our safari guide knew all of the right maneuvers to leave their premises.

Murchison Falls. One for the books, indeed.

— Divya

Here is one of my favorite photos from all of the excursions— A double rainbow I saw at the end of a hike to the top of Murchison Falls!