Under A Mango Tree

Today I felt like a bit more of an African, as I walked for over an hour on small dirt paths and through rivers to visit a friend’s church, arriving dripping sweat and panting in the heat. The service was three hours long (also very African), after which I was served a mountainous portion of rice and proceeded to walk over an hour back in the blazing midday sun, arriving in the middle of the afternoon, once again dripping sweat (that’s pretty much my style these days). I’ve found that I can often operate in specific patterns these days, always going to the same places because they’re the only places to which I have reason to go, so it was really nice to get away from the main road and see a new part of the district. I also had the refreshing feeling of being off of the paths normally trod by white people, so I felt as though I was treated more as an individual and less as a member of a group of outsiders (though still an oddity).

This weekend there has been a nation-wide push for polio and measles vaccinations, as there have been a number of polio cases in northern Uganda, and it was really interesting to see how a vaccination campaign actually looks in a rural place like Bundibugyo. On the way back, we passed a mango tree with several benches and a small table under it, a cooler with vials in it and a sharps disposal box on the table, manned by a nurse from the health center. It was as simple as that – an immunization clinic under a mango tree. Easy to access, on a well-traveled path, and perfectly effective. It reflects a lot of the way that life works here, as mango trees tend to be gathering places in this culture. We also passed church services being conducted under mango trees, a crowd attending to a man with a cobra bite under a mango tree, and countless people relaxing and socializing under mango trees. If you’ve ever seen a mango tree, then you might also have an idea of how much fruit they produce, making them centers of dietary activity as well as cultural activity. Mango trees seem to be places where life can slow down: where people seek refuge from the oppressive sun and rest during the long walks that most people here make every day just to get to market, to their gardens, to their school, to their church, to their family. And yet, they are a place where life happens. They’re where friends talk, where local officials mediate disputes, where traditional medicine is administered, where women sell food, where people sing – where life plays itself out. Sitting in the dirt, in the shelter of a mango tree. There’s a true beauty about it.