Wildlife/Nature

I had several encounters with Uganda wildlife on Sunday. In the morning on my way to church, after having accomplished the task of loading Ella up in the car, I realized that I was standing in a bunch of army ants. I carefully picked them off my feet and out of my shoes and surprisingly none bit me. Boy, they latch on and they won’t let go without drawing blood. If they latch on to a soft shoe you have to take their heads off to get them off! They just won’t let go!

After de-anting myself I checked L. She is allergic to ant bites and gets itchy welts all over, plus she screams bloody murder, so fortunately she made it out unscathed. I attribute that miracle to God of course, but also to her hard, slick, very Ugandan Sunday School shoes.

Well, the little devils had crawled into my shoes, latched on and only after I was in the middle of driving to church did they start to let go and start crawling around all over my feet. I’d stop the car and pick them off and this kept happening for the next ten minutes or so, even after I was safely in church! It’s just a good thing that I go to a Pentecostal church because I don’t think anyone even noticed my little ant dance :). Amazingly, I don’t think I ever actually got bit!

My second encounter with wildlife in the compound fortunately wasn’t as close as the ants making their home in my shoes. I was walking past the edge of my house (looking for ants actually) and if a black cobra didn’t just slither happily on by! Ack!! I was all by myself (the dogs had abandoned me and were sleeping in the neighbors house and Ella was snoozing in her bed), in my slippers without a weapon so by the time it took me to shriek at the neighbor Gift, him to come out in his flip flops and me to get my shoes on, the rascally snake was no were to be seen. We hunted around with a long pole and Sanyu, whom we used as snake bait, but to no avail.

Ella was quite disappointed to hear that she missed out on the snake sighting. I told her to stay away from snakes and to run away screaming if she saw one but I have my doubts… Both her and Sanyu would probably try to catch one, which is a scary thought. Where is the fearful little girl that I brought home 5 months ago?

Needless to say, it is not a comforting feeling to know that there is a poisonous snake slithering around one’s compound in which their daughter and dogs play. At least with rattle snakes they give you a good warning that they’re around, but these cobras have no way of warning you.


Six foot green cobra that was found in our yard last year :)