After not sleeping a lick, or a wink, or whatever it is that you kids are calling it these days, Alex and I tumbled out of bed at 5:30 for the drive in to Fort Portal. In Fort Portal, I picked up some African cocoa and “two bacon piece” for breakfast, as well as a copy of Red Pepper, to entertain me on the coach journey.

After being cooped in the same place for the best part of four weeks, it's amazing how refreshing a change of scene can be. The many and varied people we saw from the bus windows, doing many and varied things, excited and delighted the senses. Humans really are a fascinating species – so adaptable, so diverse. “Culture”, or something like that, they call it. Anyway, evidence of “culture” abounded, as it does anywhere you’re not familiar with. The brightly-painted houses advertising various soft drinks and phone networks, the people cycling with bunches of bananas larger than their bikes, the women carrying large buckets of water on their heads, the general variety of human activity thrilled my inner anthropologist no end. Never is ‘culture’ so obvious and vibrant as when you’re not used to it. Tiredness has seriously set in, so I apologise if that was somewhat garbled. What I’m trying to get across is that seeing so many people after seeing only five or six for the past age was wonderful.

Not so wonderful was the woman on the bus, who borrowed my copy of Red Pepper. I was perfectly happy to lend out Red Pepper, of course, but the problem was that she wouldn’t give it back. After reading it cover-to-cover, she proceeded to go to sleep on it, which I felt rather rude. I waited for a few minutes for her to wake up, but when next I looked, my Red Pepper was gone, and the woman was still asleep. Looking across the bus, I saw another fellow cheerily reading the publication, without a care in the world. I watched as Red Pepper wound its merry way around almost everyone in the bus. Eventually, it made its way back to the woman, who went to sleep on it again. To cut a long story short, when she stopped for a toilet break, I stole it back and pointedly read it.

The story continues. There are shopping centres, revolving restaurants and Impala, but I’m afraid that's it for the time being, I’m just too tired to tell it. Goodnight!