Drama-queen of the Nile

So, either I am a complete wuss or rafting is the scariest thing I’ve ever subjected myself to. It is an informal tradition that PC Kenya volunteers go to Uganda at least once in their 2 years to raft the Nile, so I had plenty of warning and yet, I still chose to go. I asked many volunteers who had gone previously about their experiences and every single one told me the same thing… “I thought I was going to die.” And now I believe them because I also thought I was going to die. Allow me to start from the beginning. We left for Uganda from Nairobi on a large, comfortable bus we had rented. On the 12-hour ride there, I had 6 separate items fall from the luggage rack onto my head at various times during the trip… one which caused a bloody nose. I should have taken this as a sign.

The next day we split up into groups of 6 or 7 people, each with a guide accompanying the groups on a raft. We got in, I took a deep breath and thought to myself, “I’m on the fucking Nile!” Then our guide told us to jump in. After practicing a few commands and survival tips we started to get prepared for our first rapid. However, before our guide had a chance to tell us what to do, a girl fell out of one of the other boats and was heading straight for… what was most likely death. (Oh and if anyone has done this shit before and is laughing at my naivety right now, screw you ‘cause this was my first time.) Anyhow, our guide had told us earlier that if he started yelling that it was pretty serious and here he was yelling before we had even begun. He told us to pull the girl into our raft before she went down the rapid and luckily we managed to do so, but we ended up going down the class 5 backwards and completely unprepared. Another volunteer later said that while he was under the water for what seemed like far too long he started thinking, “If only I were unconscious, this would be a lot easier.” My feeling was a tad more panicked, but along those lines.

For the rest of the trip my group managed to stay in the raft on almost every rapid… even the one called the g-spot, which our group was later named after. Ok, self-named, but seeing as we were all girls it only seemed appropriate. Later on, a guy went down a waterfall sans-raft and we all watched in horror as he was continuously sucked back under it and the rescue team was finally able to reach him. In the end, we all survived and can add rafting the Nile to the list of stupid things we’ve done, but would do again because it was amazing. Except for me, ‘cause I’m lame.