{"id":54,"date":"2018-03-29T04:00:41","date_gmt":"2018-03-29T04:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/?p=54"},"modified":"2018-09-28T01:30:41","modified_gmt":"2018-09-28T01:30:41","slug":"ugandan-flag","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/ugandan-flag\/","title":{"rendered":"Ugandan Flag"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s flag choice is Uganda.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Ugandan Flag<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For those who don\u2019t know, Uganda is a small nation in Eastern Africa<\/a>, with Kenya<\/a> to the east, South Sudan<\/a> to the north, Democratic Republic of the Congo<\/a> to the west, and Rwanda<\/a> and Tanzania<\/a> to the south.\u00a0 Uganda has a very large shoreline on Lake Victoria<\/a>, and the entire frontier with Tanzania is located through the lake\u2019s waters.<\/p>\n

The Ugandan capital city is Kampala<\/a>, located in the south-central part of the country, however, the international\u00a0 airport location, which is the air link with the world, is located further south in the city of Entebbe<\/a>.\u00a0 Entebbe is currently gaining a good deal of attention due to the movie \u201cSeven Days in Entebbe<\/a>\u201d which highlights one of the less glowing moments in the history of Uganda.<\/p>\n

Uganda was colonized by the British moving in from their colony in Kenya.\u00a0 The country was primarily a source of cotton for British mills, although in later years tea, coffee, and sugar would start to command a larger portion of the economy.\u00a0 As was typical of a colonial economy, Uganda produced raw materials for the mother country and manufactured goods were shipped back.\u00a0 This pattern would result in little to zero industrial development in what would soon be an independent nation.<\/p>\n

Uganda had a large population of east Indian indentured workers who arrived in the late 19th<\/sup> century to work on the Uganda Railway<\/a>, a project to link the interior areas of Kenya and Uganda, which is otherwise without access to the sea, to the Kenyan seaport of Mombassa.\u00a0 While most of the east Indians returned home at the end of their contracts, some 6,000+ decided to stay<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The east Indians quickly came to dominate the merchant class, a pattern common throughout former British colonies in eastern and southern Africa.\u00a0 The dominance of this class of worker, who often was more affluent than the customers who relied on their stores, bred intense resentment against the east Indians who were viewed as interlopers, even if they had been in country for generations.<\/p>\n

The resentment against the east Indian population, along with tribal conflicts known as the Buganda crisis<\/a>, all converged to lead to the dictatorship of General Idi Amin<\/a>.\u00a0 Of course, this is a GROSSLY simplistic version of events and those with an interest in the detailed events should look elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Idi Amin proved to be an infamous and depraved ruler who murdered somewhere between 80,000 and 500,000 Ugandans.\u00a0 Amin also forced all people of east Indian heritage<\/a>, regardless of who long they had lived in Uganda, to depart with almost zero notice and limited, if any, ability to take material goods or money with them.<\/p>\n

Amin was overthrown with the help of neighboring Tanzania<\/a>, after Amin foolishly declared war against the country.\u00a0 The years between the overthrow of Amin, 1979, to 1986 were marked by relative chaos.<\/p>\n

In 1986 Yoweri Kaguta Museveni<\/a>, who was also instrumental in overthrowing Amin, deposed the government of Milton Obote<\/a>, who had been in power from 1979.\u00a0 Museveni, despite being celebrated as a new generation of African leaders, has remained in power from 1986 to the present day.<\/p>\n

Under Museveni the Ugandan economy has grown and conditions for much of the population have improved.\u00a0 However, the country remains poor and has been plagued by groups such as the Lord\u2019s Resistance Army (LRA)<\/a>, a rebel group famed for forcing children in to armed soldiers as well as kidnapping girls as sexual slaves.\u00a0 It is believed that the LRA took advantage of chaos in neighboring South Sudan and DR Congo to stage a move to far eastern areas in the Central African Republic<\/a>, itself a failed state with no organized ability to respond to the presence of the LRA in their territory.<\/p>\n

So, Uganda has continued to face challenges during recent times and most recently became involved in the so-called Second Congo War<\/a>.\u00a0 Uganda, along with Rwanda and Burundi<\/a>, served as bases and sources of support for rebels opposed to Laurent Kabila<\/a>\u2019s rule in the DRC.\u00a0 The war has severely disrupted commerce and daily life in the eastern regions of the DRC and this instability has spilled over into Ugandan territory on occasion.<\/p>\n

Uganda hopes to build an eco-tourism industry, built in large part on access to some of the last remaining wild mountain gorillas<\/a> which live in the extreme southwest of the country, along the highly unstable border with the DRC and Rwanda.<\/p>\n

All that being well and good information, why were we flying the flag of Uganda?\u00a0 The answer lies in one of Tim\u2019s favorite Broadway productions.<\/p>\n

Book of Mormon<\/a>, written by the team behind the television show \u201cSouth Park,\u201d<\/a> Trey Parker<\/a> and Matt Stone<\/a>, proved to be one of the most phenomenally successful shows in Broadway history.\u00a0 We have seen the show twice: in NYC on Broadway and a traveling show in Louisville, Kentucky.\u00a0 The show proved to also be one our all-time favorite shows as well.<\/p>\n

In one of the earlier musical numbers in the play, the soon to be missionaries speculate about their destinations and talk about where they hope they will go.\u00a0 Shortly after, the assignments are read out.\u00a0 Some of the missionaries are to head to Norway<\/a> (\u201cthe land of gnomes and trolls), France<\/a> (land of pastries and turtlenecks), and Japan<\/a> (land of soy sauce and Mothra).\u00a0 Finally, our heroes receive their assignment to a small village in northern Uganda, a mission location about which they are less than enthusiastic.<\/p>\n

Long story short, in deference to the location of one of our favorite Broadway shows, we flew the flag of Uganda<\/a>.\u00a0 By the way, that is NOT a chicken, but rather the Grey Crowned Crane<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The national anthem of Uganda<\/a> is a highly appropriate accompaniment for any Ugandan flag raising.<\/p>\n

P.S.\u00a0 Before I took it down, and thus preventing and international incident, Tim had decided to fly the Norwegian flag above the Ugandan flag, which in the language of flags would indicate that Uganda is subordinate to Norway.\u00a0 While one can debate the relative merits of Norway versus Uganda, they remain equally sovereign nations accorded equal representation in the world of flags.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s flag choice is Uganda. For those who don\u2019t know, Uganda is a small nation in Eastern Africa, with Kenya […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":56,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[19,5,6,7],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.smoketreemanor.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}