Our next stop on our tour of Kampala was the Bahai Temple. The Bahai faith was a new one to us, we hadn't heard of it before. The temple was high on a hill overlooking the city surrounded by very neat and peaceful gardens. We were introduced to some followers who explained their faith to us. From what we understood, the Bahai faith is about understanding others and their faiths. There is no preacher and every Sunday, the congregation take it in turns to read from the different and numerous Holy books of the world. The temple itself was very calming and peaceful, no talking or photos allowed inside.
We did feel the peace of the place and it was very welcoming. The faith itself did come across as trying to understand others, which we agreed was a good thing and maybe the world needs a lot more of that.
After the pleasant visit to the temple, our next stop was the Kings Palace, well one of them, more his summer home for parties!
We weren't allowed inside, but were allowed to explore the grounds. A member of the palace staff showed us around and told us the history of the place and some facts about the Ugandan Royal family. Steph had to put a sarong around her trousers because any female on the Kings property can automatically be taken as his wife and the Queen never wears trousers! It doesn't matter if you're already married either! From the hill the palace is on we could see a Mosque that was funded by Gadaffi and a huge man-made lake, created by 200 men in 2 weeks!
Around the grounds were lots of car parts. Turns out the parts belonged to many classic cars including Bentleys and Rolls Royce which were destroyed in an uprising in the 1950's.
We were taken to a tunnel built into the ground. Turns out it was Idi Amin's torture chamber which was originally built as a gun store. The place used to be fully electrified when it was the torture chamber. A layer of water below the cells was also electrified. They are not sure how many people died, but it was a lot. They think some of the bodies might be at the bottom of the man-made lake. It was a very sad place and horrifying to hear the stories.
We bought a traditional picture off a local artist at the palace and were then showed around a small photo gallery of the Royal family. All in all, it was a very interesting little visit.
We finished off our day with a pizza for lunch and then returned to our hotel.
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