Visit to Kampala, preperations for the Master project

The main museum in Kampala, where my Touch-Cabinet is going to be displayed, is right in the centre of Kampala. Entrance  fee sets you back a mere 3000 shilling, about 1.50 dollars. The museum, although perhaps at one point of its long history ( It opened its doors in 1908,  but in a different building) was a light and contemporary place, it now smacked very much of a forgotten era. But strangely enough, this sense of nostalgia added to the atmosphere.A musty, smokey scent, like in so many places in Africa, filled the rather forlorn looking rooms. With every turned corner, there were displays of a huge variety of objects, which varied from the artefacts used during rainmaking ceremonies to fishing and harvesting,ceremonial headdresses,  many more anthropological artefacts.  As a textile artist i found it interesting that 'Basketry and netting were fundamental industries in Uganda, were textiles did not penetrate until the late 18th Century'. There were display cabinets full of 'instruments of punishments', fetish objects, and the recreation of bananabeer, which the young schoolchildren absorbed with bemusement.Some display caskets were eerily empty,with a mouldy long-legged bird put on top as an afterthought, which showed its sillouette in the hot Ugandan sunshine. Then, just as one thinks that it might be better to spend the day outside, the sound of drums start to fill the building. first, carefully, then harder, and more intense. I am following the sound of the noise and swiftly find many children happily interacting with traditional percussion instruments, their hands touch the tightly streched skin over the drums, Finally interaction , touch, and ....FUN