and back again…

Trivia:  How many baseball games have been delayed by volcano?  Answer:  I have no idea, but I know one baseball documentary that was.

I got back on the ground a couple weeks later than expected but I’m here now. After spending 2 months in new york dealing with the footage and business end of things, i’m excited to get back into the living story.   Oh, and of course my luggage also was delayed and came 5 days after I did.  I guess I can’t blame that on kryegslinzoigmni#niofd3 (possibly misspelled) volcano.  But finally, after a far too long break… we’re shooting again.

This entry will only be one day of shooting since that’s all I’ve done so far but didn’t want to leave you all hanging.

My first week will mostly be dedicated to filling a gap in our footage to make sure we are really able to tell the story of the pioneers fully, in particular the car crash that killed most of them.  You may remember the day I filmed Eric at his brother’s grave where I first began to hear about that crash.  So, my first day of shooting on this trip was to get that story from Coach George, a guy who lived it.

I interviewed George at his house which has some new people (Benard is now living at home in Soroti, more on that in the coming weeks).  George told me the story of the crash beginning to end in good detail.  George is not terribly emotional and tends to say some pretty eye opening stuff flatly.  I got most of the story from Eric before but it basically went like this.  George’s neighbor/friend/baseball teammate/pioneer fell sick, no one is sure of what, that’s pretty common here.  He passed away after taking a final exam for some vocational school.  He was about 30 years old..  About 20 people or so were headed to his funeral a few days later.

Two small sedan cars went first, George was in one of them, along with another pioneer named Deus who I’ll be meeting later this month (he is currently serving in Iraq… yeah weird).  The main transportation would be a pickup truck driven by a friend that most of the mourners piled into, 14 of them to be exact.  3 inside the cabin and 11 on the flatbed back.  Obviously not a safe situation, but something you see every 5 minutes here so Im sure they didn’t give it a second thought.  A few stayed behind to go later, like Eric, who wasn’t feeling well and decided to rest, which of course saved his life.

All of the roads (excpet one that I’ve seen) in Uganda are single lane each way unmarked half dirt pot hole filled paths.  The pickup truck was attempting to pass a car and pulled into the coming traffic’s lane on a downhill, unfortunately the driver miscalculated and didn’t have time to pass the car, sped up to try to make it, and didn’t.  It collided head on with an oil carrying truck, it rolled over throwing out all 11 passengers in the back.  11 of the 14 died, 9 in the back and 2 in the front.  The 3 survivors (the driver and 2 others) were not baseball players.  8 of the 11 who died were.

The one who was closest to George was named Eddie (he is the one wearing the softball cap in the article).  George spoke very highly of Eddie and called him his role model and that he often compares himself to Eddie and feels less than.  George said of Eddie “He was like our father.  I wanted to be like him.”  George’s neighbor whose funeral they were on route to also lost 2 more relatives in that accident.  George was close to all of them.

George ended the interview on the positive note that I admire by saying how the accident gave him strength and that he must have been next after Eddie and had to work harder.  He tells me that wherever they are they are going to be proud of the under 12 team.  But when he dug up the newspaper and went through the story with that in his hand he told me how lonely he feels.

Speaking of the under 12 team, they need a name.  George is going to give them a few options when they gather in the coming weeks and have them vote.  But the early leading candidate is The Little Cranes.  The Crane is the national bird and most national teams here are called the Cranes or the Pearls.  Who knows, im sure the kids will come up with some other crazy stuff.

So yeah, that’s it.  Im excited to be back and see what these kids might accomplish this year.  The Little League Regional Tournament will be held in late July in Poland.  Uganda was hoping to host it this year but for a number of reasons… they’ll have to wait for that day.  George is arranging the team that will travel to take on Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Kuwait, and possibly South Africa for a chance to earn a spot in the Little League World Series in Williamsport PA.  They have a big challenge ahead of them, wish them luck.