大象传媒

Alan Johnston presents wit and analysis from 大象传媒 correspondents around the world. In this edition Anna Cavell senses a change of mood in Uganda and Justin Rowlatt describes meeting an Amazonian tribe with a strikingly un-possessive approach to possessions.

Echoes of the bad old days in Kampala

Back in the 1970s and 80s, under the dictator Idi Amin and for a while afterwards, Uganda suffered appalling human rights abuses. Up to half a million people died. More recently, though, under President Yoweri Museveni, the country has come to be seen as a relatively stable, peaceful, promising place.

But in the aftermath of the latest elections there has been new political tension, with soldiers back on the streets and civilians wounded and some killed. Anna Cavell has been visiting Kampala for more than 15 years, and reflects on the changing mood in the city.

Broiled tortoise and battery torches

Part of the delight of travel is going to places where they do things differently. It's a chance to see life through the eyes of others and to think about the way your own society really works - what it values, and why.

Justin Rowlatt recently plunged himself into a world - that of a tribal, hunter-gatherer society in the depths of Amazon jungle - that could hardly have been more different from his own. But as he explains, he left worrying about the impact his own presence might have had.