Sunshine

Wanted: Scrabble buddy

2009-06-01T12:00:00.010+03:00

For years I kept thinking it would be nice to own a Scrabble game set. For years I kept postponing or forgetting about it. There was a time I was very passionate about it that I told whoever asked (including a few who didn't) that it would be an ideal gift if they were thinking of getting me something. For years, nothing came of my hints (I really should polish my hinting skills, or learn to be really pushy) but eventually Mr. Adam did the right thing and bought me one a few months ago. I was over the moon. It was not my birthday or any special occassion (those he has started forgetting-forgetting, shame on him, and I be too proud to remind him. I mean, the guilt when he finally remembers that he forgot an important day is well-deserved and satisfying for me.) so I really was pleased.

Now, I have the game, but I have been reduced to playing solitaire scrabble because he is usually too busy or uninterested to play with me. Or maybe he does not want to lose the game to me? He is usually very enthusiastic about playing Chess and he always beats me at it. But he knows that when it comes to word games I'm on the roll. Could it be all about the famous male ego?

Problem two is the little mintling who is growing quite an ego of her own. I can't do anything without her figuring she should be part of the picture. So a scrabble game is only so until she ambles over and turns it into a game of counting or roll-the-tiles or put-them-back-take-them-out-again.
So, nowadays it's twilight solitaire scrabble for me because I have to wait for her to go to bed, and then I can pull out the scrabble board. While Mr. Adam pokes around in his laptop and files, I sit on the floor with my scrabble.
It's funny how when you're not competing seriously, the good words and big marks seem to come easy. But it's not funny not to have a scrabble partner.

On the bright side, I'm loving the mental exercise (Hi, Ariaka, I have not forgotten).

Today's kids say darndestest things

2009-05-14T18:39:00.005+03:00

Minty (to 3-year-old Matthew): Are you happy?
Matthew: Noooo. I'm matthew.

Minty ( after narrating Sinbad the Sailor to 5-year old Dan): And that is the end of the story.
Dan (gazing longingly into a blank space): Is there a Part 2?

Michelle, 3 and a half years old: Auntie, I tell you something. My mum wears pampers.

This ring finger on my right

2009-04-01T14:46:00.005+03:00

I do realise this is a second post today in a drought-stricken blog, but I am feeling a bit concerned about a matter of great national importance. Members of our Parliament are worried about a swollen ring finger on the right hand of President Yoweri Museveni.

You see our visionary leader (It's a good thing that his vision is intact since it is not his eyes that are swollen - though many have observed that he is quite fond of bulging them during his lectures - and since he himself once said that doctors had warned him to tone down his schedule or risk blindness) has allowed his vulnerable side to show by wearing a plaster for more than two weeks now. I heard that the spicy piece of red vegetable has been on the trail of the finger that grew into a chipolata and now is 'the size of a sausage' (these last being their very words).

What is the point of this post? I have a request for all you analysts, experts, quack doctors, witch...I mean which doctors and conspiracy theorists: What do you think happened to that little (admittedly now large) finger on the president's right?

I know it was not a fish that bit his finger, because he did not himself go to Migingo Island to settle the dispute between Uganda and Kenya.

Personally, I became a bit suspicious after watching a skit on the comedy show 'Barbed Wire' when someone played the president ordering two of his ministers to prove their fitness by doing press ups.

When 'Namirembe' and 'Otafiire' fail to press even one up, the 'president' gets down to demonstrate his fitness. He shows several moves, suported on open palms, on bunched fists and even with one hand. Then he attempts to show how he does it with one finger...and collapses in a heap that only paramedics could uncollapse.

When five days later the plaster started appearing I wondered whether fiction had married truth.

So, people, hit me with your speculations.

Mucky Murphy's law

2009-04-01T14:13:00.003+03:00

Have you noticed that the whiter your shirt/blouse, the more likely you are to drop ketchup/sauce/soup/curry of a brightly lumionus colour on it during lunch?

That's why I'm boycotting lunch today. I have an important appointment this afternoon and I can't risk staining my top.

When they start to grow

2009-03-05T12:29:00.003+03:00

A teenage friend of mine was laughing about a baby in church who, after suckling at one breast, told the mother : “This one is now finished. Give me this one.”
Macline was so amused that a baby who can speak so clearly was still breastfeeding. I laughed along with her. But I shouldn’t have. My 20-month-old Misty still loves to nurse (notice the delicate choice of words) and is learning to talk. Recently she reported: “siyisht (finished),” after nursing at one side. She then turned to the other side and commanded, “eat,” with her hands already trying to dig around. I hope she will never get the chance to do that in public.

I’m beginning to see the rapid changes I have to make now that Misty is growing. When she started walking she loved to put on my clothes and shoes. She would pull down a blouse and struggle to wear it – usually it would end up as a dress-shirt or a very interesting baggy short if she decided to put it on upside down, with the sleeves as the leg holes. If it defeated her, she would drag it to the nearest adult and demand to be dressed or the World Cup of tantrums would ensue. Then she would proudly parade around the house in her latest fashion conquest.

Here she is in her layered look:

long sleeved red tee, model's own

sleeveless red polo neck, Minty's

Striped vest, Minty's.

Katikiti Mobile phone, Minty's!

A number of times I had to dive for my underwear before she got any ideas. One time she succeeded in putting one on but I grabbed her just before she walked out the bedroom door. Now all drawers containing drawers, so to speak, are off limits.

Recently I was lying down on my bed, she was sitting on my belly and we were having several disconnected conversations. She reached for my hair, ran her tiny hand over it and said, “Smaaaart.” I thanked her profusely and lied to her that her hair was also smart. A few minutes later, my hands were under my head as we continued to chat. Then she reached and pointed at the pit of my arm and declared: dirty! Now she was the one lying. Just because my skin is darker around this area! Shyaaah! No, no, it was not like Mabira neither was it like a golf course. It was smooth as a squash court.

Back to the girl chat, I had to cut it abruptly when her hands made as if towards the Central Republic of Me. Was she following a certain theme here? What was she going to do there? I jumped up before she had a chance to execute her evil plan.

Now I am considering instituting a privacy policy. Those things of following me to the bathroom have to end. In fact, I toyed with the idea of a blanket ban on the bedroom but that can wait a few more years.

PS: just so you know I have some cleverness in me, but some mercy on you, I considered leaving out the 'L' in Republic.

The triumph of Temangalo

2009-02-17T10:48:00.003+03:00

No he didn't. Oh yes he did. The president of Uganda ( and I still can't believe this) has made clear his stand on the controversial NSSF- Temangalo land saga. His latest cabinet list says so loud and clear that all you stupid fools who blew saliva on radio talk shows, who wasted airtime calling in to lambast those who used workers' money wantonly, who grew hoarse arguing on the floor and committee rooms of parliament, who spoilt your handwritings penning letters to the editors of various newspapers DON'T KNOW WHO IS BOSS! Hahaha.

What was that about 'he who washes his hands may dine with kings'? More like 'he who dirties his hands...' in this here cassava republic.
Just check this article from October 2008 about efforts to save Amama Mbabazi. And then check out the new entrants on the cabinet list. Educative.

For what it's worth, in 3000 words

2009-02-13T10:20:00.002+03:00

A quarrel

An apology

And a Kiss

Been too long in the rain. Make that murky swampy bog. With a silver lining, if that is possible.

Thoughts in Brownian motion

2008-12-15T16:07:00.001+03:00

Aka Random thoughts.

1. I want a break from work and yet I can't have it. I don't like the arrangement of having to work all through the holidays except on December 24 and 25. I want to have a sleep in weekend and an island holiday.

2. I have a feeling that the Serulanda Foundation will have their way inspite of the weirdness of their practices, and with the full participation of our M7. While the president instituted a comission of inquiry months ago, his government has at the same time been commissioning the investors and organising the legal framework under which the Lake Victoria Free Trade Zone will operate.

3. Reading about surrogate mothers in newspapers and the Internet is one thing, but knowing somebody who actually went through it is quite another thing. It hit me like a big block of ice when I heard that the beautiful young relative who had gone abroad for about a year, had actually gone to be a surro for her older sis. I should be touched by the whole giving thing, but instead I still feel chilled. I don't know why.

4. At what age do children learn to demand the bigger portion of everything? And where do they learn that if they screamed and kicked long enough you will eventually give in? Who teaches them to resort to endless nibbling especially when the cookie has become no more than the size of a pea? Is this an attempt to prolong the life of the swiftly diminishing cookie?

5. So on Tuesday last week Museveni and the LRA representative Nyekorach Matsanga meet and we are told the president agreed to talk to Kony one on one (on phone, by the way). Then on Sunday this week a joint Uganda-Congo-South Sudan force bombards the LRA hideout in Garamba. How interesting. Now if this is the same Matsanga who early this year reportedly wrote a letter to Museveni urging him to carry out swift military action against Kony, then I think the Tuesday meeting was about talking to Kony in the language of the gun.

Awards that are not necesarily awe inspiring

2008-12-04T13:57:00.000+03:00

This is Navio of Klear Kut receiving his Pearl of Africa Music Award for best Hip Hop something from the Commander of the Land Forces Maj. Gen. Katumba Wamala.

All good. But the PAM Award trophy is not all that, I am just saying. I have nothing against the spirit of the awards but that trophy is not inspiring at all. At first you would imagine they would have something shaped like Africa or if that was too hard, like a pearl. Wait. Maybe 'pearl' is what the organizers told the craftsman to make, just that he understood pearl to be a rare gem and came up with a diamond shape. That is my working theory.
Anyway, there have since beeen other groups stampeding to start their own 'Awadi' (In the last month alone, there have been adverts for Volunteer awards, Real Estate awards, just to mention the most intriguing for me) ceremonies. Not bad. However, there is going to be trouble if the organisers are too lazy to deviate from that glass triangular shaped trophy.

For instance, the winners of the 2008 MTN Kampala Marathon received fantastic trophies. Check them out.

Can you seen the glass thingy with the pointy end? If there was a sudden earth tremour, or someone bumped into one of these winners, or the dais went wobbly, would their eyes escape being poked?

Okay. Now at the inaugural Uganda film industry awards guess what inspired the trophy. Well as you can see, the prismic thingy showed up here too, albeit with a stylish looking stand.
Although there were a couple of variations, like this one here below.

The pointy apex was slashed off. Or the craftsman ran out of material too late. Or he had an idea of who would get this particular trophy and wanted to keep the old man safe from the deadly sharp point.

I hope these trophies come with a small text in the corner:

Fragile, Handle with care: If that thing dropped from a significant height, you can be saying goodbye to your prized symbol of progress.

Slippery, handle with dry hands: Oh, Oh, imagine that Katumba Wamala's hands were sweaty and with all the Clere Lotion he used, the Pam Award trophy slipped off his fingers, just before Navio received.

Keep out of reach of children. The sharp apex looks dangerous enough to be used in slaying the cat. And worse could happen, God forbid.

Then imagine that you won in all three contests then your mantelpiece would really be something to look at (not).
I’m sure it certainly beats receiving those infamous wooden ‘shields’, but if they want to continue employing the same bored glass cutter, why not venture into other shapes and better etch work?
Better still, what is so wrong with giving the job to a few sculptors, say at Makerere University, to do a serious job?

In other news:

Overheard on Power FM in the voice of Ben Mwine: They are a dime and a dozen to come across.

(And he was not even saying that THEY are many. Just the opposite.)

Monday's smiley moon

2008-12-04T09:52:00.007+03:00

By now you have already discussed and discussed the 'smiley' moon that showed in our skies on Monday night.

Anyway, when Jupiter and Venus came that close to the crescent moon, I was only too eager to try and photograph the spectacle. I have no fancy lens to my simple camera. I should have known the results would be awful.

The first try gave terrible results:

So, Mr. Adam offered to help me and he got this:

I politely snatched the camera back and got this one:

The right 'eye' in the smiley is barely visible but it's there. You can see it if you squint, squeeze your eyes near shut, put your nose on the screen or use a magnifying glass.

where in Kampala is this?

2008-11-25T14:28:00.009+03:00

I stumbled upon these interesting photos of Kampala in those days of our grandfathers. I'm young like that, unlike some of you who were in P6 already by 1960. Of course Baz I'm not talking about you. You are like us the youth of today (that is just a saying, not the title of that 1980s song by Musical Youth. Which I heard on the radio of course) and your latest Bad Idea had me in stitches.
Right, let's play a little game and see how many of us can identify which places are featured in the photos.

Number 1

Number 2

Number 3

Number 4

Answers in the comments section Priiz. Sanx.

The Obamamadness is still with us

2008-11-19T14:57:00.003+03:00

Either Obamamania has refused to go away or some people just know how to make quick money. Ugandans love to party and any excuse will do.

Oh, well, at least I got to know that Blue Africa Restaurant changed names to 'Super Paradise' (how do you like the name, eh?).

Also, here's where I've wasted most of the Company's time today. I hope you'll understand why couldn't tear myself away from Cake Wrecks. With all my relatives, inlaws and outlaws, you can be sure I have seen some frightful cakes in my life. Maybe sometime I will do a cake wrecks special post on this blog.

Pix fest

2008-11-15T16:35:00.003+03:00

This little mintling is quite fashion conscious.

Of late she has taken to sharing some of my stuff.

Here, she commandeers my boots. Even if it means getting a little extra help to take those steps.

I must admit she makes them look quite battered. Maybe it's time to let them go.

You may stumble and fall, but each time pick yourself up and try again.

Even if it means walking the rest of the journey with only one shoe.

Enjoy the weekend all you good people.

Shouted on the rooftops

2008-11-11T17:17:00.005+03:00

There is this endangered species that is common in the Christian church, the species that have forced a past tense to become an adjective. Some members of these species, identified as the Marrieds, are sighted mostly around church buildings on Sunday afternoons. They hurdle together and whisper things that other species can only be curious about, and perhaps make a resolution to find their way into that circle.

Well, every once in a while the males and females of the species decide to meet separately, for better elucidation and unhindered discussion of certain gender-specific matters.

Sometimes some of the things that one hears at such meets remain with one forever. I have two examples that put the fear of Marrieds in my brave heart.

From the women's camp, somebody opened her mouth and delivered the lines that will just not get out of my head:

And the way they like IT in the morning! It's like they are always ready, yet you have things to do.

Only one person had the ill-timed judgement to agree, with an overenthusiastic "Owaaye!"

And from the men's camp, our agent, Mr. Adam brought back on a silver platter the following:

"The problem is that she insists on bathing with hot water at night, which just makes it..."

Sorry people, for some reason my mind has marred the rest of that line. I need to have the exact words lest I misrepresent, because I could fill it with any number of sad endings.

After that experience, you just have to make a mental note to dodge all the men-only or women-only meetings in future. Because after someone bares his/her soul, they will not be content until they have extracted a dangerous confession out of each one in the group. And like Minty and Adam compared notes, all the wives and husbands sure must have done the same. After that you don't know who is looking at you in a shiny new light.

I'd rather stay in the shadows, thanks.

Why Obama won: An African's speculation

2008-11-05T10:33:00.001+03:00

Barrack Obama had many more Yirizis (lucky charms) than John McCain.

I'm just kidding. Apparently such paraphernalia were part and parcel of the campaign strategies of both candidates.

A Nsenene Chronicle

2008-11-02T19:23:00.000+03:00

(Photo snatched from www.spaech.blogspot.com)

The Baganda call this month Musenene, the month in which, from ages past, the edible and well loved grasshopper (Homorocoryphus Nitidulus) literally fell from the sky. November is the main nsenene season, the other being April, when a swarm of the delicious locusts converges on the areas around Lake Victoria from the greater North.
The season was heralded by children and adults alike gathering round street light posts to catch the dazed insects. Mindless about street traffic, with eyes fixed on the zooming green and brown nsenene, many people put their lives at risk of road accidents. Those with bright security lights benefited from the juicy visitors that whirred by during the night. In the morning chattering children, many of them in school uniforms, would be seen chasing after the nsenene caught in the dew of the grass.
The insects would be caught, one at a time, and stuffed down the neck of a bottle or into a cup of hot water – either route being a point of no return.
Then the harvest would be brought home with much excitement, for the wings and legs to be twisted off, leaving only a slender naked abdomen and knob-shaped head.

These would then be stirred over a hot pan until they turned a deliciously crisp golden brown. Crunchy and somewhat salty, nsenene is a cheap source of protein, calcium, and unsaturated oils.
To those that have acquired the taste, nsenene is the object of undiluted greed for many Ugandans of all ages. A favourite joke is to tease a husband about finding himself on the receiving end of his pregnant wife’s tantrums if she asks for nsenene in the middle of the night, moreover on the wrong month.
During the month of Musenene, everyone was sure to get a mini harvest and neighbours would freely (maybe grudgingly too) share their catch.

Well, the romantic story of nsenene of old is no more.
Today most of the grasshoppers that make the long trip from the Abyssinian heights end up at commercial harvesting rigs set up by ambitious greedy capitalists who have monopolized the catching of nsenene.

Weeks before the first insects are expected, building sites with top floors are booked and leased for the sole purpose of catching the most nsenene possible. The ‘combine harvesters’ consist of rows of huge barrels fitted with shiny new iron sheets and crudely wired light bulbs. The fluorescent lights bounce off the iron sheets, at once attracting and blinding the insects. When they hit the iron sheets the nsenene slide all the way down to the bottom of the barrel, literally. Security guards are hired to keep watch, and sometimes live electric cables are wired around the area to deter thieves.
This way the monopolists lag home tonnes and tonnes of nsenene, and close out the ordinary people who used to get free ‘manna’ from heaven.
The commercial nsenene production includes wholesale trade in sacks of nsenene, transported over distances as long as 150km to the city in order to get the best price. At the market places like Nakasero in Kampala, vendors use ash to dewing the insects and set about selling them raw, fried or preserving them. To preserve nsenene, they are boiled briefly in water then sun dried to a crispness.
With the preservation, nsenene can be available all year round, rather than in the month of Musenene.
While this makes it possible to preserve, market and even export the delicacy, the natural balance has been upset.
Commercially harvested nsenene usually starts to smell as the live insects interact with dead ones in sacks loaded on cramped vehicles. This smell lingers on to the last. The quality deteriorates significantly with the passing of time. Sometimes at the onset of the season traders are not ashamed to sell last season’s nsenene as if it were fresh.
Many people cannot afford a dessertspoonful of fried nsenene – barely enough to satisfy a craving - at between sh100 and sh300.
The social activity around the collection and preparation of the grasshoppers is no more and I fear that a strong part of the Kiganda culture is died with it. There are old songs about grasshopper gathering, which no doubt are not being sung by the commercial harvesters.

I write this as I thank God for the handful of fresh nsenene popping in my mouth. I write as I mourn the way comercialisation has overtaken the rich tradition and taste of the versions we traditionally caught and prepared ourselves in days gone by.

The mini version of a rant

2008-10-27T15:13:00.000+03:00

Bathe, baby, bathe

When invisible walls are closing in
Can you part the stench curtains
And stick your nose outside
Hoping to drink in some fresh air?

How do you crawl
Out of the dark chocking depth
Of an office cubicle
Turned stinky dungeon?

Where can you hide
From these territorial claws
Of co-worker’s odour
Reaching with anti-perfume hugs
Of sweat-buttered,
Armpit-hairy,
Crotch-suffocated,
mouldy-toed,
Unwashed body?

*This is the short version of a very eloquent rant I have bottled up since last week. I'm about to report to work in a space suit. How do you handle?

Food on my mind

2008-10-23T16:25:00.000+03:00

Office Katogo*

He has a plastic fork in his hand
Gripped between two fingers and thumb.

Like a pelican, the fork dives into a red dish.
When it comes back up,
A piece of matooke is impaled on its tip.
His eager lips collect the harvest with one bite.
The fork goes back in to swim in the gravy.
Another piece of matooke drips with slick juices
As it balances tantalizingly on its way up.

He looks up.
I shift my gaze to the window above him.
“It is raining outside,” I manage to say.
“Do you want some?”
“Some what?”
He pulls out a fork from his drawer
And starts to hand me the dish.
“Ah...No, boss. I just had lunch.”
He rewards my discretion with an oily smile.

*Katogo is a meal of matooke (cooked green bananas)* in a rich relish of meat or offals or beans or peanut sauce. The word is also commonly used to describe a confusing or disorganised situation.

*Is there an easier way to translate 'matooke'?

No meat month update

2008-10-13T17:57:00.000+03:00

This is my last week in my no red meat month. Before that, I hardly went two days without eating beef. I put it down to the buffet kind of service at the office canteen. First of all, white meat like fish and chicken is more expensive than beef. Secondly it is easy to just go with the flow without even thinking about what you are doing.
So I decided to break the tight hold that red meat had on me by snubbing it for one month. Warrabout!

Week 1
I am so determined to stick to the deal. I have decided to build a buffer zone by telling as many people as I think will be around me during meal times. The logic is that they would remind me in case I made the mistake of ordering beef mindlessly.
This did not help me on the weekend when sitting next to my house help I ordered chips and sausage at Java’s restaurant at City Oil. Actually, I chose the meal because it was one of the cheapest on the menu and I was just waiting for the four wheeled Esperanza to be serviced. I only remembered my resolution well into the second sausage.
And then, two days later I had a lunch at Fang Fang restaurant as part of a group. Without thinking, I chewed on beef among the fancily prepared meats they served. Arrrgh (but the chilli beef was too good. I am glad I let down my guard for it).

Week two

I think I am already feeling different. I wonder whether I am not psychologically biased to expect good results. There is a certain lightness and I don’t feel tired in the afternoons (after lunch) like I used to.
Well, the other truth is that visits to Mr. John have been less stressful. So Cheri’s colourful description of what red meat does to the colon must be true.
On the two days the rest of the house was eating red meat, I ate my rice ‘dry’. Poor planning. I should have stocked some alternatives. I could see my house help thinking: “This is no way to live!”

Weak three
No mishaps this week. I was wise enough to buy a tin of tuna and somebody sent us two fat cabbages so I have been covered nicely. I commended myself for resisting the juicy looking liver stew like a Hindu.
I still feeling gooder than I have felt in years. For real. I am not sure if this feel-good-ness is due to the no-red-meat regime. I have been waking up earlier every day and with less of a verbal and physical tug of war to get me out of bed. This is great!

Weak four
I am having problems with chocolate cravings. I have eaten many bars of chocolate, lunch bars and TV bars in this week than I have in the last two months. I must be trying to convert my catholic resistance to beef into indulgence of anything not forbidden. This is not good.

Today
It is two days to go. I want to celebrate with a platter of the P1G, flanked by avocado, kachumbari and cassava (I am drooling at the mere thought) on Thursday.
Over all, this is something I will certainly hope to do again, if only to feel less enslaved by things that seem to have a grip on me. Plus, my mind has come to accept that lunch at the canteen can be complete without beef. I am going to be stricter on the amount of beef I eat from now on.

Simple and fuss free contraceptive...for goats!

2008-10-07T13:11:00.000+03:00

Have you ever heard of the 'olor'? A BBC story (click the link in the title) reports that Maasai pastoralists have found it necessary to prevent the unnecessary expansion of their goat herds during this drought season using a barrier to prevent goats from getting erm, reproductive. The logic is that there is too much competition for pasture and water to afford more goats now. In november the cowhide 'condom' (or goatdom) can be taken off and free copulation can take place.
The Maasai have had this technology for generations, even before wazungu brought this idea of condoms as a barrier method of contraception.
This makes me think that the idea of iron underpants for philandering men can actually work.

NSSF-Temangalo deal, what gives?

2008-09-29T12:20:00.000+03:00

I'm sure you will agree with me that what started as a land transaction between the National Social Security Fund and the security minister Amama Mbabazi and his associate Amos Nzeyi has morphed into an octopus with too many arms to keep up with.

If the powers that be wanted me completely baffled they have done a commendable job.
it seems that the stage has been set with some superb actors and some terribly lame ones. I can't get my head around the cast but I wish someone would explain to me the plot.

Why are there so many diversions from the real issues? Here, there's a side circus of Barnabas Tinkasimire, Margaret Muhanga, Banyenzaki, etc. Then the Jim Muhwezi monkey act is given a new twist when the disruptive monkey is rounded up for having escaped its cage. There's this angle of the so called foiled robbery at Garden City (it's been ages since a bank robbery was foiled by our police, what vigilance!)Not to forget the chief court jester, Charles Rwomushana resigned or sent packing from the internal security body for talking too much.
Who is policing who in this mix?
What part is the media playing in all this?
I can't keep up with the letters to the editor saying exactly the same thing, almost word for word. I have seen Mbabazi's face and heard his haughty voice on more talk shows this month than in my entire TV-watching and radio-listening life. Suddenly the NRM secretary general who was recently accused of being unavailable has become too available because he has to defend his controversial sale.

Is there more going on masterminded by the top circus master at NRM?

Are NSSF managers such fools that they would hand in all of sh11bn for land whose acreage, occupancy or topography they hadn't confirmed?
Was the discovery of the deal accidental and the land titles hurriedly handed over to cover up for the irregular doling of workers' savings?
When shall we know the truth?

Goodbye red meat. See you in one month

2008-09-18T09:01:00.000+03:00

This is an announcement. I have made a decision to resign from my post of chief beef eater for a month. Unlike some stubborn ministers in our government, I have decided to step aside for a while to allow investigations into the report health effects of red meat to go on.

I confess that I am an over-consumer of the stuff, which worries me considering that there's all this health talk about what meat can do to the human body. Plus, beef prices have gone absolutely crazy, so I should be able to save some money.

ciao ciao baby

Of course there are those who complain that today's scientists don't want us to eat anything that tastes good. In today's world sugar is bad, soda is bad, salt is bad, white bread is bad, etc etc.

Well, I had a dream last night (heh, just kidding). It's just that I would like to test the red meat argument for myself.

I want to know how my body (and mind) will do without meat for 31 straight days, starting today. I have heard that in fact the body gets a boost when it does not have to deal with red meat. I shall see.

This means picking mainly greens and pulses off that buffet table and saying no to those scrumptious meat samosas from the office canteen. I will only eat fish and the occasional chicken, but no pork (which is technically red meat although it appears white).

Now the reason I am stating this here is, I need to be accountable. Otherwise, without witnesses the whole deal will fall through. I am not exactly Miss Clean when it comes to sticking to some hard decisions.

To keep myself in check, I will be writing a daily diary about how I am feeling, although only occasional extracts may make it to this blog.

Wish me luck as I take the plunge.

Mob justice at the old taxi park

2008-09-09T11:59:00.001+03:00

Downtown Kampala
Monday September 8, 2008
Time: 19:26hrs

His trousers were bunched painfully around his groin, his feet barely touching the pavement as he was forcefully dragged by his belt. As they semi-hopped from one side of the taxi park to the centre, everyone turned to see him. What had he done to make the crowd so excited with the unrestrained need to release their anger? Had he been caught cutting someone’s handbag? Was he a pickpocket or a much grander thief?
There was no time to find out. The mere fact that three people were dragging him was condemnation enough.
So they set upon him with sticks and stones. They hurled him to the tarmac yard and kicked and kicked. There were shouts that he should be killed on the spot. Others wondered that a woman can give birth to a boy who would grow up to be a thief.
When a wide gash on his temple begun spewing thick red metallic-smelling blood, only then did someone decide that he had paid for his crime. They let him stumble away, hardly seeing for the blood dripping in his eye.

Suddenly, as if reminded of some duty she had left undone, a woman, neatly covered in a blue apron, got up with such fury. She swept up the stool she had been sitting on and made her way to the man who had just been released out of mercy. She aimed the stool at him and clobbered him with all her might. She did it with all the dedication of someone who was going to get paid for the job. Then she turned, disgusted at the fact that she had got blood on her stool, and walked back with a scowl to her snacks and sweets stall.

Idle blogging

2008-09-01T17:58:00.000+03:00

So I hear you chaps who go for BHH are so unserious, you only talk trivia, discuss boobs and generally play kawuna? I am never coming for a BHH. But I can get myself a job as a waiter at Effendy's so I can keep a surreptitious eye on the goings on. Obviously, the now famous Thomas Smyth missed out on quite some fun by walking out.

Now, let me share my very serious and of public concern boobs story. In the video for the Dream Girls' song ‘weekend’, the girls dance and play, presumably in a jungle. Well in the jungle dress, there are some bits that escaped from their tiny confines. So we have a small glimpse of boob in that video, around the first mention of the word ‘weekend’. It took a lot of homework to bring you this tid bit, mind, so when you go a-looking, you need to squint real hard to see what I saw. By now you are wondering why I didn't just post a video clip or something. It is part of the blogger deficiency on my side. My PC doesn't allow those intarekchuo things of You Tube. Anyhow, I just keep wondering if any of the Dream Girls members or their managers noticed, whether they just can't be bothered to edit that out, or it is intentional?

And also, I have a moobs picture too. Man-boobs at the Pyramids Casino tent at the Goat Races in Munyonyo.

Frightening! I have to run from my own blog.

A mini portrait of Kampala

2008-07-28T14:04:00.000+03:00

.... when no one is looking

Who are they trying to keep in or out at University Hall Makerere with razor wire? Are the students wont to scale the walls (and roof) or have thieves become a problem?

Talk about biting off more than you can chew. Right in the middle of traffic on jinja road, the matresses started 'pouring' off the boda bike. I don't know how long it took to pick up all the pieces.

A dead marabou stork lies uninterred at the foot of a signpost on the traffic island just opposite the Lugogo Mall pedestrian entrance.

Went back to check out the progress of disintegration two weeks later. Only the beak (triangular things in the right foreground) a few bones and feathers were left. Nature is really thorough. Makes you think about how much space would be saved if we stopped building 6 feet by 2 concrete houses underground for every dead being.

This picture is not that good. I was looking at the rooftop of the Madhvani buildings opposite Barclays Jinja road. There were some places CHOGM did not kiss.

P.S: I'm still waiting for someone to review Prof.Dr.VicePresident (house-like-a-hotel, now-Hotel-like-a-housing-block) Upland Rice (when does he do vice-presidenting?) champion's book. Gilbert Bukenya recently launched ( that word bores me) ‘Through Intricate Corridors to Power’ (what kind of an overbearing luggage of an insufferably long and terribly worded title is that?). Has any one read? Please I am dying to know if a Ugandan politician can really write an autobiography or it's another altobiography ( hastily made up term for altered bio). I am not eager to read the late Noble Mayombo's 'An Officer and a Gentleman' though.

P.P.S: I will be out for about a month while I do this annual leave thing. Enjoy your good and funny selves.