Crossroads

  He is lying in bed making a thousand wishes. He is ready to take the least blessing if the Big Guy up there will grant it now. But somehow he knows that he’s been given all the blessings and the grace he was ever going to get and he’s blown it all.

  He is listening to Bob Marley and crying into his pillow. His hospital gown barely covers him but that is not on his mind now. Wearing baby blue is preposterous. It is against the revolution. It is a Babylonian invasion. But at the moment, if help came from the Babylon System, he would gladly kiss a foot.

  Some git once said big boys don’t cry but such is the stupidity of the world. That git was not at a crossroads when he said that. Was probably high on some prehistoric grass.

  Last year, he was fine. Two years ago he did not think it would come to this. He felt stronger than his hero Bob, who had a condition like this and just looked straight in the face of his fate. Right now, he does not feel very brave.

  His foot will be history in a few hours. The doctor said, in his hospital gray tone, that if the leg was not amputated, he was going to be dead in a month. The cancer has progressed to such an extent.

  He is thinking of his little Princess. She is but a month old.

  At the point when he had to be brave and say he was keeping his leg; when his much-touted revolutionary instinct was put on the weighing scale to inspire others the way Bob Marley’s stubbornness has done for many Rastas since his death, he buckled and gave in.

  He cannot just go like that. He is too young to die. Princess must see her daddy. She must grow up with memories of being soothed to sleep when she wakes up crying in the night. She must kiss away daddy’s tears when she walks down the isle at her nuptials. This is not the time to die.

  He gives his toe another twitch, the hundredth this hour.

  Small blessings.

  

The Ugandan moor

Sekamatte has been hearing rumours about Janeti and the guy she’s been seeing on the side for some time. As they are rumours and he sees himself as an upright young man, he has struggled with the burden, not knowing what to do about this potato.

 

Last year he proposed. After stalling for a lifetime in which he was written off by everyone as a non-man, he threw caution to the wind and asked Janeti to be his wife. He thought it through thoroughly before he said anything so he does not regret it.

 

He has been saving up for the dream wedding. He has taken up three additional jobs to cover the bill. He also wants to give his sweetheart the best life he can offer. He loves her like that.

 

But now his countenance is constantly clouded. Its like he is always trying to solve some secret mental puzzle. He is back to the drab khaki pants and the unpolished shoes we thought were now history since he met the woman of his life and was transformed. He talks to himself as he walks and he even goes past his house sometimes because he is far too gone in his thoughts.

 

Since he does not hang out with his peers, doesn’t imbibe the poison and doesn’t think Ange and Silk are all that, those who know him are at a loss for what to do about him. They know there is something wrong but they don’t know how to help him out.

 

Someone knows what’s going on though. And he cannot help him since he is the one who brought it on. Some guy called James. He became friends with Sekamatte about the time he hooked up with Janeti but that’s neither here nor there. No one really cares about this, least of all, Sekamatte.

 

The issue is that James has planted the seed. He’s told the poor soul that Janeti has not been true to him. The extra hours he’s putting in and the fact that he is always tired at the end of the day have not really impressed Janeti in the way he thought they would. She feels he’s abandoned her and that the wedding is now more important to him.

 

According to James, Janeti has been going out with a certain Juma, a moneyed, potbellied, dark monster with monster wheels to boot. Said monster has been picking her up at her hostel at a safe hour, when Sekamatte has retired to his own house tired and looking forward to his sleep.

 

Jilted lover is too proud to bring it up with his ladylove. But it’s killing him inside.

 

Today, James gave him a book. He said he might find a solution in the book. The book is called Othello.

Greet me first

If you live in Uganda, particularly in the central part of the country, you have prolly gone through the pain of having to lick. I mean it the way you think I do. It’s a term I learnt from a great orator called Rodney Ruvuza referring to the act of allowing oneself to be a door rag but that’s a story for another day.

Adults in your life were always trying to make you feel like you were lower than the dirt off Smigle’s hideous feet. (Imagine that!). Who gave people the right to lord it over children? It would seem obvious that when I meet someone in the street, we both have not seen each other since last year or last night so we both prolly would want to know how the other slept, no?

In fact, the kid has better things to think about other than the pains in the back of some old crone who spends the day gossiping with the neighbouring hags. The last I checked, I had grown up. I am not a kid. When I meet you, please don’t expect me to greet you. Greet you? Why? Why don’t you greet me?

The stupidity of the whole thing is that when you stop doing the comic genuflections on meeting peeps with some weight about them that makes them think they have the right to lord it over you, they start plotting your death.

Because you did not greet them when you passed by them. I have better things to think about; like what shall I do with the 50 mil sitting in the bank? Or the 100 things i’d like to do to that Gashumba dude who’s riding on a poor child’s fate. Greet me first if you want me to greet you. Gasiya Ttu!

Great weekend

Hooray to the Uganda Cranes. Blah, blah, blah and all that.

In the dying minutes, our guys were gripped by a fear so strong, i thought they would drop the game. The keeper was visibly shaking in his boots, making one stupid error after another.

But we carried the day. We beat the Super Eagles. And what do you know, they are complaining about the ref. Deja Vu? The Cranes were beaten in Nigeria in the first leg and the ref was the culprit.

In other news….

DivizionZ rocked!!!! Props to Mr. Nathan Magoola (who’s name was on the credits as they rolled). It was by far better than Battle of the Souls. What you read in the newspapers about the movie is true. Don Mugisha and his team have arrived.