What: Friday Nyte Out with Sqoop
When: Tomorrow, 25th September, 2009
Where: Blue Haze. Former Cheese Bar
How to get in: among the 1st 150, just show the Sqoop Magazine of Friday 25th. After 150 people, just pay 5k.
The deal: they will tell you that Grace Nakimera(hi Sleek, Nev and Normzo), GNL (yay!), Bobi Wine, Estar and the Nu Lyfe Dancers will perform. They might even add that Richard T. K and Zuena wiil host. But isn’t it just enough to know that I will be there?
Ok. See you!
What: Public reading
When: Thursday 17th September 2009 at 4:00pm
Where: the National Theatre Auditorium.
theme: A Reading Family: Linking Reading to Nation Building.”
The intention of this event is to promote Ugandan Creative Writers and encourage reading especially of Ugandan authored books.
The main authors who will read from their work are Dr. Susan Kiguli (The African Saga), Lillian Tindyebwa (Recipe For Disaster), Dr. Patrick Mangeni (A Leopard In My Bed and Other Stories), Captain Ulysses Chuka Kibuuka (Of Saints And Scare Crows), and Joseph Mugasa (Pulse Of The Pearl). Other authors include the three winners of The Beverly Nambozo Poetry Award and Lantern Meet of Poets group.
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When the Rwandan genocide took place, i was 8 years old and i really did not understand what the whole thing was about. save fo the fact that my dad was always in serious meetings, made sure to call a certain place every day at the same time without fail and that whole thing of people’s fingers in fish, i just could not understand the magnitude of what was happening.
I have often heard people call Rwandans mean and hardhearted people who could kill their own. I have even heard people say that such a thing would never happen in Uganda or any other country because no one can be as ruthless as those ‘banalwanda’.
during the Mabira Saga there was a threat on the lives of Indians here in Kampala and i just could not believe the course we were taking. and then the post colonial violence in Kenya left me speechless because whereas we had pretended to be so heart broken by the genocide in Rwanda, we had not learnt a single thing!
and now there is this Bafuruki thing going on and the Kabaka-Kayunga saga and i am so scared of what might happen to us!
you see, i was seated in a taxi this morning when CBS broadcast it’s morning news. ofcourse the Kayunga thing was among the top stories. there was a man infront of me who was so infuriated and this is what he said: ” Ye lwaki bajooga Kabaka waffe bwebatyo?…hmmm?…Tebamanyi nagwebazannya naye. Tujakubookya! Nze singa naliyo eyo ekayunga tewali munyala yandivuddewo mulamu!” (Why are they undermining our Kabaka?…They don’t even know who they are playing with…We will BURN them! Me if i had been in Kayunga no munyala would have left alive!”)
I have Kiganda blood in me but i am terrified by Baganda. not because they are bad people but because they have power that is so silently potent and loyalty that is so extreme(you remember how they literally brought New Vision to it’s knees) it scares me…and frankly i don’t even get what this Kayunga thing is about! But it is the sentiments of such people like the man in the taxi that scare me so. and make me realise that the genocide was not limited to ‘mean and hard hearted banalwanda’ but that it is something that we should all be afraid will take over our hearts.
i’m just worried. let’s see how the Kabaka’s tour turns out this saturday.
What: Xtreme 2020: a christian jig
When: 24th July 2009
In attendance: Nev,Walkonby, SolodawgKing, The Node Six Crew plus a guy I am inclined to believe is the Emrys, Heaven! and (much later) Sleek…and other people.
You can read more on this at Nev’s.
Now, the photographic evidence.
1. the fashion show
2. the music
a)the guy who can undoubtedly give Isaiah Katumwa a run for his money. Brian Mugyenyi
b. Isaac Rucci, Rockamilley, Pragmo: whose pictures are refusing to upload and i am not really known for patience. apologies…ok let me try again…
ok…it has refused!
3. the bloggers that represented
Alrightie then…hope y’all are doing well.
These are the causes that are very close to my heart: the fight against domestic violence, the fight against breast cancer (because in my second year I got a scare. Thankfully when I was checked, they found that even though I had quite abnormal lumps, they were not cancerous) and blood donation.
June 14th is the International Blood Donor Day. Very exciting for me this year is the fact that that the company I work for now calls in people from the blood bank so that we can donate. Infact I have just donated my blood.
I donate blood because importantly, I am blood group O. That means I can give the entire world blood.
Also, very many people need blood.
In March this year, a distant relation of mine was brought from the village because he was very sick. When they got to Mulago, the doctors announced that he needed blood but the hospital did not have blood. Which is as absurd as Mulago usually gets. My relatives then called me but I was recovering from Malaria and it had just rained red at mine a few days earlier making me a very poor candidate for donation. I have never felt so bad in my life.
About three weeks ago, my cousin gave birth to a handsome baby boy who I have since called my new boyfriend (sorry, Ebony). Even though the delivery was normal she almost bled to death but the doctors were able to notice early enough and take her to theatre. She had a blood transfusion and is up to now feeding on all sorts of green vegetables to be healthy again. And she is not alone. There are hundreds of women who lose blood in the labour wards.
Strange that someone can go to hospital and not find blood? In May, New Vision reported that the blood bank was facing shortage. Bukenya (the blood donor mobiliser based at the Nakasero Blood Bank in Kampala) said the bank needed 200,000 units of blood to supply all the health centres across the country. “If people and organisations don’t respond by donating blood, the officials said, even Mulago, the largest hospital, would be affected.”
This is what yesterday’s Daily Monitor reported:
Dr Nathan Kenya Mugisha, the director of health services – Clinical and Community, said …
“We need about 200,000 units of blood per year. Currently, we are getting 180,000 units,” Dr Mugisha said. “We can’t manufacture blood. We urge people to donate blood and save lives.”
Dr Mugisha added that Uganda has an annual shortage of 20,000 units of blood. “The need for blood increases with the increasing population and the burden of diseases especially malaria and anaemia. If we can control those diseases, the need for blood would reduce,” he said.
From the internet:
Facts about the blood donation process
1. Donating blood is a safe process. A sterile needle is used only once for each donor and then discarded
2. Blood donation is a simple four-step process: registration and medical history, mini-physical, donation, and refreshments
3. Every blood donor is given a mini-physical, checking the donor’s temperature, blood pressure, pulse and hematocrit level (red blood cells count) to ensure it is safe for him or her to give blood
4. The actual blood donation typically takes less than 10-12 minutes. T
5. The average adult has about 10 to 12 pints of blood in his body. Roughly 1 pint is given during a donation
6. All donated blood is tested for HIV, Hepatitis B and C, syphilis and other infectious diseases, before it can be released to hospitals
7. Information you give during the donation process is strictly confidential. It may not be released without your permission except as directed by law
Facts about blood and its components
8. Whole blood can be processed into red cells, platelets, plasma, and cryoprecipitate. The total number of units of all of these components transfused in a year is 29 million (2001)
9. It is possible to donate specifically only platelets or plasma. This process is called apheresis 10. Most donated red blood cells must be used within 42 days of collection
11. Donated platelets must be used within 5 days of collection — new donations are constantly needed
12. Healthy bone marrow makes a constant supply of red cells, plasma and platelets. The body will replenish the elements given during a blood donation – some in a matter of hours, and others in a matter of weeks
Facts about donors
13. The #1 reason donors say they give blood is because they “want to help others”
14. Two most common reasons cited by people who don’t give blood are: “Never thought about it” and “I don’t like needles”
15. One donation can help save the lives of up to 3 people
16. If you began donating blood at age 17 and donated every 56 days until you reached 76, you would have donated 48 gallons of blood, potentially helping save over 1,000 lives!
17. Red Cross donors are 50% male, 50% female
18. People with O- type blood are universal donors. Their blood can be given to people of all blood types.
19. Type O- blood is often used in emergencies before the patient’s blood type is known, and with newborns who need blood.
20. People with AB+ type blood are universal donors of plasma, the liquid portion of blood. AB+ plasma is often used in emergencies, for newborns and for patients requiring massive transfusions
What do you tell your boss when he/she asks you to do something that goes against everything that you believe in. i am not talking about sexual harrassment because that is easy(you tell him tomanyira…and bambi i won’t quit just because you are stray. oswadde!) but you know, things like he wants you to do the dirty work for him/her. say bribe someone so you can get work done. you know that you can get that work done even without having to bribe someone although it might take you longer and the boss needs it done now so the boss insists that the solution is bribery.
or, say if you and your boss sell tomatoes. yes. tomatoes. and then a particular customer asks for say 20 tomatoes and you have only 12. so the boss says, ” we don’t have those other tomatoes but we have some bad tomatoes-although they are not rotting yet, that we can mix in and they will never know.”…ofcourse they will know. they are going to use the damn tomatoes!…and really, do you know how infuriating that is when it is done to you?…so what do you tell your boss….no, i won’t?
…and then, when i was writing this post, i glanced over at today’s New Vision…and this is the screwed up country in which we live! read this story: http://newvision.co.ug/D/8/26/678908
or if link is giving you a hard time, let me just copy and paste for you.
Molested boy expelled from school, culprit out on bail
By Gladys Kalibbala
Nnalongo (real name withheld), a resident in Lunnyo village, Entebbe Municipality is in a dilemma after her son was sodomised and later expelled from school.
The widow, a mother of seven children, says she is devastated after the ‘double torture’ to her son.
“Before my boy has recovered from the trauma of being sodomised, we find he has nowhere to study from,” she wails.
She narrates that she fainted immediately after making an alarm which attracted a big crowd.
She could not stand the shock of watching a trusted family friend sucking the private parts of her 12-year-old son.
Her children called him ‘uncle’ because of his close relationship to Nnalongo. The incident happened next door to Nnalongo’s home in Herman Kalule’s hair salon. Kalule is the area LC1 youth secretary.
“What Kalule did was terrible,” she says. She adds that according to Deutronomy Chapter 28, a man who engages in a sexual relationship with a fellow man is cursed in the eyes of the Lord.
“I have to pray and fast intensively and beg the Almighty Lord to lift that curse off my dear son,” she says while sobbing.
On the fateful day, Nnalongo was picked from Nakiwogo landing site where she works, as one of her daughters studying in Kampala was seriously sick.
However, her plans changed when she got home and found one of her sons missing.
On inquiry, she was told he was seen with Kalule at the salon. She rushed there to let him know about the sick girl. When she got there, the door was closed and there was music playing. She panicked and kicked the door open.
“Oh! I don’t want to remember how Kalule was sucking the tip of my son’s penis,” she says.
Nnalongo reported the matter to the Police, but when Kalule was taken to court, he was bailed out. Over the Easter weekend, he invaded her home, but she was not home, so he insulted her children.
A lady passing by says she heard Kalule calling the children’s mother a poor woman. The witness says Kalule said it would be impossible for him to stay in jail because he has enough money to bail him out.
To add insult to injury, Nnalongo received a letter from the school, advising her to take her son elsewhere as the administration feared that their reputation might be tarnished because of the boy.
“This boy may have already gone deep into the homosexual behaviour and end up spoiling other children in the school,” commented a teacher.
Nnalongo says since she has meagre resources, her son has been sponsored by friends who will not be happy and may stop giving them money if she does not produce a school report for this term.
Meanwhile, Kajumba Mayanja, a psychologist from Makerere University, advises that the boy is young and still traumatised from the incident and needs total support from his school and family.
“This is a situation where the school should work hand-in-hand with the parents to see that legal action is taken against whoever molested the boy instead of punishing him for a crime he cannot understand,” he explains.
Kajumba cautions the public to stop regarding such minors as culprits in cases of defilement or sodomy because they are too young to make a concession regarding their behaviour.
He advises parents to show love and not punish the boy because he needs a lot of comfort at the moment as he may have either been influenced by the man who is much older than him or even forced into this. Kalule is suspected to be in his 30s.
“The young boy needs urgent care of a psychologist or counsellor to help him overcome the situation.There is also a need to see that he is helped to overcome the homosexual influence,” he said.
Repeat offender
Nnalongo, a born-again Christian, confesses that like many other people in Lunnyo, she has heard rumours about Kalule’s homosexuality.
Little did she know that he even involves children as young as her son.
Nnalongo took her son for a medical check-up at Entebbe Hospital and the results showed that the boy had ever been penetrated, which brings her to the conclusion that this was not the first time.
She recalls that sometime last year, her daughter used to complain that her brother’s underwear was always soiled.
She had also seen the soiled underwear and ordered the boy to wash them.
In the same area, a 17-year-old boy confessed that Kalule, who was a friend of his family, started sexually abusing him from the age of six to 13.
He broke off the relationship after his 10-year-old friend who was also pursued by Kalule, shared his dilemma with him.
The other boy says he refused to accept Kalule’s advances, although he still fears to tell his parents.
A survey among the residents in the area revealed that many women who had found out what their sons had gone through just kept quiet, saying they never wanted their children to be embarrassed.
One lady narrates how a few years ago, Kalule was caught with a boy when he was working in Nzabanita’s Salon around the former Entebbe bus park.
It is alleged that Kalule went into hiding when the father of the boy, an army man, started looking for him.
After the fury ebbed, Kalule returned and has been working in his salon at Lunnyo for about four years.
The residents say the salon is usually occupied by young boys, including those whom Kalule pays school fees for.
Eavesdropping
Listening to the maid talking to my nephew
Maid: In morning you say no wash my body. Why? Eh? Why? (He hates to bathe. In the morning he throws tantrums. In the evening he lies that he bathed at school. He is 4 years old)
Maid: where is stick of mine? (This is supposed to threaten him to do what she wants him to do because she is actually saying, “where is my kiboko?”)
Maid: you talk to baby sorry. (Telling him to apologise to his sister for hitting her)
….and from the mouths of babes:
My nephew sing to us : Headi, shoulders, knees and booboos, knees and booboos, knees and booboos, knees and booboos” (he sand booboos while touching his bu breasts!) he is a real male, this one!
My niece: “Auntie Nana have big big stomach.eh!”…pointing at my stomach.
My nephew: “Where is daddy’s president?”(he was asking me whether I had gotten a present for his dad on his birthday)
My niece (to my dad) : “I have baby in my stomach.” And that is how my dad found out that my sister-in-law was expecting again. She had earlier on told her daughter about the baby in her stomach and now the young girl imagines she has one too.
and now, because, i am young and foolish:
I have always wanted to have dreds. recently, it got so bad that one time at church a lady with dreds sat infront of me and i got out my camera and took a pic of her dreds. so i decided, let me just do them and get over them. maybe its a phase, maybe its not. the first time my dad saw them he said, ” You are really broke, now i can tell. You always take care of your hair.”
me: “Daddy, my hair is taken care of. I did it 2 days ago.”
Daddy : ” and that is how it looks? who is going to employ you now?”
…and of my parents, my dad is the liberal one. Imagine the conversation i had with my mum! Thankfully, my new job(ya. i finally got something. nothing fancy. no fancy swivel chair. no air conditioned partitioned office. no door with fancy title on it. Heck, there is even no title but it is work none the less.)does not require that i look a certain way.
so here’s the look that i am loving. it’s not so clear but you get the picture,ya?
the new me!
plus, eons after everyone, i discovered Picassa…and i am in love!
and in totally unrelated news, this is the totally unrelated quote that i am leaving because i love to leave quotes and this line made me raise my eyebrows and laugh at the same time. here is this post’s quote:
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“Have you ever had mind-blowing sex and you just want to stop and die?! Like it is so good, you just want to lie down and…just die!?” Katherine Heigl in Grey’s Anatomy, Season 5 (read it in an excited, big smile i tot’ly can’t believe what has hit my world voice!)
Remember when I told you that at the end of this month you might have a crazy woman on your hands? Funny thing you never seemed startled by that threat. Not that anything ever startles you.
Well, here we are. You of all people know a lot more that has gone wrong than I choose to let on. And you have stayed calm and looked at me like there’re stars in my eyes. Stars that will never burn out.
You make me want to do so much.
You make me want to peek into the future. And even though things wouldn’t be that bright, I know if I looked in your eyes, I would smile.
Thank you:
For being there for me.
For being excited for me (Remember the text you sent me when I first told you about the new job? “This is orgasmic!” Yeah. That is something only you say).
For responding for the frantic “Please call. I need my share of calmness” texts.
For helping me laugh at some of this hopelessness.
For sometimes luring me into deep sleep. Deep enough to shut out the demons.
For the stolen kisses even when you knew my mind could have been far off.
For abandoning it all to travel with me on those nauseating trips. And held my hand when all I was saying was “Oh I am so going to puke!”
For waking my tired body up to read.
For the long, passionate kisses that made me not care about the world for that moment.
And yes, for making me really believe that there are better days ahead.
Most importantly, thank you ever so much for teaching me how to stay calm because you are annoyingly the calmest person I know.
x0×0x0,
Hope
p.s: Remember that time you called me on the phone while walking towards me?…I am still finding the words to describe what that did for me. Needless to say, the memory makes me smile!
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Also introducing: SleeknWild!…the kid is on a roll!Flood him! and show him some love…the only way we know how.
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“Education provides you the confidence that you can turn down something and have something else”
-Dean Faculty of Computer Science and IT,MUK
I am just breezing through….hope to see you there!
The lantern meet summons its first poetry recital on Saturday 16th August from 6:30-9:00 at the National Theatre.
You are cordially invited to a grand experience! Entrance is free!
Fun, Food, Laughter and the Pleasure of Rewarding Intellectual company!!”.Event: A Poetry Recital
“A Night To Remember”
What: Recital
Host: THE LANTERN MEET
Start Time: Saturday, August 16 at 6:30pm
End Time: Saturday, August 16 at 9:00pm
Where: National Theatre.C.I.C.P. Room
My boss saw the crack in the specs. She chose to ignore it.
so i had to fix them. Two weeks of having to explain how i got the crack in one lens is a tedious ordeal in itself. Plus someone said my pupil (the one whose lens was cracked) would get confused.
Presenting, the best friend i had to throw out:
The new best friend.
I know. No one has noticed the difference except for the lack of the crack:( Bad news is that my sight is steadily deteoriating so am on carrots and the optician was saying it is because i do not wear them. Dude, I bathe in my specs. I forget them and sleep when am wearing them sometimes. see that crack there?
Now am not sure whether I should continue paying this guy
But these new ones are going down in history as the 1st pair i ever bought myself!!!i feel so grown up& stuff!!
** You will rememmeber that line(the title) if you have watched the Jesus film in luganda.
“I want to posses radical but humane and well-informed political ideals, and I want to hold passionate but reasoned debates round wooden kitchen tables, saying things like ‘define your terms!’ and ‘ your premise is patently specious!’ and then suddenly to discover that the sun’s come up and we’ve been talking all night. I want to use words like ‘eponymous’ and ’solipsistic’ and ‘utiltarian’ with confidence. I want to learn to appreciate fine wines, and exotic liquers, and fine single malts, and learn how to drink them without turning into a complete div,…
I want to be able to speak many languages fluently, and maybe even a dead language or two, and to carry a small leather-bound notebook in which i jot incisive thoughts and observations and the occassional line of verse. Most of all i want to read books; books thick as a brick, leather-bound books with incredibly thin paper and those purple ribbons to mark where you left off; cheap dusty, second hand books of collected verse, incredibly expensive, imported books of incomprehensible essays from foreign universities….
At some point , I’d like to have an original idea. And i’d like to be fancied, or maybe loved even, but i’ll wait and see. and as for a job, I’m not sure exactly what i want yet, but something that I don’t despise, and that doesn’t make me ill, and that means I don’t worry about money all the time.’
-David Nicholls in STARTER FOR TEN-The Novel
