Why Men Love Bitches

Why Men Love Bitches

I am a Bitch who knows some other bitches. We are all proud and certified Bitches stamped, ready to go out and share it with the rest of womankind. I am roaring out loud that bitch is the way to go. However should any man, boy or hooligan call me that, he will meet the open palm of my small hand as I slap the living daylights out of him.

I am aware that I have created quite uproar but before any woman desert me for speaking such blasphemy hear me out. About three months ago our CFO (a delightful temperamental sunshine-coloured woman) emailed all the ladies in the office a surprising ‘gift’ that created controversy at the work lunch table that afternoon. It was Sherry Argov’s Why Men Love Bitches. I know what you must be thinking; the title alone is enough to start an uprising by the female population if only to prove that they are no bitches. ‘Bitch’ in ordinary circles (except of course in Boondocks & Katt Williams’ standup comedy) is a derogatory term used to refer to a woman. Granted it is a nasty word to but trust feminists to have found a way to turn this into a tool of empowerment.

Reading the book later that night I was blown away by the idea that this woman presented on how women can control the dynamics of relationships. According to Sherry men do not like women who are doormats, the all ‘too nice-too sweet’ girl next door who whimper and waft when you do not call her. Men are put off by the clingy girl who is so worried about them, caging them, building an altar to them, so dependent on them it that her world revolves around him. Apparently it is better to be a bitch, assertive, know just the right angle to stroke a man’s ego and play bimbo just enough to get him to do what you want. At the first glance Sherry gives the impression that bitches should act like the those douche bag exes we have all had who never called and acted like they we were doing just us a favour just to date us however an in-depth read presents exactly that (I am kidding....don’t ever do that to your significant other). The truth is that the book pretty much preaches that women should be self- confident and have boundaries, how they should quit hopping like bunny rabbits just to run to his beck and call, and instead of stewing up a storm of anger they should just notify the guy-in-question when he is acting less than the gentleman he should be. Your mama did not raise you to be somebody’s doormat.

Now I wouldn’t advise anyone to act like the mizigo women I hear about in the slums who scream for the entire world to hear when the man is being an idiot and less than attentive in bed (bad move). “Honey I was not amused with the move you pulled yesterday. Please do not do that again” delivered with a smile, with or without the endearments (depending on how miffed you are) and a bit of silent treatment will do just the trick. You end up pulling off sweetness without letting him get away with it.

So back to bitchiness, now some women take the bitchy thing too far. They are mean, so darn aggressive bordering on psycho, disrespectful, difficult, giving off an aura of meanness that has men giving them a wide berth of space. Then they go on complaining how they just can’t find a man. You can be a go-getter, self assured, CEO of some company and still be all sugar, spice and everything (basically a Powerpuff girl). My definition of being a bitch is finding the perfect balance of asking for what you want (within reason) without sacrificing your femininity.

During one of those rare father-daughter talks my Papa advised me to treat a man right but not to build my entire life around him. He told me to hold my own weight, be independent, remain exactly who I am and act like I am a prize and that way no man would ever take me for granted. This action plan although not full proof has worked perfectly for me.
I do not condemn nice girls everywhere I just think they should add just a bit of zest in that awesome personality they already possess. Honestly as humans we tend to take people who are too nice to us for granted regardless of gender and that applies for all relationships.
All sense of propriety and niceties aside ladies, y’all need to grow some boobs, balls (oops wrong gender), or even an extra vagina (if that helps) and get some standards. Men only treat you the way they do because you let them get away with it. We all have that guy that we pine after, who calls you once in a month at ungodly hours (btw 11:30 pm is an ungodly hour) for the occasional booty call, texts back on whatsapp after 4 days even if you can clearly see his stupid behind is always online. The dwanzi who has got us practising those acrobatic karma sutra sex moves to please him in bed but still won’t introduce us to his boys as a girlfriend even after a year. Girl you need to let his sorry ass see that door slam in his face. Adopt some bitch attitude.

Don’t be that girl that shuts up when he screws up and become his weekend maid service while he is off keeping FIFA scores while on Playstation with the boys. Don’t allow yourself to leave the bedroom without that much needed orgasm because you are too afraid to tell him just how you like it (mbu you will hurt his ego). I will admit some guys will leave you (even those you like) but the perk is you remain with the worthwhile ones. The kind that will respect and value your opinion without thinking you are aloof and standoffish.
Bitching isn’t about complaining all the time about what is wrong or trying to wear the pants in the relationship. Bitching is being unafraid to voice an opinion or disagree. Being a bitch just means not allow anyone to walk all over you. If his ass does something you do not like, speak up instead of avidly watching Sony Max’s A 1000 Ways to die looking for ways to make his murder look as natural as possible.

I once went out with a guy who I am sure was used to treating his women indifferently. On a Saturday he invites me over to his place for drinks with his friends which I accepted on condition that he pick me up since I was unfamiliar with his residence location. Time check 11:30 pm and there I was a lone figure stuck at a gas station with night duty pump attendants giving me creepy eyes. By this time the fool was not picking his phone and my hyper imaginative mind was playing tricks on me. I took matters into my own hands and with the help of one of his friends found my way to his place. Acting like he had not abandoned me, he hugged me and on my inquiries on his absence, he launched into a sob story about a liquor bottle slicing him and showed me the accompanying cut as if I was his mama that would kiss the hurt and make it go away. Needless to say there was a stunned silence and cries of ‘owww’ from the guests later when I slapped him and just for good measure back handed him. His ego bruised, my hands smarting from the pain I walked out of the gate, took a cab to Legends and had an awesome night. There was no communication from him until a week later when he sent an apology message that immediately saw the bottom of my recycle bin. Happy ending to this story we are now friends although he now knows better. (PS: slapping is not encouraged unless he is being a total douche bag and your temper gets away from you)

Standards set you apart from every other female. They are your signature, the unforgettable thing about you. Your standards whether they are on when you decide to sleep with him, your exclusivity, how you should treat each other while dating etc are entirely up to your tastes and preferences. I have had the privilege of being privy to the inner workings of men’s minds during those moments when my male friends gossip and forget I exist. Men (the millennial ones at least) actually like women who are not afraid to speak their mind, those are the kind that they will take home to their mamas. The too nice girl, they say, is a suspicious character who is vying for the Mrs. title and once that ring is on her figure she will become the female version of Sméagol. They want character equilibrium of a bitch and the nice girl. The female CEO that will still cook their dinner and accept occasionally to be a damsel in distress all the while keeping it together without losing her individuality.

So yeeeyy Bitches.....let’s go conquer the universe.

Florentyna Twongyere

Horrible Bosses Are From Hell

Horrible Bosses Are From Hell

How can a widely revered man also be the epitome of a boss from hell???? When hell was carving out the most horrible bosses, the most senior demons took care with creating my boss. They poured enough sweetness into him to make him lure in ambitious juniors. They also poured four times the amount of vindictive portion into him. When they were stirring the mixture of his character, they put spadefuls of meanness, treachery and bile to make him a bad case of Tormentor. They also rubbed into the mixture buckets of immaturity, micro-managing and sourgraping. And then they put the mixture into a kiln of domination and conquest. He boiled there to the core. As he hardened, they smeared sardonic charm and prolific wit into his curved form. They breathed evil brilliance into his nostrils and he came alive with a smile and a scream. When he awoke, the bossiest demon whispered instructions into his ear.

"Go destroy junior souls and break down old institutions. Go and spread your repressive spell all over the earth. Go taunt and torment your juniors. Crush their spirits!"

And then my boss was released from hell and straight to Uganda where he was born. Can I write my resignation on perfumed pink paper?

"Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again"

"When you grow up you, tend to get told that the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world, try not to bash into the walls too much, try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money. That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader, once you discover one simple fact, and that is that everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.”

‘African time’ is an insult to ‘Africanness’

At one of our public universities, I once asked my students to anonymously evaluate me.

I implored them to be as honest as possible. And, indeed, they poured. One of the most striking comments was: “sir, I don’t mind you, but you are annoyingly punctual”. Yes, ‘annoyingly’!

While reading out the comments to the rest of the class, one student clarified that they were used to lectures starting about 15-20 minutes late. In some cases, without any notice to students, a lecturer will not show up.

As this anecdote illustrates, poor timekeeping has been normalised in our society, to the extent that keenness to time has come to seem abnormal!

As such, when you are planning any activity or occasion, you have to include about one or two loose hours for the latecomers. If you plan to start at 10am, then you have to indicate 8am on the programme. Indeed many will arrive after 10! Arrive at 8am if you are ready to look odd.

The common excuse is to generalise the bad practice as ‘African time’. In other words, one is saying that they have not done anything unusual – they are simply being African. With a few exceptions, if you plan to invite a government minister or other ‘big people’ as chief guests at your function, you may always need a plan B.

They will assure you of their attendance and ask to be reminded of the start time, only to turn up late and mess the whole programme without any expression of remorse! And when they finally arrive, everything is halted to welcome the ‘important’ guest who will take his/her front seat with a smile, indicative of an inconsiderate sense of importance.

When their turn to speak comes, they will talk until cows come back! Because most MCs want to ‘respect’ them, they will not treat them like other speakers. They won’t give them time reminders. By the time they are done with their lengthy speech, there is a crisis at the function.

Those who had been given 15 minutes on the programme to make their presentations are now cut down to five. Both because of the sudden time-cut and their own poor timekeeping, the other speakers will also eat into each other’s time. By this time, the cause of the disaster has already left. They rarely stay to witness the chaotic consequences of their poor time management.

I have also witnessed occasions where the chief guest kept informing organisers that he was on his way, up to the end of the function! What we see in the behaviour of these leaders in a way reflects the behaviour of the wider society. We are a people not so keen on time despite the observation that this costs us a lot.

Important meetings are cut short and rushed because they started late; teaching time is eaten into, hence not covering some of the course content; people wait for hours to be attended to as office-bearers turn up late or delay at lunchtime conversations!

Unfortunately, there is often no price to pay for the latecomer. Not even a price of shame, for it is normal to be late. In his autobiography, Prof George Kanyeihamba narrates an interesting encounter with his former colleague, Hon Jaberi Bidandi Ssali, who would arrive late, and without apology, for meetings he was supposed to chair.

When Kanyeihamba one time raised a point of order to ask as to the precise time the committee was to start its meetings, Bidandi responded that Kanyeihamba was so worried about time because of his long stay in the UK and was yet to adjust to African time. Kanyeihamba recalls in words that must be emphasised: “I vehemently protested saying that there is no such thing as African time. One is either on time or late. Full stop. Thereafter, Honorable Bidandi Ssali would come on time and often remark that he did not wish to offend George”.

We cannot continue degrading ‘Africanness’ by claiming that late-coming is African time. I actually believe that the roots of this euphemism are from the sarcasm of visitors from outside Africa in a way of trying to politely mock us. We ought to desist from owning the stereotype and using it as justification for the bad habit.

Mechanisms should be put in place to ensure that time mismanagement becomes costly for its perpetrators. This should go together with nurturing our children at home and in school to grow up with time consciousness, to learn that poor time keeping is not endemic to Africa. It is a construct that we can and must deconstruct.

jsssentongo@gmail.com

The author is a lecturer in Ethics at Uganda Martyrs University, Nkozi.

adapted

http://www.observer.ug/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=32461%3A-african-time-is-an-insult-to-africanness&catid=37%3Aguest-writers&Itemid=66

40 and still more to do

Today I am turning forty years old
with my own Ipsum Car-keys jingling in my hand,
my three babies on my broad black back,
my dreadlocked head has the PhD from London,
my name confirmed in the service of Uganda's oldest university,
my wardrobe full of long three-piece bitengis,
my fourth passport nearly full of cross-border stamps,
my heart: fool of a loveless marriage to an estranged man,
my life full of love from doting parents, three sincere sisters and a few firm friends,
my faith in religion is at a healthy place of querying dogma,
my spirituality is wholesome with eclectic belief,
my right ear-lobe has six holes while my left has just two,
and my forty-year-old body still boasts no tatoo.

Today I am turning forty years old
without enough cash in the bank - the story of my life!
I still have to learn how to save and invest!
I still have to pay off my three remaining debts!
I still have to learn to bake, cook and fry!
I still have to resume my building project!
I still have to start gardening flowers or an orchard of succulent fruit and spicy herbs!
I still have to complete my first monograph!
I still have to brave my first pap smear!
I still have to build regular exercise into my lifestyle!
I still have to learn to stop working without taking a break!
I still have to start dance classes, start dance classes, start dance classes!
I still have to learn how to live well, love deep and laugh much.

Stella Nyanzi

Still I'll rise

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Maya Angelou

The Allure of Married Men

I am officially a pariah. You would think it was a choice I made but No. There was no voting involved and none of the Museveni – Mbabazi drama with somebody vying for my pariah position. No polls were conducted to weigh how I felt about it. I was knighted a pariah. It crept up to me and became an extension to my already existing triple threat of a name bonding and mutating like the T-Virus in Resident Evil.

It would seem that saying that you can never date a married man in the middle of an argument with your girlfriends can silence a room. Don’t look at me like that, if I had known I would never have let the words escape my mouth. But wait scratch that…on second thought I would have gladly screamed it out on top of the Clock Tower. My girls were looking at me like I had suddenly grown Cerberus’ three heads and spoken in Parseltongue. The attention seemed so good that I repeated it and still the silence continued. Jemimah suddenly guffawed, called me a lunatic and that broke the silence. Suddenly I was awash with torrents of reasons why married men are awesome. Confounded I caught snippets of conversation that made me realized that I was a virgin, a total greenhorn to the changing trends of the ever revolving social existence. I was, as they say a certified social outcast.

So what was it about married men that had females eating out of the palm of their hands? Was there a pheromone outbreak in married men that was spreading like the Black Plague and infecting every girl in sight? What is it that these Pied Pipers have that lets them have their cake and eat it too? Being a bit of a curious cat I thought maybe getting a married boyfriend would get me the answers but that had my moral compass spinning out of control I gave up the idea. I got creative and decided that my friends would make excellent lab rats (I mean what friends are for if not for experimentation).  Of course the lab rats (Oops I mean friends) had be fed and watered so I made a get together out of it and got muchomo, 2 boxes of Namaqua and of course some black forest cake (God knows girls go nuts for cake) until they were ready to spill their guts.

In the glow of relaxed satisfaction I found myself in a lucid moment where I saw the world in a whole new light.  With trading stories came the comprehension that the world did not exist just as I envisioned it. In my world married men are usually represented with older men graying, blackened teeth, distended stomachs that could house food to feed a small village and the smell of Old Spice. I had completely forgotten that they included the likes of the so handsome Brian Mulondo, Ben Mwine, Maurice Mugisha, Boris Kodjoe of this universe who were still young, debonair and exuded sex appeal and maturity like dark chocolate. I would probably lose my mind to them like all the other females.

The thing about wedded men at present is that they are strong, confident and are settled all the things that the feminine specie is looking for. The guys we went to school with are viewed as hustlers and salesmen of pipe dreams, castles in the air and promises of green pastures when they can barely wipe their asses (Don’t curse!! Not my words). The allure in married men is like that phase where you dated a bad boy. You know it wrong and won’t last but you find it irresistible that your inner goddess is released and your wild, darker alter ego can go on a rampage with no reservations and judgments if only for a few day pockets of time.

One friend (name withheld) narrated to me of the little bubble of happiness she lived in while dating an Adonis of a married man. Their romance begun with sharing a related social circle, spying each other across the room, his offer to buy a drink, her flash of a beautiful smile proceeding to giddy giggles, his whispered promises of an unforgettable night, her glazed lustful eyes, their drive to the nearest hotel, the trembling anticipation as he rushes to unlock the door, the fumbles to get tear everything off and finally the culminating to an orgasms of defining magnitude. After that they were both hooked and were junkies that would anything for the next fix. Her life revolved around shopping sprees (reason he tells the wife he is broke and why can’t she pay anyway), the sneaking around sleeping in different hotels (reason he is away on so many business trips & workshops) that was just an aphrodisiac. She described it as being on a year long high, unnoticing of the time that flew by.  

That lasted until it started to dawn on her that she was starting to fall for him and she was falling so far in that abyss she could not stop herself and who could blame her. The remarkable sex, the pampering and all the excitement has a way of working with your mind. It started to dawn on her that she wanted more than hotel rooms, stolen kisses and whispered phone conversations. She wanted the whole packages until it hit that he was and could never be hers at least not permanently. He was hers just for a few hours of a day but never hers to hold, cuddle, confide and even go home to. The man already had a wife and children for that. So commenced the pleas for him to stay longer clinging to him if only for a little while, the prohibited phones while he is home, questions of his whereabouts and all the while her insecurities started to show. He was patient at first, understanding even all the while being firm and reminding her that they were just having an arrangement. In poor taste he let her go for misconduct and failure to adhere to proper mistress etiquette. No matter how much courage you muster up when getting a shot at the doctor it doesn’t take the pain away and neither did the preparation she made matter. The breakup ate at her self esteem filling her with self loathing, regret, heart wrenching pain that would not go away no matter how many tequila shots she threw back. That was the price she paid.

The famous adage goes “It’s better to have loved than to not have loved at all” but personally I think I would want to pass over on this particular torment. I have had the fortune or misfortune to know wives whose husbands have been unfaithful and the anguish and hurt that they felt and dispersed nearly floored my heart. Clinging to their love children, warm tears flowing like rivulets on their beautiful faces these powerful beings who are career women, mothers, wives, sisters are bereft of any oomph to fight and live forever in doubt of how worthy they are in their own capacities. To be on the other side of the looking glass has lent me an empathy that gives me the courage to make a choice to have no part in causing this pain to another woman. As one guy’s mother said “If they are cheating on their current wife what makes your relationship so special?” This mother is so right and I know this because mothers are usually right.

In truth I have been tempted and given so many chances to date married men who want to offer me the world but saying no and sticking to your word is where the true test lies. I never did like to share my men anyway. I am generous to a fault but when it comes to a guy am not budging on that. I am one of those girls who want to be your only one and would make you the sole guardian of her heart. I do not get this sharing thing, perhaps it makes sense to some people but I can’t make heads or tails of it.

Falling in love is a tricky business and who we fall in love with is sometimes beyond us a game play between fate and destiny but I would consider letting the taken ones go and finding somebody who is just all yours and a perfect safe haven.

Adapted

http://florentinacherries.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-allure-of-married-men.html

The Eagle Has Landed

Cliche Title,I know, but I am the queen of all things cliche. It is such a huge crown but I carry it with such grace. A few weeks ago I went to a book launch, i had actually gone for the great finger food they serve at the end of such dos but that was the day it all changed for me. During the launch while i stuffed my face with amazing food and made some small talk, one of the writers said something to me that made my jaw drop. It actually took me a while to pick up that damn jaw and whipe the drool. I barely remember what I had said to her but i will never forget what she said to me. I was probably whining about how I want to be a writer but I don't have the balls, (writers have such big balls). She looked square at me and told me, "If it is your wish to write, My dear ,you will write and you will write good." Sounds pretty basic and easy the way she said it, right? Hehe, That is one of the most cryptic things I ever heard. It took me a while to wrap my head around her words. For days I processed what she had said to me, I thought of nothing else but the words she had spoken. I am obsessive and slow like that. Then it finally hit me like a tonne of bricks. Go ahead write, that never killed anyone. And that my friends is how this blog was born. Deciding that I was going to write was the easy part, but what in the world was I going to write about? I still have not figured that one out but here we are. A long time ago I asked a writer friend of mine,(turns out i have a lot of those), to give me some tips and tricks of the trade, He told me, "write about what you know." Another mind boggling statement from a writer, Why in the world do they always have to be so damn cryptic? I eventually decoded it and decided to write about what I know. Here is why i write, because it feels right. See what i did there with the write and right. hehe I am getting the hang of this writing thing. I write because no one else can tell my story like I can. I write because , in this insane world we all need that thing that grounds us, music does that for a lot of people but for me writing is my drug/ poison of choice. I want to dedicate this first post, (Do people do that on here? hmmmh), to that writer chick at the book launch. It probabaly looked like I was paying more attention to the finger food than I was to you but I was actually listening.

Phatie

adapted form http://iphatie.blogspot.com/2014/05/hello-world.html

Markets are like Cheese

Markets are what sustains a business. Good markets can be rewarding to the business. Regular and steady markets bring in the needed financial power that is required to keep the business running.

Markets are like oil that keep the engine running. When the oil goes bad, the engine stops running. Markets like cheese keep on changing. You got to smell your market all the time to see if it is going bad.

There is always new market out there. If you bother to look hard enough, you can unearth a whole new market. Some new markets are even more rewarding than old markets. New markets usually find you prepared and more experienced to take up their requirements.

Get rid of the old complaining unsatisfied and ungrateful market for the new market.

Alex Agaba

Entrepreneur

10 years of "The Facebook"

Today is Facebook's 10th anniversary.

It's been an amazing journey so far, and I'm so grateful to be a part of it. It's rare to be able to touch so many people's lives, and I try to remind myself to make the most of every day and have the biggest impact I can.

People often ask if I always knew that Facebook would become what it is today. No way.

I remember getting pizza with my friends one night in college shortly after opening Facebook. I told them I was excited to help connect our school community, but one day someone needed to connect the whole world.

I always thought this was important -- giving people the power to share and stay connected, empowering people to build their own communities themselves.

When I reflect on the last 10 years, one question I ask myself is: why were we the ones to build this? We were just students. We had way fewer resources than big companies. If they had focused on this problem, they could have done it.

The only answer I can think of is: we just cared more.

While some doubted that connecting the world was actually important, we were building. While others doubted that this would be sustainable, you were forming lasting connections.

We just cared more about connecting the world than anyone else. And we still do today.

That's why I'm even more excited about the next ten years than the last. The first ten years were about bootstrapping this network. Now we have the resources to help people across the world solve even bigger and more important problems.

Today, only one-third of the world's population has access to the internet. In the next decade, we have the opportunity and the responsibility to connect the other two-thirds.

Today, social networks are mostly about sharing moments. In the next decade, they'll also help you answer questions and solve complex problems.

Today, we have only a few ways to share our experiences. In the next decade, technology will enable us to create many more ways to capture and communicate new kinds of experiences.

It's been amazing to see how all of you have used our tools to build a real community. You've shared the happy moments and the painful ones. You've started new families, and kept spread out families connected. You've created new services and built small businesses. You've helped each other in so many ways.

I'm so grateful to be able to help build these tools for you. I feel a deep responsibility to make the most of my time here and serve you the best I can.

Thank you for letting me be a part of this journey.

Mark

Tell Me How, When They are Long gone

AN OBITUARY POEM TO YOU DEAR FRIEND.

 PENINAH KOBUSINGYE...

Tell me how...

Tell me how to turn new page
When my tears touched each of them till the last one?
How to move on
When the strength and hope left me alone?
How to open my eyes tomorrow and look the new dawn
When they are dead?
Tell me how?

How to believe that everything will be alright
When sorrow walks among us, bringing pain with each touch?
How to walk through all this darkness
When my soul is drowned deep into it?

How to look at the others

RIP Kobusinge Penninah
BSc MUK 

When I can’t even look at myself?

Oh, I look… I look at some time
Long gone you are !
Searching for that piece of life I left somewhere in time.
I look at an illusion wishing it was true
Wishing I was here with you.

So many questions
None with an answer
Only silence…
And the silence is killing me
The silence, eternally
Silence filled with screams and words never told
The silence – elegy for the one gone long ago.
We love you Pennie...Rest In peace.

By Solomon S Kaweesa.

The Symbolism of Graduation

It is the first day of another graduation season at Makerere University. Lines of smartly dressed parents/ guardians and their graduating children are proudly streaming into the university through all the gates. Men in kanzus, men in suits and ties, men casually dressed ties, and of course the ladies are wearing all sorts of apparel. Graduation ceremonies remind me about my own first ceremony at this same old hill. Graduation is a rite of passage that marks the successful completion of one phase of life and the entry into formal employment, maturity, adulthood, paying income tax, contributing towards the bills at home, and eventual independence.

But heh as I think about graduation, my eye catches onto something odd, strange, weird... There is something off-beat about a man smartly dressed in a tie, whistling to a young hawker with trays of boiled eggs on his head. I watch this man-in-a-tie asking for the price of one boiled egg. And then he pulls out his old leather wallet. He digs into it for a crumpled note of 1,000/=, pays the boy and then proceeds to carefully choose one hard-boiled egg out of the tray. I think he chooses the biggest egg in the tray. This man-in-a-tie then cracks the hard-boiled egg against the other eggs remaining in the tray, removes the shells and takes a big bite of the egg-white. He reaches for the salt-shaker, sprinkles some salt onto his egg, and takes another bite. Getting his balance from the egg-hawker, the man-in-a-tie walks off as he continues to chew his boiled egg.

There is something enigmatic about a man in a tie buying a hard-boiled egg from a street-hawker on graduation day at the oldest university in Kampala. Surely graduation may still fail to deliver youths out of dependency on parents and guardians who dress smartly to celebrate the completion of university. What does graduation symbolise in Uganda today?

Stella Nyanzi

Start Over

When you've trusted God and walked his way,

When you've felt his hand lead you day by day,

But your steps now take you another way-

Start Over.

When you've made your plans and they've gone awry,

When you've tried your best and there's no more try,

When you've failed yourself and you don't know why-

Start Over.

When you've told your friends what you plan to do,

When you've trusted them and they didn't come through,

And now you are all alone and it's up to you-

Start Over.

When you've failed your kids and they're grown and gone,

When you've done your best but it's turned out wrong,

And now your grandchildren have come along-

Start Over.

When you've prayed to God so you'll know his will,

When you've prayed and prayed and you don't know still,

When you want to stop 'cause you've had your fill-

Start Over.

When you think you're finished and want to quit,

When you've bottomed out in life's deepest pit,

When you've tried and tried to get out of it-

Start Over.

When the year has been long and successes few,

When December comes and you're feling blue,

God gives a January just for you-

Start Over.

Starting Over means "victories won;"

Starting Over means "a race well run."

Starting Over means "God's will be done"-

So don't just sit there,...

Adapted