Brothers’ keeper

Every now and then, I have these work related travels to upcountry places. Being a lover of travel, adventure and discoveries, these are some moments I crave.

Some of the roads can be rugged especially where they snake into rural Uganda but there are some very good ones too at majority African standards and some others on construction or repair. So having to stop in an annoyingly long trail of a jam with dusty patches, waiting for the opening of the blockades is customary.

Thanks to the vigilance of Police in the recent past along the roads where abrupt check ups for seat belts, speed limits, insurance, and general mechanical conditions of vehicles is a common scene along a travel on nearly any road.  There are now spots along most roads that traffickers are cognizant of obvious and regular police checks. Along such routes, order and discipline are customary.

Aware of this, the Police also once a while relocate to queer and unexpected spots. Some even have developed play tactics of hide and seek laying embargoes in bushy and forest areas where their presence on the road is obscure with their digital speed guns rehearsing the guerrilla warfare-like siasa, (sung in one victory song), which led the NRM  to power some 27 years ago.

Normally they shoot at any on-coming car often seeking to seize those driving above the allowed speed limits. Incidents of some underhand practices by individual officers trying to push drivers towards paying bribes grace such snares.

Even in a society that is almost rapidly degenerating into a self-seeking, individualistic one, you can not fail to notice how drivers –especially taxi drivers using uncustomary traffic signs, flashing headlights; pushing one hand out of the window and pointing down, notifying the would be preys to slow down and avoid the white boys.

Solidarity or rather being a brother’s keeper is the gesture you can but fail to miss on any average day you travel. Looking out for the other, warning them against danger, is the moral here. You need the other person who has seen it all, who is offering you help. However, you owe it to yourself to accept and heed to the warnings others and life gives you!

Village near

It was a Saturday and we were headed for a friend’s wedding reception off some village in Mukono District. The reception was hosted at a garden under development, the grass fully grown and trimmed to a sensibly smart size.

We had driven for over three kilometers and going but the celebrated garden was not being seen anywhere. Having grown from a village setting also, the trick to finding locations is to keep asking and asking people who seem indigenous by their appearance. It situations like this, boda boda (motor cycle transporters) are handy.

Approaching a junction where there were two divergent roads, asking was necessary. So I did. Do you know this garden? And how far is it from here?

The gracious lady with such onerous gait of certainty pointed us towards the direction. ‘It is just so near from here!’ ‘You will find a school ahead of you, bypass it on the left and you will find the place’.

So I said thanks to her and off we went. In my heart came the thought and quickly I voiced it. I hope it’s not the ‘village near’. If you have been to villages around the country, there are times someone tells you a place is just near here but you end up travelling miles and miles.

Once upon a time we were travelling to some up country home and we were told that the home is three kilometers from the main roadside but we traveled over 15 kilometers before we could finally arrive. Another time, in Rwanda, we were told the village we were headed to is just is just near and we drove over forty kilometers before arriving.

I can’t tell if there is a problem with measurements or because such distances are walk-able in villages that familiarity breeds contempt for distances.

This time round, my instinct awakened and was not going to be duped to simply believing a place is near in the village, especially where it’s my first time. Thank God this time round, it was a ‘town near’ and shortly we were there and we ate.