#MukyalaLosa

(courtesy Magny T)

On my second visit to Uganda in the late 1980's after the war, my grandmother told me a story I will never forget. It gives me the chills every time it comes to mind.
By the way, my grandparents were quite the modern pair, having attended prestigious schools -Gayaza and Buddo- and sending their children to the same schools. My grandma was a church-woman, a member of the Mothers’ Union who wore her snow-white busuuti with an emerald blue sash to prayers every Sunday with pride, and conducted a service for her grandchildren in her sitting room every morning and evening. I remember dozing off in the dark sometimes, and my cousins sniggering over one or other joke as she asked us to read from Zabbuli, “Mukama ye Musumba wange, seetaagenga…”.

The story goes…

One night in the 1950's, when they still stayed in Entebbe, near the shores of the Lake Victoria, she asked my grandfather, after he returned from work, that they should visit a neighbor who had been poorly of late.
It was evening and the night was settling in when they made their way through the trees, and cassava and banana plantations to the neighbor’s house.

Mukyala Losa was pleased to see them, and received the loaf of bread and jug of milk with appreciation. “Bannange, ndaba ku ki? mweebale kwetikka!”
“Nga olabye n’obukuluma.” They had heard of her illness and wished her a quick recovery.

For about 15 minutes, the conversation centered on how she was struck down and what the slow recovery process entailed. Then she excused herself, asking for a few minutes to prepare her visitors a cup of tea in her kitchen which was adjacent to the house.

They talked as they waited. And waited. The tadooba that she had lit in the sitting room ran out of kerosene and the room went dark.
“Owange! Mukyala Losa, e’tadooba nga ezikidde!”
No answer.
“Mukyala Losa!”

Jjajja Maama opened the back door and walked to the kitchen which had no door. The tin-lamp flickered. But there was nobody there.
“Mukyala Losa! Owange, oluwa?” Had she dashed off to get some sugar from the neighbor’s?

Jjajja Maama looked around the small room. The milk was still sitting in its jug, the way they had brought it, and the cooking stones in the fireplace stared back at her.

She grabbed the tadooba and hurried back to the sitting room where Taata Jjajja was sitting in the dark.
“Owange, tugende. Ono alabika si wa’kudda kati. Taliyo mu kiyungu. Mpise naye taddamu. Tutere tutambule.”

They walked out of the house with the lamp, Maama Jjaja leading the way, as they stumbled through the dark maize plantation that Mukyala Losa had planted near the entrance to her compound.
They could barely make out where they were going, but soon got to the banana plantation.

A figure suddenly, but slowly rose from behind a banana stem right next to the path. Like a ghost. Jjajja Maama had time only to glimpse a face, a female mouth and cheekbones, before the lamp was knocked out of her hand and went hurtling to the ground and she screamed. It was a feeling of horror.
Taata Jjajja had no idea what was happening. He only heard blood-curdling screams, then the sound of something falling in the dark, and suddenly the sound of footsteps bolting into the dark. He followed suit, kakookola tondeka nyuma style. 
Somehow, they found themselves in their house, out of breath, their legs, hands and clothes scratched and torn in many places.

Till the day that she died, my grandmother believed that Mukyala Losa was the person who was hiding behind the banana stem.

A night dancer perhaps?