#theperfectpuff

I couldn’t wait for the afternoon to come.
I had been counting down the days after I hit on the perfect plan for what to use my weekly savings for. A professional hot comb.
The salon belonged to my school-mate’s mother. I had also been trying all week to talk to the girl, to try to make friends with her. We were not in the same stream, but it was crucial for me to talk her into some amiability of sorts Maybe I could get to ask her how much her mother charged, if she was the one who chomad the hair herself, things like that.
Well, I did succeed, but didn’t get much except that her mother only managed the money, she didn’t put iron combs on the sigiri and singe people’s hair, there were hairstylists employed to do that. You see, my hair is that kind which is like the shrubs that struggle to survive in the Sahara desert. Its length has never ever gotten beyond two inches, even with chemicals, strings, braids, cornrows.
I had been trying for years, since I was six, standing on an upturned pail in the bathroom mirror, and using the wooden kichanuo to twist it around and around the teeth, to loosen the tight black curls and make them longer (My young mind really believed that the endless determined twisting brought it out from my scalp).
Thank God my mother was not one for haircuts (a doctor once suggested that she should cut my hair after I’d gotten a ringworm patch from school. I looked at my mother with pleading doggy-like eyes, imploring her not to take off my crown. I also worried how I would face my school-mates with their long puffs and matutas. Anyway, she didn’t even broach the subject of a haircut and I breathed easy as the fungal cream and de-worming tablets did their work.) but she also had no idea about plaiting either.
And so, I tried to twist and plait and when that refused to work, I used the wooden comb to stretch the locks which just sprang back into place, frustrating all my efforts. I also cannot recount how many times I pulled the kaweke into a stubborn puff held together by black thread from my mother’s sewing box, one that only held the hair in the middle. Once, we went out for an afternoon drive in the hills, and when we got back, only a few tufts of hair remained held tight by the string. Oh, how I tried.
But now I had heard that the hot comb could do it easily, with the least effort required for the task. My sisters had no problems with their manes- Susan always cried when her hair was combed, and Carol was not bothered. Not like me.
I felt a bit shy to announce to Mummy what I intended to do with the savings from my break money on Saturday afternoon. She knew how much I loved long hair because I had told her so as I fed hers with the mix of coconut and red castor oils while she dozed off from the softness of my young expert fingers.
Now, Saturday morning was here, and I needed to make arrangements- did I need to wash my hair first? Did I need to leave it a bit wet? Did I need to put in some coconut and red castor oils? What about a comb- should I pack one? Mummy smiled when I told her- she understood my struggle. She asked me how much the salon charged. I had no idea but I guessed it would be about 5 shillings. And I quickly quipped, “I can afford it. I saved my break money!” Lunch was eaten in anticipation of the glorious puff I would have on my head that afternoon. Rosebud was away in boarding school and could not offer any expert advice having been a recipient of the hot piece of metal untold times in the midst of a flow of tears.
I asked Mummy for a piece of string that I would use for the puff and was soon on my way. The woman at the saloon welcomed me and asked if I was waiting for somebody. That kind of unnerved me. I was the one there for service I said. “Unataka kufanya nini kwa nywele zako sweetie?”
“Nataka kuchoma.”
And so it was that she took her own wooden comb and roughly took it through the coarse shrub on my head. Painful. But I would bear it. After all, no gain with no pain. Then it was the short walk to the door, the hair was not chomad inside. There was another customer and the salon lady told me to "ngojea kidogo". The customer was soon done and I took my place on the wooden chair. I watched as she put the straightener on the red hot coals. It singed the hair and oil that had stayed on the comb and the smell was terrible. Anyway, I was determined to stand on the upturned pail in the bathroom mirror and sing to myself as I styled my puff on Sunday morning.
She sectioned the hair, commenting that it was really short and the wondering if the wooden comb would do the job (I learned later that it was dangerous and unheard of to use a comb with steel teeth, because it automatically burnt your scalp). Then she opened the plastic container of jelly- it was a yellow cheap-smelling petroleum that my sisters and I had always dismissed as cheap- and smeared it into the three tufts at the front.
“Eh, so she was starting at the front?" I thought. "Bad thing she doesn’t have a mirror to let me watch the progress.”
Anyway, the name of the game was to be patient as she stood over me and made me more beautiful. The comb was picked from the sigiri smoking hot, and wiped off on a wet cloth that had been singed in many places (I also learned later that very hot combs broke the hair and caused ugly split ends, the reason many women only did it for events like weddings), then she cupped my forehead and put the comb on my hair. I nearly jumped as the heat melted the oil which quickly slid down to the scalp. “Kaa vizuri Mammy, utachomeka!” She was a patient sort.
With the first tuft straightened, she put the hot-comb back on the stove. I was tempted to ask her for a mirror to see the transformation, but I held my tongue. Soon, the second and third tufts were done and then she did the other side of the front, explaining that since my hair was so short, the work would be slow. Apart from the hot oil melting on my scalp, and the heat I was feeling under the heavy leso she told me to wrap around my neck and shoulders to avoid any accidents, things were going smoothly. Or so I thought.
I was not prepared for the back section of the head, the one she had left for last due to its delicateness. There’s something about the snip of scissors near the ear that is so ominous. That is the same feeling of a rod of heat hovering around your nape. My nape. J-E-H-O-V-A-H! As the comb approached, I felt a tingling sensation and I jumped. The comb caught the side of my head, near the right ear and singed. I let out a loud yelp. “Kalia straight Mammy, utachomeka!” She scooped a dab of the cheap yellow jelly (why is it called jelly anyway? Because jelly has never been oily!) and rubbed it onto the burn. With that corner of my head done, she went for the left side. More torture. The dreams of standing on the upturned pail in the bathroom, twirling in the mirror and singing at the top of my voice as I combed my straight puff out on Sunday morning had disappeared into thin air. The notion of puffs was hot air. The tingles radiating from somewhere in the middle of my back, my spine, racing into my neck, spreading out to my sweating shoulders under the heavy leso and shooting near my ears were too much to bear. I writhed and squirmed as she stood behind me, trying to hold me in one place, until she decided to change tactics just so she could finish her near perfect job.  
“Kaa chini,” she commanded. I thought she was telling me not to jump off the chair. Then comb was back on the fire, and she was pulling me off the chair and onto the cold cement floor. Now that was a relief from all this heat. But only temporary. Her hands felt rough and uncomfortably hot. She plonked herself on the chair and told me put my head between her legs. It was a strait-jacket like grip, those legs of hers.
“Mammy kaa straight nimaliza kazi! Usinisumbue!” The next thing was a searing white-hot pain at the nape. I swear I heard the sound of flesh crackling and the smell of human meat! She must have taken a hefty chunk out of my neck. The tingles were at their worst, the grip was suffocating. I was meeting the devil for sure. And then it was over. She released the headlock and I was free. I threw the leso off.
“Ah, ah Mummy, usionde sasa, kwanza tuchanue nywele.” 
 Oh, so there was that? I just wanted to run back home and forget the torture chamber I had been thrown into. I was not even sure I would stand on the upturned pail and tie up my puff tonight, or even on Sunday morning.
She carried the wooden chair into the saloon. I sat down, still under the leso, sweating and feeling anything but beautiful. She brought a small mirror, it had a crack running through it. I searched in my pocket and handed her the black thread to tie the puff. She continued combing backwards through my hair.  
“Unaona vile uko mrembo! Lakini umechomeka sana, ukirudi home, umuambie Mama atie Vaseline.” She pronounced it Vazaline. I wondered why she was not taking the string.
“Here, tie my hair up.”
Then I looked in the mirror and nearly got the shock of my life. The hair was straight, yes, but that was just about it. It was so short that there was no way it could go into a puff, not even if I pulled and twisted it around and around the teeth of the wooden comb. My heart sank. I reached into my pocket, took out the 5 shillings and handed it to her without saying “Asante.”
I could feel the hot tears in my eyes as I ran all the way home, feeling that everybody could see the discomfort I had been through, that everybody could feel the heat I had been subjected to, that everyone could see how miserably my puff had failed, how ugly and uneven my hair was, and everybody could sense that I had an unsightly burn at the back of my neck.
Mummy was shocked to see me crying as I ran through the front door.
“What is it?”
“I look so ugly Mummy, my hair has refused to grow into the puff I wanted, and the woman burnt me with her comb.”
Then I dissolved into a hot flood of miserable tears as she held me and told me not to worry and that I was always going to be beautiful and that it would be okay.
I did not stand on the upturned pail in the bathroom mirror and twirl as I styled my puff.
Instead, I angrily washed out the hair that very evening, swearing that it would be the last time I would subject myself to such misery in the name of hair and beauty. Good pity party it was.
It would be a long time till I tried pulling a puff again.

#bigbeggars

My five-year old niece was telling me about kids at their school who swoop in on other people’s break boxes. They descend upon the break-bringers, rubbing their little hands in anticipation, as they chant the “sharing is caring” line, to break even the meanest break-bringer.
And my niece is the giving type, but sometimes she doesn't even eat one bite because the beggars take everything. Some even grab and even proceed to eat the crumbs that drop on the floor (and these are children from DECENT homes, mark you.) Like hawks. Like bu-thieves.
One time here I wrote about a teacher who had a habit of invading another niece’s break-box and taking her daddies, biscuits, queen cakes, bhagia. Her mother confirmed what the child had been telling her when one Parents’ Day, the teacher (foolishly) told her, “Eh, bu bhagia bwo packingira Tendo nga buwooma!” (That bhagia you pack for Tendo is very tasty!). By the way, they take the goodies and then offer the child 'popocorns', bread etc.
I strongly believe this beggar thing follows you. That there are people who cannot hold back that desire when they see someone else with something. It overwhelms them and makes them lose all sense of shame. And there’s a huge difference here between a GENUINE request when you are GENUINELY hungry, but there’s this type who cannot hold back. That when their eyes see food, when their noses smell food, they have to have food, and if they had a begging bowl, then it would forever be in their hands.
And they even lurk in our workplaces. They see someone pulling out a pack of groundnuts, they want.
They spot another with fresh, boiled maize, mandazi. They hover, and eventually ask for one line.
They smell the chicken that a workmate is having for late lunch, they approach with, “can I tear-ko a little bit?” and as they speak, they are already tearing.
There was a Nnalongo I know, who would have lunch on other people's budgets. Yaani, she would move around, armed with her saucer on random days. She would have a spoon here, another there, a forkful here, a bite there- and her lunch was sorted. And people talked. Another, a father of two could never hold back on the, “Give me some”, even when he had just passed the sumbusa man on his way up, but could not spare some change and buy his own breakfast. He was like this dog in the Pavlov experiment.
Then there are those of “Give me a sip”, or the type who come bearing a paper cone for your hard-corn of 500 shillings. Bannange, mwefuge ko!
Granted, no man can live like an island, but have they ever given thought to the fact that they are paid, and they can also afford that which they kuyoya so much, and that it takes just a little planning and good manners?
To be honest, I know what torture the overpowering smell of chips can inflict, but even when my mouth is watering, I will never approach, unless you offer.
Like the Baganda say, “Omumpi w'akoma w'akwata.”

#porkpeasandchocolate

The pork was the type you bought on a skewer. Seven well-marinated delicious finger-lickin’ good sizeable cubes on a stick. I was out with my ‘celebrity’ friend and everywhere we passed people were turning their heads, women were giggling when he flirtatiously said, “Hi darling.” Anyway, he ordered (he always does) and told the waiter that could “the pork come on the skewers please?” The waiter said he wanted cash first.

Me: Eh, nawe, do you really have to emphasize that the pork has to be on the skewers?

Celeb: I am paying for it. Gwe, you don't know these people. They’ll very dryly bring you three pieces for 10,000 shillings!

And so the waiter came back 10 or so minutes later, bearing two plates with three pork skewers n’ebigenderako- baked green matooke in its jacket, greens, red chilli powder. And that mix of tomatoes and onions- kachumbari.

He pulled the cubes off the skewer as we watched. Then we dug in and drunk Novida and enjoyed our conversation.

Two weeks later I treated my son to pork at the very same place. I cannot tell you what I was thinking, because in my haste to order, I forgot the earlier very important (free) lesson from the ‘cereebu’. The waiter had brought us six pieces of pork (didn’t look very finger-lickin’ good). For 20,000 shillings! I was flabbergasted (for lack of a better word) and asked him if he was very serious. Then I told him to either take back the food and bring it back on skewers with the bigenderako, or bring back my money. Guess what? He returned, very shamelessly, with 14 very healthy pieces. Anyway, short story- I have never gone back!

Now, I nearly had a fit when I was doing my weekly shopping for groceries on Sunday. The vendor was trying to sell me peas that were very obviously not worth the money I was paying her. She said it was 2,500 shillings per cup. I wanted three. First cup went into the bag, scooped the second and third, and then very deftly, proceeded to fill the cup before she had even knotted the bag with MY peas. Then she handed it to me.

I had a light-bulb moment. Aha!

Me: Show me your cup.

Her: What?

She quickly snatched the bag out of my hands, tore the knot she had tied and like a magician, pulled out another cup, a blue Nice cup from nowhere, as she struggled to hide the original one, all the while pouring the peas back into the kibbo.

Her: Madam, don’t worry. Let me use this cup. That one is bad!

Me: Bad how? Hand me that cup right now!

But she had already gotten another bag and was filling it as I yelled, attracting attention.

I wanted to get the kibbo of peas and tip it over. But I didn’t. So I leaned over and grabbed the other cup from where she had attempted to hide it. She made a lunge for it but not before I had glimpsed what she was so desperate to hide. A false bottom. Cleverly fitted into the cup. For unsuspecting customers. Like I VERY nearly was.

I shot her a dangerous look and then whispered menacingly in her ear (in Luganda), “Have a heart for people who work hard for their money and have families to feed! Why are you a THIEF?? Why can’t you be honest? What will you teach your children??”

She tried, very unconvincingly to defend herself: Auntie, even me I bought the sack of peas very expensive. Nange bansedde, kati ensawo nagiguze emitwalo…

This woman was not in the least bit remorseful.

“Bull****! So bloody what! Does that mean that you give me half of what I pay for?” I was tempted to pull the kitambala off her head.

“Auntie, I’m sorry, forgive me. Let me give you what you paid for.”

But I was already walking away. Glad that I had called her out, and that everybody could see the foolishness on her face.

This happens in many places you go to, especially if you are not a 'kasitoma'. Try passion fruit. The vendor displays nice fat healthy fresh-looking fruit, with one cut through the middle to display numerous juicy seeds. With a dodgy-looking cardboard paper (aren’t they always) on which it says “8 for 1,000” stuck in the basket of fruit.

Hmmmm… if you are not very observant, these sellers can be very sharp. The wretched-looking fruits are placed close to the surface and when the vendor picks three good ones, he very cleverly picks up a sick one with his thumb and throws them into the bag. And many times than not, they are fewer than what you are paying for. It’s only just right to let them finish practicing their crafty skill, and then politely ask them to let you count. Mark my words- you will find the rotten, discarded, misshapen rejects right there in your bag!

Same goes for these people who lenga tomatoes and tangerines. Then there are these matooke 'myeera' thugs. They pick from here, they pick from there. Anything they can nick from the sacks as they unload the trucks. I tell you, you can end up eating a meal of matooke from 10 different plantations!

This list would be incomplete without our gallant butchers. Bannange, kyemutukola with those weighing scales of yours! When we were young, Mum bought our beef from a proper butchery with a clean display and no flies buzzing about. The beef was garnished with a sprig of celery and you just pointed out to him what you wanted. He put it on the weighing scale where you could see, announced how much you had to pay, and you went home with your money’s worth. That was then.

Today, (of course not all of them) butchers have a dodgy-looking block of wood on which they chop your meat. That block of wood is placed at the back of the room. Your guess is as good as mine about how the slab of kisavu, bones (I always tell them I am not a dog) and an old ka-day-before-yesterday’s piece ends up in the kaveera. The meat weighs much less as well. (Someone made me laugh when they told me to only buy from butcheries where the flies hang out with the beef. That that is the good meat, meat that has not been tampered with, the one which has not been ‘Formalinised’)

Other things like bread, crisps weigh much less but for the same amount of money. A bag with ten pieces of yellow potato for 2,000 shillings. And we never ever bother to read the fine print to see the weight. Can the manufacturers even risk and notify you that their products weigh much less?

Just look at the chocolate. What used to be a nice Dairy Milk block for a few thousand shillings (one that you could read a whole novel with) is now a slender measly bar with new packaging (no silver foil to fiddle around with) and teeny-weeny squares that you can pop three in your mouth and they disappear just like that! For many thousands of shillings.

Oh, I had forgotten- the drinking chocolate tins. So big and the contents so little. Sneaky packaging tricks, yeah? Do we ever bother to check products like toilet paper? Do we even know how many sheets we are getting?

What about the supermarket that sells vinegar at 5,000 shillings and a few metes away, the Shell Select shop stocks it for 1,500 shillings a bottle? Their pack of candles costs 3,000 shillings while Shell Select sells the same thing at 1,500 shillings.

I suspect the yogurt packs (won’t name the company) are getting smaller as well. The reduction may not be easy to notice right away but with time you realize that the contents in the package are less.

The bar soap, substandard crockery and cutlery that cuts your mouth as you eat. Smell of China.

The petrol station attendant who fills your tank with air.

The list is long. The list is too, too long.

#mrveteran

In 2010, an army veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) threatened to shoot me. After boasting how he had a gun and would finish me off that night because I called him a series of coarse names for being a bad-mannered neighbor and disturbing our peace, he swaggered out of the gate with his thin doggy-like waist.
The shooting didn't happen. Instead he vented his rage on his live-in girlfriend, aka wife. Anyway, I reported the incident to the Police- the police post was some small wooden shack- somewhere deep in Kalerwe, behind the market. The policeman there did not want me to speak in English. He said he only understood vernacular. So, I put on my best Luganda. And do you know what he did? In the middle of my narration, he got a call on his kabiriti and walked away to take it. He returned five minutes later, with the ‘Statimenti Book’, drew some lines in it- if I remember well, date, details etc, handed me a red Biro, and told me to write my statement in CAPITAL letters, and to clearly indicate where I lived- he called it “your place of residence”.
As I left, he promised that they would patrol the area in the night. He also gave me his telephone number (after I had asked for it).
Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) did not disappoint. As he was busy thumping his live-in girlfriend, aka wife, and screaming at her daughter, “Gwe Divaini, vvayo ndage akakazi kano empisa!”, I dialed the policeman. It was around 10pm.
“Who is this?” “Where did you say you were?”, “You are the who?”, “The one who…”. Seems he was deep in sleep. So early?
“Come quickly!” I urged, wanting him to witness first-hand the viciousness of the thug who was beating his live-in girlfriend, aka wife, punching her face in all the wrong places- in front of her two young children and maid, who were all screaming at the same time. The noise! Just like popcorn.
I did not dare to come out of the house to be Mama Divaini’s Joan of Arc, just in case Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) pulled out his ‘shotgun’ and peppered me with pellets.
Anyway, the policemen did come. Armed. What annoyed me most was that they told Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) that someone had called them. “Who?” he demanded to know. Oba what did they tell him?
Then, they walked him out of the house and started kuwozaring with him. I heard a little bit from my front window. “Ssebo, don't beat your wife like that, eh. You know there are people in the house and you beat her like that, eh?” I expected, and wanted, them to march him off to the police station and throw him in the cells, and then throw away the key.
Instead he came back about 15 minutes later, swearing to do away with someone, whoever had called the cops on him.
Mama Divaini had had enough of his beatings. She was a nakawere, her baby was barely three months old. From what I learned later, Divaini (Her name was Divine, and she was one and a half years old) was not his daughter. Mama Divaini packed her things and left after a week, housemaid and all. Chairs, tables, bed, mattresses, percolator, buckets, slippers. Kila kindu.
Mr. Veteran (he may have been a veteran for all I know) agenda okuda from his nocturnal jaunts, thumped on the door yelling for Mama Divaini to “come open up or else I’ma show you, I’ma beat the living daylights outta you!”. (I wonder who told him his fake American accent sounded cool) But Mama Divaini did not come to the door, nor did he beat the living daylights outta anyone. Instead, he looked for the warmest corner of his verandah, where he nodded off until morning when some of us, who went to work at 5am found him, cold and miserable. He resorted to playing Philly Bongole ballads to fill the void.
And then one day, Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) disappeared. Peace and heaven in the neighborhood. After a week and a half, I returned home to find a meeting of the neighbors. They spoke in low tones. Someone had pasted a picture of the good old Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know), a newspaper article with his picture, with his buswiriri on his front door.
The story went that Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) had hired a ‘Special’ to Mayuge district, then he also took him deep into some village in Hoima and then back to his house on Mawanda road.
Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) said he was the DPC of Kira, the Division Police Commander. When it came to the time to pay, Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) pulled out a pistol and told the Special Hire driver that he was “gonna blow his bloody brains out so he berra shut the f*** up!” And then he disappeared into the night.
The Special Hire guy reported the case to police, and they came for Mr. Veteran (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) early one morning when he was still in his teeny nylon shorts that he called nighties.
And they carted him to the same Kira Police Station that he purported to be DPC of. A newspaper journalist looking for police report of the day wrote the story, took a picture of the suspect’s ID and the story was in the papers the next day.
And that was how some clever person got a hold of it and pasted it on Mr. Veteran’s (he may have been a wannabe for all I know) front door.
I dunno when he ever got out, because I moved house at the end of the week, but the remaining days were sheer bliss.
But I do know he got out because, six months after that as I was waiting for the salon lady to do my hair, I heard a familiar voice. I tell you, I nearly jumped out of my skin. It was him. He popped his head into the shop and I ducked.
You ask me why I did it. I don’t know why. But I did.