All visitors bring joy. Some by coming but many by leaving. With urbanisation and the expenses rising, no city dweller would dare welcome a visitor for a week.

But there are people who overstay their welcome, making endless demands. How do you tactfully send them away? Denis Jjuuko looks at possible options.

Offer bad meals
These visitors dream about good meals. They all come hoping to have a feast. Meat, chicken, spaghetti and all the sorts of food Kampalans enjoy. Make sure they eat what they always hate.

Start budgeting for cassava, sweet potatoes and groundnuts. Posho will do the trick for you if they are from the central or western region. By eating ‘badly’, there will be no difference between the villages where they come from and the urban areas they have always dreamt of.

Breakfast is another. Make milk for the children alone and let them not eat buttered bread. In fact, bread shouldn’t be bought in the first place. Let them eat pancakes and some pieces of cassava or mawolu (left overs). So they will leave.

Disconnect the DStv
Most of these visitors are from the rural areas and the TV is one of their favourites. So disconnect the DStv. No chance for them to watch things they do not even understand. But before you do that, first encourage them to watch the TV. When it is disconnected, they will feel something strange. There will be no reason to stay.

The same applies to movies. Stop renting movies and they will also go. Or change tactics. Villagers over love action movies, bring on love stories, documentaries and comedies and you will see them packing.

Encourage them to work
Show them the compound to slash. Let them learn how to mop the house and make sure they wash up. At this time, send your house help on leave. These visitors have a tendency of wanting to be served like kings. Show them how to wash the vehicle. They will eventually say bye-bye.

Do not let them luxuriate in your guest wing. Give them these mattresses commonly known as ‘One Inch’ to lay on the floor. Get a room that will not be comfortable for them.

If you have the audacity to force them sleep in the corridor let it be. This will be a process for them to remove their bedding early in the morning and they will have to sleep when everybody has slept.

These visitors love staying in bed for long hours. This will force them out.

Pretend to be busy
Leave early in the morning and come back home late. Talk to your visitors about your busy schedule. Make it look like there is no time to socialise and talk about the dead or gossip further about those who eloped with someone’s daughter in the village. When you come back home, before you even take a shower make sure you are engaged in the study room.

Do some reading and if possible lie that you have a presentation to your bosses the next day. Have no time for them.

Out of boredom, they will beg to leave and they will not come back because they are aware of your working schedule.

Do not boast of your latest acquisitions
Let money scarcity be your number one song. Talk about it as soon as he arrives. There will be no excuse keeping him around waiting for some money to waste on booze when he is back in the villages.

Help them pack
Look for a friend who might be going to the hometown and request him to drop the guy there. Or pretend with your personal driver.

Come back home unexpected, panicking and inform him how lucky somebody is going to that town and agreed to transport him free of charge. Then help him pack his buveeras (polythene bags) and see him off.

Switch off electricity
There are people of a certain tribe I have heard of. That every time they visit, they always come in large numbers just because they gave you a wife. And when they come, they never want to leave. You have heard of them or faced their ‘wrath.’ So when the worse comes to the worst, turn off the main electricity switch. Get candles and use charcoal for boiling the beans-see, they hate beans.

Make it dramatic so that it looks a typical village. They will surely leave. If they do not, then call for more extreme measures.

No visits to theme parks
Do not let them know Didi’s World exists. If you are to take him out, take him to places like Ekitoobero where he will only eat traditional foods-the ones he eats everyday at his village home. He will see no difference being served yams and luwombo (steamed chicken).

Ange Mystic should not be heard of. The guy might think every Saturday is a party.

Leave the newspapers in the office
Having some leisure reading everyday might make this unwanted visitor a permanent resident at your house.

Kindly place that Bukedde copy in the office drawer. So the next morning, he will be extremely bored, prompting him to leave.

Do not buy them alcoholic drinks
When that visitor arrives, don’t buy him a beer. Don’t make it a party. Do not ask him what type of beer he prefers because he can take anything available.

If you do buy him a beer, he will be thinking of it every now and then. This will actually force him to always come back. Stick to your wallet. No beers! No wines! He will know when to leave and it will be sooner than expected.