I Don’t Have A Village Home
HAVE you ever been to the village? I have, but for some reason people do not believe me; just because I have not stood in a line for hours, just to get a seat in a bus going to the ‘village.’
My ancestral home is five kilometres from the Main Post Office. If I wanted I could walk to the village
By Kalungi Kabuye
HAVE you ever been to the village? I have, but for some reason people do not believe me; just because I have not stood in a line for hours, just to get a seat in a bus going to the ‘village.’ Because I did not have to fight touts, somehow wedge my way inside, and then pay twice the usual fare, I am told I have not been to the ‘village.’
Every time there is a festival of some sort or a big day where people feel they have to go and spend time with their families, this phenomenon starts — going to the village. Each time they ask me if I am going to the village, and every single time I answer: “No, I’m not going to the village,†which is followed by a quick, “You don’t have a village?â€
There is a group of people, increasingly becoming a minority, who are unfortunate enough not to have a village to go to. From the time Kampala became the cosmopolitan city it is, many of us have lost our villages.
It is a strange feeling when, especially at Christmas time, almost everybody else in the office is planning and speaking of going to the ‘village.’
They plan what they are going to take and how good it will be to see all those people they have not seen the whole year.
When I was still staying in Bukoto, I had a neighbour who was from Mbale. He had a large family staying with him.
Come Christmas time and his house would be a hive of activity, as the whole bunch of them prepared to go to the ‘village.’ It was a major event as they loaded up with supplies and gifts to take home.
He would ask me if I was not going to the ‘village,’ and would never understand when I said no.
“Are you ashamed of your village? Did your people disown you/? Why don’t you go?†he asks.
By the time I left Bukoto I was tired of answering that question; tired of explaining that my ‘village’ is here, and that I can go there anytime I want to.
I was tired of explaining that my ‘village,’ Kazo (and not the one in Mbarara) is about five kilometres from the General Post Office (now re-named Posta Uganda) from where I understand road measurements begin.
If I wanted to I could walk to the ‘village,’ as indeed we used to do during the Obote II days, when public transport became such a pain.
This strange phenomenon of going to the ‘village’ first came home to me during the early eighties, when I was living in Nairobi.
It was Christmas time and almost everybody I knew went to the ‘village.’
My mates at USIU went off to different places. Some trouped off deeper into Kikuyu land. Others found their way to Luo-land and Kamba-land, and the foreigners went to the coast.
I was left all alone in Nairobi city, and it was a strange feeling.
But I knew when I got back home I would never spend another lonely Christmas because, hey, this would be home, and everybody I knew lived in Kampala.
Now I’m here in Kampala, and that strange feeling is back again, when almost everybody at my work place goes to the ‘village’ come Christmas.
I have heard children ask their parents: “How come we don’t have a village when everybody in school does?â€
What are we folks who do not have ‘villages’ to do? I mean the people that have lived in Lubaga, Mengo and Lungujja for generations?
What about Makerere, Mulago, Bukoto and Ntinda? There is a mistaken belief that everybody who lives in Kampala came from somewhere else.
In my department at The New Vision, there are approximately 20 people, and all the others have a ‘village’ to go to, except me.
Now that is strange: when you are home and starting feeling out of place.
But it is not all roses for the folks with villages. Festive times must be the worst days to travel.
I like my comfort, and there is no way I will share my bus/taxi seat with several chickens and ducks going ‘home’ for the slaughter.
I hate it when a bus tout treats my designer backpack like so much larded ghee as he throws it in the back of the bus, or sharing a seat meant for four people with five ‘villagers’ sweating a hundred different types of odour.
Then you pay twice as much for the privilege.
And when you get there, the whole village turns out to see what your 12-month-long labour has brought them.
Even those cousins five times removed will feel resentful when they do not get ‘theirs.’
And four days later— after all the money has been spent, all the villages have drunk your booze and eaten your meat while complaining of not getting enough— you begin the trek back to Kampala, broke, and stressed out by the villagers’ demands; glad that you do not have to go through that again for the next twelve months.
So, you can keep your village, thank you very much.
We people without villages are happy as we are, and come Christmas will gladly walk to my father’s home, after they have called me and said lunch is ready. Ends
By Kalungi Kabuye
HAVE you ever been to the village? I have, but for some reason people do not believe me; just because I have not stood in a line for hours, just to get a seat in a bus going to the ‘village.’ Because I did not have to fight touts, somehow wedge my way inside, and then pay twice the usual fare, I am told I have not been to the ‘village.’
Every time there is a festival of some sort or a big day where people feel they have to go and spend time with their families, this phenomenon starts — going to the village. Each time they ask me if I am going to the village, and every single time I answer: “No, I’m not going to the village,†which is followed by a quick, “You don’t have a village?â€
There is a group of people, increasingly becoming a minority, who are unfortunate enough not to have a village to go to. From the time Kampala became the cosmopolitan city it is, many of us have lost our villages.
It is a strange feeling when, especially at Christmas time, almost everybody else in the office is planning and speaking of going to the ‘village.’
They plan what they are going to take and how good it will be to see all those people they have not seen the whole year.
When I was still staying in Bukoto, I had a neighbour who was from Mbale. He had a large family staying with him.
Come Christmas time and his house would be a hive of activity, as the whole bunch of them prepared to go to the ‘village.’ It was a major event as they loaded up with supplies and gifts to take home.
He would ask me if I was not going to the ‘village,’ and would never understand when I said no.
“Are you ashamed of your village? Did your people disown you/? Why don’t you go?†he asks.
By the time I left Bukoto I was tired of answering that question; tired of explaining that my ‘village’ is here, and that I can go there anytime I want to.
I was tired of explaining that my ‘village,’ Kazo (and not the one in Mbarara) is about five kilometres from the General Post Office (now re-named Posta Uganda) from where I understand road measurements begin.
If I wanted to I could walk to the ‘village,’ as indeed we used to do during the Obote II days, when public transport became such a pain.
This strange phenomenon of going to the ‘village’ first came home to me during the early eighties, when I was living in Nairobi.
It was Christmas time and almost everybody I knew went to the ‘village.’
My mates at USIU went off to different places. Some trouped off deeper into Kikuyu land. Others found their way to Luo-land and Kamba-land, and the foreigners went to the coast.
I was left all alone in Nairobi city, and it was a strange feeling.
But I knew when I got back home I would never spend another lonely Christmas because, hey, this would be home, and everybody I knew lived in Kampala.
Now I’m here in Kampala, and that strange feeling is back again, when almost everybody at my work place goes to the ‘village’ come Christmas.
I have heard children ask their parents: “How come we don’t have a village when everybody in school does?â€
What are we folks who do not have ‘villages’ to do? I mean the people that have lived in Lubaga, Mengo and Lungujja for generations?
What about Makerere, Mulago, Bukoto and Ntinda? There is a mistaken belief that everybody who lives in Kampala came from somewhere else.
In my department at The New Vision, there are approximately 20 people, and all the others have a ‘village’ to go to, except me.
Now that is strange: when you are home and starting feeling out of place.
But it is not all roses for the folks with villages. Festive times must be the worst days to travel.
I like my comfort, and there is no way I will share my bus/taxi seat with several chickens and ducks going ‘home’ for the slaughter.
I hate it when a bus tout treats my designer backpack like so much larded ghee as he throws it in the back of the bus, or sharing a seat meant for four people with five ‘villagers’ sweating a hundred different types of odour.
Then you pay twice as much for the privilege.
And when you get there, the whole village turns out to see what your 12-month-long labour has brought them.
Even those cousins five times removed will feel resentful when they do not get ‘theirs.’
And four days later— after all the money has been spent, all the villages have drunk your booze and eaten your meat while complaining of not getting enough— you begin the trek back to Kampala, broke, and stressed out by the villagers’ demands; glad that you do not have to go through that again for the next twelve months.
So, you can keep your village, thank you very much.
We people without villages are happy as we are, and come Christmas will gladly walk to my father’s home, after they have called me and said lunch is ready. Ends