My Yoga Experience...

Last week, one of my colleagues invited me for a Yoga class. We made a date for Tuesday (Yesterday) 'Wear something loose' she said.
And so i did.

I have always loved exercise, generally, though i thought more (as do many people) that Yoga is mostly an 80% of the time, passive trance inciting exercise where one sits and chants some mantra repeatedly till he/she attains (or pretends to attain) a state of euphoria, mind undulation, floating awareness..., as i thought that it's active. The latter state-of-mind clearly stamped out, the constant wincing as i type out on this keyboard maintaining as a rude reminder.

We went to this American club in off Makindye known for its famous flea markets where expats leaving the country regularly sell off their artifacts and other things.
After renting a yoga mat from the fitness center, i was whisked off to this room at the south side of the expansive house/center/club (all in one) and was welcomed by this ugandan instructor, 5.8", slight build, ebony skin, unplacable accent with matching, exaggerated arm (and leg) gesticulations.

Quickly we were told to get onto our knees. Here i am thinking, Kinky!! Unplacable accent starts drawling these commands, '...... put left limb infront of right limb, raise head above and arch your spine, feel the tensing of the muscle (says biologic name of mentioned muscle)...' '....stand on your right leg with your right toes digging into the ground, raise your left leg behind you at a 90degree angle to your right leg, lean forward until your spine lines perfectly with your left leg.... for those who want to go higher, raise your back until you do a U shape..... feel your body align.....your chakra..'
'Did he say chakra?' i mused to myself.
He said Align. Interesting, as i thought that particular word was used more for cars.

The exercises were too strenuous, i thought i tore something in the process. One and a half hour long execution of the most impossible swan shapes and curves i thought i last saw on TV, done by those pint sized Japanese freak acrobats.

At around 7.30pm we were told to lie down and relax our muscles, in a strait-jacket shape with our eyes closed. Unplacable accent then crept around covering our eyes with a cloth filled with crystal-like consistency, lavender scented stones. These had a clean, calming smell that quickly relaxed me. He went ahead and covered the entire length of our bodies with light burka like pieces, and went ahead and sprayed potpourri all around the room.
We were ordered to stay still and meditate.
Now, i have never meditated, my mind is too crazy for that. Yes, i always sit down and think, hell, i do that on a daily basis as the execution of my work tasks needs a lucid mind and well thought out task executiion techniques, BUT i have never really sat down in an ape-like trance, clearing my mind of all thought and try to attain a state of ethereal hypnosis.
I dont know what that is, but i sure want to try out, and this is what was required of me in yesterday's Yoga class.
As the instructor rustled about, unzipping bags and taking out Godknowswhat, i couldn't help but wonder what he was removing, that he was probably retrieving some oriental charm that would take a life, shape, form of its own and bite all of us into next-year! But the African in me was quicky doused by the consciousness that i was in a real studio and was doing real, yoga things, and that if unplacable accent did his job well, that i would probably be back next Tuesday.

'... now slowly regain your consciousness, feel your spirit taking form again, find your center...' the instructor softly droned, his voice sounding like a radio whose volume was being turned up, slowly-slowly.
I quickly, impatiently shook off the covers and darted my eyes around the now darkened room, as if expecting to see the receeding tail of the monster that could have been dancing around the room...
And with an awkward sound to his voice, sounding, not, like we were getting off the Alladin carpet from the flight over Asia, but, that it was time for us to fork out the money and pay up, for the session was complete, he said '...hmm..mmm and that is the end of today's session...' to which we awkwardly cleared our throats in in return, and paid up.

The whole experience left me with an ambivalence, a "what was that?" question, a curiosity that will only be placated by thorough internet research, and perhaps another visit to unplacable accents' domain for some of those indecipherable indian words....

Diets!

Ok, i know there are as many diet plans as there are spam emails in my inbox, and believe me, those are MANY. However, i cannot help but wonder about some of the success stories i have read about on the internet and the efficacies of the diets thereof.
To start off, i do not have a weight problem, i am as fit as should be, with no pouring midsections or God forbid, double chins...
That said, i do miss my body as it were at 21. Lean and spry. (You know the typical 21 year old body) I am 100% sure there is a medical acronym for my 'condition' (missing the 21 year old body), though i don't care to find out.
Just like the man who is scared of heights, or the girl who shreiks when she sees a grass-hopper.
I know, when you turn 25 or thereabouts, your body fills out. Suddenly the attractively gaunt cheekbones get rounded, the rack as it were gets a little softer, you know...

Forget about those freaks of nature, those abberations, the skinny ones who eat and dont gain a single kilo. We all know life has its variations, and those are natures' ways of showing off her versatility!

I have gone through a couple of phases, when i was 26, i used to run the marathon like the wind, with stamina on track that would so badly be envied by a 65yr old man in the bedroom.
I recently turned 28 and all i can think about is diets!
Yes, i know the adage, the horror stories, 'He(or she) dieted all his life, and instead became a compulsive overeater, gained 10 stone and was unhappy for the rest of his life'
The nutritionists who crow menacingly, 'You have to eat healthy, the body needs this, and that....'
Where do i draw the much needed line separating healthy from fattening?
I have friends who have all sorts of ridiculous information about food 'If you cut down on your carbohydrates, your teeth will fall out!' That is lame as it is incredulous!

I and have read lots of literature about the body, and what it needs. Put simply, give the body more than it needs and it will store up for the winter! If you give your body more carbohydrates than it needs, it will convert them into fat and store them in your midsection!
This sustains the efficacy of the low-carb diet. It is splashed all over the internet. Pros and cons, sensationalists and cynics alike all sing the same song.
I am a recent convert.
Shoot me someone, please!!

I am intently studying 'The Atkins diet.'
Major Pro - I absolutely dont snack between meals because i eat mostly proteins. As they get digested slower, cravings for sugar are not as frequent.

Major Pro - I enjoy all my steak and vegetables, my favorite anyway, i dont cringe when i see fatty meat or chicken.... and ignore most of the complex carbohydrates like processed foods (flour, etc)

Major Con - The ketones (these are generated as a result of breakdown of stored fat into ready energy for the body, in absence of carb energy) cause a slight bad breath odor in the first days of the restrictive diet stage, but this clears if you drink lots of water.

Major Con - In the first two weeks, no ALCOHOL! now why did they have to go and do that! Well, Atkins says alcohol can cause erratic blood sugar levels, cravings etc, and as we all know, beer has lots of carbs, spirits don't help either cause the mixers usually have sugar in them, and these will knock you straight out of ketosis.

It always gets difficult to stick to one diet, i know, but it is healthy to adopt a certain way of living (WOL), eating what your body needs, and not what it wants NOW.
I have always challenged my body to do things, since it is MINE, (i am stressing the possessive) I want to be able to lose 5 Kilos to fit into something for the weekend, and gain 5 kilos again when i want to. Isn't that amazing?

So i should say, hello 21!

Over? Or under 25? That is the Question!!

When does one say it's cross generation?
A friend once posted something on facebook that said, "you know it's cross-generation when you are 40, and you and your partners cumulative age is not over 55.
As funny as this sounds, it sets me thinking.
A fellow blogger posted something about "if over 25, date over 25" (not in those exact words, but that's the crux)
I will argue for and against, for personally, i have been (and still are) confused by this whole dating over or under.

Over 25 has its cons, one; you can 'get' each other, you have both trudged the road, have your experiences tucked under, forgetten all about milk time and gotten down to business.
Thats good in itself, with the right 25 and above.

Everyone longs for another (mature person) who tunes the same wave-length like they do, speaks as well as they do, and gives as well as they take. Not a tick at the side or a moocher who takes selfishly, like some of the younger ones, someone with a JOB, (and i cannot even begin to stress how important that is) can take care of themselves and won't ask for airtime.

If one is mature enough, confident about themselves, goes about their business purposefully, calls you (does not beep) at the right time, looks good enough and swells you up with pride when you introduce him(or her) to your friends, that is good stuff, all good stuff.


However, when they are over 25, alright, but still ask for airtime, drink too much, speak rudely to your friends to a point where you would rather not introduce them, it all becomes an itchy, sob story.
Lately, i have come across 25 and older guys (or girls) who behave like kids, Throwing childish tantrums, farting openly (though that may be attributed to poor upbringing), condescendingly obstinate or plain lazy, i get 'daylights out of me' BORED!

We all get a chance to be young once, but age pulls us in as naturally as it was designed to do. The more we protest, (stay out till late, dress less conservatively, lace our syllables with heavy jargon), the more age manifests, brilliantly, bitterly! The more it shines its torch on us, quietly scorning us, like a harsh, white dentists' light glaring down on mangled teeth, examining, showing lines of festering gums and plaque caught with a coral reef consistency.
The realization that this is a one way traffic route, we reach out for those younger than us to vicariously live through them, experience through them what we missed while we were younger...
We look at their perfect bodies and get pulled back into time when we had perfect bodies, everything in place, not consciously tucked in(or sucked in), unbroken skin, clear open smiles not tainted by life and its cynicisms, exuberance and huge draughts of youthful optimism and determination. We throw all caution to the wind and we take the plunge.

For some, it works out, those who are lucky to get young'uns who, despite the obviously young countenance, think older than they look, will to learn, hold their own in an intellectual fete, and are not GOD FORBID, under 21 years of age!
For others, all hell breaks loose, belongings get stolen, lives robbed, dignities get soiled and blackmail takes its only acceptable direction; young lout meets older, cushier romantic.

Its as old as time itself, this thing, we are only having our go!

Whew! My password

"I think i have forgotten my password!" I thought despairingly to myself as i typed into my blogs' password box for five times straight and the screen returned the same dull message "Wrong password or email combination"
I looked unbelievingly at the screen, and my thoughts flew straight to the night before, steak-out where i had, out of pure merriment and happiness, imbibed two quarters of Uganda Waragi, a gin famous for causing memory loss, where your brain, out of defiance, decides to wipe itself out, getting an eraser and with a deliberate rejoinder to the alcohol contents making it uneasy, wipes, slowly by slowly, everything, there goes your mother's name. There goes the coordinates to your house. And with it all, goes the password to your blog.
Keeling from the night before, it's decadence and alcoholic marathon, i banged my head against the screen as if to jump-start my brains memory. Brain jams. I bang, brain instead fires back synapses causing a blinding headache.

I thought of the google account i opened when i started the blog, and the same email/password combination to said account matches with blog email/password entry combo, this meant that i could'nt use the helpful line below on the blogger screen that says, with a tinge of amusement "Forgotten your password? click here!"

I decide to wait it out (only option left).

I called a friend who regaled stories of bloggers who frequently complain about their pages getting burgled by hackers, forgodknowswhatreason! Blogger.com does the obvious, locks the account. When the hapless blog owner types in the password the next day, (fresh with ideas and stories to share with the world) blogger.com displays dull page, like a heavy tongue hanging out of a cows mouth, immobile, greyed, useless.
Horrific images flashed through my mind (thats the bargain my brain could give me, horrific images! bad brain!!) upward journey, trudging through blogger with a new account, carefully, painstakingly reconstructing my followers lists, and the fan-base i have been growing steadily (yes! i have a fan-base) and all other things that made my pace quicken out of anticipation of the worst!!
...

After two hours of bated trepidation, i typed the password into the beckoning box again, and same blank screen countered, winking at me, as if mocking me. I decided to give up and resignedly went away for the weekend.
This morning, HALLELUJAH!!! (Jumping, banshee-screaming, mixture of belief and disbelief in equal prop) typed in the same password and there! I GOT IN!
I wondered to myself, why was blogger.com acting up the other time? Have the website administrators lost their edge? Why did they lock me out of my own bloody account!!! However, the furor in itself was dulled by the sheer happiness that i could, once agin, post normally into my OWN blog!

YES!!

Kamunye's deplorable picture.

Before i go there, let me indulge you a little in todays new vision hint:

Olara Otunnu (UPC Flag-bearer) is set to walk down the aisle with a one 'Jocelyn Bafokugamba'
New vision says Joyce and Olara met about three years ago in France... 'but their romance has only assumed a new sense of urgency in recent weeks.' Hmmmm...
'His impending marriage should improve his political fortunes in a country which puts a high premium on the family man.' They add.

Either its April Fools day and they mean to mock Olara, grating salt into the rabid insinuations that have been plaguing the poor man since he made an appearance on the Uganda political scene, or it may actually have a hint of truth in it, but i remain skeptical.

On to the next one!
A few days ago, a friend showed me an article in a Luganda version of the Red Pepper infamy called "Kamunye"
Kamunye follows hot on the heels of red-pepper, brandishing cack to all Luganda reading Ugandans willing to 'wag their dogs', Kamunye generously follows routine to indulge the land with images and stories of astoundingly repugnating proportions. A bare breast here, a dirty look up the skirt there, and all sorts of sex-talk that even your garden-variety loud-mouthed self-appointed sex braggadocio will grimace at when his eyes get confronted by rag-tag.
I digress;
Back to the story;
It's about a pastor who was caught in Jinja, flagrante delicto with two guys and,... hold your breath... a GOAT!
Kamunye, the frivolous daily (or weekly) doesn't stop there. It prints a picture!
A picture that is not worthy of a news daily, a picture so sordid i felt compelled to write about it on this blog, a picture that makes you bite your tongue, spill your wine, and choke on your hors d'oeuvres all in rapid succession.
Let me give you a mind visual. Two guys, buck naked, kissing in the background of the picture, holding hands and rubbing nethers against each other, eyes scrunched closed in utter euphoria. Pastor in the foreground, naked as well, looking down at a GOAT! Yes, a goat, giving him head. The pastor looks completely taken in the moment, his eyes are brimming with desire, and the goat! the goat looks like it's expertly sucking him off! Like it has been trained to do this sort of thing, and the picture in question just goes to show that it's another day in the goats' sucking (or suckling) days.

The picture first repulsed me to the core, and then i burst out in raucous laughter, and then something hit me, and i rapidly went solemn. This could be just a prank by this cheap daily, making a statement, equating homosexuality = beastiality. Therefore it's not a big deal that both repulsive acts take place in the same dingy room in Bugembe, Jinja.
Bugembe, famous for its tarty prostitutes, rampant witchcraft with men and women cursing each other in a movemental frenzy, resulting into children born with no eyes or something dark like that, snakes born in the place of one of a twin pair, et al.

My second reaction after peeking at the picture was disbelief, and i made known my reservations to my friend. My skepticism has it that this could be a super-imposed picture, that the goat could have been expertly photo-shopped (inset in place of another person performing fellatio?)
That beastiality and homosexuality are swimming tandem (in that picture) justifies some of Uganda's homophobes who argue, to my chagrin, that homosexuality acts are on the same rung of the ladder with beastiality, and that both deserve the same hot skin-charring coals in the 9th hell.

The story in it's self made little meaning to me, but i did snatch a few sentences that alluded to homosexuality being a western thing. (As if the picture was not damning enough!)

Please, by all means, pick up that copy of Kamunye, issue is a few days gone i know, gasp at lewd picture, read story surreptitiously and subsequently burn page.
This thing should burn out of our heads sooner rather than later, as unbelievingly as it was presented, hot and fast.
I shudder!

Hope in Uganda afterall...

Well, this wont be political diatribe. This infact will be far from that, its about the spirit of (some) Ugandans, and the beacon of hope that we hope will spread throughout and sundry, the verve that it should be.

This is about a taxi conductor who defied all known habit and did what's right, it is about, in part, lady luck and how she smiled down on me.

Thursday morning, i leave home, hitch a ride with a neighbor because my car had problems. Thursday evening, i arrive to town at around half 6pm from Entebbe and subsequently jump into a taxi to Wandegeya for that much needed haircut.

7.00pm, contentedly seat on the barbers chair, his fingers and clippers precariously going through my hair. I sigh contentedly as i hear the familiar buzz of the clippers next to my ear. Five minutes into the appointment, i go through the familiar habit of absentmindedly checking my pockets to make sure everything is intact, especially when i have moved from crowded places to quieter ones. I do this out of habit, really, for i dont expect anything to have gone awry, but as they say, good habits, good benefits.
This particular time, i do the necessary and immediately notice there is something wrong, i jerk up with a start, eyes popping out of sockets, i barely whisper 'My phone!' I frantically search through my pockets and man-bag for the phone, but as the panic goes and the realization sets in that one of my phones is gone, i smile sadly and think to myself, 'Oh that Taxi', 'Oh all my phone contacts!'
That taxi i awkwardly entered, that banged up taxi with the loud music, that stupid taxi stuck in jam for 20 minutes, the same taxi with this big haired neighbor, a lanky fellow who couldn't stop peering at my phone screen to look at my sordid text messages. Ha!

The barber offered helpfully, 'Try calling the phone, someone just might pick it up, you never know!' I pursed my lips and my memory took me to a time when the same thing happened. About 8 years ago, i left my phone in a taxi and when i tried to ring it a few minutes after i realised it was lost, some one picked it up and exclaimed in luganda to his friend i assumed 'Heh! this one has left his phone in the car, hmmm.' Not entirely believing his luck, and trying to trap same luck before it flew out of the window, ended the call immediately and subsequently switched the phone off! It doesn't suffice to mention that i tried to call the phone desperately, again and again, but as they say... alas!

Getting back to Thursday night, i jerked out of my reverie and took charge, called my phone, and after a few rings, some one picked it up and to my amazement said, again in Luganda. 'I am the conductor of this taxi, (gave me the number plate) We are bound for Kawempe. 'You left your phone in our taxi!' he added. Then, with an urgency in his voice, offered 'Take a Boda, we are still stuck in the jam, i am sure you will get us before we cross the nothern bypass. 'Hurry because we are already late!' he unecessarily added. 'Call when you see the car' he then spelled out the number plate again!

I did as ordered, head half done, looking ridiculous with what can only be described as a "lopsided mohawk" clipped hairs on my sleeve and collar, also half believing my luck, quickly paid the barber and firmy said 'nkomawo!'(i am coming back!), jumped on a boda and sped off. Bwaise bound jam this time worked in my favor, and we quickly, almost acrobatically, sped past the cars lined up in a long jam snaking, winding, and inching its way slowly towards the nothern bypass. I would call the taxi tout every two minutes to half confirm that he was still into the deal!, and also that i was not being 'punk'd!'
We caught up with the car just as it crossed under the bypass bridge and the boda screeched to a halt. I urgently run to the conductors side, and breathlessly, profusely thanked him as he handed me the phone. I duly, quickly forked a 5,000 shs note out of my wallet and offered it to him. He took it from me and smiled gently.

As we headed back to wandegeya, i started thinking to myself. Uganda has a number of good hearted people whose little acts of honesty really make a big difference. They do make a big difference to ugandans and foreigners alike.
Imagine a tourist walking down kampala road, drops a 50,000shs note and a stranger quickly walks up to him, taps him on the shoulder and says 'You dropped this Mr!' and with an apologetic smile on the tourist's behalf, hands him the dropped 50k!
Personally i would wallow in my own rapidly blurted out 'Thank you's.' This tourist would do too, plus he would leave Uganda with a good feeling in his heart, i think!.
These little acts of honorableness are like little dots, coordinates on different parts of a map, scattered around, and with goodness and a general will of ugandan people, can soon spread out like a "good rash!" Hopefully.

My silent musings, wishful thinking was suddenly, interrupted by my boda boda man who screeched, yet again to a halt, avoiding an accident, a boda infront of us had crashed into the ground and three people down with it, a bicycle suddenly joined the pile up and there was a mass of bodies on the floor. The passengers, confused by what had struck them so suddenly, jumped up and started for all directions. Oncoming cars, bicycles and boda-bodas swerved to avoid hitting them, as i looked on fearfully, scrunching my eyes shut as one limping passenger almost got run-over by a sturdy SUV. After my Boda-boda man regained composure, (quickly as we were at a fast moving round-about area), he slowly navigated his bike past the boda man infront who was quickly picking himself and his boda off the tarmac, starting and revving it even before seating astride and speeding off, of course to avoid the wrath of ugly mobs who quickly but inordinately steal from hapless passengers involved in accidents.

As we reached Wandegeya, i shook my head part in disbelief of how fast the last 15 minutes of my life had gone by, and partly, how much adrenaline was coursing through my veins at that very moment. I paid off the boda, and on shaky, jelly-like legs, walked back to "La salon" the real name of the salon i had previously half done my head, plopped down on the barbers seat, closed my eyes and offered up a silent Prayer of Thanks.

'Whoa, What a Thursday evening!' i exclaimed to no one in particular.

On the Flip Side - What i am reading...

Zadie Smith's first novel, 'White Teeth' is like no other. The then 24 British satirist wunderkind spun a tale so enthralling, a multigenerational span depicting the zeitgeist of different epochs, this book will leave you with a happy frolicky feel. And no, i am not done with it yet.


A number of you might have read it for it was done at the turn of the millenium, 2000. This novel miscegenates characters of different races, and creates a mongrel of Jamaican, Bengali, British..

The language is very fluent even for the then Smith, and the characters and situations are described in painstaking detail...

"You had to admire it and admire the man, who sat now like a benign locust, his slender insectile body swamped in a black leather chair, leaning over the desk, all smiles, a parasite disguised as a philanthropist"

And of course the drama....

'Who are they?' She slammed her little fist on to the kitchen table, sending the salt and pepper flying, to collide spectacularly with each other in the air. 'I don't know them!........ 'But tell me,' she shouted, returning to her favored topic, 'Where is our food?' Theatrically, she threw open every cupboard in the kitchen. 'Where is it? Can we eat china?' Two plates smashed to the floor. She patted her stomach to indicate her unborn child and pointed to the pieces. 'Hungry?'

This well woven piece of fiction was an instant bestseller that propelled her to the light early. She has written two books since then 'Autograph Man'(2003) and 'On Beauty'(2005), both which became instant bestsellers.