Bryan White: The gift that keeps giving

One day, Bryan Kirumira had a dream. He saw himself becoming white. He named himself White. Just like that. Then another day, while having a siesta, he woke up with a start. He had had a peculiar dream in which he was rich enough to own 30 planes like Desh Kananura’s friend. And so, he became rich.

With this simple background of the man Bryan White, there is no need to continue questioning the depth of his pocket. Instead, it’s time to focus on Bryan White as the gift that keeps giving. He is that guy who believes in something and goes for it. Just imagine this country had two Bryan Whites…

Anyway, even just one is amazing in itself. The other day I went to Mutima beach to cover rescue efforts after the boat accident on Lake Victoria when Bryan White showed up. Believing in his powers, he envisaged himself as a diver. Let’s call him Seaman for this one was going to do what professional marine police and UPDF had failed to do—locate all the missing bodies.

Of course, with his weight, I remain to be convinced he would sink. In fact, he doesn’t need a life jacket to float. He could have even walked on that water. With the power of his money and the swank, I am just surprised Bryan White did not attempt to walk on water.

Then he envisaged himself as an admiral and started dispensing advice on how to handle the challenge at hand. Before long, he was commanding the seasoned divers and marine officers. I was there wondering what more he wouldn’t do when it happened.
The gift that keeps giving envisaged that if he just threw cash around, humans would retrieve the wreckage of the ship from wherever it had rested. And that is just what he moved to implement.

I saw divers disappear with ropes into the lake, one end of which was left at the shore. Within no time, several malnourished young men, each hardly five stones heavier that Bryan White himself, were tagging on the rope.

These guys were going to pull the sunken boat to the shore in the power of Bryan White. Or rather his money. Jesus must have been staring down the earth with envy that his records on water were going to be beaten. I stood there looking like an antelope caught in the strong glare of headlights, the kind Desh used to illuminate Lake Victoria so his wife could see who to rescue.

An elderly woman noticed my bemusement and interpreted it for grief, never mind that what Bryan White was asking the young men to do was itself more grief-striking. The woman offered me condolences. “It’s God’s decision so trust in Him and the body of your loved one will be recovered,” she said.

By dusk, Bryan White had realised that it wasn’t possible to turn money into muscles with enough energy to lift the stern of a sunken boat.

Now, the sight of Bryan issuing orders to soldiers was bizarre enough, and his manual attempt to pull the sunken boat even more bizarre yet the most bizarre was yet to come.

Apparently, he drove to a police garage, lifted a digger to his head like leopard did with ‘olubengo’ (grinding stone) in 1996. He then entered his convertible car and drove back to the beach. True legend at the beach.

In Bryan White speak, there was money. A lot of money. And there were people. Many, too. What was lacking, therefore, was energy. A digger pulling a sunken boat is something that would only happen in Paw Patrol cartoon strips. But let’s not deviate and insult Paw Patrols because those puppies are fat and cute.

At first, I thought Bryan White was going to have the digger create a tunnel from the shore to where the boat was resting. Then he would use his cap to strike on the water and the lake would part for people to walk in there and pick the wreckage of the boat. But Lake Victoria is neither a Bible nor is it even mentioned in the Holy Book. What more, Bryan White will never be Moses.

The digger failed. MV Kalangala failed. And I’m off to Prophet Mbonye’s church to hear of how he prophesied of the boat tragedy in 1971, who knows, he might tell us where the missing bodies are.