In praise of Ugandan time

I suffered, I cried, I lashed out in anguish, I was depressed by Ugandan time. With my beautiful Ugandan family, we always agreed to set off at 8am. Little did I understand that 8am was when people would be waking up. Then at 9am, someone would be preparing breakfast aka, ekyenkya. “You want us to travel hungry?” a one Jowy would ask. By this time, I would be boiling red. At 10am, the last person would be leaving the shower. Then at 11am, the great Mama would have forgotten where she placed the car keys. Finally at mid-day, we would set off. We would arrive at 3pm for a function that was meant to start by 1pm.

But fear not! The 1pm function would still be setting up tents. It would only kick off at 5pm. It thus always went without saying that we were never late or too early for any Ugandan event. If we adhered to Ugandan time, we would never have to wait (being too early) or be late. With Ugandan time, we were always on time.

For a decade, I went through this cycle of fighting hard against this absurdity that is Ugandan time. Matters became worse when I jumped on a plane or two. Now I could insist that things in Berlin are different. My black European Aunty, aka shirt-lom, would support my cause. All my other pseudo-Western would join in the party, and we would denigrate these Ugandans and their Ugandan time. But friends, this was a decade of insistence, and nothing was changing.

One day, like the great Cwezi I am, I stumbled on the mystery. The thing that had cooked my head for a decade was no more. Imagine, there was nothing wrong with Ugandan time. It was all in my ‘Western’ corrupted mind. I could have run out into the streets shouting; ‘I have found it. Eureka.’ But then, I was not archimedes. I am, thus, here to inform the country at large that I have solved the greatest puzzle in the world, I have found the solution to Ugandan time.

Now, when we praised Berlin and the trains, little did we know that a lot went into making time work in the Western world. There was the infrastructure to support the time. To keep time in Uganda, it means you must kill 3 hours in advance to be in time for a meeting. Yes, there is a higher cost to keeping time here. And then what if you make it to that meeting on time? To be told by someone that they will only get back to you later? That they are still reviewing the proposal. Imagine attempting to keep time in a sea of potholes? What time are you keeping?

I believe Ugandan time is the last of our freedoms. It’s a freedom we shouldn’t attempt to lose. My family and friends ensured that my protracted war against Ugandan time failed. But since I do not believe in failure, I translated my failure into success. If for 10 years Ugandans couldn’t bulge an inch on Ugandan time, then there must be something in Ugandan time. Something they hold sacrosanct.

Ugandan time is the glue that holds every aspect of Ugandan culture together. Without Ugandan time, we lose our inclusiveness. Because with Ugandan time, everyone is accommodated. With Ugandan time, we can accord our politicians the necessary recognition at functions. If our politicians arrived in ‘Western time’, they would find no one to receive them. But with Ugandan time, we can all glance at them, welcome them, clap for them, and recognise their sense of fashion. If not for Ugandan time, many would be past retirement age. With Ugandan time, we can freeze age. We have friends who have been 28 for the last 10 years.

And the beauty with Ugandan time, it cures depression. You will never be late in life. You just must agree among each other that the Saturday meeting has been set according to Ugandan time. We can have an abbreviation UT for our Ugandan time. For example, ‘the Friday concert is at 4pm UT.’ We have lost everything as Ugandans, let’s not lose our Ugandan time! And who knows, our dear President could be developing Uganda based on Ugandan time…

Twitter: ortegatalks