Last week, we ran a story in these pages about a woman who was strangled unconscious, robbed clean and violated sexually by her trusted boda guy, and literally left for dead in Kampala. In the days that followed, some readers suggested we flip the coin and look at what boda men also go through in the hands of female clients, you know, just to balance the act. After all men and women and all humans in a fallen state, right? So we went asking boda men for their experiences. Time check, 7:30 pm. James Kagaba was riding his boda boda home after a particularly productive day. As he was passing by a fancy apartment block in the leafy neighbourhood of Lubowa, a young lady exiting the gate waved him down. James stopped. One more job to close the day couldn’t hurt a fly, especially when the said client is a lady. The only question that remained in James’ mind was how far she was going. It was already dark. It’s not like he could just ride to any destination at this time.
She was going to Mpelerwe some 15km across town from Lubowa. Too far for a night ride, James thought. Farther than he had hoped but it was a female client. Ladies tend to be safer bets for after-dark rides as they pose much less risk compared to male clients. After agreeing on the proper fare, the two set off northwards towards her destination. “We had barely done three kilometres when she brought her hands to my waist and gently held on, claiming she felt like she was about to fall off. There was nothing strange about holding my waist. Female clients tend to do this but there was something flirty about the way she said it,” Kagaba says. “By the time we reached Katwe, the lady had pushed herself so tightly onto me that her bare thighs were tightly clasping me. She was a thick girl wearing a very soft round skirt so that the closer she got, the more I felt like I was being swallowed up by her body. I could feel her warmth on me,” Kagaba adds. Kagaba was a 25-year-old man.
He was properly warm-blooded and carrying around raging hormones. The lady was not making things any easier by holding him like that. But instead of being turned on by these sexual overtures, he was scared instead. He had only been riding for a few months having just recently transitioned from construction work. He was not yet used to the road enough to have divided focus. But the lady was not done with her shenanigans. “By the time we reached Kampala Road, her hands had found their way to my bare skin around the navel area, just above my belt. As we were passing by King Fahd building, I can never forget a single thing on that journey, she started sliding her hands into my pants. I asked her, ‘where are you going, madam?’ And she said, ‘I am so sorry, but I’d like to touch’. Remember this girl was absolutely beautiful. There is no way I was going to say no to her. So I said, ‘okay, touch wherever you want’,” Kagaba chuckles. The girl, having been give full access, went all in. Whenever they passed well-lit spots, especially in low speeds, she’d quickly remove her hands from position.
And whenever she went back in, she’d ensure to get the best hold possible. Interestingly, Kagaba was so scared out of his mind that the touches were not registering as they should, which he thanked providence for because he’d rather ride scared than aroused. Non-the-less, he was in a daze. So much was going on in his mind. Had the woman fallen for him so much that she couldn’t help but act it out? Was he dreaming? Because the girl was definitely out of his league. On the other hand, she was about his age of around 25. In hindsight, he could see why she might have thought him handsome because his body was still obviously ripped from his previous occupation as a construction worker. “As we neared her final destination, she showed me a side road to turn into. After a few metres, having reached far enough away from the traffic on the main road, she asked me to park the bike. She told me she had enjoying touching me and now she wanted to know if I’d be okay with returning the favour,” Kagaba says.
He had forgotten how beautiful the girl really was. When he saw her standing there leaning on him and pulling her skirts up, all the pent-up hormones broke loose and rioted. While he was definitely mortified, he couldn’t help himself. All she wanted was for him to return the favour, right there on his bike by the roadside. Kagaba thought to himself that this was the least he could do for the distressed lady. As he slid his hand under her garments, feeling stupid for allowing to be manipulated, he wondered what had happened to her in that apartment in Lubowa to pushed her to such extremes. Whenever people walked toward them on their way from work, the two would pretend to be chatting long enough for the passer by to go away. They stood their being inappropriate for about 45 minutes until she requested for a BJ and he turned her down.
First all, he’d never even heard that people do that, so he partly thought she was just joking. “As soon as I said no, she seemed to get offended. She pulled down her skirts, and promptly asked to be taken to her house. Looking back at that night now, I was very green those days. I had just come to the city and didn’t know my way around. If it had been today, I’d have found a way of getting a better deal,” he says. He never got her name or her phone number. It was purely a heat-of-the-moment incident, orchestrated by his female client to pleasure herself on a purely physical level. As he transported her on that final stretch to her home, he couldn’t believe what he had done. All he wanted was to get paid so he could go home. But as soon as she got to her gate, she entered and closed it behind her, saying nothing to him. That is how he did a 30km trip for free.
