Dogs don’t share bones; Ugandan motorists don’t share roads

What you need to know:

  • If these guys really mean business, let them start with recording how special we are on this part of the planet and there is no better place to go than checking the traffic beauty.

There are these guys who run the Guinness World Records. We hear about them from time to time. And they really hate Ugandans. 

Can you imagine we have been consistently normalised doing the most bizarre things and these Guinness guys have never bothered to tell the world so? We’ve the worst Twitter user on the planet and the Guinness people have yet to give this guy his certificate as if they fear vengeance.

Instead, they run around and give one to some idlers who apparently made the world’s biggest rolex. Rolex on a pan on which these guys were stepping, wasn’t Guinness trying to mock us with this one?

If these guys really mean business, let them start with recording how special we are on this part of the planet and there is no better place to go than checking the traffic beauty. Now I know there are one too many case studies but I reckon the chaps at UNRA would easily map the Guinness fellows around.

My only worry is that in an attempt to get to the best traffic situations in the world that can only be found in or around Jampala – the capital we erroneously call Kampala – the Guinness chaps will be stuck in traffic for so long they would either give up or give up.

Imagine UNRA taking them to that famous place on the Kampala-Jinja Highway around Namataba. There is this part near the junction to Seeta High School. Obviously the best managed traffic in the world and I am sure that if UNRA’s Allan and Allen ever passed here, they would airlift the Guinness fellows chap-chap to issue the certificate live in stuck traffic.

For the last two years, this place has been such a fine mess that when you are at the tail-end of traffic from either side, you will be tempted to think that Allan and Allen – one is the executive director and the other communications specialist – have broken up the highway into two so that only cars that can jump can cross to the other side. 

But there is no car that can jump. Not even a boda.

Carlsberg used to have this ad that claimed that their beer is brewed much longer for perfection. I’m sure Allan and Allen followed the script. They have been fixing this part of the highway for years… for perfection. When finally complete, I hear vehicles passing through this spot will just disappear and materialise at their destination like Houdini.  

Saves time, Allan and Allen say.

The beauty of the place is accentuated by our inherent creativity. The other day, on the way to Kampala, motorists from Jinja filled up the entire width of the highway. Even wind struggled to pass through. When I finally waded through swamps to the other side, I found motorists from Kampala had executed the exact fine mess. 

These are truly geniuses for the Guinness. I suspect Allan and Allen have connived with motorists to compel us to use Kayunga and Katosi roads. Especially the latter. They want people to know about it and praise the spotted animal for constructing a narrow highway that will need widening in 2025 election pledge.

As I wondered if Allan and Allen could just divide the highway into two so that motorists to Jinja have their side that cannot allow even those UG-plated egos who like driving on opposite lane, Pepe Kalle’s ‘Divise Pas Deux’ started playing on the stereo.

Divise Pas Deux is French for divide by two. Allan and Allen would like that. The song, I mean. And then later the idea of it, too. Back in our UTV days, this song used to play a lot on the grainy black and white telly.

Pepe Kalle goes like “Divise par deux, Gigi, omona wapi mbwa akaba mokuwa eh, Gigi” (divide by two, Gigi, where have you seen a dog share a bone?)

Truly, our motorists don’t want to share the bits of roads in pothole that Allan and Allen serve us. Every motorist wants to take up the entire pothole to themselves.

And then you hear police say it’s now a fad to share your spouse with some horny chap when motorists won’t share the road and dogs won’t share the bone. Duh!