My Gripe

People gripe and I am no exception. Sometimes I feel I am developing a hernia because I start to gripe about something as soon as I wake up but, I have resigned myself to fighting a losing battle with my gripes.

Right now I have a gripe to pick with the tycoon, Karim Hiriji. Could somebody please tell him that, it has been close to ten years since he bought the former UCB building on Kampala Road and renamed it Cham Towers. And while I do applaud him for having carried out renovation works on it, one thing he has not done is to remove the blue and white protective foil that covered the brown tiles that were used on the exterior of the building. Far from having some charm, Cham Towers, is a building that blights the city’s landscape.

I feel like going out today but, I have locked myself in the house for I have 29 reasons why I think I should stay home.

1. Watches: I don’t like people who wear watches that do not work. Worse still, when you ask them what the time is, they look down at their watch, then try to hide it up as they whisper it does not work.

2. Waitresses: What is it with waitresses who come to your table to take your order and just stand there? They make no attempt at a greeting or making you feel welcome. And if you decide to wait for a greeting which won’t be forth coming, they will just walk off.

3. Petrol pump attendants: Their favourite word is - ‘extend’. As in, extend your car. You really can’t extend a car because it means you are being asked to make the body longer.

4. The missed call people: These are people who call you back when they see a missed call from you. When they call back, they ask, “Were you trying to call me?” Duh, by the time you see a missed from me, it means I was trying to call you!

5. Two pieces of meat: Going out to eat in a restaurant where you are only entitled to a measly two pieces of meat, whose idea was that? I want at least five pieces.

6. Surname first: People who introduce themselves starting off with their surname as in, “My names are Bukumunhe Timothy. So not on! It should always be first name first as in Timothy Bukumunhe.

7. The watchstrap: People who wear watches with a strap that is too big for them that it slides up and down their arm. When they want to look at the time, they always shake their wrist to get the watch looking upright.

8. Apparently: Like the reporter I sent to cover a function which had been cancelled. He called and told me, “Apparently it has been cancelled.” Either the function was cancelled or it wasn’t.

9. Lazy women: Lazy women in the taxis who sit up in the front and by the door. What do they do? When you want to get out, rather they getting out of the taxi to make it easier for you to get out, they stay put and simply swing their legs over seat as you struggle to get by.

10. Nose pickers: People who pick their noses then look at their snot for a good while before rolling it into a ball and flicking it across the room.

11. Boda boda riders: How difficult is it to button up a jacket? Well for boda boda riders it is. They feel it is easier to wear them back to front than buttoning or zipping up.

12. Bajaj riders: These are the Asian men who take their families out on a Sunday ride on their Bajaj motorcycles. Yes daddy will wear a crash helmet but his wife and child are not entitled to one.

13. The small finger: Men who think it is cool and sexy to have a long nail on their small finger.

14. Bumper stickers: Men who drive top of the range cars like a Ranger Rover Sports or Audi Q7’s then deface them with stickers that read: “I love Namagunga SSS” or “CBS – Radio ya Buganda. If anything, such cars should only have two window stickers – insurance and parking sticker.

15. Conning: Women who when asked out on a date say, “so and so is trying to con me”. Women, when a man asks you out on a date, he is asking you out on a date. So why do you say he is trying to con you?

16. Tugging at the crotch: Men who are seemingly unable to walk through town without tugging at their crotches.

17. Indecisive Women: Women who you take to lunch and who tell you they are not hungry but when your pork and chips arrive, they start picking at it.

18. Ministers and MPs: Ministers and MPs who get to church late and then expect you to give up your seat for them.

19. Carpenters opposite Total in Nsambya: When you buy furniture from them, everything is steady and firm until you get home and lay them out on your floor which is even. That’s when discover the tables and chairs will rock all over the place because they were built in a workshop with an uneven floor.

20. Asking to look at your phone: People who pick up your phone to have a look at its applications then swiftly go into your directory where they start taking down the numbers they don’t have.

21. University students: When you ask them what they are studying, they proudly say, “I am offering a degree in management.” Just what on earth is ‘offering’? When asked, the answer is simple. “I am doing a degree in management”.

22. Waitresses II: Why on earth is it physically impossible for a waitress to take your order without having to lean on the table? Are they incapable of standing up without the aid of one?

23. Security personnel: They love the glove compartment. From the police at Entebbe Airport check point to the guards at Sheraton hotel, the first thing they want to check is the glove compartment. Nobody with a gun or some incendiary device hides them in the glove box. There are many other places where those items can be hidden.

24. Askaris: What do they mean when they ask, “where are you coming from?” The last time Askari asked me that question, I dutifully replied, “I am coming from home” to which he retorted, “What do you mean you are coming from home?” Looking at him, I said, “you asked me where I was coming from and I said from home. I drove straight from home to this office.”

25. Over there: I will pay 100k to the first person who can tell me where, ‘over there’ is. People say ‘over there’ while pouting their mouths in the general direction of ‘over there’, like the waitress in Gabiro, the Bugolobi based pub did when I asked her where the washrooms were. She turned her head, pouted her lips then said over there.

26. The ATM: Why on earth does the person behind you have to stand so close behind you that he practically grinds his groin into your butt? Don’t they know that the queue won’t move any faster whether they are pressing and grinding into your butt on not? Give me some space!

27. The ‘ok please’ and ‘well done’ people: When you say okay, you are not obliged to finish it off with the word please. Okay on its own will suffice. And there is ‘well done’. After a brief conversation with a friend who owns a shop, as we parted company he tells me well done. Why, what have I done to deserve it?

28. Orders from above: Does anybody know who ‘orders from above’ is? In my many battles with the police and security agents, the answer they always give me when I dare question them is ‘orders from above’. Who is he or she?

29. Feet Dragging: Why can’t people especially women just not walk. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out how to walk. Simply lift one foot and move it forward. Then lift the other and do the same. But alas, it would appear it is too much work for the fairer sex who would rather drag their feet all over town rather than lifting them!