The Retreat

Am afraid I did something silly during the course of the week. I tried to do some exercise – something that my body so I found out was not equipped to do. This thing called exercise ended up giving me a bad back.

Lady Chemist in Bunga, suggested I buy a cream called Fungisafe which should do the trick. With her recommendation, I did buy it and while at home and reading through the small leaflet that came with it, nothing made sense for this is how they described Fungisafe.

“Terbinafine HCI (Fungisafe) is a synthetic allylamine derivative that exerts its antifungal effect by inhibiting squalene epoxidase; a key enzyme in sterol biosynthesis in fungi. This action results in a deficiency in ergosterol and a corresponding accumulation of squalene within the fungal cell causing fungal death. It is fungicidal against dermatophytes (Trichophyton, Microsporum and some Epidermophyton) mould fungi and some yeasts.”

What was all that about and why can’t the manufacturer put it in plain simple English and straight to the point – like: “Fungisafe will make you feel better?”

Moving on, I was at a retreat at a place called Kamouflage on the Munyonyo road. Its run by a chap called Thomas and one of the key attractions at Kamouflage is paintball shooting.

The purpose of the retreat was supposed to be all about team building so Elizabeth, the organizer told me. When the team turned up, I realized that there are more women than men within Sunday Vision.

Not everybody turned up – the noticeable absentees being Danny who draws excellent cartoons and Lucy who had a valid reason for on her Facebook page she posted something about her nanny running off. Why Danny didn’t turn up remains a mystery but perhaps he felt that if he is to team build, the only person in New Vision who can understand him is his fellow cartoonist, Mr. Ras.

While team building is designed to have a positive effect, to build up morale and enable one to get along better with ones work colleagues, there can at times be a negative effect.

During one of games where we had to imitate each other, one girl was less amused when she was described as walking with ‘bow legs’. “Bow legs” she screamed, “I don’t have bow legs, and I so don’t have bow legs!”

Okay so she sought to play down the whole matter but seriously inside her, I thought she was seething! Then there was one person – MM who, decided to be ‘a loner’. He really didn’t involve himself if the activities and kept to himself as he drank his Bell beer.

That was food for thought. Is there some grudge he has been harbouring that he wanted to bring out? Was he on the verge of cutting a wire? A wicked thought passed through me – who knows that one day he might turn up to work with a machete and go on a hacking spree. Thank God that I won’t be there if it happens because my work is sent by e-mail!

Overall the day was a success and I really did think that Elizabeth Namazzi, Joyday and the rest did a lot for the Sunday Vision team. Dr. Wendo who, is the head honcho at Sunday Vision can be satisfied that he has a good team who all work well together. With that I look forward to the Kampala Sun retreat and that companies, if they are not already doing it, should have retreats for their staff and not just senior staff