Eclipse excited my village

19:50 by tsup ug
I love visiting my village, every time I have to travel those eighty plus miles to Rakai, I get ready for the celebrity treatment that awaits me. That doesn’t however mean I don’t invest in fitting the role.
This weekend, late in the evening I travelled home – just to catch up with family and since it was the eclipse week, I thought it would appear better in the village.
I left Kampala on Saturday night and having called my grandma about my intentions, she also spread the rumor of my coming to other villagers around.
By morning, almost three quarters of the population in our little town knew I was around; the story was that am an ambassador from The Observer in Kampala, and I had allegedly brought the eclipse with me.
I had to fit the part so I gave those at home old issues of the Observer newspaper, for my grandmother’s house, I pinned cuttings of my articles in the kitchen, corridor, dinning and her bedroom just in case her eye misses all the others.
Then the moment for the Eclipse came, earlier it had been announced that it would kick off at 3am, so I told everyone not to view before I test – yes I had been appointed the chief viewer, which also had privileges, I would give a little speech.
In my light and quick speech, I told them of how, my bosses had delivered the eclipse, I warned and encouraged many of them to acquire the right viewing gears from me, they were black polythene bags.
Being a journalist, I was on twitter for most of the time, #Eclipse was trending and I couldn’t stop imagining the kind of headlines that were going to come from Pakwach; President launches the eclipse, promises to bring the moon, Or better; President raps opposition for trying to fail the eclipse.
Then  it was time for the thing to happen, I waited for the total darkness we had been promised and I saw none, there was even this common notion among villagers that the sun and moon were going to fight!
But I still didn’t see any of that, in fact the dynamics of the eclipse left me the chief viewer/astronomist and journalist more confused, I could barely understand how a person in Rakai sees just a bit of clouds and some light yet those in Masaka saw the entire scene.
Then I didn’t understand what was wrong with this TV station, instead of showing the eclipse, they concentrated on showing us this guy watching it.
However, the show had its advantages; by the time I left all girls knew my name, wanted to take pictures with me and yes, they all pronounced my name with passion, like it were a beverage. How I wish every day is eclipse day.
kaggwandre@gmail.com


0 comments:

Post a Comment