Rules and Uganda

Here’s the thing about me

I’m a rule-follower. A conformist. A direction-taker. An authoritarian’s wettest wildest dream. I like to cross roads at the zebra crossing. I look left, right, and left again before I cross. I walk on the demarcated pathways, not the organic paths people make in the lawns. I stand in queues and patiently await my turn. I add 2 cups of water to 1 cup of rice. I boil my eggs for exactly 12 minutes. I pay my taxes, my rent, my utilities bills on time. I shake before use. 

I enjoy order. Thrive on it, even. It’s for this reason that I believe that, somewhere in heaven, or wherever the creator(s) of humanity sit, nationality is one big joke, and being Ugandan is the punchline.

Because, order? Uganda? Antonymous, I fear. Why am I looking left and right and left again on a one-way road? Why is someone pressing their belly into my back as we line up at the bank? Why is having power a happy accident, not the norm? Where are the road signs, the street lights? 

It’s jarring, for someone who depends so much on patterns to function appropriately. The country’s motto is “For God and my country”, but maybe it should be “Damn.”