An original novel story - The Strike Leader (Chapter 1)

Ever so hesitantly, the weekend sun lazily unrolls its blanket over the little town of Soloti, but the nocturnal town, home to my childhood and now the fulcrum of my existence, awoke to life much earlier.

Now as the first beams radiate from the earths eastern rim, the street junctions are already jammed. The cinema halls are packed to capacity and the vendors are already catcalling. But curtailing all these, the morning yawns black and ominous.

A raven just spattered its droppings on a lady dressed to kill and she responded with a scream. Along the road, a begging cripple, slow and shuffling just got crashed under the wheels of a politician’s car. “Stupid cripple” growls the politician, more worried about his car than the lifeless cripple whose remains are left splattered along the road.

In the scurry of activity, only an old man spotting a hat tilted at a rakish angle mourns the cripple’s demise in the humming’s of a dirge:Begu, Bagu, he sings, snaking through the crowds,clang clank bego. Why wake early? And why cross the road?

And he sings of how the rich are enemies to beggars in the mornings and friends in the evenings when they have to absolve their sins with alms -a nd now no funeral for you. He whistles away as if to reprimand the demised cripple.

Ruing the stampede, and hastening my strides, I snake my way out of the crowds at the pavement. To the left, I sleep walk past the clank of a beggar’s can and side step another cripple rolling on a wood ledge.

Without as much as a glance, I round behind a preacher man incensed with Holy Ghost fire and reprimanding the sinful generation but whose warnings, stifled out of his voice by the hoot and howl of the buses and the vendors, make him look like a lunatic shouting in a dream.

After much hustling and bustling, I finally book a seat in a full-packed taxi. Now this is why I dislike Taxis. In addition to doubling beyond capacity the number of passengers, they are also often manned by dubious characters with little regard for anything other than money.

My preferred means of travel is a bus and often, I would just rather postpone a journey than board a taxi. Unfortunately, I just missed the only one-way bus that transverses to the eastern town of Busia and I cannot fail to travel today; I am already a week late for campus.

Sometime later into the journey and now away from the streets of Soroti, I look through the window and begin to feel a faint air of relief: it won’t be long before I disembark.

The journey is very uncomfortable, but with the sights outside, I know that it is about to end. For now though, I have to continue tilting my head window side to catch the fresh although strong inflow of air to avoid vomiting of the stench of smoked fish and urine and bad breath and everything else dominating the air inside the taxi.

Keeping watch at the scenes outside as the taxi glides along the tarmac of the Tororo-Busia road; my attention is glued to the familiar features. I have traveled along this road many times, but rarely do I intentionally focus my attention to the roadway that leads to the place I am destined for.

But this once; I can’t help but consider the familiar landscape with a sense of interest. For probably only the first time, I pay much attention to the seamless beauty of the misted top of the rock at the heart of Tororo town as the taxi makes about the junction. This sudden interest, I must confess, has to do with my personal attitude towards the destination this tamed beauty of a landscape leads to.

Whenever I have traveled along this road, I have always angered at because it leads to a place I am still fighting to accept. Subsequently and of course undeservedly, this road, trafficked by trailers and long vehicles, strained and carrying the weight of loaded high capacity Lorries, has absorbed in its dumb feelings, much of my frustrations and angers.

However, for the first time in years since I started traveling along it, my spirits are high. The road too appears new and I notice the absence of the bumpy-swervy of the earlier travel errands.

My personal life too, it is apparent, has on account of my new found willingness to accept and embrace not just the road but also the journey in its finality to a place I don’t like but in which I must study, evolved. I feel I am being re-born.

The road, meandering and in some sections sloped at weakened depressions, straight to some lengths and yet invisible in its absorption of all the weights of the living, is it seems, an equivalent of my existence. With accepting eyes, I have a renewed sight of the road markings racing opposite as I look through the window.

The current trend of events in my personal life, I see, is like the road. My acceptance of the destination it leads to and my sudden willingness to embrace the landscape I once despised even in her beauty, it is obvious, marry me to her. My life is proving endless and like the road, the holes in it, I can see, are being patched up.

This road is one of the busiest roads I have ever travelled because it leads in its ultimate, to the border with Kenya. I have travelled along it many times before but it is the first time I am traveling it in high spirits and not even, it seems, the discomfort of the taxi inside, is enough to gloom my new feelings.

For the first time, I am impatient to reach the place this road will drop me along its infinite destinations; I am impatient to reach Busitema University located somewhere along this road and this, I will in a short while.

Meanwhile, outside, the features are increasingly becoming familiar. Not long and I have to alert the conductor of my disembarking station.

“Hey conductor…University gate” I shout while rising. But the conductor, who is dozing, does not hear me. The old woman sat adjacent however taps him to consciousness. Like a man who has just dreamed up an instruction, he knocks at the board while shouting at his colleague.

“College gate… College gate”

But I promptly correct him; “University gate” I insist, frustrated at the reference to the University by her old status. I am actually tired of always making the correction that Busitema was upgraded and is now a University, not a college. People still think of her as the Agricultural College it was.

Nonetheless, the conductor does not think it his business: “College or University, what’s the difference?” he insists in his local dialect while sliding open the door.

Stooping as I start out, I don’t see any good in arguing.

“Mr. your money…transport” the conductor now asks, offering his hand. However, disregarding him, I force my way through.

“Since when did passengers begin paying double fare?”

With a long pronounced, if not, derogatory jeer, he mumbles and hurling a few insults, signals his driver to start off.

As I dust off my trousers, a glance at the old woman who had sat next to me reveals her buck-toothed smile; only she understands that I have just duped the conductor.

Relieved, I acknowledge the end to my journey with a loud sigh, glancing one last time at the taxi as it screeches off leaving a trail of smoke. Almost immediately, I turn my thoughts to the world I have just landed on.

The University buildings are visible but it is not they that capture my first attention, it is the expansive grassland that surrounds her to the west but mostly the barren twin hill dominating from the north of the University’s open recess.

It is amazing how suddenly I am appreciative of the University’s view. In the previous days, the sights that now excite me often left a sore taste in my words.

It is true; I have a long history of disregard for the University I have studied in for the last two years. It has always been like a prison from where I have had to scourge through my days. This is why the road I just traveled has previously been like a road to hell.

I am at a loss to explain why it is that I have long disliked the University, but let us just say that right from day one of my admission, even before I first set foot in the University premises, I never once thought I would find myself in this University, which by the way, was unknown to me until the day I was admitted.

I shall not dwell on the circumstances under which I got admitted except that apart from dislike of the program for which I was admitted, the location of the University itself angered me. Rich with the high school dreams, the University located at the country side was never going to give me the free and exciting life I had fantasized about.

And worse, I wasn’t going to pursue medicine but Agricultural engineering. The day I walked into the University premises on my first reporting date saw my first high school dream of pursuing medicine die.

I have, for a long time now carried in my heart the genuine frustrations of failing to study in the glamorous Universities at the city, but overtime, I have come to accept that my future lies in Busitema. My return now in such a buoyant mood is doubtless inspired by a change of attitude.

The first thing to welcome me is the expansive billboard spelling out the inscription Welcome to Busitema University main campus. Hmm, Main campus, I muse, reflecting on the implication of that.

This University, I infer with pride, really is special. Whenever the Vice Chancellor has had to make a speech, she has often bragged of how the multi-campus University that Busitema is exists as the first and only public University of its model in the entire country.

With an array of sister campuses already running and others gradually being incorporated, the University, it is true, has a great future although presently, that great future and the expected enormous projects talked of as in the offing, is insignificant to me. I am a resident student at main campus and I have little regard for the other campuses.

Through the holed window of the gate watch-room as I walk through, a uniformed police man peeps, rubbing off sleep from his eyes. I acknowledge his presence with a nod and he waves back in the loud interrupt of a tired yawn.

Outside on a lame bench, another trio of police officers sat in ceremonial silence all turn and wave at me. This time I manage a smile and waving back, regard them with conscious pride. I know what is going on in their minds and the chit chat they withdraw into is testament to what I already know: that I am not just an ordinary student.

I am lean, dark-skinned and of average height. I still keep long hair in the afro style adopted since high school. Funny isn’t it? Over two years after high school and not much of me seems to have changed.

Not exactly though, in fact, many things as will define the events of the coming days will imply, maybe not a change in stature, for my physical build-up according to my friends, has taken on a constant, but a change in my character and personality.

With my hands tucked into my pockets and my head nodding to the rap and roll in my ear phones, I bounce up the dirt track.

Meanwhile, my free thoughts probe the officers I have just left behind in a chit chat. Just a hand full, what purpose do they serve? Of course I know that police keep law and order and that for a University, police has to man the security and check any student uprising in this age of student strikes.

All these justify their presence, but considering their small number, I am wondering if the dish in which all these justifications is served is not too small for realistic expectations, unless of course the handful of officers is carelessly assumed able to man the relative number of approximately five hundred students at the main campus. I have many doubts to this end.

And my doubts are vindicated by the scene I have just witnessed as I walked in. A dark screened sedan just hooted to which the police man responded by rushing to open wide the gate. I am left debating the role of the officer. What is his role; to gate-keep or to ensure maximum security by filtering entrants into the University compound?

Well, this is Busitema, I tell myself, giving up all together. My thoughts however instantly recapture the sights around me.

As I swagger in the involuntary demonstration of self-confidence, the slanting beams from the red of the western sky cut across, and although shining to beauty, also shine to desertion, the linear array of the University buildings.

From afar, the compound seems deserted. It is now over one week from the official reporting date and I am intrigued at the solitude. Far from the solitude of the compound, the sloping fields, as I bounce up the side walk of the dirt track, I realize are tended to and look really beautiful.

The expansive compound, obviously only until recently mowed, smiles at me. The flowers on the depression at the side walk, which I notice only for the first time, gleam in reflect of their lone color. It downs on me that these flowers had not existed the previous semester and must have been planted during the semester break.

Hastening my stride, and approaching the bend toward the halls of residence, I begin to reclaim my thoughts from the new sight of flowers to the prospects of catching up with my buddies. It has been a while since we last were together.

One thing, even as I walk the track, that my eyes are glued to is the beauty whose details I am suddenly conscious of. Sandwiched by an unbroken forest, the geographic location of the University can pass for a tourist attraction.

Everything looks new, yet on second thought, I feel as though the present sight is the same as that of two years back when I first walked into this same compound as a novice. Nothing, it seems, has changed. But can nothing really change in over two years? Can a man remain the same forever? And places, do they stay the same forever? Can we move places and meet different people without getting modified in our persons?

Not exactly, the barren stony hills seem to have shifted further away from the University proximity, reminding me of the sad story of a young man my high school teacher once spoke of, who, nurtured in the silent forests of his village, swore never to leave the lands of his native memories but whose fanatic reverence of his forested kingdom misted out with the advance of civilization.

Helplessly, he watched as bellied politicians brought smoke-billow machines and men in overalls to fell the objects of his only joys in the name of civilization, of creating modern roads and constructing schools to educate the ignorant village.

Years later, the revered wilderness left him. Busitema too has changed: up on the twin hills, stand two masts. The paneled perpendiculars of the halls of residence too, as I shift my thoughts to them, seem to have disjointed and with them, the anatomical positioning of the buildings.

But is it really true that the buildings have shifted or am I unconsciously looking at the University with new eyes. Eyes that over time have drawn their own model of what the University should be like? Or maybe I am actually juxtaposing the picture of my imagination into the place of the real features?

I am now a few yards away from the first hall of residence wherein I actually reside and I can make out a few students sat on the verandah. Not long, they already regard my arrival with shouts. One walks over and helps off me the back-bag. Others call out.

“Silas welcome back”

“Soroti man what’s up?”

“What have you brought us?”

“How is Kony?”

“By the time I left he was fine” I shout back, not missing the implication of that question. Of course jokingly made but I know it is representative of the attitude among students especially from the western end of the country that the rebel leader and his gang are still terrorizing my home district.

I am nonetheless overwhelmed by the welcome I am being accorded, but not surprised because I am not just any student and I know it.

Others, tight buddies are even joyously obscene

“Bum, welcome back”

That is Blydens, a tight pal and clique member. Hastily, he reaches out to me, elbow stretched out in our special hug.

“F**k you” I reply “who is a bum?’

“Ok, genius, whad’up?” And we both laugh.

“T’s up with everybody? Don’t tell me I am the first around here” I continue, making an issue of the solitude but Blydens promptly makes me understand that everyone is in the main hall watching the day’s football matches. Blydens’ probing, nearly perplexed face is a reflection of my own self disappointment.

How could I have missed that, I am an Arsenal FC fan and one of the most vocal fans around campus, and then of course it is a weekend.

With a slight twist on my face, I make that blush seem intentional,

“Lectures already on?”

“Just a few”

As we climb up the second floor, I subsequently discover from Blydens that the spirits within campus are low and that there is a lot of dissent amongst students. I am curious for the reasons.

“Why?’

“The usual zib” he utters, nearly disinterested “does anything ever change in Busitema” he asks, and continuing, answers his own rhetorical question “never”

“But the flowers were not there last semester” I chip in, but he curve in my lips betrays the joke.

“Flowers, we came back hoping to find internet up and running only to find that all that the chimpanzees up that block…” he points at the senate building “spent weeks doing was planting flowers”

Passim, he narrates of the poor food quality in the University restaurant, how dirty the tap water still is and how a student nearly died the previous night.

“All that was available in the University drug store was Panadol” he says, rounding the bend toward my room.

“Smile if you want man, but shit is tight around here” he continues, taking me by surprise in my instinctive smile, it is obvious he knows I have taken note of his ‘drug store’ mention. Actually, that is how students like to refer to the University sick bay; simply a drug store, they claim because all that is availed are the everyday pain killers.

“We thought the start of this academic year would be better but things just seem to have gotten worse” he explains “there is still no internet and we still have to pay excessive functional fees”

It is not as if I am ignorant of Blydens’s revelations. Whatever he is saying is actually true, or at least was true by the time we broke off home the previous semester, but the University management had made promises to the effect that this semester the problems would be solved. Well, nothing, it probably is true, has changed.

“So what are the students thinking?”

After expressing my own disappointment at the state of affairs, I am curious to know the student’s level of frustration.

“What’d you expect? Angry, disappointed, pissed off, but f**k, they are resigned. We can’t do anything”

On that can’t do anything, I disagree but keep my thoughts to myself. With a simple murmur, I leave a second to pass before intentionally changing topic and staying that for the future.

“So what are you guys up to? Where’s Davi and Co?”

Blydens explains the whereabouts of each of our clique members.

“Biggie ain’t back but Davi’ n jimmy are out on social evening”

Those two had kick-started the semester in style, already out on errands to the only few happening joints bordering the remote University.

“So the malaria couldn’t allow you join them”

“Man, I couldn’t take that risk, not when the drug store is locked on weekends like this”

And we again laugh.

When we reach the room, I am received with another round of applause and pleasantries by my roommates. Before long, I start off to lay my property. Blydens excuses himself and I have to give him a push down to his own hall of residence from where I leave him to retire to his bed.

‘I’ll check on you in a short while” I say “but make sure you at least take those pain killers, you are still too young to die”

“F**k you” he shouts as I close the door at my back “go organize your kitchen!”

“At least it is better than this rubbish pit of yours” I shout back and proceed down my hall, leaving Blyden’s faint voice to filter out with distance.

For the first few moments, I sit on my chair and swinging, stare at the ceiling in meditative silence, taking time to absorb and gauge the implication of Blyden’s revelations. Almost immediately, I embark on nocturnal scribbling and write down my first diaries: Day one: arrival. Re-union. And reminiscing of the new developments at campus, I take note of the implications: difficult choices await.

Not long and I fall deep into slumber.

To the West, the sun follows suit but I remain wondering what dreams she is likely to have. For my part; I am already holding hands, impassioned and running through hanging gardens with my beloved Julian.