Uganda Television shows in the 80's

When I have time to twiddle my fingers my mind goes into flash back mode--to my childhood. These particular memories get tickled when I have to seriously screen and re screen what Mich watches. 

Gone are the days when the mere mention of cartoon sufficed--when you knew that it was something for the kids to watch and it was safe.

This is where my love for UTV (Uganda Television) back in the 80’s gets rekindled.
I would rush home from school to watch “Clue Club” “Blue Falcon and Dog Wonder” and “Scooby doo”, any body identify?

Ok, what about Electric Company and Sesame Street? Yeah, I knew that would be more familiar.
There was even a time I thought if I happened to land in Germany I would find my way “Pappenheimer” taught us basic German phrases.

Then when the tapes were over and UTV had overly repeated them and finally got ashamed they brought “Peter and His Toy Box”. Oh! that was fun, he showed us how things like rubber, glass, and wood were manufactured and used (imagine, I can not find these guys on the internet).

But nothing beat the Alvin show with the Chipmunks and Clyde Crush-cup, absolutely hilarious. It would never have worked without Alvin’s character. I learned songs like “oo ee oo ah ah … wala wala bing bang”.
“Felix the Cat”, was phasing out by the time I got to watching TV regularly but I remember the theme song “Felix the cat, the wonderful wonderful cat…”.

It is official now, I am from another generation but that’s just fine with me.

Did you get to watch “The Bear, The Tiger and The Others”?, the Flintstones? Pingu?
Clown Ferdinand?
Then there were some Asian cartoons that moved in the most interesting manner (like they were about to fall) and the stories where killer.

“101 tales” about a princess who slept forever and someone told her stories in the hope that she would awake or something.

I also watched “The Danny Thomas Show” you probably don’t remember that one.
Any one remember “Logan’s Run” or “Daktari”?
I presume Daktari is Doctor in Swahili; with ‘Clarence’ the cross eyed lion and a monkey called ‘Judy’.

After “Amawulire gagano nga basomerwa Golooba oba Fred Kasozi” (news in Luganda) we had “Kyeeswa” yeee!!!, just kidding I never sat down to watch the man, but I hear he was quite funny. (Never to be found on the internet though :-)).

“Telematch” was fun, we always took sides with the teams playing and woe unto you if your team lost.
“The Lucy Show” was really entertaining, I remember watching it with my parents (one of the few they sat through).
“Didi’s Comedy Show”, pretty much speaks for itself--non stop nonsense.

One thing that baffled my dad was how at specific times everybody showed up in the sitting room, when it was time for news we all remembered we had things to do. As soon as news was over, we were back faithfully.

He didn't know that it was illegal to miss “Different Strokes” - the world don't move to the beat of just one drum; “The Jeffersons”- moving on up to a deluxe apartment; “Sanford and Son” always having the big one (heart attack); “Good Times”- with clap "kid--dynomite"; “227”- there is no place like home, unless of course you were extremely sick ICU style. We had near fights when someone forgot to call someone else for the show, it was that serious.

So after several failed attempts to get “these young people” to listen to the news, daddy gave up.

Soon we were back for “Hawaii Five-O”, "Twilight Zone", "The Beverly Hillbillies", "Top of the Pops” and “Studio B”.

We kept our fingers crossed wishing that the TV anchor would not come and say something like “Good evening viewers, we are sorry …” That would just kill. Those were times one was tempted to call UTV station to give them a piece of ones mind. To think we didn't have other TV stations to turn to, absolute stress right there--trained our little hearts for life's disappointments.

If we were lucky and the tapes were not lost or misplaced, we got to stay up for features like “The Old Fox”, “Palmers Town”, “Another Life”, “Golden Years”, “Inspector Derrick”, “Riviera”.

When the worst came to the worst we had “James Last” music.

Those were the days.

A moment of silence please.

Thank you.

I wonder if kids of today would take a fancy to Clue Club and so on, if not, why? Is that a silly question? 

I guess I am officially old school because I can’t quite click “Power Rangers”, “Wow Wow Wubbzy”, “Dexter’s Lab” (I’m sorry but I don’t), “Power Puff Girls” oba what.

Growing on me?

On Mich’s birthday we met some neighbors as he played in the compound, he told anyone willing to listen – “It’s my birthday today”
“Oh, my! Happy Birthday! How old are you? What are going to do? What did your parents get you? Are you going out to dinner?”
“I’m five years old”, is all he’d say, didn't bother to answer the other questions, were they too many? Did they fly over his head?, I don’t know.

I got talking with this lady who was child sitting a friend’s 8 year old daughter. This girl (I forget her name) was apparently the best golf player of her age in the area, I thought wow! Golf at 8?!, back in the day Simon and I would run through the golf course shielding our heads with our bags lest a golf ball found a good landing spot on top of us.
Then the lady went on to ask me what games Mich plays, “err …anything fun, whatever” I shrugged my shoulders, I mean he is still a kid right?.
Then she says, “this would be the perfect time for him start golf training, he is the right age. My son started when he was 3”, and I’m smiling and saying wow! (I personally think golf is boring).
She says “but if he likes soccer he can start that now too, this is the best time”
Enough with the pressure, where I come from kids just play everything and anything, - tie banana fibers together make a ball and play, knot strips of grass together and skip, ati professional training at 3 or 4 years of age? What’s that?
Can a little person read and ace his exams? That is all that counts, you don’t waste time and money on games.

Later her husband joined us and Mich did his thing, “It’s my birthday”
The cycle begun again, “how old are you?” “what game do you play”, at this point I was thinking oh no! not again.
But you know, I'm thinking it would be nice to get him into something fun, playing a musical instrument maybe, like the piano or guitar. Oh my goodness! then I would end up being a real ‘soccer mom’ running from this rehearsal to the next.
Is this American lifestyle starting to grow on me?

You know what this reminds me of? - the time I first came into America.
I was advised to pack as little as possible with the notion that I would get everything I needed here.
With the excitement of travel and the knowledge that I had a toddler I was careful to heed the advice.
America after all is the land of our dreams, it has everything in abundance. The latest fashions, the most sophisticated electronic gadgets (from Japan), it’s the home to most celebrities, in fact the streets are so clean one doesn't have to wash clothes or bathe often :-).
They have amazing food, cuisines from around the world are fairly represented in the “American kitchen”. I just needed a few clothes that would tide me over the first few months and I was half right.
I was so wrong about the food, for the first weeks I thought my son and I were slowly going to die of hunger. Not that we were broke and couldn't buy any thing,- there was plenty of food, all kinds of food as a matter of fact but nothing familiar. The bakery aisle in the super market was filled with all tribes of bread but non that caught my fancy. The milk was a whole other issue - 1 percent, 2 percent, ¾ percent, whole milk, half milk, one was certainly spoilt for choice, but that would only be true if I was familiar with the choices.
Where I come from, there is milk period.
You go to the market and you get diary milk, or nido for those of you.
I haven’t even mentioned how I couldn't find blue band. I found carrots, tomatoes, green paper and onions of all colors but no matooke (plantains) or sweet potatoes, there was no millet flour or curry powder, there was no dodo, ebo, buga or nakati but they had collard greens and broccoli - greens I had never tasted. I thought, you know what? This is the end of me.
Quite apart from that, I was intimidated by the huge super markets and felt like someone stepping off a spinning wheel when I walked out the door. I had to be quick because I had a toddler to feed and a husband who was busy getting accustomed to his school schedule. Not to mention the times I wanted the house to cave in on me because I was afraid to venture outside – this in the crazy summer when it was too hot to stay outdoors or indoors for that matter. We lacked air conditioning you see. Philadelphia summer gave hot a whole new meaning.

I promised to bring all the foods I wanted from home when I had a chance. My shopping consisted of bare necessities (my version) for a Ugandan living away from home..
Banana chips, Simsim balls (sesame seed), -oh!nothing tastes as good as our local simsim or g-nuts. Millet flour for porridge and kalo (millet bread), cassava flour for kabalagala (banana pancakes).
By the way, did you know some people here have no idea what passion fruits are , never seen, never heard of - “mu life eno!” as one of my friends likes to say.
Unfortunately I couldn't carry nsenene (grass hoppers), deep fried tilapia – Ggaba style, dripping, sizzling pork “ne bigenderako” from Zanzi , luwombo, katogo... that is not to say the thought never crossed my mind.
But what am I saying?
This second time here, I don’t miss home food that much (self denial?), I’m more accustomed to what is available – Zucchini, Artichokes, kumquat, that kind of thing.
I never imagined I would get to this point, is the American lifestyle growing on me or what?

Splendour of the King

Fantastic day today.
A beautiful, beautiful day.

I took some pictures along the way.
God be praised, is all I will say.

Officially Mapengo

He suddenly sprung out of his chair-

"Mummy, my tooth is out"

"Really? how did it happen?"

With the cutest, toothless grin I ever saw he said, "I just kept turning it around and around with my tongue".

So, that's how it happened.
I was just laughing at myself - by the time losing a tooth becomes a thrill then you know parenting is something else.

With all the special days popping up these past weeks - what with the valentines party, his birthday, he got invited for a party this weekend... I couldn't quite make the whole tooth fairy thing work. He is not big on it anyway and since we still have candy around the house, it served well for the occasion. I didn't even try to add the mystic aspect, but we will see, still have 19 or so teeth to lose right? atleast he knows we rejoice with him.

Hello Love

I attended the Hello Love Concert featuring Chris Tomlin and Israel Houghton last night.

Woooooo!!! now that was some really fine stuff in there.

Israel Houghton got us off to a real good start, he pulled out "I am a friend of God", "I am not forgotten","Lord you are good" then sprinkled a few new songs here and there. I was dancing and singing like my life depended on it. But the crowd was not coming up to par, they were just not getting into the groove. Perfect surround sound, great music, musicians all in sync, I could literally feel the vibes under my feet, you know?!

Somewhere along the way Israel figured they probably didn't know him, so - rewind, start again, my name is Israel ...

I couldn't believe it. Here I was working up a sweat and people were still standing?, were we listening to the same music?.

Anyway I decided not to look around, thank God the place was dark so I was able to really get jiggy with it and not have people looking at me like I had gone crazy. My neighbors did give me space though.

But I still don't have an excuse for the crowds reaction.

Second half, Chris Tomlin came on stage and people cheered, whistled, clapped, shouted, I thought "hmmm, they were actually waiting for Chris huh?". When he did his first song "we will sing sing sing" they went back to just standing and a few people at the front had raised hands. That's when I thought "these guys have got to be kidding me", I was almost hitting the roof at this point and screaming my lungs out. The music was awesome, the songs were familiar, the lyrics where up on the screen, what?, people what?

My conclusion?, worship artists should invest in travelling and doing all their concerts in Africa, Uganda in particular. At least back home we know how to express ourselves, dance, dance, dance - ok if you can't dance, jump, I know a lot of people who get away with it.

Again I decided to chill the people and do my thing, forget about my surroundings, concentrate on Him and worship Him, that's what I paid for ain't it?

I loved that Chris would start the songs and let the crowd carry on, it felt like a worship session, that blessed my heart.

We sang, "God of this city", "Indescribable", "How Great is our God", "Let God arise", "Jesus Messiah", "Your grace is enough", "Amazing Grace" and many more

After a while we sat down and Chris shared what he'd been up to and what God had placed on his heart. He talked about travelling the world on the Passion tour and was more than glad that he didn't forget to mention Uganda.

Then he talked about a song he recorded with the Watoto. Yeow!! that's when I begun swelling in my chair. I almost screamed at that point but "diggi" was killing me. He went on to say he'd called Mercy the choir director, and showed a video clip of the kids, at this point I was half the size of the auditorium (at least in my head and heart I was). He talked about having a chat with Louie Giglio, who said he had just come back from a conference at which he met the founders of Watoto - Gary and Marilyn Skinner. Now I was bursting, I wanted to scream, "that's my pastor your talking about".

Chris mentioned a fundraising tour called "One million can do something now" and how they want to come and build sustainable villages for Ugandan refugees and homes for former child soldiers in Gulu, I was thrilled.

It's wonderful to see what God is doing through the Watoto, never dreamed it would get this big, looks like it's getting even bigger and that's awesome for the orphans, the displaced kids of Gulu, for KPC, for Kampala, for Uganda, for Africa, for the world.

Just when I thought I couldn't take any more, Israel and Chris came back on stage to sing their last song, then waved good bye as they went off the stage.

Two seconds later they were back and we had a good 5 minutes jam session before they run off for good.
I heaved a sweet sigh of satisfaction, picked up my bag and headed home.

The Birthday Boy

It was a pretty calm day.
Got up about 6:30am.
The birthday boy woke up to a happy birthday duet by his dad and I.
He was really excited, he said " I have been waiting for this day a long time". Turns out he had done his own decorating in the middle of the night so my balloons added to "his" touch. He had paper strings placed around his bed.

That was about all the peace we had that morning before...

"mummy, where are my power rangers?"

We got him some really nice clothes but I hadn't wrapped them (my bad), then he says "mummy they are supposed to be wrapped", now I'm thinking what have I got myself into? little boy can't settle, is not too thrilled about the clothes ...

I was tempted to start the "in our days" talk, but we had a whole day a head of us, so I told him to have fun at school and that we would be passing by.

Sam and I had planned for him to celebrate the day with his friends at school and Ms. Dee was in on that.

We showed up at 10am. The kids were all excited except the birthday boy. "Mummy, mummy, did you bring the power rangers?" "mummy..."

"Mich relax, you will get your presents at home, you are not allowed to have presents at school because all the other kids will want to take them"

That seemed to settle things for a bit, then it was "mummy, mummy, can I come home with you?" "mummy I want to go home now"

We haven't even shared the cup cakes or sang happy birthday at this point. Meanwhile his friends are eagerly waiting. I'm thinking, this is getting really embarrassing.

We finally get to sing for him, eat some cake and before he could start "mummy, I want to ..." I said "Ok Mich, have a nice day, see you later" I gave him a big hug and we were out the door.

I was a little flustered that he was so jittery, wasn't grateful for what we had done and then wanted toys so he could show off.

Ok, so I take some blame for not teaching Mich to be grateful with what he is given - how ever small the gift, even if it's not what he dreamed.

After musing on this a bit I realise other factors come in to play.

1 - Going to birthday parties where parents out do themselves with all sorts of presents for their kids (young fella begins to think he can have flying monkeys)

2 - Issues with trying to fit in and be cool, you know?!, getting liked by the other kids, (oh why would kids be having pressures so early? he has a whole life of that a head of him).

3 - It's just a crazy era to be growing up in, let alone being right here ( this is when I really miss home)

Whatever happened to the days when just drinking a soda made it all exciting, or getting a dress, a packet of biscuits?

He finally came home and found his presents on his bed. Then he said "This is the best day I have ever had. Mummy you are the best mummy in the whole world. Daddy you are the best daddy in the whole world".

Shortly after that he was looking forward to his 6th birthday and telling us all the things he would like. That is when I lost it and we had a serious talk about being grateful, now he only mentions the things he wants when we are saying the grace.

You get it all

Mich celebrates his 5th birthday tomorrow and it seems like he's in a hurry to hit some targets before he shows all fingers of one hand.

For a while there school was like a horror story but things a looking up now.

Yesterday, straight from school, bag still on his back he said "mummy 't', 't', 'in' - 'tin", I was thrilled, finally he is beginning to understand how words are created.
A week ago he said, mummy, you know what?, "a consonant and a vowel put together make a blend". Yeee! thumbs up Ms. Dee, you are doing a great job.

He told his Dad "reading is easy", but fell back on that one, every time we tried reading together he got really frustrated.

Anyway, lately his favourite bed times stories have been "Elmo's alphabet" and "Eating the alphabet". Noooo!, I kid you not.

Mich loves stories, long stories, stories that go on and on and keep him captivated to the tale until "the end" or "and they lived happily ever after".

There have even been times his head was heavy with sleep and I've thought, phew! no story tonight, then as soon as I lay him down he says "mummy we haven't read a story", (shoot!)

I respond "Mich, you are really tired, we will read it tomorrow" (absolutely wrong move), he will sit up like he was never sleepy in the first place and demand his story.

So, moving from that to "A" is for Apricot, "C" is for Corn? some one pinch me.

Last night I was so eager to watch American Idol, I made sure dinner was ready, we ate and Sam kindly put Mich to bed.
After reading a story, praying and saying goodnight we kept hearing crushing sounds from Mich's room, I brushed it off because he is known to use that to get attention.

When Sam walked into the room a little later, ah!!

The wall was covered with miniature ink prints of Minnie mouse. Aaaaaaarrrrrgggghhhhh!!

He had a session with his dad then I sat him down and explained why what he had done was wrong, that decorating the wall with stamps of Minnie mouse wasn't exactly cool. He seemed surprised that we were not pleased, he was just trying to make his room look good. I'm hoping that we shall not be discussing something like this again, at least he seemed to understand that.

Raising a child takes a lot of wisdom, so where as this was so wrong and we can't get it off the wall, it was a first time.

Yep, with parenting you get the whole package, the good, the bad and the ugly.

And now we try to clean up the mess, which I suspect is going to take a long time.