Don’t Mention Donation

**I originally posted this on the delightful Matooke Nation blog…

Halfway through typing out this blog post (trying frantically to meet the oppressive and completely unrealistic two week deadline imposed on me by the tyrants who run Matooke Nation), I heard a loud hooting sound which alerted me to grab the steering wheel and swerve out of the way of an incoming four-wheel drive vehicle. I had to place the laptop on the passenger seat so that I could properly gesticulate obscenities with my hands at the reckless driver who almost knocked into me.

It is at this moment that I noticed something peculiar written on the side of his car. Mbu “This vehicle was donated by ***** [name of NGO].” Now I found this to be both amusing and bemusing at the same time. Why on earth is this NGO tie-tying on the car for? What I understand by the word ‘donate’, is to give freely. Now if the vehicle has been given freely, why should the NGO encumber the recipients with an unwanted tattoo? It’s as if they’ve been branded like an Ankole cow! You’re still my property whether you like it or not!

He clearly misunderstood when they told him that the Ankole cow is horny.

I was always taught that you’re supposed to give with one heart and without using the act of donation to show off or undermine the recipient. Now how is the driver supposed to pose on campus chicks and take them out for coke, chips, chaps, chicken ne’nkoko when he has some random donation logo inscribed on the side of the vehicle?

The opposite of swag...

Now consider this. If a campaigning politician were to give out a few metallic cases to a handful of boarding school students, imagine how people would feel if on each suitcase, were emblazoned the words “Donated by Seya Ssebaggala. Please Voting Me!” People would doubt the politicians true intentions for his act of goodwill.

So if you belong to an organization that ‘donates’ vehicles, how about you just try handing over the car and leaving it at that. No stickers, no logos, no visual reminders of your benevolence. Or is it too hard to do charity without trying to get some free advertising out of it too?

*This article was donated to Matooke Nation by www.Twitter.com/IamEnygma

Annoying Time Murderers

Once upon a time, visiting banking halls was a perilous endeavour. The branches were few and far between, overly crowded and impossibly bogged down by procedural bureaucracy that it was often wise to clear out a couple of days in your calendar for the simple matter of visiting your money. And that’s not even during school fees season. Who am I kidding? It’s still like that today!

Anyway, some bright chap somewhere stumbled upon the solution of creating a faceless machine slotted into a hole in the wall. This would allow normally functioning human beings to insert a card, type their pin, withdraw their cash and leave with a receipt all within the space of 60 seconds. In fact, I believe the original script of the Nicolas Cage and Angelina Jolie blockbuster, Gone in 60 Seconds, was based on this magnificent concept. However the idea was derided as being far too fictitious for an average cinema-goer to believe since the majority of us have never actually witnessed a normally functioning human being using an ATM!

A watched pot never boils...

I mean seriously! What the hell are you doing at the damn machine?! Is there a new video game installed in the ATMs that I don’t know about, as part of the banks’ public relations programme? Perhaps, I’m behind the times and there’s a hack to access Facebook from the ATM? That would sure explain why some of you can arrive after a visit from the salon and leave just in time for your next hair appointment! And don’t get me started on those guys who put in the card, transact, take it out, then put it back in, transact, take it out, put it back, transact, take it out, etc ad nauseam!

Good grief! I think there should be a time limit on the ATM cards so that if you spend longer than 60 seconds (okay 75 for some of you slower ones), then your card is swallowed and you are forced into the banking hall. I mean, I started typing this blog after the guy in front of me punched in his pin code and he’s still not finished!!

PS: Please stop calling them ATM machines. ATM is an acronym for Automated Teller Machine. Which means you’re actually calling it an Automated Teller Machine Machine.