[UAH] A night on a city street

A night on a city street

Street families sleep in groups for their own protection. Strangers are charged a fee. Photos by Abubaker Lubowa. 

In Summary

Every evening, you will find people using the streets in downtown Kampala as places to spend the night. Some are regulars. Others are just passing by. And others are lost with nowhere else to go. Our reporter spent a night with them.

Journalism school does not teach impersonation as part of the core ethics of the profession, rather it advises that if all other legitimate methods fail, you are allowed to try deceptive measures.

For this particular assignment, an assortment of a fairly old and dirty blue shirt, a khaki trouser and a three-year-old pair of open sandals that I purchased from St Balikkuddembe Market in June 2010, were the best I could get.

At the back of my mind, I was pretty sure that my dark skin would earn me comparative advantage because I would fit into the group that spends the nights on the street (of course, a few light skinned people sleep on the streets). For one, my colour can easily make one think I have not had a scrub, or that my body has not seen some water and soap in many days. Secondly, not many questions, such as, "Who is this man?" would arise.

So at 9.55pm on the night of June 4, I decide spend the night out on the street. My choice of stay is Ben Kiwanuka Street, one of the areas that I always trekked through as I headed to my village during my childhood, a place, I now live in, Mengo Kisenyi (forget about the 1990s when it was a hub of thugs. I am talking about the new one with well-built roads and functional street lights and arcades).

Along this road is where Assistant Superintendent of Police, John Bosco Ariong, was killed last year as construction was on going.

The road that runs between Mukwano Arcade, Pioneer View building, Finca House and the Old Taxi park, is one of the busiest in the city.

During the day, taxis hooting, the "clap-clap" noise of ladies' shoes merchants, pre-recorded play backs of several phones and movies, and noise from taxi touts as they scramble for passengers mainly to Kawempe and Ggaba Road all adds up to make a cacophony of noise.

By the time of my arrival however, all that sound is gone. The road is as clear as that which leads to church on any day but Sunday.

Kampala Capital City Authority workers – many of them, women in their prime – clad in yellow reflector jackets are busy cleaning the roads of the dust, plastic bags and the wrapping boxes that are from the shops and careless city dwellers.

The ladies do not forget their most important protective gear, the mouth and nose mask, that shields them from the dust.

Meeting my family
Towards the stroke of midnight, more and more people come together to spend the night. The verandas of the buildings that are shops during the day turn into a lodging of sorts.

After moving around a few places in town, I decide that bellow Finca House will be my home for the night.

On this veranda, a space of over 20 metres is covered with people sleeping. Cardboard paper is their bed, huge black, white or blue polythene papers their "bed sheets" while others have thin cloth sheets to shield them from night's cold.

It is rather difficult for me to walk towards people who are happily preparing to sleep and tell them I want to be with them. What do I say? "I would like to spend a night with you?"

I think hard and decide on what to do. Although this may lead to my cover being blown, I decide with my photographer colleague, to hire a boda boda and take photos first.

After he does so, I am left with finding a place to sleep. First, I decide to stand along the street to observe what goes on and hopefully attract sympathy from one of the people near me.

Two hours of observation reveal a family of mainly disabled men going by the more than six wheel chairs that act as barrier between the walkway and the "beds".

The other group is one of old women, many of them who seem to be in their 50s and 60s. They have jerrycans with water they draw from the Old Taxi Park.

It is this water that is used for drinking and other house work. This group, probably due to age – go to bed as early as 10pm.

The larger group of little girls and boys between the ages of seven and 15 is still jolly, jumping and giggling as if they are in a home compound.

Right behind where I am standing while I lean against a pole with a sign, "No Parking" are two men with crippled legs – one on a wheel chair and the other sitting on a polythene bag.

The one seated, who I understand goes by the name Twaha, is complaining to his colleague about how Jennifer Musisi is making it hard for him to do his shoe vending work. He speaks about it in jest though, as they crack jokes about how they are the most intelligent people in the city.

A few moments later, Twaha's colleague decides he needs to ease himself. He unzips his trouser and urinates the road. This, he does in front of the little girls and boys. No one seems to care, this is a small family and everyone is free with everybody. And he is not the last to do it. Minutes later, a Red Bull energy drink can, flies past me and drops several metres ahead. It contains urine from one of the people that went to bed early.

Who are they, where do they come from?
It appears that the people who spend nights on the street are not street people or perpetual beggars.

As I stand by that place, a new member of the family, a young girl in a pink Polo T-shirt, white pyjama shorts and red slippers arrives, looking puzzled and confused. One of the girls called Brenda that has been playing around notices her and draws closer to her.

"Are you new? Are you lost? Have your parents chased you away from home? Do you have where to stay? Do you want to work?" are the questions Brenda poses to her. She answers all the questions in affirmative apart from one – "Do you have where to stay?"

Immediately, Brenda summons another seemingly older girl, Joan.

"We have got a new person," Brenda cries out loud.

Dressed in a green blouse, a cap and black leggings, Joan hurries over.

The girls are now a few metres away and I can barely hear what they are saying. All I see is them doing preliminary tests to establish whether this is a boy or girl. Touches on the chest area to look out for budding breasts, and a search below the abdomen, are part of the routine check.

Minutes later, Joan and Brenda escort the new girl to their resting place. She is given a bed sheet to cover herself and she actually sleeps off.

Summoned to explain myself
As I stand observing all this, Twaha is taking note of my activities and he summons me.

"My brother, I have left all the others and I am now focusing on you. I have been seeing you stand by that pole. You are not talking to anybody, but do not worry, we are both men and I would like to know whether you have a problem and we see how we can handle it," Twaha says in a deep voice.

He continues, "I do not want to see you standing there, in case of any problem, say a group of gangsters passes and they beat you up. So come and sit here."

I tell him that I am stranded and I need a place where I can spend a night such that in the morning, I can find taxis to Bukomansimbi.

As easy as that, I get a place behind Umeme cable covers, not to sleep but to sit.

Little do I know that for the next five hours, I am going to be tormented by drugs that keep Twaha awake till morning. Jet fuel, Chief Waragi, marijuana. The strong smell of these constantly assaults me.

"If you take some, feel free to ask. If you don't and they do you bad, you can easily tell me because we are men and I know you have a problem and I would like to respect that," Twaha tells me.

I am seated in the middle of the little polythene paper, facing Shell fuel station, on Ben Kiwanuka Street. Twaha is on my right, and on my left hand lies a baby aged probably a year and a half.

The baby is in the company of its father whose head keeps swinging left, right, back and forward as sleep overpowers him. His wife, on the extreme side is sleeping away.

Twaha explains to me, "I have given that man a punishment. How can he get his child and wife from the village that they are coming to Kampala, where you do not have a job?!"

He adds, "I have told him, let the others sleep while he sits, and he will do that until morning."

The man does not speak English or Luganda, only Swahili. I can speak basic Swahili, and in a conversation with him, the man tells me that he came from Mbale. They had come to visit a person admitted at Mulago hospital but they arrived late and he needed to wait until dawn to continue with his journey.

I turn back to Twaha who is constantly talking about life on the street. He says he has been sleeping on the street for the last 20 years. Sleeping under the guard of Saracen and KK security guards, Twaha tells me that all the people sleeping along his area of stay pay at least Shs500 to spend a night. Indeed, the guards are forever patrolling the area as they check out on a new member and he or she has to explain where they are from and why they are sleeping on the street.

As I begin to dose at around 4am, Twaha warns me that I should not even attempt to close my eyes because I "have not paid to sleep."

"I don't want to talk to people who are sleeping. You see I helped that family and they are not going to pay. If you want to sleep you should pay me and I will cover for you. If the guards come around asking about you, I will tell them that you are my courier," Twaha tells me. I pay him Shs1,000.

"Yes, now we can continue with the conversation from where we had stopped," he says in a softer tone.

He goes on to tell me that he has a family of three in Rwampanga, Masaka and that he come to the city to work (vend second-hand shoes) on Thursday and goes back home on Friday.

It is now 5am and he says he has to go to a location he does not name. It is the same situation with many others sleeping along the street. The women have woken up and it is time to clean up – on the streets.

How they do it? One woman wraps a small lesu is around the bottom part of her body. Bathing is done starting with the head, arms and the chest and the legs. I am curious to find out how she will wash the other wrapped parts and still keep her modesty. Well, she doesn't. As soon as she has finished cleaning the other parts, she removes her lesu and bathes stark naked on the street. No one bats an eyelid, except me of course.

The city has now began to come alive and taxis have started coming in. All the other street people are up and it is time for me to go home.

Soon the verandas are so clear, you would be hard pressed to believe that every night, they turn into homes for a host of different people in the city, that every night, they get a new member, that every night, a member leaves, having stopped by just for the night or having decided they have had enough of the street and they will go anywhere else, just like the other who got onto the taxi, unsure of her destination.

akiyaga@ug.nationmedia.com

--
H.OGWAPITI
-----------------------------------------------------
"To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that  we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic  and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."
---Theodore Roosevelt

--
UAH forum is devoted to matters of interest to Ugandans and Africans in general. Individuals are responsible for whatever they post on this forum.To unsubscribe from this group, send email to: ugandans-at-heart+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com or Abbey Semuwemba at: abbeysemuwemba@gmail.com.