Kimbugwe Muzaphal
“AGAIN? MAKERERE FRESHER REPORTS WITH METALLIC BOX CASE, OUSOFIA BAG”, READS THE HEADLINE.
In his own screwed up way, the writer, some Joe writing a 5,000 shilling article for a “fast growing” blog thinks that such is backward and that the student is worth making fun of. He wonders in his writing, who still brings a metallic box to campus?
While I am struggling to contain myself and not insult this writer or curse the demon of stupidity now having sex and reproducing in his little brain, I choose to speak to all freshers.
Dear freshers, welcome to University. I hope all is going well so far and you are having some fun. However, please allow me share these few words with you.
It is not written anywhere, what a university student should look, feel or be like in order to fit in. Please be yourselves.
You got a metallic box, so what? You owe no one a Gucci bag, you owe no one a leather suitcase, and you owe no one nothing.
It is only you that knows your reality and if it is the reality of a metallic box or an old pair of shoes from high school, it is your reality, at least for now.
You owe no one a pair of designer shoes or clothes and they are certainly not what you need to make it.
Please don’t yield to pressure, don’t try to prove a point to anyone, and don’t try so hard to fit in, to catch-up.
When you yield to such pressure, your troubles will begin because let’s be honest, you won’t be able to fit in if.
Don’t let the world around you define who are. Let the world around you follow your rhythm.
Stay in your lane, work your ass off, do you, do you good. Life will clear the way for you step by step, a little at a time.
See, while you get to campus now in a matatu with a nearly empty metallic box, somebody’s son is cruising to campus in the latest SUV and they will be staying in a high class hostel.
That is their reality. Contrary to yours, it is fancy, it is classy, and it is admirable.
You may try to fit in the same lane, to catch up, to compete but ask yourself, at this level, does your life have to be a chase?
Is it worth it?
Don’t move now, to hurt your self esteem. Please remember that you are in no way inadequate. You are a young person on the move.
Let the reality of those better than you, at least socially, inspire you and not make a wannabe of you.
Learn from their reality, that life can be good, that life can be fun, that life, when you get the language, can be badass and so freaking good and to me, as I hope it is to you, can only be just that.
Learn now, to build bridges between your reality and theirs. Have dreams, have ambitions and stay calm as you work on those even if the landscape might be belittling and super humbling.
Make friends and make meaningful ones. Should you wake up and you are the guy whose job in the clique to drink a lot to fit in, take a step back.
When you are in a clique in which you must have endless sex to fit in, take a step back.
Those are some of the ways in which, if you render yourself inadequate, you will try to fit in-trying to do the most outrageous things that though wondrous to many, now make you a subject of interest, a memorable being.
I may not say it all here, but in a nutshell, there will be many pressures, there will be moments that excite you, there will be moments that throw you off balance and there will be moments that can ruin you.
Stay in your lane, be you and you will make it through.
