I plead guilty to ‘terrorism’

Kampala, Uganda: On a cool Saturday morning as we prepared our house for our weekend visitors, my wife heard some irritating noise that went on and on. Her instinct was that this noise must have been coming from some enemy with ill intentions of interfering with our peace. “Honey, please act fast and find out what’s causing this noise”, she sweetly called out.

I hurried to the rescue and found some rare insect number 1 dancing around the window curtains. I suspected that it was the author of the noise, but was very hesitant to claim its life. I was torn between pleasing my wife and getting rid of this insect. It remains my personal principle NEVER to kill anything except in self defense. So, before I could do injustice to this insect, I said a little prayer and hit it once with a slipper, and it lay lifeless on the floor. Meantime, my wife had long taken to her heels frightened.

My wife returned moments later after I had assured her that the job was already done. But then the noise started all over again and this time it was a little louder and relentless. Without taking chances, I had to do everything possible to get done with the enemy. I had previously killed the innocent insect but felt remorseless nonetheless.

So I turned one of our door curtains and found Mr. Wasp. It’s him that was making so much noise all along. Wasp had carefully built a house for himself and his family on the inside of our door curtain. Without a second thought, I struck Mr. Wasp with all my might, but the slipper, being the only tool I had on me, missed him and he quickly flew out through the kitchen window away from harm’s way.

 Mr. Wasp returned not long after and continued with his incessant noises. This time I was on better target and knocked him down. Once he lay flat on the floor with his face up, I knew his time was up. To lessen my guilt, I avoided hitting him further; after all, there appeared no come back for him. I razed down his house to clear the curtains and found Mr. Wasp’s entire family including little ones of varying ages. Any further breeding of wasps in the house was unwanted, and as such, I cleared the entire family for the sake of my wife’s comfort. At the end of the day though, I wasn’t sure whether to celebrate victory or suck in guilt of a terrorist act. Thinking of the harm the Wasp was likely to cause to the family at an unspecified future date though, and the necessity to guarantee my wife’s comfort, I believe there were very few options in my way.

Next in line was the Cock we had been fattening the previous week in time for the visitors. It looked really healthy. This time, I was not about to indulge in more killing. So I asked my wife to take care of this, and she contracted our neighbor to help out. Once the chicken was served, the rest was history.

One lesson I found challenging particularly with Mr. Wasp, was his level of organization. I wondered: How does this insect decide which material to use to build a home for its family and the appropriate and safe location? Wasp’s house was so well and firmly done that no ordinary force would bring it down so easily. He occasionally left his children and went out to search for food and brought to them-God knows how or from where. Wasp’s sudden demise felt to me like modern day terrorist acts, in which lives of innocent individuals are claimed without warning, to serve selfish interests of the terrorists and their families.

Later in the day, the following day; as I went about my house chores, what I suspected to be a Bee appeared from nowhere and stung my neck without warning.  I felt it. Was this a retaliatory attack from the insect family? I cried out to my wife for help and she came to the rescue, but could hardly see the stinger. Now, it turns out that our house-help would never touch ‘my wife’s husband’ in any way for whatever reason’. On this occasion though, since my wife couldn’t identify the stinger and was desperate to ‘save her husband’; she had to call for help. The only available option was the house-help, who had to get a little closer and touch a little to have the stinger removed. Gladly it all ended without further incident as my wife later applied onion juice on the affected part, and I was well again.

Well, before the Police pick me up for self confession of terrorist acts, I am probably immune since the anti-terrorist law possibly does not cover insects. Said and done though, from my experience, I realized that there’s a hell lot to learn between what goes on in the life of insects/animals and our very own human life. Perhaps, a deeper appreciation of this reality could help us answer some of the world’s most intriguing questions.

 

Tumusiime Deo. K is an International Communications Consultant

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