You know the fairy-tale about a princess who kissed a frog and it turned into a prince and they lived happily ever after? Well, this story isn’t about that. I needn’t say that I’m not a princess and I am still single and desperate for a "happily ever after.” Okay, maybe I’m not desperate and maybe I think "happily ever after” is an idealistic statement but the story isn’t about that either. The story is about how I kissed an actual frog.

Every first day of April, a class would select a teacher and he/she would be the victim of a vicarious prank. There were no consequences to our actions. April 1st was, after all, Fool’s Day. My class was full of overachieving delinquents. No class was allowed to outdo ours in bad behaviour. The previous year, we had written Mr Muhereza’s nickname on his jacket and he had gone back to the staffroom wearing it. But another class had exchanged rooms, successfully convincing a new teacher that he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Obviously, their prank was better than ours and we were not happy about it. We were determined to regain our glory as the worst class in the whole school.

The Biology laboratory attendant loved to feel needed. He hung around waiting for students to ask him questions and when they did, he gave endless explanations and elaborations. So we took advantage of his enthusiasm by asking questions while other students stole the cage which contained frogs. We waited until the last teacher left the staffroom and then we opened the cage and let frogs in through an opening under the door.

It was supposed to have been funny but Mrs Bonabana, our Biology teacher, wasn’t known for her sense of humour. She pointed us to the swamp and asked us to bring ten frogs. When I finally spotted a frog, I was excited. I guess the frog was excited too because it jumped high, its mouth landing straight on my lips. I wiped my lips and scrubbed my mouth and I have stayed away from amphibians in general since then. But nothing I do can erase the fact that I kissed a frog.