I had never known the real extent of the Kigali rugambo until I tasted a huge dose of it last week. You may recall that I had mounted a search for long lost nephews and nieces so as to obtain some cash from them. I needed this cash in order to wet my ever dry and yearning throat. So, my legs led me all the way to Rwanda Revenue Authority.

I had not gone to RRA to pay for VAT or IPR taxes. No way. Instead, I had rushed there in search for a long lost nephew. I had learnt about a young nephew who had chewed big time in RRA.

The last time I had seen him was about 13 years ago when he was just a dirty looking school boy in Gikondo. It was during the mid 90s when Aggrey and I were boasting of lucrative jobs at the Gikondo UN compound. 

The nephew used to spend his lunch hour kicking football in the middle of the Gikondo dusty roads. Whenever I drove along the bumpy road in the official jeep, I would look the other way lest people associated me with this kid. As for the kid himself, he would jump up and down upon seeing my jeep. "Uncle, Uncle!” he would scream.

His fellow kids would then chase me along the road begging me for a ride in the huge Toyota. But I would just ignore them and accelerate leaving behind a huge clowd of dust.
Now, this kid happens to be a rich young employee at RRA.

Together with his brothers, sisters and cousins, my nephew went on to high school and thereafter joined KIST for his degree course.

As I speak, I have just joined SFB for a mature entry course after failing to make it abroad in the Diaspora. I am staying at Aggrey’s home as a day scholar where I get access to free booze in the fully packed refrigerator.

However, Aggrey has recently imposed sanctions on me by buying a huge padlock for the fridge. This is because he discovered that I had been visiting several bars pretending to be Aggrey himself. He discovered that I had been drinking on credit; thanks to Aggrey’s account. 

As a result, I decided that I would solve my throat problems by visiting my nephews and nieces for some quid. But then my nephew at RRA never recognised me when I paid him a visit at the RRA offices.

I pretended to be an old uncle from deep in the village. I begged him for inkunga as my "hut” had recently been swept by heavy rains.

Imagine, I asked him for Rwf 100,000 but to my surprise he offered to give me Rwf 200,000! Wow that was a real scoop for me! But, Ooops, a fellow SFB colleague just stormed in and spoilt my day.

He started to innocently reveal my true identity by mentioning words such as assignments, ROI computation and Macro economics. That did it. My nephew took a second look at me and begun to laugh out loudly.

"So you were trying to con me of money? You are just a student at SFB and here you are pretending to be my long lost uncle! Shame on you” With those words, my nephew proceeded to stash away the bundles of cash that he had intended to give me.

I looked on helplessly as my nephew left me at the reception area as thirsty as before. I slowly walked out of the place and started to walk under the terrible scorching sunshine. I started to put together a Plan X. My Plan X was to visit my long lost niece who works at one of the top Kigali banks.

My plan was to introduce myself as an uncle from the village who wants to start a poverty eradication project. I wanted her to arrange for me a small loan from her bank which would be paid in 3 months. Would she be my surety?

As I trekked towards the bank, I never knew that my RRA nephew was busy spreading rugambo to all his relatives about an uncle masquerading along the Kigali streets. So, all relatives had to be very alert if a funny looking SFB mature student came along to solicit for funds.

So when I arrived at the bank, my niece was already well briefed. I asked the receptionist to call her down. "Tell her it is her uncle from the village”.

A few minutes later, my niece came to greet me with a broad smile. I knew instantly that bucks would simply jump from her pockets into mine; osmosis style.

As usual I gave her a warm hug and started to tell her about the village. I started to narrate to her about the micro finance projects and how everything was looking good.

When I finally popped the question, my niece surprised me when she asked me the following question; "Haven’t you been to the RRA offices this morning? So, please try else where. You will not succeed here…”
                                                                   
Contact: diaspoman@yahoo.com