Lifestyle Archives - Page 11 of 15

Scientist

May 2, 2020

I have always loved biology or say science ever since I began school. When I was choosing out a combination going into my A’level, despite the fact that I had performed pretty well in my Arts subjects, I did not at one time consider them.

Day 14 of #UgBlogMonth tasked me to write which job I would choose to do in this world.

Like I said earlier my love for biology or science will have me doing any job in that line. Thankfully I am doing just that. I am a nutritionist just so you know. The 2018 Global Nutrition Report revealed that the global burden of malnutrition is unacceptably high and now affects every country in the world. Uganda’s adult population face a malnutrition burden. 28.5% of women of reproductive age have anaemia, and 4.7% of adult women have diabetes, compared to 4.4% of men. Meanwhile, 8.6% of women and 1.8% of men have obesity. These are the things excite me.

The best thing I love the most about what I do is patient care. Recently as I checked on my patients given that I cannot get to them in this lock down, one of them was surprised me when his joy for me reaching out to him could not be hidden. If any of you is a medical worker you will know the kind of glow this can bring to your heart and your career as a whole.

The other thing I want to do and should do pretty soon is medical research. While at university we had to submit a research paper on a particular topic. I did a research on the nutrition status of breastfeeding children born to mothers living with HIV/AIDS in Kawaala Health Centre IV. The whole process to do this research was very exciting especially conducting interviews among the mothers.

The ultimate motivation in science is to discover . When a person achieves his or her scientific aim, he or she feels supreme pleasure. In medical science, discovery may directly lead to human welfare through improved disease diagnosis, treatment, and/or prophylaxis or health promotion. The contribution may seem small, but the outcome associated with it may prove to be invaluable and the pleasure experienced by the researcher immense.

Science is something relatable and just doing it fulfills me. If I had to do any job in the world it would deal with health care.

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Lifestyle

Travis Greene

May 1, 2020

Today is the 13th day of the #UgBlogMonth challenge. Task; if I had 20 minutes to be with a celebrity, who would it be and why.

First I always dread being in the presence of any celebrity because they always have a lot going on around them, too many fans, security detail, name it so I always loathe being anywhere near them.

This celebrity is one whose music and personal story I love so much. If I had just 20 minutes to spend with a celebrity, it would certainly be Travis Greene, an American gospel musician and pastor.

*Travis Greene – American gospel singer and pastor*

I can imagine death trying me twice. No not even that far, just one time is enough to shake up my whole existence, my clan and the whole family tree.

Born in 1984, Travis Greene entered into this world still-born thus declared dead. His mother called on the name of the Lord and He answered and brought her baby boy back to life. Now right at this point I can just imagine the scene in that delivery room. His mother shaking this lifeless young boy back to life as she screams the name of Jesus. Now that is a faith that is admirable.

Like that was not enough at the age of four, he fell out of the window of the family’s fourth floor apartment in Germany. Someone advised his mom that her toddler was dead and by the time she got outside a white sheet was pulled over his face. As she picked up the lifeless body of her child she called on Jesus over-and-over until he came back to life.

Through the countless interviews Travis has given, he says this transpired in the natural but in the supernatural there was an occurrence that has forever made an indelible imprint in his life. As he fell from the window a giant hand accompanied by a very bright light caught him. The voice asked, “Do you want to go with your Mom or do you want to come home with me?” Four-year-old Travis answered, “I want my Mom.” (Just like any young child would say) The voice said, “OK, go home to your mom, but the next time, you’re coming home with me.” Inquisitively Travis asked, “Sir, what is your name?” The voice answered, “My name is Jesus.” Each time I watch this story it never grows old. I always gape like it were the first time to hear it.

Shortly after this life-altering experience in 1989 Travis’ father suddenly died of an aneurysm (aneurysm is a ballooning and weakened area in an artery. Aneurysms often occur in the aorta, brain, back of the knee, intestine or spleen. A ruptured aneurysm can result in internal bleeding and stroke.)

Just like everyone has a turning point, this was it for Travis. He became very passionate about music. It was God’s way of giving him an escape from tragedy and crisis as he says.

If I had 20 minutes with Travis I would want to listen to this story again for the Nth time.

His music stands out for me and I would love him to play me ‘You waited’ which is one of my favorite among his songs.

You Waited -Travis Greene

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Lifestyle

If only I knew

April 30, 2020

I have been writing for as long as I can remember although active blogging only began a few years ago. I always wrote and threw my writes on the different whatsapp groups I was a part of. For a very long time, my friends encouraged me to open up a blog although I felt I was way below average for me to qualify to be a blogger.

Day 12 of the #UgBlogMonth has got me writing 10 things I wish I knew before I started blogging. So in here I have mixed what I wish I knew and tips to go round this blogging craft.

1. It is for everyone

Blogging as I later came to discover is for everyone. For some reason I always perceived bloggers to be for ‘slayers’ for lack of a better word. I came to learn that the term blogger is just a fancy word for a writer. As long as you have views to put across and would like the public to know, behold you qualify to be one. There is no special person curved out of clay to be a blogger.

2. Get ready to stumble

As you begin to blog, you are bound to stumble here and there. Like it is said,no one starts out perfect, so is the case for blogging. When I finally swallowed my pride and decided to blog, I had to figure out where this would be. I stumbled and began by opening up on blogpost, then moved to medium until I settled for opening up my own website. I do not know what I had against WordPress but I did not even what to hear about it. The downside to this though, is that each time I migrated, there are some pieces that I did not move along with. I can comfortably say I have over 100 pieces but they are all sprinkled in the ‘homes’ that gave me shelter once.

3. Requires hard work

Blogging will not come on a silver platter. When you decide to come to this part of the world, you are like a person building a house that will have occupants, and these you will have to fend for. The occupants are your followers. You do not want to leave them unfed. So you have to put in work to see that the ‘food’ you serve them is of quality. I will say this though that, some of what you serve will be welcomed and some times it will not. Other times you will be judged for it. It is all part of the game. Do not be discouraged. You will sometimes sleep late trying to put out something or editing it to perfection.

4. The internet does not forget

Each time you put your work out there, know that a foot print is being marked. How terrible it will be for you to portray something that is not you or false. It is only prudent that put out something that you live by, or at least proud to defend. If it is something you have imagined, be sure to tell your readers lest you mislead them.

5. Wear your reader’s shoes

While blogging the length of your write is important. You do not want to write something very short that leaves the reader yearning for more, or something too long that is going to leave the reader too tired to finish. As you write, you need to put yourself in the reader’s shoes. That will be the best way to gauge the length that is enough depending on what you are writing about.

6. Passion before Profit

Blogging is better off if done for fun than for money. In other words passion should precede the money. Each time you begin writing with the intention of money other than passion, it is more than likely that your gas will run out before you realise your goal. You need to know that the world will have to appreciate your work before they can pay for it. Trust the process.

7. Consistency is the glue

Consistency is the glue that cements blogging. Blogging is a situation of ‘out of sight out of mind’. Each time you are not consistent with feeding people with your work, they soon or later forget about you. All successful bloggers have learnt that consistency is one of the most important things, so they blog even when they do not feel like it.

8. Share your work

Share, share and share your work. Luke 8:16 reads; “No one lights a lamp and hides it in a clay jar or puts it under a bed. Instead, they put it on a stand, so that those who come in can see the light.” It is the same case with blogging. You do not want to write and leave your work on your blog site. Put word out there. Share your work to anyone and everyone. Social media platforms are the quickest and easiest way to put out your work. Even when someone does not say it, they are secretly reading your work. So do not get discouraged when you share your post to a whatsapp group and everyone is quiet about it. Believe you me someone has read your work.

9. Be your own editor.

Reading a blog post with grammatical and spelling errors is like eating rice with stones in them. The trick to this is to read through your work out loud. As you edit your work, try to listen to how different words feel in context to what you have written about. If it sounds vague to you, it is more than certain that it will be the same thing to the reader too. Incase you can find someone to look through what you have written, the better but this may not be the case all the time.

10. Keep it simple

There is no need to use ‘big’ words through out your write. The rule is less is always more. If your piece is one that needs someone to frown to every word that you have written, or run for a dictionary, they will soon abandon it. Write in such a way that even someone who has not seen so many black boards will enjoy what you have written.

With that said, blogging is a learning on job situation. No one can ever prepare you enough. You perfect your craft as you do it more and more often.

Good luck

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Lifestyle

Oh! How I miss……..

April 29, 2020

Much as I have so many things I miss so dearly and would have loved to write about them, they are things that I can easily get back soon or later. So I am going to write just two things that I can never get back. Not in this life and oh! how heavens know I miss them so dearly.

I dearly miss my childhood. Isn’t it so funny how when you are young you just cannot wait to be an adult, yet this is something that you cannot get back once you are grown. Somehow things always worked themselves out while I was young. There was no apparent stress of figuring out life because there was someone else carrying that cross. Never was I concerned about safety, sleeping hungry, shelter name it. All I had to do was live life as it was handed to me. I miss my childhood so bad and maybe if I had known that it will never come back, I would have lived it fuller than I lived it. I however do not regret the way I lived it but I only wish God could give me just a week in my childhood again.

The other thing I forever miss is my best friend who the world took from me prematurely. I miss the pure heart he had, the never dull moments that we always had. Not only with me but with every person that crossed his path. The time I doubted myself, he was there to believe in me. Even when the whole world misunderstood our friendship, he stood in the tide. The endless plans for each others separate lives we had and couldn’t wait to witness is something I will forever miss. Oh! I miss the beer nights too. Even when I would want to be angry at the world that snatched him from us, I do not have right to but this is a friendship I will miss forever.

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Lifestyle

I almost slept in jail

April 28, 2020

We are ten days already in the #ugBlogMonth, It is amazing that I get to write each day. Do I like to write every single day? Oh yes! But some days I just do not feel like my opening my computer but guess what! A girl gotta write even when she don’t like it…..

So today I had to write a confession and here it is.

I start this by saying, God bless mothers because they go through a lot to see their children turn out the upright children they ought them to be. Fathers do too I guess but mothers do more.

If you were born in the 90s and earlier, you probably know that playing was the source of entertainment for most of the children. Televisions were just beginning to make their mark in the society, phones let alone smart phones were almost non existent, radios did not have as much entertainment like they do today. My childhood was full of play, play and more play. We played at dawn, in the scorching sun, at dusk even in the night. There was only one small problem though. Mummy always disorganized our programs. If it weren’t to go sleep after food, it was too late to play or we had to do dishes. It almost felt like she had a problem seeing us free, and doing our business (playing)

So on this fateful day, we were on the lose as mummy was at work. By that time she worked as an accountant at the same school I went to for my lower primary. It is not always easy going to a school that your parent works at trust me, but that is a story for another day. So we played from a friend’s compound whose home was near the road. I don’t remember what prompted us to start going for a mango hunt but we did. We agreed to use stones to knock the unripe mangoes off the tree and when it was my turn, the stone took another trajectory and hit a passing passenger van. The rest of the crew took to their heels leaving me in the hands of two grown scary looking men.

My heart began to pound not because of what I had done but what my mother would do to me. I had already imagined the intensity of beating I was going to get and it freaked the hell out of me, so I began to cry and yell for mercy. These two men cared the very lest to my pleas and dragged me like a goat being taken to graze. All I could hear them say is, we will take you to prison and you will not leave until our broken head lamp is paid. In Uganda it does not take long before dozens of people gather to a scene and that was the case. Mark you I was about 6 or 7 years then. As the scuffle continued to ensue, one old man stepped forward and advised the men to look for my parent(s) or guardian to resolve this or else if I am taken to prison, I am way below the age of imprisonment and I will be let out.

At the end of the day, my mother was located and had to compensate the two men and I survived going to jail at such a young age. But the beating I got that day, is one I can never forget in my life.

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