Bombs in Kampala...

World cup time. The final game, and, with Ugandans being as football
crazy as they are, the streets were empty. I know. I was one of those
who went to those places.

I was with my partner. Watched the march.

It was during the post football celebrations that the news got to us.
Must say I was in my confort zone. My partner went home (for other
reasons) and I remained at the bar, having fun. It was only much
later, when I got home, that I realised what a major attack that was.

Stunned. Then angered, then....

Gosh. Cant imagine why a person would do such a heinous act of
cruelty. No wonder it is called terrorism.
Only idealisms turns human beings into un-thinking automatons.
Fundamentalists, whether Christian, Moslem, or not... just boggles the
mind.

Have been listening to the news reports. More than 60 killed. More
injured. Overwhelmed hospitals... cant imagine what it was on such a
day to be turned into a war zone. Our health services are dire at
best. They could never handle such an emergency. The very pictures
from the sites are gruesome.

http://www.monitor.co.ug/News/National/-/688334/956230/-/x22qm4/-/index.html
~The first explosion ripped through the Ethiopian restaurant in
Kabalagala at around 10pm, killing at least 13 people, many of them
foreign nationals, and injuring several others. More than an hour
later, an explosion ripped through a crowd of revellers at an open-air
screening of the game at Kyadondo Rugby Club, setting off scenes of
mayhem.
Less than a minute later, as the crowd scrambled for safety, another
explosion went off, ripping through the sea of humanity. Police
officers at the scene in Lugogo could not confirm the death toll at
the scene. However, a Daily Monitor photojournalist counted 32 bodies
at the scene.
What had earlier been a scene of joy and football celebration had been
reduced to a theatre of death and destruction. White plastic chairs
lay abandoned, save for about a dozen in the centre of the viewing
area which remained occupied – by dead revellers, their lives ended
abruptly, their bodies frozen in time. The angry sirens of police
pick-up trucks and hospital ambulances filled the air as the dead and
injured were ferried to the city mortuary and hospital respectively.
There were blood stains in the grass, amidst the abandoned bags and
shoes and half-drunk bottles of beer. Klaus Sanga, who survived the
blast at Lugogo, said: "There was blood all over. It was really scary.
There was just running and screaming. It was really bad. I'd never
expect something like this. I carried 15 people [to the ambulances]."
Another survivor who declined to give his name added: "I was coming
here because all my brothers are here. I came and stopped at Nakawa. I
don't know why; only God knows."
~

The excerpt is from the Daily Monitor.

Uganda attacked. Really, it is humanity attacked. Who has the gall to
be happy at such atrocity? Apparently, Somali insurgents are happy.
Because they are fighting African Union troops in Somalia, who have
stopped them from establishing an Islamic state under Sharia law. They
don't like football. It is from the decadent west. They would rather
train teens to be fighters than footballers. And, suicide bombers.

Yeah, I know it is a proxy war, the Taliban and al Qaeda on one side,
and on the other the US and their allies... the 'War on terror'. What
I see are country mates, human beings who were doing nothing worse
than watching a football match who were killed and maimed, in the name
of ideals that they may have no real thought about, actions that they
cannot control in the least.

Yeah, there is a disease, a failure at logic which is glorified and
called 'idealism' or 'fundamentalism', when the other person's well
being is tertiary to the 'purity' of one's idealism and thoughts.

Sad, sad, day.

Another sadness, it is almost impossible for me to access the net. The
speed has gone down to near zero. Oh well...!

gug