Journey's beginning

I have on so many occasions been asked questions about my country of origin, Uganda, what it is like and how the political situation is at the moment.

Having lived in the United Kingdom for over a decade now, one finds that clear concise answers become more difficult.

Unless one is actively engaged, the danger is that slowly these topics start getting hard to articulate.

There are however stories that we who have made The United Kingdom and England especially our home by choice that never fade.

Those stories that we the immigrant population hope that we will be able to tell to our grandchildren with clarity as if the events being described only happened in the recent past.

On occasions, I have been asked about my first impression of the United Kingdom when I first visited. In this age of mass migration, when the population of the UK has grown, the new arrivals have had varying thoughts of their new home. I wonder what the Vikings thought when they first arrived on these shores.

I can only imagine the thoughts of those poor Jamaicans arriving on The Empire Windrush at Tilbury in June 1948 to a country that was overwhelmingly white. And yet this seems only yesterday.

Lenny Henry the comedian has wondered on one of his shows why his father opted for Dudley instead of Kingston, Jamaica.

The Irish immigrants to England in the 19^th Century probably did not find the UK much of a difference with the weather.

But they helped with the expansion of industry in this country. The late 20^th Century saw large migrations from Africa many of whom came here for casual labour. Some came to study and ended up settling here.

Now with the expansion of the European Union, the immigrants to this country are not necessarily coming from far flung places but right on the door step of The UK. For centuries this country has welcomed immigrants all with different stories of what they thought of their adopted motherland. This is mine.

Rick Steves the renown travel writer once wrote: "Many Americans board a plane for an overseas destination without fully realising that they are flying into a completely different culture.

"Some experience culture shock; a psychological disorientation caused by immersion in a place where people do things differently and see things differently."

That fully sums up my first visit to the UK in 1995, a young impressionable man from a comfortable African family. My whole family apart from me had at the time had a British Education in some form.

My father, an Anglican priest had been at Birmingham Christian College, Selly Oak. My Mother too had also been to some Christian instruction college near Farnham in Surrey. My sister was at college in London and my two brothers had been to University at Queens in Belfast and Aberystwyth in Wales. So, on this basis and from the stories they told of the United Kingdom, I felt pretty knowledgeable about the country.

Saturday 22^nd April 1995 was a cool day as I prepared to fly out of Uganda. I had been invited to visit by two families. The first one(Diane and Harold) lived in Winchester, Hampshire and the other family (Jimmy and Nadine) live in St Johns Isle Of Man.

The two families had their daughters working as volunteers in Uganda. The excitement was almost tangible. For my family, they felt that at long last they could talk about the London "tube" without me looking on with my jaw falling through the floor.

On my part, this day was the culmination on a number of events. Uganda at the time was still reeling from decades of political turmoil. For one to acquire a passport was next to impossible.

However, my father had managed to get mine in a record two weeks. Needless to say he spent hours waiting at offices and cajoling officers for their signatures only to be told that the next signature would be got from another officer across the county the size of Cheshire and Staffordshire combined.

With the dire road situation, that meant a two hour journey at best. He still managed to get the coveted book and I will never forget the smile on his face as he handed it to me. At that moment, it felt like he had just given me the freedom to roam the globe!

At the airport I was getting slightly irritated by my family who had come out in force to see me off. They kept giving me tips on what to do when and how. What to expect when I got on to that Gulf Air plane.

My father kept on checking to see whether I still had my passport. He kept looking at the visa to make sure it was in date. It never seemed ending and I just wanted to get away from everyone and start on my adventure.

The airport was full of people who had come to see loved ones off. This used to be a common practice in Uganda before travel became common place. The airport would be heaving with people who had come to see loved ones fly off to other countries. Entebbe airport could have had one flight in the day but the lobby and the restaurants would be full. It was a day out! Suddenly, our flight was called to start checking in! My adventures had begun. And I was getting away from these lot...............