By Agatha Christie Akello
Do you know what I miss most about campus? Dating for food! Back then, it was not as classless as it is now. In fact, it was a sign of being street smart as you could pocket your upkeep while eating KFC and CJs from toasters. Now that my restaurant connoisseur habits are all dependent on my visa card, I have started dating for looks, emotional intelligence, the ability to father twins, a Mercedes Benz GLE, along with a lake view mansion in Entebbe.
Back then too, besides the free food, campus relationships had an extensive number of board members who ate and cried with you. The communal dating made heartbreaks more bearable. Nowadays you will learn about your friend’s romantic relationship when an indiscreet mutual friend shares photos of their kwanjula. I do not know when the shift happened, but we are more private about our dealings and suddenly superstitious these days.
I believe the university innocence is what made dating and friendship easy for me. I loved and trusted wholeheartedly, because the world was yet to give me a reason not to. Then I fell into a Kampala situationship and everything changed! Do you know what it’s like to nurse a heartbreak while having a 9-5, two side hustles, rent and eating three healthy meals a day? Neither did I, but I had to learn after I realised that gwenalonda mubanji (the one I chose among many) had in fact, not picked me back, and was the apple of two other pairs of eyes. Fire sharpens iron indeed.
Hope lives eternal
The only thing giving me hope now is how Toni Tone was proposed to, along with the realisation that I have matured so much from heartbreak. I just need one more to catapult me into Parliament, because I believe with a stone cold heart, I would make a phenomenal speaker but I digress.
What I am trying to say is, as I get older, I am more intentional about how and why I decide to date. Since graduating from Makerere University, my values and interests have shifted. I no longer fall prey to the air conditioning in German vehicles and posh restaurants. I realise the value of coming home to someone you can share life’s joys and burdens with, because it surely gets lonely at the top if you are not intentional about nurturing good relationships.
However, I must admit, coming to the awareness that investing in a romantic relationship is not gender exclusive has been unpleasant. I mean, why did the 50/50 conversation start just as I was about to stop fearing men? When did birthday gifts transcend from undershirts to new tyres not less than UGX 2.5m? And why am I attracting people who are not aware of the fact that Valentine's Day is a girl’s second birthday? It’s tough, but, what do we do with life’s lemons? We make a whiskey sour because we are adults.
If you are still at campus make lemonade and be silly, you will recover faster from the consequences; but if you have a fully developed prefrontal cortex like me, try these five things and see how much ease it brings to your adult relationships:
- Make friends from scratch. Not to sound like Nara Smith or anything, but building friendships outside of an institution has opened up my world. Getting to know people without the bias of familiarity has allowed me to equally express myself freely and form deep meaningful connections. In simpler terms, be open to meeting people you didn’t go to school with or know from the past.
- Grow your value. I was going to say make money, but that has been overemphasised in lieu of knowledge, accountability, integrity and honesty to mention a few. Can we all just be good rich people who are considerate about how our words and actions contribute to the life experiences of those around us? Good.
- Get therapy. I was watching the friendship episode of the Unpopular Opinion and Prim mentioned the gaps we try to fill vicariously through our companions. Like attending all your friends’ family events because you didn’t come from a tight knit family. With therapy, these threads that link the past to present can be easily identified and put to good use. Do I make sense? Yes? No? Topic for another day, but the point remains. Therapy is amazingly useful so look for a good therapist.
- Let people join you on your life’s adventure. I read this in an article a while ago and it stuck with me. We often sit around waiting for God knows who to sweep us off our feet so our lives can truly begin. But all that does is limit us from experiencing the vast beauty life has to offer. Go out there and live! Good things come to those who seek them.
- Be gracious in your journey. Listen, if I had a dollar for every person I cut off without good reason, I would have that Mercedes GLE. In my defence, I never bothered to actually understand the reason they did the things that they did or check how entitled to their time I had become. Now that I am more retrospective, I recognise the situations I could have handled better and pledge to extend grace whenever I am caught in conflict with a person I love and value.
While there is a surplus of unsolicited relationship advice on the internet, I hope that these tips bring some light to your current season. Remember, every good thing you are looking for, is searching for you too!
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