Uncle Rwamiti was attending a funeral when the conversation began.

An old friend pointed toward a handsome house on the neighbouring hill.

“That’s Kato’s country home.”

“Beautiful,” Uncle Rwamiti said. “Does he live there?”

“No. He lives in Kampala.”

“His children?”

“London, Toronto and Kampala.”

“Does he come here often?”

“Christmas sometimes. Funerals. Maybe Easter.”

Uncle Rwamiti looked again.

Large house.

Beautiful compound.

Water tank.

Solar panels.

A caretaker lived in a small room behind it.

“How much did it cost?”

His friend lowered his voice.

“About 600 million.”

Uncle Rwamiti nearly swallowed his groundnuts whole.

“Six hundred million shillings?”

His friend nodded.

“But why?”

The man looked surprised that anyone needed to ask.

“My friend, you must have a home where you come from.”

Then he pointed toward the family burial ground.

“And eventually, that is where Kato will come home.”

Uncle Rwamiti stared at him.

“So Kato spent 600 million building accommodation for a journey he intends to make after he is dead?”

“Rwamiti!”

They both burst out laughing.

But the question followed him home.

Because Kato wasn’t foolish.

And the house wasn’t useless.

It represented belonging.

Roots.

Family.

Status.

A physical declaration:

I came from here.

For generations, that mattered enormously.

Perhaps it still does.

But Uncle Rwamiti wondered whether something had changed.

Our grandparents often lived close to where they were born.

Their children moved to Kampala.

Their grandchildren moved to Dubai, London, Toronto and Johannesburg.

Families became geographically scattered.

Yet the house back home remained.

Sometimes magnificent.

Sometimes empty.

Sometimes occupied mainly by a caretaker, a few chickens and several extremely confident lizards.

And behind it waited the family graves.

Then Uncle Rwamiti made the mistake of raising the matter with his wife.

“I think I should be cremated.”

She looked at him.

“No.”

“But I’ll be dead.”

“Exactly.”

“So surely I won’t object?”

“You are objecting now.”

That discussion ended surprisingly quickly.

😂

But something remained with him.

Perhaps the issue wasn’t whether burial was better than cremation.

Or whether everyone should stop building ancestral homes.

That would simply replace one rigid rule with another.

The interesting question was much bigger.

How many things do we continue doing because they once made perfect sense?

A second home.

Another piece of land.

Marriage by a certain age.

Several children because one child is somehow incomplete.

A degree because respectable people have degrees.

Retirement because sixty means your useful years are behind you.

A physical building because wealth must be something visitors can see.

Some of these traditions may still be wonderful.

Some may still give us belonging, security and meaning.

Some may need adjusting.

And perhaps some have quietly reached their expiry date.

Uncle Rwamiti therefore wrote five words in his notebook:

DOES IT STILL SERVE US?

Not:

Is our culture wrong?

Not:

Were our parents foolish?

Certainly not:

Let’s throw away tradition.

Just:

Does it still serve us?

Because wisdom isn’t blindly rejecting what our ancestors handed us.

But neither is wisdom preserving everything simply because they handed it to us.

Sometimes honouring those who came before us means keeping what still works.

Sometimes it means adapting it.

And occasionally, it means having the courage to say:

“This carried them very well. But perhaps it doesn’t have to carry us.”

Uncle Rwamiti closed his notebook.

Then he remembered his wife’s instructions.

Apparently, some traditions were still under negotiation.

And in his particular household…

cremation had not yet secured Cabinet approval.

— Uncle Rwamiti
Does it still serve us?