UgandAshis 2009 – 6. Internet/credit crash

UgandAshis 2009 – 6. Internet/credit crash

Kampala, Uganda
April 26, 2009.

Dear all,

I have been getting close recently to the lovely staff of the help desk of UTL 3G. My mobile wireless modem is having some problems. Today however I found out that the entire service is down. No emails therefore from my house/home/laptop connection.

Strolling over to an Internet cafe is an option and given downloading a gmail/twitter/facebook account may take up to 10 minutes I pass. You then proceed to rush a letter as the connection may fail. Wi-Fi, ASDL high speed is rare and costly here and therefore downloading films or uploading photos is not easy from Uganda. Low bandwidth access is the mantra. At least until the cable connecting the whole of Africa will be connected (2010?)

We take for granted many things in the West, flawless Internet access one of them.

The African Development Bank shows growth figures of 6% for the Eastern African region. Looking at the day-to-day life it seems the credit crunch has by passed Uganda. Here when you pay for a house, dowry, phone, car or any thing else you tend to pay cash. Very little credit is around.

Still there are signs that the world’s turmoil will affect the Uganda economy. Prices of a bag of cement are up from 14,500 Ugandan shilling to 30,000. We wait and see. Don’t worry about a thing, cause every little thing is going to be all right.

In my own way I have been stimulating the Ugandan economy by buying a bed, mattress, table, chairs, gas stove, cylinder, crockery, cutlery, cupboard and more. This house of mine is turning into a palace. Once a guard materializes I will have geese, chicken or ducks.

What do you recommend?

Namaskar,
Ashis