How to quit smoking

If you know me you’re familiar with my endless attempts to quit smoking. The last one was 3 days before I left for Kampala. For anyone who’s wondering, it’s very easy to be a non-smoker here. You can’t smoke inside any public places. Most people don’t smoke –most people can’t afford to smoke. No one at work smokes. Of all the people I’ve met, only one or two ever take a puff, and they’re ex-pats.

So, for anyone looking to quit, moving to Uganda is an effective method. I tried nicotine gum, the patch, self-help books and Zyban. Nothing worked. So I decided to take drastic measures. You generally don’t crave, because no one’s smoking, and when you do crave you can’t be bothered to trek for half an hour down the bumpy dirt road to the off-licence shop that sells cigarettes. You don’t gain weight because there’s largely no junk food to be had here. When you do get snacky you go to the kitchen and ask yourself “Do I want this variety of banana, or this slightly different variety of banana?” Also, conducting daily tasks is a lot of work (no washing machines etc.) so you get exercise without even trying. Nothing works up a sweat like walking up Kampala’s hills under the blazing sun.

The down side is that my lungs feel as if I still smoked, thanks to the air pollution. You’d be amazed (or disgusted) by the black stuff I blow out my nose each day. Not to mention the red dust.

So don’t worry folks, you too can quit smoking.