Uganda, April 9 -- I receive several requests from good folks in Kampala to go buy, and send to them stuff from some Nairobi store or other; from rare books, computer and camera components, to medicine. Always glad to do my patriotic duty.

One time I went to a big pharmacy in Nairobi to buy medicine for a desperate family in Kampala who couldn't find it in the city. I asked the pharmacy if they could spark it so the medicine wasn't destroyed in transit. They said they could do me one better; ship it to Kampala.

"How?" I asked.

The pharmacist asked me to go round the back, and he showed me a table piled high with packed medicines.

"We are sending all those to Kampala tonight", he said.

So I paid transit fees and left them with the med...