Vienna Days:The Jerk, the Pawi Era, and the Lasting Echoes

 The Jerk, the Pawi Era, and the Lasting Echoes of Vienna Days

Told by Higenyi Semu Ernest (Class of 2015)

Some school traditions stay with you long after you’ve left small rituals that resurface unexpectedly, years later, as vivid fragments. For me, it’s Vienna College’s term-opening dinner. It was the closest thing we had to a reset button. You walked in knowing the term had officially begun.

Students dressed like they were auditioning for the lead role in a teenage movie suit a size too ambitious, gowns that hinted at who people hoped to become. A talent show always followed, turning the dining hall into a stage where dancers, singers, and comedians claimed their moment. And it always ended in a dance, louder and freer than anything I’d experienced before coming from a school where social events were strictly rationed.

Vienna felt open in a way I hadn’t expected. People were social. Making friends didn’t feel like work. The place almost assumed you had something to offer.

My introduction to Vienna actually started years earlier, when my older brother joined the school. I remember visiting him and standing at the edge of the campus half intimidated, half excited, convinced that everyone there already understood who they were going to be. Compared to where I’d come from, Vienna felt expansive.

That sense of performance shaped my most unforgettable moment: the prefect campaigns. At Vienna, campaigns were never just campaigns. They were full-blown shows, dance battles, rap sessions, and comedy skits. You had to entertain people before you could convince them to vote.

I hadn’t prepared anything.

I watched Joel, Kim, and Antoinette take the stage like they’d been doing it professionally for years. They each had their own presence, easy, confident, and completely unfazed by the crowd pressing in around the tiny hall next to the dining area.

Then my name was called. I chose what felt like the only option: survival mode. The Jerk. DJ Mario nodded, played “Teach Me How to Jerk,” and I jumped into the spotlight. Panic drowned whatever rhythm I had. The performance ended as quickly and awkwardly as it began.

Then Madam Azida, sitting at the front, offered me a lifeline:

“Sing one of your brother Benezeri’s songs.”

So I did. I chose Girls from Kampala. And instantly, the room shifted. People recognized the song, joined in, and by the end, the disaster had somehow turned into a shared moment. That performance born from panic taught me more about fear and courage than anything else I did that year. When I eventually wore the prefect uniform, it felt earned.

But if there’s one memory that still makes me laugh, it’s our trip to Fort Portal. Everything about that journey embodied the chaos of being 17 the loud bus, the nonstop jokes, the reckless confidence. At one point, a guy who volunteered to keep everyone’s phones safe got thrown into the pool by someone who didn’t realize he had them in his pockets. A dozen phones died instantly. The confusion was unforgettable; the comedy was even better.

Two people defined the mood of that trip: Travis and Fidempa loud, fearless, and hilarious. They teased everyone without turning it cruel. They were the kind of people who could shift an entire room.

Back at school, daily life came with its own rhythms: the bell, the noise on the pavements, and the weekly chase for new episodes of Game of Thrones. Perez and Gemenze, the only guys with BlackBerrys and MTN unlimited internet, became our unofficial media distributors. When a new episode dropped, everyone ran to them with flash drives. That was our version of streaming impatient, chaotic, and somehow more fun.

But our final year is defined in my memory by one thing: the “Pawi Era.”

No one really knows who started it. The word just appeared one day and spread through the campus like wildfire. At the same time, the whole school had turned into a gym. The Bar Brothers, a muscular group a class below us, set off a fitness craze. Protein powder was suddenly everywhere. “Pawi” became the soundtrack of that moment, half joke, half badge of honour.

Even now, hearing it takes me back.

If I could return to Vienna for one day, I know exactly what I’d fix. I’d give the Class of 2015 a Prom. We never had one. Mr. Okumu announced it quietly one day with no explanation, just a simple “There will be no Prom.” We acted like it didn’t matter, but it did. With our class a group full of character and ambition it would have been unforgettable.

That’s the thing about Vienna. The place stays with you in old slang, in failed dances redeemed by courage, in episodes downloaded from a friend’s phone, in jokes shouted across a bus winding toward Fort Portal. It was a world that taught me to step up, even when I wasn’t ready, and trust that the moment would meet me halfway.

Some schools stay in your memory. Vienna still lives in mine.