He called for pity, It was 9 in the evening and he was lost, but he had an idea he was lost. Traffick in Nairobi can be tricky! He was supposed to board number 33 for kenyatta hospital mbagathi road and kenyatta estate, he had taken number 33 for pipeline. He did not have any cash on him. He was asking for direction so he could walk back to town and head to Mbagathi hospital. He was as arrogant as only an ignorant person can be. Insisting that he was capable of walking all the way!
A mother is boarding a matatu, "manyanga" people no longer use that word but i find it delectable. No 45 Githu Githurai, stage ni mbao, (20 bob). The tout is shouting, dressed in baggy clothes, oversized clothes is what i see and cheweing on a miraa twig, he fits the part. Perfectly. In the lazy tuesday afternoon, no one pays the lady a second glance, she is just part of the backdrop that is Nairobi and no one gives a damn really! But she is about to steal the show for a little while! "My child, wooi my child!" She suddenly starts wailing. At first no one listens, then the ever omnipresent urchins move towards her, next the touts follow and soon a little crowd has collected around her. She is crying frantically! In between her sobs the story is told, its a one-liner really but by the end of the day, it will have more versions than a folk lore! Her baby boy is lost, he was right behind her, yes she crossed the busy Ronald Ngara Road with him, he is six years old, he was wearing a scooby doo t-shirt! As the crowd loses intrest, two cops materialize, the crowd melts away. No one wants to be a witness and spend countless unproductive hours in court when they could be equally useless elsewhere! The lady is escorted towards central to record her statement!
Sitted in the corner seat of the back row, The infamous 'city hoppa' finds it's way in the congested traffic! Gods! its sunday afternoon! Its only in Nairobi where there is a traffic snarl up on a sunday afternoon. Can it get any worse? The sweltering heat does not let up, the company is unbearable, there is a little baby cring somewhere at the front! It is in this lapses of sanity that i get the tale, told from a guy i left back in high school in form three, now he has grown a beard, am still beardless, he even has a wife. Am impressed. "Mwanaume ni efort!" I tell him and clap him on the back! "That guy has a death wish!" Am pulled from going insane by the noise and heat by this statement. I snap back into reality! He has a neighbour who has committed suicide twice over a chick who according to him (my friend) is not worth a rats arse! "The first time we took him to the 'hosi' and we used our own cash to treat him, the second time too, if he pulls one like that again, ill just ignore him and let him die!" I stare back in silence trying to picture why one could attempt suicide twice! And how my friend could let him die! If left to me, id look for a whip and flog the guy all the way through Eastlands! Then the heat comes back in a wave and i stick head out of the window to feel the breeze, unfortunately, there is no breeze, only the putrid smell that is muthurwa market hits my nostrills! Ok, i now see why one could want to die! I turn back to the tale, After our suicidal guy got out of hospital the second time, he lost his job working as 'mtu wa mkono' the landlord locked his door and the girl whom he was murdering himself for wont take him in. My friend is feeding three mouths, and he is just a student! The traffic finally lets up and the city hoppa groans on its way to join Jogoo road! Thankfully the traffic is light! My friend tells me about this new phone he wants to buy. All talk of the suicidal guy is forgoten. In no minute at all, we are remiscing about old times! Highschool! Nostlagia kicks in! The city hoppa lumbers on!
The beatles echo away! Yellow submarine!
