MY NEW ROOM IS GREAT

     After a whole year of sleeping no where specific, the system finally got me a decent room. Yes they may be a little late considering that they gave it to me when it was holiday time but still I am not complaining. It only for this month and cost me only 7 shillings extra a day. You hear such an amount and you can just imagine how shitty the rooms must be. Whenever anyone ask me how much a hostel cost me per year I tell them Ksh 5880 . Then they ask me ‘ 6000 per month?’ and I am like no, that is per academic year! Fucking cheap right? Well that is even the expensive ones around here. We get charged between 18 – 30 shillings per day, meaning you can even get a room for 3906 Ksh p.a. But that is only for freshmen. Strictly! I cannot stress this enough. The cheapest ones are for the First Years. This is a reason I am stressing this so much.


    I am stressing it just in case you turn out to be one of those parents who behave like my dad. Just before I got to my second year of campus, my dad asked my how much the hostel would cost, so I told him 5880 and he asked me why I was not paying 3906 like I did the year before. First of all, I was shocked that he'd remember the exact figure he had paid a year ago. But then again my dad's misery (miserness?) makes him have a very sharp memory. He is very economical and has a knack for exactitude, so its was not that much of a surprise. Second of all, I did not believe he was complaining about paying 6000 per year for a room at these times when you can barely get one for 6000 a month. He actually thought I was lying in order to steal from him ‘to go buy hard drugs and entertain campus girls out in strip clubs on school nights’. If only he knew how little I cared for his money.
     So he did what he normally does and sent someone else behind my back to confirm the real hostel rates. I almost missed a hostel waiting for this mysterious person to confirm. (it was the uncle that works in a neighboring college. I am not supposed to know this officially). Now in 3rd year, when he was sure that I was not lying, my dad actually paid on time. But since it was the online system that was allocating this year round, it did not matter who paid before who. They had scrapped off that first come first serve shenanigans and introduced the more effective 'if you are lucky' criteria. I never have any luck let alone bad ones so it was no surprise that I missed a room. But before I re-give you a full history of how that story went, let me just tell you about the room I am to spend this month in.
     First of all, its on the ground floor. The most insecure rooms on campus. For obvious reasons. And secondly its just next to the toilets. Just my luck, right? Then the bulb is missing and its holder spoilt. Navigation at night is either by touch and feel or by electronic screens.

And let there still be no lights

     The door knob on the inside is missing . I only realized this when I tried getting out for the first time and found that I was closed in. My phone’s credit was 'below the ground time threshold' so I just had to lie there staring at the ceiling waiting for someone to call me so that I plead for help in getting out. It was a long wait. I recited pi to the millionth digit before someone called looking for me.

Wanna hear a knock knock joke?

     There are no curtains so people walking by outside my room are free to look for something to come steal later when they clearly see that I am not in the room. The walls are literary rotten but the previous occupant tried hiding this fact using wallpaper than was more hideous than the walls. It was a shit colored wallpaper with teddy bears all over. Either the previous owner is bent or he lived full time with his girlfriend.Knowing the history of this hall, the latter is most probably true.

What is with the Winnie the Poop wallpaper?

     The floor tiles are chipped off and I do not want to guess its because of the water that occasionally flows in from the bathrooms. The socket is burst. But the way i get it it, all rooms in this hall come like this and I am supposed to spend my own money fixing the stuff I did not spoil. That is what you get for 6000 a year. Spending even more fixing the room. And I am telling you this is one of the most coveted halls on campus. Try and imagine the one I was in in First year.

The last time this wall got painted my grandfather was still collaborating with the British

     The best thing about this hostel? The water is cold. The one I was used to in Second Year had solar heated water and that made the drinking water taste bad. I hate drinking warm water. I sometimes had to come all the way to this hostel just to drink water. The two hostels are two campuses apart. A 45 minute walk.
     The worst thing about this hostel? The water is cold. The one I was used to in Second Year had solar heated water and that made showering bearable. I like taking hot showers. But now I cannot. The only choices I have is either a cold shower or a hot bucket bath. I am torn. As much as I hate cold showers, I hate even more waiting for water to boil. I find waiting a lot of time wastage because I waste enough time finding a guy to help me with his kettle. Also, bucket baths suck. Mainly because I do not own a bucket and partly because it involves continuous bending or squatting. positions I find very tasking. Its like working out. And I'm just lazy. I wish I was short sometimes. Then I could bath from a bucket while standing up.
     The bathrooms are also kind of small and if you bend ovyo ovyo your butt might touch the slimy walls. Disgusting! And there are no doors on these bathrooms.Just shower curtains that slide open when you least expect it. When there is soap in your eyes. But all in all. I am very fortunate to have this room during this ‘fourth term’. It may only be for a month but I am going to enjoy it as much as possible despite its inadequacies.

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