Two Fourteen

Dad : Now what is this? My dad had just come back to find two parking attendants about to clamp his car. Her : Mzee haujalipa parking so utaenda City Hall kulipia huko. Dad : Who has refused to pay? I parked here and no one came so I came looking for you! It's like you people hide so that you can trick us into bribing you. This car has not even been here for 5 minutes. Him : Mzee let me tell you. We don't take bribes here. You see this? * turns to show a faded 'Corruption is Evil' label on his dust coat? *  Her : Usiongee mbaya mzee! Ati tunajificha? Ebu funga iyo gari ndio aone hatujifichi. This went on for a while. The car did not get clamped though. Neither did he bribe any of them.  The whole incidence however, did raise his blood pressure and that made our evening very unpleasant.      Have you ever gotten your car towed by the Nairobi City Council because they claimed you double parked yet there were no discernible parking lines on that...

These matatu people should just die!  is what I was thinking as I was stumbled out of the moving matatu that had changed route midway. It was not like I was late enough as it was. I don't remember what I was in a hurry to do.  All I remember is jumping off the matatu and doing the usual self pat-down.      If you live in Eastlands you know what I mean. If you don't let me explain.      I live in an area full of thuggery. You might be seated to a passenger who will pick your pocket. You will only realize it later that, the reason that bastard was opening the newspaper that wide was because his third hand was busy in your pocket. And there you were thinking he was kind enough to let you read the sports section. Or it could be the conductor doing it. Why do you think he has to overload the matatu and still insist on moving around to collect everyone's fare personally? Huh? Why? Isuzu Prado? Seems legit     So , usually, when you g...

      I am a big fan of motorbikes. I really am. I even have plans of getting an Aprilia or a Ducati before life (read marriage) forces me to settle down. I think they are cool and powerful and might get me laid a lot (oh these great and wonderful ambitions I have). Of late however, I think I am going to have to change my dreams (and ambitions) because of these bodabodas . If you have never been to Kenya (or you are rich) you definitely haven't had the displeasure of interacting with these deathtraps. With the economic rise of these Asian industries, a lot of things have made made affordable and among them; motorcycles. These bikes are so cheap that every Tom, Dick and Harry can buy them. And they have. The country is now littered by them. They are mostly used as taxis ( bodaboda ). The rise of the bodaboda business has been both great and bad. Mostly bad. Yes they give jobs to the youth and all but most of these bodaboda riders are very incompetent, so it is usually a gl...

Seven months of struggling, sweating, late nights and a lot of shillings later, I am through with my field report. Hot damn it feels good. Hot damn, it’s been long. I had even forgotten about the field study. It was in August last year, in the wilderness, for 40 28 days. Remember that? Probably not. The field work was hard and long but the report writing should have not even taken more than 2 weeks. We could have been through with it by September, but this being a third world country, our labs lacked equipment for analyzing samples and we had to take them to the government labs, and we all know how those are. Add high levels of procrastinations to that and you have report of 60 pages taking a whole 6 months to write. Kenya. Anyway, 3 weeks ago, we finally got all the data we needed and truthfully, that is when the real report writing began. On the day of handing in the reports however we were hit with something we didn’t expect. Together with the hard copy (which cost an arm and 3 fin...

This post is continued from here (The tales of the wretched soul hunter) . It might be good for continuity’s sake to read that post before this.         Just when I thought I had something clever to say she and her friend stood up. They had arrived at their destination. She said a quick thanks and alighted, leaving me without telling me her name and feeling like I wasted a chance of a lifetime.       My friends however seemed to disagree. Some even insisted that it was she that wasted a chance to steal my phone. Because I am oh so stupid. Handing out my phone  to a a girl just because I thought she was hot! I deserved to be stolen for. Apparently I am very gullible when it comes to chicks I imagine as hot or pretty. I of course do not agree but they sort of had a point. What if she had taken it and threw it out of the window to her on waiting friend? What then? Could I have hit her? Could I have screamed thief while point...

     I boarded the minibus at around seven O'clock. I figured it may not get me closest to The House, but it was roomier than than the 14-seater vans that could. I hate getting my legs crushed behind the seats of these small matatus . One of the few perks of being so tall. I feel like a contortionist trying to fit on the back of these vans. Matatus: The minibus next to the van      The minibus was almost full with the remaining seat being next to this man that was the size of a van. This nigga was huge. He put the human in humangous . He was taking up both seats and I guessed he was only going to pay for one. That image reminded me of a matatu sticker: ' Sisemi wewe ni mnono lakini u kikalia viti mbili lipia' . Which loosely translated is the opposite of  'if you are sexy and you know it clap your hands'. Meaning: big fat ass guys taking up two seats in a matatu should pay for them both. I, personally, am not in tune with this line of thin...