It’s getting out of hand, there’s this that and the Other
The other’s always bigger a menace
That’s why its o is growing a face
Into a monstruous cave you can carve with your fingernails
Out of the Other
Out there it’s a lake of calm electrical cables
Laid out grinding the skies
Greek greek ropes in the slack
They slap your back
’til you turn ’round
And kiss off the track.

**
As it happens in my world, people stop by on the road to ask me – in a variety of ways – what the hell I am doing here. I have a tendency to look lost on stupid country roads. The fact that I look around smiling to myself doesn’t help them to categorize me as a simple stroller (is that even a word??). Now the whole fun lies in the said variety of ways they express themselves.

Heard in Embu

(pick-up containing two members of the male clique): “I give you a rift?” followed by a loud unpleasant laugh. I have a feeling I was not laughing for the same reason

In Nanyuki

(Truck containing a driver, a cow and 3 guys on top of the cow)
I gaze at the truck passing and for some reason I’m amused at the sight of a cow riding in there. I tell you, I’ve hitched at the back of pick-ups alongside salads, carrots and potatoes, in spot-clean Mercedes, in packed to the brim vans, on the occasional pikipiki but I’ve not yet experienced a ride in company a cow. I was tempted to stick my thumb out but the 3 guys kind of put me off it.

**
Nanyuki was also the place of a mind-blowing Christmas revelation: Mary of the Bible was a Kenyan!

At the reception of a guesthouse:
- Jina lako ni nani?
- Mary
Pen hanging in the air. He’s not sure if I’m joking or what.
- Kumbe we ni mkenya? Wazungu hawaituangi Mary!

**
That’s all for today. There’s a few more stories to come. I need to snap out of the post-travelling blues…
MERRY CHRISTMAS to you people!

Look up
Where the crows are crying tears of gasoline
These lines don’t fit in the box
And your car’s too flashy
So drop the face and march to the sound of raindeers
Blurt it out
Where the crowds are pricking their bodies
For a shiny necklace
And the likes of you
Dignified to heeps of hell
Your hands are firm
Shaking other hands but the grounds are melting
To the banging of soles
Stuck in motion.

Hey check out that girl in jeans, pink t-shirt and a bangly thing in her hair. That’s me, as I am attempting to walk into the Intercontinental hotel.

- Habari yako?
- Nzuri sana. Za asubuhi?
- Salama

So far, I think I master the situation. These are security guards whose duty is to peep into people’s bags and check for hidden weapons or potentially dangerous objects. I once found out at my expense that mascara can be used in the making of a bomb. I must say I have had many zany ideas in my childhood but this, not. What they don’t know though is that I am potentially dangerous even without a potentially harmful object. Anyway, I remember not to throw a joke about forgetting my gun at home because something tells me they might not appreciate French humour. As expected, my bag is opened and I feel like somebody is scanning my guts. The content appears to be hilarious but they finally let me in. Come to think of it, I had an errand to run at the Hilton a couple of days ago which ran pretty much along the same lines. I’m starting to take the measure of the hilarity my rucksack provokes among the security guard population. Something to invesitgate further in my free time.

Let me tell you that: I am here with a well laid-out plan and clear instructions. Find the reception desk. Approach a certain receptionist answering to the name of Alfred. Tell him my name and explain that a tall gentleman left a book for me to pick up. Obtain the book and walk out. Simple, end of the business. Now, I’m old enough to follow instructions when necessary (and only when necessary because you’ll find that not following them brings out interesting – potentially dangerous – avenues). I am also old enough to know that a well laid-out plan is unheard of in Kancil Land. The plan already fails at step 2 when the said Alfred is nowhere to be seen. At least I am sure I am in the right hotel. I am attended to by a trainee called David who doesn’t know shit about my shit. I’m forced to forgive him right away – we’ve all been there. He tactfully directs me to the ‘concierge’.

Some shuffling around later, I am standing here observing and being observed. Two girls with their businessman of a father are rolling tiny pink suitcases, looking all important until they decide to race to the door and nearly run into a pinced-lipped Japanese tourist. Then there’s this cleaner who is pretending to be wiping the base of a pillar next to me. I’m glad I have picked today as jeans day. Somehow, I like this place.

I am now duly informed that the unreachable Alfred was found in the changing room and the bag is discovered in a drawer. No, I love Intercontinental. It’s exactly the kind of place where you can share a hearty laugh with the concierge: under my name is a note that reads ’short mzungu girl’.

It’s 8am and I feel like jumping around, laughing at the first dull-faced guy on the way to a very important meeting and telling him that ‘Life’s awesome, you should try it!’.

Can someone volunteer to teach me at least one of these things please? I’m an awfully late bloomer and I need to get around these things:

1. Lie for the sake of convenience (=so that I don’t have to tell half of my life story to answer such a simple question as ‘How long are you here for?’) You know the whole: you needn’t slyly challenge someone’s values at 8.24am when all they want is to make small talk.

2. Negotiate, especially when it comes to money, salaries and the likes.

3. Speak Lingala. That’s optional but I’d love to have this in my back pocket

4. Tell someone off with class. The telling off part doesn’t come easily to me because I have this smile stuck on my face even when I need to demonstrate authority. When the telling off actually comes off – which rarely happens – it’s usually one of these long-contained venomous words which reveals more unconscious feelings than I would have wanted to pour in.

Now, I can teach you a couple of cool things in exchange!

At a friend’s place, there’s this poster showing a man jumping over a high rift. He seems like he is flying with the audacity of a child. The picture captured him hanging there and I’m facing his runners. They don’t even have a spot of mud on them. I register that if I ever wanted to be a hero, I should have started by cleaning my shoes. Would that have helped? The poster has a caption which reads: ‘Courage is not the absence of fear, it is the feeling that something is more important than fear’.

I sit there. The room starts feeling stuffy, all these colours. Then I realise that there’s too much green. Is telling my friend I don’t like the colour of her curtains and table cloth more important than fear? There she comes in with two mugs of fuming tea. We chat like chickens pick in the garden and the runner man is still jumping on the wall with all that courage pressed against his teeth.

Later we’re parting at the door. The door is actually a grid whose paint is peeling off in places. My shoes are staring at me. I don’t stare back and I walk until I reach the manager’s office with a small red file. My cheeks are coloured from the 8 flights of stairs. I seem to have missed some piece of information that would have led me to a lift but nevermind. The manager gives me this up and down look. And down, down. My shoes have turned into a black and mud funny pattern. Sometimes, courage is about walking into the office without double-checking one’s attire.

It is that time of the day when everybody’s out of work, either rushing home or hanging about in suits at a cafe. There’s still a pinch of seriousness around the edges, in the creaks of the collars and on the swaying earrings. The eyes have lost the determination they had in the morning race but the hands still whip the air to tell the world that was left in suspense from 8 to 6.

A man craddles his forehead. He’s alone at a table of three of his colleagues. Compassion has not found its way to their spot. He’s on the dashed line between office and home, where a malicious spirit has erased the ink. Even the dark dots have fainted away now.

Have you read what so and so said about the Mau? Outrageous, isn’t it? Are the children home? Where did Nadia run to? I am so tired of politics. I am seriously considering moving overseas. Has she left forever? I should call her mother. What do you think about the new manager? Oh really? I don’t know, from the first impression – and I trust first impressions – … I might be going home to an empty house.

They have animated conversations on the phone – let me pick up it’s my wife. Then they leave in the dark suits and the race starts over. The man craddling his forehead does the same: he leaves in his dark suit and start the race over to a scary place he used to call home.

Being back in a city makes my whole life bubble up like an acid bath.

1. Auntie Kancil had only one strawberry chewing gum in her hand bag and two jumping kids on a sofa. What was she to do?
Expected answer: Have the little monsters share the chewing gum.

2. Auntie Kancil had a chewing gum to share between two sugar-avid kids. How should they proceed to make a fair division?
At this point you have several options:
a. Auntie cuts it herself to avoid all drama and has the youngest pick one hand where the piece of chewing gum is hidden. The idea is that she will start chewing it before any discussion has the occasion to arise.
b. One of the kids cuts the chewing gum while the other one picks his share so the division is more or less fair.
c. Grab a ruler and a pair of scissors to ensure utmost precision.

Would you believe that an 11-year-old spontaneously opted for c.? This makes me miss my job big time!

How was it on the other side?
I wonder how you felt
In the flow of your anger
Or was it bare passion?

How was it on your side?
Pushing barriers
Fragile enough to break
To the force of your desire
In the night I saw
Your face its convulsions

How was it behind your distorted eyes?
I will never know
But your face in the night
I can never forget

I pray you have these words around you
I pray you ask me in the many nights
That follow silent
How was it on your side?
But you will never know.