Growing up 2

The tales of my growing up continues. I finally graduated to upper primary and the drama that was my life in class 4 and 5 will leave you in stitches. I hardly remember any gud things that I did during that time in my life apart from the good grades and being smart in composition writing. Atleast I was good in school. I however found myself on the wrong side of the law back at home. I think its the company I kept. It had a negative influence on my life as compared to the one I had in school.

I think I should start this post by telling you this. It is one thing I hate to remember. In meru culture, especially the Tiganians where I come from, young boys have to undergo some rights of passage (Wiiyi bukuru). These are several stages that are meant to prepare a young boy before he becomes of age and finally faces the knife for him to be termed as an adult (Nthaka).

During holidays and on weekends, I could join my cousins and other young boys for herding. I must admit that I was very tiny hence the weakest of them all. Whatever they told me I would most definetely do. I had to adhere to their rules or else I risked being sent away with our two cows at the middle of the day (Kwathurirwa) or worse still get a ban of not going herding with them any more.

During this time, I had not undergone the young boys right of passage and so were my cousins and friends, I later learnt. They however teased me that they had, a thing I so innocently believed.

‘We  shall not be herding with someone who has not undergone the right of passage (Mbura muu).’ My cousin protested. You either accept that we do it for you or you cease to be in our company. I had to fit in no matter what. I had to be man enough and accept to cross the line although I had no idea what the procedure was like. My crystal balls told me it wasnt something cool thou. However, after some serious soul searching I finally woke up one day and told them that I was ready for the breath taking event. You wont believe what those young naive village boys did to me all in the name of a right of passage.

‘Strip naked,’ My cousin instructed. This I did with so much ease. Boy! He plucked a euphorbia tree stem (Muthuuri) and squeezed its poisonous milky sap on my member. Have you ever seen someone whose eyes have come into contact with that euphorbia juice? Thats exactly what I’m talking about. You could have seen my walking style that evening as I walked home, legs apart and in a snails pace. The pain I was experiencing was unbearable. I wont talk about how swollen my member was here. It is an abomination, besides I still have gat my manners.

Before I continue, I must tell you categorically that what those boys did to me is not part of the normal Meru rights of passage. It was just an invention by those small boys to trick me that they had undergone the same and that they were more men than I was. I later underwent the normal rights of passage a year later while in class five and I tell you they had nothing to do with smearing my member with Euphorbia juice. It is however not within my mandate to share with you what the normal rights of passage were like. That I will have to connsult Njuri ncheke elders and get back to you with the tales if they give me their blessings to do so. Keep your fingers crossed that they do. I digress.

When I got home that evening, it never took my mum long before she finally discovered that there was something terribly amiss with me. When she insisted that I tell her what it was, I told her that euphorbia juice got into my member as I was urinating on a fence during the day. See, I never lied to her. Atleast I mentioned euphorbia juice and my member, I only forgot to mention the boys who did it to me, I blame my forgeting on the pain I was experiencing thou, hahaha!!. However, mum did not take my explanation just like that. Mum is the kind of a person who feels it deep in her blood system when you cheat. She didnt need rocket science to know I was lying. I however insisted and she finally took it. I remember how she used warm water to wash my member that night with hope that it would save the situation.

In the morning, the situation had become worse. Mum carried me on her back to the nearby Tigania Mission Hospital. In hospital, I was placed on a bed in my birth suit, the nurse threatened me to either tell her what had happened to me or she would cut the whole thing off. See, this thing aint hair or grass, it would not sprout after being chopped off. Confession ensued. Believe you me I never left out a single drop of the truth during the confession. I had to do anything possible to save the ‘Future Generation’.  Mum listened to every bit of the truth I had denied telling her the previous night. Finally I confirmed her worst fears.

Thank heavens the nurse worked on it well and by the following day things were back to normal. The lesson was learnt, though through the hard way. It took mum more than a year before she allowed me to go herding with those naughty boys again. When I went back herding I had undergone the full cycle of the rights of passage, and so were my friends. We were all mature boys then (Iyiyi biikuru).

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When we joined class 4, we were mixed up; those who were in class 3 Tiger and Elephant. I was lucky I remained in Elephant once more. It is while in class four Elephant that I met friends that I have kept to date. Martin and Titus stands out. I have fond memories of how we played during break time, branding ourselves wrestling stars. Martin – Mike Tyson, Titus – Hitman and myself – Shawn Michaels. Mehn! We fought all in the name of playing, wrestling was our thing. We always ignored the ‘Dont try this at home’ warning that is repeatendly played during the wrestling show on TV. Sorry, we never ignored coz we never tried it at home anyway. We only did it in school. On Sundays after mass we would go (The three of us) to Muriri shopping centre to catch a movie for five bob. I would do anything to get that five bob even if it meant stealing it from my mum or not taking offertory during mass and instead saving my five bob offering to go watch a movie (God have mercy on me). My favourite actor was Van Damme back then. On Mondays movie reviews would fill the air and take the better part of our free time, narrating to our friends who were not as previleged as we were to make it to the ‘7D Movie Theatre’ (A small dark room the size of a 14 seater nissan matatu that accomodated about 35 people and fitted with a 14 inch Sanyo TV that showed actors the size of my small finger).

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I so loved Speedo pen, a black speedo pen to be precise. Ngai! Si! that pen was a monster! There was something about this pen that got me fascinated. I can brag if my humble self allows me to; that there was no any other boy or girl who used Speedo in my entire class during those days (If you say I’m lying, just raise up your hand and imma give you a second to prove it). May be they never used it coz they didnt get the magic of writing using the pen or because they had no idea where it was being sold. They all struggled with Aim and Bic like it was a prescription to them. But do I say!

Speedo – Write on!

I credit my good grades in English composition and Kiswahili insha to that pen. I remember the first composition I ever wrote was titled, ‘My School.’

Mr. Kathurima our english teacher who doubled as our class teacher didnt care what you wrote when he added us each a foolscap. All he wanted was a foolscap filled with writing at the end of the 40 minutes. During the first 5 or so minutes, the entire class became so quite, we exchanged glances, giggled, smiled and scratched our little heads. A few minutes later, I looked right, left back and forth and saw people writing. Whatever it is that they were writing I had no idea. My pen finally stepped on that fool scap about ten minutes later. Ideas finally started rolling in my oval shaped head. You would have seen how my black speedo was doing endless break-dance moves on that white sheet of paper.

I wrote on a whole one side of the foolscap in a record 25 minutes and handed over my paper to to the teacher. A week later, the teacher gave us back our papers, know what? I was the top with 28/40. He poured me praises for my good writing and even requested me to read my composition aloud to the entire class. However, he told me had I not used a pen to write I would have scored higher marks.

‘I said, use pencils in writing your composition, it seems its only you who didnt follow instructions. I however forgive you because you scored good marks,’ Warned the teacher.

I honestly could not remember when he said we use pencils. There I was, used a pen and managed to score 28 when most of my classmates had a zero-something. That gave me confidence and I maintained good grades in composition writing.

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It is while I was in class 5 that the school feeding programme by the Plan International was introduced. This was the second best thing that ever happened to our lives while in school after the Nyayo Milk for Schools that we only tasted twice or thrice while in nursery school before all the Nyayo cows died of foot and mouth disease.

The school feeding program helped us a great deal. Not because there was no food at home but because it saved us the agony of running home for lunch in the afternoons, a one and a half kilometre distance. Before the programme we would run all the way home, take lunch while standing and again run back to school to save time for playing. This made us sweat so much that concentrating in class in the afternoon was next to impossible. Most of us especially boys went to school bare footed, not because we didnt have shoes, but because of our love for the ball. Those with shoes would hardly be allowed to play football for claims that they would injure those without during the match. To save ourselves the ordeal, we opted to leave the shoes back at home.

During the hot season, the dusty paths would become too hot and walking bare footed was so hard, we had to walk besides the fence on either sides of the paths. Mum forced me to put on shoes, I would sometimes, though I would hide them on the fence immediately I was out of the gate. I would pick them and put them on with my dusty feet to avoid a beating from mum. I told you I was naughty, sorry! I was smart.

Eating in school felt so cool. It saved us alot. People ate so much, those who took more than one plate we branded them ‘Combiners’ These were mostly boys, you could not miss a girl or two thou, who had such mannerisms. The greedy ones. Far from combining, there were those who traded the ingredients they carried with food. Not every day that food would remain for them to combine. Sometimes the teacher on duty would notice them and chase them away as they tried  to combine while the entire school had not been served. To make up for that, they always carried royco cubes, curry powder and avocado fruits. You see, these merchants would put you a small fraction of a royco cube and in exchange he would get two spoon full of githeri from the client(A royco cube used to cost 2 shillings and 50 cents then and it would be shared among 5 or so people, that translated to ten spoon full of githeri). This applied to Carry powder and Avocado as well. Some people had eating records I tell you.

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Bullies never miss in any place. My school was no exception. One boy, a classmate was that type. He bullied me every opportunity he got. I feared him to bits and froze any time he came near me. Coincidentally, they had a piece of land next to our home. On Saturdays, he would come to the shamba with his brother. They would visit our home during the day after their investigations showed that it was only me and my kid brother that were at home. They would beat us at our home, get into the house, eat our lunch and threaten us that they would beat us on Monday if we dared tell anyone. We played by their game. Zed (Thats the name we called him in school) made my life both in school and at home so difficult. One day he beat me and my friend Martin so hard that Martin reported him to his cousin, Muchena who was in class seven then. The following day Zed received a discipline of its kind. That marked the end of his bullying and the begining of our friendship with Zed.

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I know I have talked so much about mum in this post and the previous one and I can feel you ask, ‘how about you tell us a lil bit about your dad?’ Here we go. I know I will have to do a whole post about my dad. However, it would be only good if I introduced the great man right now.

When I was growing up, my dad used to work several kilometres  away from home, in Maasai Mara Game Reserve – Mara Buffallo Camp. He was at home very few days in a year. However, the little time he was at home meant alot for us. Mum always made us understand why dad had to be away for several days. That we understood so well, he loved us, thats why he stayed away so we could eat, drink, put on and remain in school. It is absolutely because of his prolonged absence and lots of sacrifices from this great man that I am where I am today. Thank you dad.

Whenever dad was at home you could actually smell it. You didnt have to see him to know he was around. My dad used to smoke (Thank God he finally stopped). Growing up there was no smell that was as good as that of cigarette (Sportsman). It smelled so sweet. Something in me changed eventually and the opposite is now true. Maybe because dad stopped smoking or they might have changed the flavours that made cigarette back in the day.

The second thing that would tell you that dad was around was the soap he used for bathing. He still

use it to date. Protex! Dad loves that soap. Protex manufacturers should actually give dad a call right away and reward him for being such a loyal customer. It is a common rule that dad must use protex for bathing. I can actually smell Protex as I write this article some 450 Km away from home.

As I write this, Dad is somewhere in Washington DC with his two lovely grand daughters, his elder sons’ daughters. I will have to call and find out if there is Protex up there in the land of opportunities.

Enough about my dad for now. I have to save the rest for another post. He deserves a whole post about himself. Trust me it will be a nice read, that I promise. Deal!?  

My speedo pen has to take a rest before it embarks on writing yet another post on the tales of our growing up together (The Speedo and myself). Watch this space for part 3 of this sequel.

Dad & his grand daughter, Imani in Wasgington DC