maisha – Page 13 – Kikuyumoja

I’ve been tagged by Mental…

…aggggrobatics, so here’s my reply:

dim ruuuls:

Post six weird facts/habits about yourself. These cannot be used against you later on.
At the bottom name the six people you will tag next.
Leave them a comment to let them know they’ve been tagged and to read your blog.

1. When communicating with other Exilkenyaners, I make frequent use of words like “aterere….., oh? i see…, kweli?, sasa?, aca!, whereby, supposed to, particulaaaar” etc. and automaticarrry adjust my pronouciaaaation in a way that I say simppoooooolll (instead of simple) or prrobarrry (probably).
You got to show peeepooooll where you’ve grown up.

2. I LOVE repairing stuff. The best thing I’ve ever repaired were diving goggles where the rubber broke – and I’d managed to fix it by using some thin fishing line and a cheap needle. As far as I am informed, those goggles are still in use (ama, Mathias?).
I know this is a common habit among other geeks, and I partly blame it on MacGyver & Co…

3. As a geek-growing-up, I used to be very interested in amateur radio and have been a member of The Amateur Radio Society of Kenya (ARSK) and the Deutsche Amateur Radio Club (DARC). I never managed to obtain a licence for a call-sign though as the internet with its various other technological challenges came in between. Maybe later…
The only licence I managed to get was a firearms licence for a simpooool air rifle way back in Kenya from the Firearms Department. I’ve never seen a Kenyan office THAT well organized. Kudos to those guys!

However, I would never again spend money on weapons. Except for my Leatherman Wave, of course :-)

4. The first CD I bought in my life was INXS “Welcome To Wherever You Are“, released in 1993. The first record was a single by OPUS “Life is Life”, sometime in 1986 or so. Ngoma ni maisha! (=> listening to music AND making my own music!)

5. I keep a diary in form of sketchbooks. Something that has been inspired by the late Dan Eldon. After going through various boxes of souvenirs from all the places I’ve been to and nice letters I’ve received in the past, I figured Dan’s way to be the most perfect solution to arrange all this stuff. All virtual stuff that I want to share with the world goes into my blog, the rest into my sketchbooks.

6. I bought ~~this~~ these books in Kenya to ~~scratch Rrrucy’s back~~ polish up my (non-existent) knowledge of the Gikuyu language:

And this one to take me there…. (knowledgii muuiiiuuruuuu)
(~ now you know what the Zungu in Mzungu stands for! :-)

Next victims of the tagging biashara shall be Anja, Cedric, Steve, Adrian, Wambui , Astrid, Carina, Edith, Christoph and Kui! :-)

Uhuru

There are these things in life you just can’t catch with a camera…

Nairobi lowdown

“The best of the City in the Sun” as promised by a (relatively) new blog: Nairobi Lowdown. This might also be of interest to those Kenyans in exile (“Exilkenianer”, as my friend Turbodave calls them) who always wanted to know WHAT exactly they are missing out in terms of interesting events/locations in our good old Nairobi.
Check out this cooooool video of a bubudiu-man trying to catch a lift from a Matatu while ROLLERBLADING on the streets of Nbo…ati? Roller Blades in Kenya? S T Y L E!

Btw, I think it’s about time to promote websites like ArtMatters.Info who are trying to cover some cultural events in EA. There’s still so much potential in NBO, so many interesting details that one could blog about – stuff that IS interesting and could also help to show a different image of the country (despite of the tourism industry, the marathon athletes, the media coverage of famines & raids on newspaper publishers, etc.)…
How about an open blog for cultural events in Nairobi? How about a blog that compares the lifestyles of Nairobi ppl with those from upcountry/shaggz?

AOB: Letta Mbulu “Zimkile” – a song that makes me think of Mshairi & Sokari – enjoy! :-)

another view…

Part 2 of Saturday saw us doing it the Nairobi way by switching from the dirt of Waruku to the beautiful view(s) behind Karen – in particular the area next to that KBC transmitter station somewhere on the way to Ngong.
That’s for you, dear Oscar & Zora! :-)

It was already late in the afternoon and we were hungry so our stomaches forced us to cancel any further Kitengela-related plans but instead proposed an improvised and spontaneous picnic at the road-side.
Ok, this is Kenya, there’s no picnic possiboooool as most plots belong to someone, so we ended up driving up to Ngong where we received the message by telephone that some strange Telekom Kenya guys had come to our place in Kigwaru during the day (which is in the north-west of Nairobi) to erect a telephone post (good) and in the process of that hacked the 2 month old water pipe into pieces (bad). Instead of returning home, though, we continued our crazy idea of enjoying our food somewhere in nature and consequently had us driving up Ngong Hills as late as 5.45 pm to reach the gates on top already closed (we met the rangers half way through and continued anyways).

The picnic included some roasted maize from the the road side as well as the unevitaboooool Lucozade Boost which btw still tastes the same as it did “back in those days”.

I tend to think that being able to do such excursions (time, money, transport, etc.) is pure luxury that needs to be enjoyed whenever possible.

I could just sit there all day long and enjoy the beauty of the view…..

Githingithia

Plans for saturday* actually included a visit @ Nani in Kitengela and taking a refreshing bath @ Maasai Lodge, but things turned out completly different. And better.

Waruku (~ New Muthangari), Nairobi, Kenya
I’m leaving on Wednesday and I still wanted to meet my old friend Stephen Kamau wa Gitau who has spent the last 30 years living in Waruku – that area between Kangemi and Muthangari (police station) in Nairobi.

Welcome to Waruku, home of Nairobi River! Imagine I used to catch crabs here while growing up in this neighbourhood…aterere…

As a matter of fact, i recently blogged about him as I was googling for “Waruku” and came across a story in the DN about his son who’d been taken away (and shot?) by the police for no specific reason. The story also featured a pic of him – so I knew they were talking of him. Meeting him on my 3 weeks stay in Kenya immediately became a mandatory task.

The idea was to track him down in Waruku by asking people from places he’d most likely visit: the local bar/pub. Which I did.

I described him to one of the barkeepers (“old man, big belly, funny – Kirima-1970s-hairstyle”, full name) and soon got the desired answer that Kamau actually lives near by.

We hadn’t seen each other for ten yeas and I often wondered what he’d be up to these days.

Someone from the bar showed us the way and when I saw him standing there in the crowd that curiously followed the work of ONE man in a Caterpillar (digging up the road), I just couldn’t believe that he actually lives at the very same spot I assumed him to be during all those years.

Kamau, who’s nicknamed Githingithia (earthquake) due to that Githingithia song he often played, now owns a small duka in the middle of Waruku – some 30m away from Nairobi River. Business isn’t that good, but he somehow managed to survive and considering that he never learned how to read or write, he’s still doing fine with his ~66 years and has remained the same person during all these years: a strong, independent survivor who knows how to feed 15 children and to remain very popular among his neighbours.

Stephen Kamau “Githingithia” wa Gitau in front of his duka
Meeting Kamau “Githingithia” after all these years really made me very happy and I promised to arrange some sort of Harambee for him among those ppl he’s been working for before.

And the best thing: I have the contact details of his most favourite joint – so whenever I feel like getting in contact with him, I can just send a short message or even “assist” him in one way or another as I consider him part of my extended family…

NB: Mama Daktarimbili, the Lady who runs that Medical Office in Waruku next to the bar and who openly fights with those drunkards whose wifes are her beaten-up customers, put this sign on the bench for her customers. She told me that the Somali refugees, who seek assistance at this Somali branch in Waruku every day, normally occupy and vandalise it, so she was forced to teach them a lesson in her own style….

With women like her (yes, that’s her arm :-), I know what Madaraka really means and what kind of daily struggles Kenyans take upon them since Independence…
(*= I wrote this on Sunday, 28th May while staying in NBO…)

on the road…

Atangaye sana na jua, hujua.

…stay tuned for more… :-)

tengeneza hii…

While surfing the net and distracting myself from work that urgently needs to be finished, I stumbled upon this useful information [via Gizmodo] [via lifehacker] on “how to get an upgrade to First Class“.

You know, a few more centimeters of leg-room are a whole world to someone who is 192 cm (6,3 ft) tall. Especially, since I realized that the assigned seats fall under the “be aware” category.

Here’s their advice:

Ask the ticket counter agent nicely.

hippopotamus balconius

Lady Kiboko, who diligently supervises all human activities on the balcony, had an unpleasant encounter with wood worms (anobium punctatum) right after her birth.
Since all attempts to persuade these uninvited visitors to go away and look for another host failed, Mr Kamau wa Gitau suggested that I should bath her in kerosene for about a month. Which of course didn’t change anything except for Kamau, who ended up with 5ltrs. of free Kerosene.
One day she was asked to join me on my trip to Germany, where she would guard the balcony. Being exposed to an extreme climate over here, which ranges from a temperature of -20°C during winter time up to a maximum of +40°C in direct sunshine, the people from Woodwormistan eventually decided to come out of their hiding – covering Lady Kiboko’s warm belly with a fine layer of wood flour. Well…as an external incentive, I used some chemicals on her that would kill all remaining dudus, so in the end it was only her and her perforated belly – which I painted with some brown varnish (hence the dark colour).

And today, while cleaning up the balcony and preparing it for tomorrows Nyama Choma BBQ, I discovered this:

A little plant growing out of the belly…