If anyone had ever told me that after graduating, my first place of hustle would be Embu Town, I would probably have laughed my ass off or Bitched Slapped he or she or an Andrew turned Audrey or vice versa, Bitch Slaps do not discriminate.
First, I am going to give you a brief geography lesson about Embu town. I do not know when it was established so that will not appear in the geography lesson. It is the headquarters of the newly created Embu County, it is populated by the Embus and it is in the former Eastern Province.Thats all the geography I know about this town and thus deem it relevant, factual and enough to help with my story.
I being a pessimist, you would be forgiven to think I was not elated, but I reveled at this this new adventure and opportunity. I had never really experienced Embu town. The best I knew about the town was the Matatu (Taxi) stage. So off I went in such of the Money, Mulla, Chums, Pesa, Mapeni etc...you get the picture, in Embu.
I am a huge Sci Fi movie fan and after watching so many alien movies, I decided to apply some of the lessons learnt, well minus the total annihilation of the populus. So like an alien, first I had to blend in...this was easy, aided by the fact that so many Kikuyus irk a living in this town and the language is just like my mother toungue say for some difference in a few syllables here and there and the slightly high pitched pronunciation of words, otherwise I could understand what was said and I could reply without a lot of meaning being lost in the wording. Furthermore, there were three national languages to fall back on [English, Kiswahili and Sheng].
Anyway, the second thing was to locate an aboard, a place to lay my bones. A place I could live among them and report to Alien command of my experiences...LOL...I digress a little, too much alien movies I suppose. Ignoring the Alien reference and continuing with the story...To find a place to stay in this town is no walk in the park. I kid you not. Call me proud, say am that too influenced by the Nairobi City life but some of the rooms I would not fathom inviting my own mother for a visit; they were dump, showed signs of vermin infestation and let me not tell you about the facilities, this is a happy blog and not a horror one but on the flipside, they were cheap. Being an Arsenal fan, am a patient man, I continued with the search and before long I had found it, not what i really wanted but eeh!..it was a four walls and a roof either way, so I decided to approach the landlord. I do not know if I had SUCKER tattooed on my forehead or something because this idiot (landlord) blartted out well strewn lies that if he was the devil tempting Christ, dare I say He would have taken the devil on his offer.
He promised to paint the house, clean it, make the necessary repairs just to make the aboard a palace for this alien. So I waited for him to do that. You know, sometimes patience does not pay because no sooner had I turned my back, than he decided to give it to a woman with two kids. I should see the logic in that somewhere, or may be the morality, right? but frankly I do not care, he double crossed me for a nympho with offspring. I felt insulted to say the least.
Either way, I took it like a man and as the old adage goes "Aluta Continua", I continued with my search. Luckily It did not take long and I finally found one. A quaint but it is my little palace. Am now satisfied, content and feeling like shouting "IN YOUR FACE!" to that bloody idiotic landlord.
Enough with the victory party, let's continue with the story. Every alien movie watching buff will tell you that after finding accommodation, the next step, try the transport system.You must know how to get around, among them. Now, If you are a daily commuter or have used a Matatu, you might have come across a sticker on the wall "Watu wanne wanne kama Orbit/PK". In my view that sticker is meant to poke fun at the stringent Michuki rules, you know as a very lame satirical joke, right?...WRONG! in Embu, that sticker does not poke fun, it dictates the rules. It is like matatus here never heard of Michuki or they are stuck in a time warp and cannot get out, or traffic cops do not exist here or something. But the sad reality is and as a Mzalendo I say this with with loads of shame and utter disappointment, the cops here encourage the vice by demanding a 'kifumba macho' if you know what I mean, from the matatus. As in, you would expect a sane person to actually do something about it but a tightly folded Kshs.100 note, tucked under the passenger side door's handle is enough for an officer to allow the perpetual gambling with innocent lives. But, the funny thing is, and this is surely funny, you will get a laugh from this...the number of accidents on the roads ain't as much as you would expect. Hell, for the time I have been here, I ain't heard or been a witness to one.
Enough of that, let us continue with the story..., so I hop into a matatu thinking that am going to travel in comfort only to hear the conductor order "Wee, Boss, shika hii saucer uweke hapo katikati!" handing me this wooden plank to rest between two seats. Only then did this huge woman step in and sit on the saucer. My first thought was, how the hell does that wooden plank not break?, the woman is huge. Anyway, that is not the point, the point is due to her size she not only occupied the saucer per say but half my seat.
Enough of that, let us continue with the story..., so I hop into a matatu thinking that am going to travel in comfort only to hear the conductor order "Wee, Boss, shika hii saucer uweke hapo katikati!" handing me this wooden plank to rest between two seats. Only then did this huge woman step in and sit on the saucer. My first thought was, how the hell does that wooden plank not break?, the woman is huge. Anyway, that is not the point, the point is due to her size she not only occupied the saucer per say but half my seat.
You know, the ironical thing about that situation was in that very same matatu, there was a sticker claiming "Hatusemi wewe ni mnono, lakini ukikalia viti mbili lipia". I was of the opinion that since she occupied her saucer and half my seat, she should foot half my fare but a second glance at her, I chose not to publicly declare my opinion, not because I was scared of her but because I love myself too much to want to feel any pain and am a lover not a fighter. And so, the journey commenced only for, the matatu to increase its contents. I swear we were about 25 halfway through the journey. Well, actually, 28 considering the huge woman was 3 times my size...LOL. That's when I decided to throw a Hail Mary towards heaven asking the Creator to prepare a fully furnished condo, with a heated pool and jacuzzi once I stepped into Heaven. Oh, and servants, I asked for angel servants too.
It seems God did not get my prayer, may be He was busy or it was not my time yet because I eventually alighted at my destination, safe and sound, albeit a few sizes smaller from all the squeezing I got in that matatu.
My month here might have been filled with surprises, disappointments and near death experiences but there has been patches of good. In fact, those patches have made me kind of fall in love with these laid back members of the Mt. Kenya Mafia. That's jumping the gun too much, I guess but lets wait and see, I still got a lot of adventures waiting for me in this town.............
STAY TUNED, FOR ANOTHER EPISODE OF............
EMBU: My CITY, My TOWN! Chroncles of my life in Embu so far.....
It seems God did not get my prayer, may be He was busy or it was not my time yet because I eventually alighted at my destination, safe and sound, albeit a few sizes smaller from all the squeezing I got in that matatu.
My month here might have been filled with surprises, disappointments and near death experiences but there has been patches of good. In fact, those patches have made me kind of fall in love with these laid back members of the Mt. Kenya Mafia. That's jumping the gun too much, I guess but lets wait and see, I still got a lot of adventures waiting for me in this town.............
STAY TUNED, FOR ANOTHER EPISODE OF............
EMBU: My CITY, My TOWN! Chroncles of my life in Embu so far.....
