Out from my cave..

Ok…following various threats on Facebook….i return to this here thingie.

You people are DISTURBED. *bows head in prayer*

So at the moment I’m a full time student, which means that I’m currently poorer than i used to be, which in turn means that I’m a regular user of public transportation. No shiny pink vitz for me, thanks very much.

I generally don’t mind javving…seriously i don’t.  The walking is good exercise, and there are some interesting characters that i wouldn’t see otherwise from the confines of a private vehicle. I like people-watching, you see. And Kenyans…wow…as a population we really are a few cards short of a deck. The sh*t I’ve seen? DSM IV!!!

But seriously though, there are times when stuff goes down that makes me want to kick a puppy and strangle a kitten. (More DSM IV right there.)
1. The edge-hog: this is the profoundly annoying person who insists on sitting in the aisle seat, and makes you almost copulate with his/her thigh as you climb over him/her to get to the window seat. Ati “Nashuka hapo mbele..” and he ends up taking the jav all the way to the end. At the driver’s house. Pu.

2. The shoulder-ass sandwich: when you’re lucky enough to escape the edge-hog and get yourself an aisle seat near the front , you become a DNA collection petri dish for every one who makes their way to and from the back of the jav. Now there is a split second when as they pass by, your shoulder is wedged firmly between their ass cheeks. Yaay. Intimacy.

3. Chemical Ali(son): This is the Kenyan who literally brings tears to your eyes with the heady aroma of their two day old sweat. And as Murphy would have it, this person ALWAYS feels the need to rest their elbow on the seat in front, placing you squarely in the line of..er..fire. Yum.

4. Hello-is-it-me-you’re-looking-for: Every reasonably attractive Kenyan girl has experienced this…the guy who sits next to you, stares unblinkingly at you for about 5 minutes (thereby probably drying out his cornea), then proceeds to chatter non-stop about your charms and how hot you are and how he’s looking for a wife. He is, without fail, grotesque, and also, without fail, gets off a stop after you. So there’s no escape. Jesus take the wheel.

5. The Plague: this is the person who sits next to you and proceed to emit fluids from every orifice in his head. He blows his nose then spreads out his hankie like a billboard, treating you to the appetizing contents of his sinuses, he makes lovely bubbling sounds with the phlegm in his throat..and you stagger out of the mat just in time to avoid losing your lunch.

Ok…i need a car. This is depressing.

Sorry…we’re fresh out of sympathy

I am an insomniac.

The kind that prowls the house at 3 in the am and scares the crap out of my poor mother.

So last night, in between doing my best Night Prowler impression, i decided to get on Facebook, chokora the heck out of people’s walls and hopefully bore myself to sleep.

Now i have ALOT of Facebook friends. I personally know maybe a third of them. Don’t look at me with your judging eyes…I’m a philanthropist. I accept all friends requests. (Except if you have a name like Candyland McSexy iceCream TupacBitch Wanjiku. That’s where i draw the line.)

So as i was up to my elbows in my nocturnal Facebook ransackings, i saw that one of my unknown friends had put up a note.

I opened it.

It went something like ‘fat women  object to being made fun of, but can call thinner chics skinny bitches. We have feelings too!’

Boo-freakin-hoo.

Poor skinny girls. It must be so hard, fighting off the male attention.

And having no trouble finding jeans that fit your snake-like hips must really suck. Poor things.

How about not having to unbutton your pants every time you have a hearty meal?  Ain’t that a bitch?

Not getting made fun of..being called a whale/hippo/buffalo/woolly mammoth, that blows, doesn’t it?

Sorry…no sympathy here. Try me next week, when I’m not feeling like a bloated woolly mammoth.

Hell on earth..

I thought that i had seen it all. After all, i spent two years up to my elbows dissecting dead bodies. I have seen people die horribly right before my eyes. But nothing…nothing could have prepared me for the horror of yesterday’s fire disaster in Sinai slum.

Seeing the bodies of people who lived, laughed, cried  and loved mere hours before reduced to charred, blackened spots on the ground. Scenes of grim desolation.

Death is a part of life, they say. But the utter destruction of over one hundred people is a tragic waste.

But the real tragedy here becomes apparent when you stop and think about how these people – and so many others live. Try and imagine eking out a miserable existence, living from day to day, your life a constant struggle to stave off hunger and to keep a ramshackle roof over your head. Of course you cannot fathom it. This is why i just shake my head when i hear the middle class pontificating about greed and ignorance, saying, with condescension…Kenyans will never learn.

But how can they? When your life is a constant struggle to keep the wolves from your door on less than a dollar a day, when money literally flows past your doorstep, will you turn down the opportunity to make a few coins, and have your first decent meal in weeks??

The people who died yesterday were willing to wade into raw sewage to scoop up that which led to their deaths. In my view, that is not greed, or ignorance. That is desperation.

And that is the real tragedy.

Of humps…and lost mojo.

I have had a strange week.

The kind that makes you question quite a few things about the fundamental you. But because I’m not one of those people who are big jobo excessive self-disclosure, i think I’ll peel off those layers one at a time for you…over a few decades.

Yesterday i had a bit of writer’s block, which generally happens when i feel all this pressure to churn out comedic masterpieces even when i really don’t feel like it. Then i remembered….my life is like a tragic comedy anyway! Plenty of inspiration there!

Last post, i mentioned that I’d had an encounter with a guy who had a hump…and i thought I’d write about it. Then, because I’m not a completely evil hag, i baulked at the thought of laughing at something someone was born with and has no control over. See, i believe in karma. And if i made this guy the butt of my cyber-wit, something crazy would happen to me.  Like a piano dropping on me as i walk down Moi Avenue.

So.. sorry folks. No nasty freak show humour a someone’s expense today. Let me find my mojo the right way.

Meanwhile, si you guys were supposed to be finding me a man??  Slackers!  Don’t make me go start praying for a hosband at Nyayo Stadium ooo! 

Afrosinema continues shortly…

He’s baaaaack, ladies!

Who, you ask?

Well a while ago, a pastor from the land of Chineke took Kenya by storm, when he came here, promising all lonely women who had given up hope of being married, that if they attended his seminar, (and bought his book) that they would find their soulmate and be married to him in less than six months.

Mayhem ensued.

I still remember watching those poor women on the news, stampeding like migrating wildebeest, pulling out synthetic weaves and gold-plated earrings in their haste to get into KICC, and some breaking down in utter despair when they were told that the venue was too full for them to enter.

Well, a full venue shall be the least of your worries, ladies! An entire stadium has been booked for this divine event!  Come and get your miracle!

(Glow-reh!)

For too long, you have been alone, spending two hours every Sunday evening watching all the wedding shows on telly. You have planned your wedding down to the last detail. You know your theme colour, who will be in your lineup and what precise shade of vermilion they will wear. You have, prayed, fasted and offered holocaust so that the man of your dreams may drop into your lap like a glorious windfall. You have been on countless first dates with tall men, short men, fat men, men with humps (this actually happened to me..lol. story for another post)…and none of them ever called back.

Well my sister oh, receive your ‘hosband’…..for a fee.

And entertain the rest of us while we watch you on the news stampeding like migrating wildebeest, pulling out synthetic weaves and gold-plated earrings.

Glow-reh!

Phobia…

For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

(2 Tim . 1 :7 )

I was thinking about this today…yes children, I’m not a heathen…after i had a weird nightmare involving magic mushrooms and snakes with legs, and i awoke covered in sweat. *shivers*.

Now, I’m a girl that has weird fears. When i was younger, i had this recurring nightmare about being trapped in a room without windows or a door, just covered with white tiles from top to bottom. Then, after i watched the movie It, i can never look at a clown without feeling a level of nervousness. And anyway..clowns are creepy, with their painted faces and giant shoes.

But my greatest fear? Snakes. I remember going to watch the movie Anaconda with this guy that i really liked…and spent the entire movie screaming into his armpit. I never got another date. :-/

Why am i on fears today? I realized that a lot of people are held back by irrational fears. You will not approach someone you’re interested in because you’re afraid they’ll roll about on the floor laughing at you and pointing. You’re afraid of going on that job interview because you think you’ll be seized by a bout of projectile vomiting when you’re asked about your weaknesses. (Although that would be an effective answer. “I vomit under pressure.”) You’re afraid of taking a great new job in another country because you’re terrified of nazi racists/ rabid monkeys/ Ebola.

But don’t you see?  All that stuff is highly unlikely to happen.

Except the rabid monkeys. Those are real.

With men like these…..

This weekend, i had lunch with my girl, and she told me a story that was in equal parts hilarious, maddening….and despair inducing.

So this guy calls her and says,

“It’s been a while, si we do breakfast at Java Yaya?”

So my pal goes like…ok, cool, but she suggests they meet at the Java near Nairobi Hospital, as it’s more convenient for her, but he insists that they meet at Yaya. I should mention at this juncture that he was driving and she wasn’t.

So she turns up at Yaya, and finds that she’s the first one there. She finds a table, sits, and waits. After she’s been waiting a few minutes, he calls her and tells her that he’ll be there soon, and that she should go ahead and order.

Now, seeing as she knows she’s going to have a large lunch later – and because she’s one of those infuriating girls that watch their weight – she orders a fruit salad and a herbal tea.

So finally, the guy shows up, and proceeds to order the full giant breakfast…eggs, bacon, toast, juice, coffee…and they talk as they eat. First, this guy probably fell in the shower, sustained a concussion, and came to thinking he’s an American rapper…because a guy’s speech is peppered with cussing, calling women bitches..eish. Deal-breaker number one.

Finally, they’re done eating, and he signals for the bill. It’s brought over, he opens it, looks at it, closes it….and slides it over to my girl, crosses his legs, and looks off into the distance.

I shit you not.

So for a few moments, she thinks…ha ha ha…he’s kidding. But a guy continues gazing round at other diners, and it slowly dawns on her…he’s dead serious! She pays the bill…and as she’s about to leave, he says,
“We should do a movie, i’ll call you.”
Balls of steel, that one.
Cast iron testicles.

Here is a guy…invites a girl to breakfast, insists on the location, eats food that’s the equivalent weight of several small children…as she’s there eating a grape…..and then makes her pay the whole bill???  Without even offering to go Dutch?? What deep dark jungle species is this?  

And here i am, looking for a husband.

I’m screwed.

PS..my pal would now like to be taken out by a real man…to get that sour taste out of her mouth.

WTF????

Today has been a weird day. Some guy woke me up at the crack of dawn, calling me with a hidden number, then whispering sleazy nothings in my ear.
“I can’t wait to see that ass of yours naked.”

I mean……..WTF????

Who does that??  And how is that the first thing i hear today? He raped my ears!  I wanted to run a hot shower and crouch under the running water, clutching my knees and rocking back and forth.
And I’m one of those people who hear a song first thing in the morning and it’s stuck in my head all day. So today, that nasty slimy whisper has been on replay. All freaking day. I just heard it now.

Excuse me while i go cry in the shower.

OPERATION FIND CIRU A HUSBAND

Ok. That does it. I’m tired of being a single woman in Nairobi, fishing in a limited pool, watching The Wedding Show and wanting to pluck out my lashes one at a time.. I’ll come right out and say it.  I’m ready to be someone’s wife. I’m ready to take care of my man, make a good home for him, have a couple of kids who hopefully will not inherit my ridiculous hair. I’m ready

Here’s the problem though.  Where on earth are all the decent single men???  Were they rounded up and forced to join a secret Subaru-worshipping cult?  Did they sit through enough episodes of La Mujer de la Truinfo la Revancha de l’amor to turn them all gay?  Or (and this is the more probable conclusion) .
..do they all duck behind bushes when they see me coming??

Whatever the case, I am now seriously looking for my future husband. And because i have previously shown baaaaad judgement in picking my men, I’m asking you all to help me.

I’m dead serious by the way.

Pamoja tumtafutie Ciru bwana.

Random musings..

So apparently, South B is a verrry sought after residential area.

Why do i say this?

A friend of mine currently lives in the rural areas and is tired of the cross-country trip he makes every day to get to work, so he wants to move somewhere where he’s not greeted by the intoxicating aroma of fresh cow dung every morning. I don’t blame him. On the couple of occasions i went to his house, we literally ran out of stories on the flight drive there. Anyone who knows me will tell you that i cannot shut up, so this should tell you how far we’re talking about.
Sooo..being the angelic ray of sunshine that i am, i offered to look for a place in South B. (Now my hood is awesome. I can go to Java and the movies in my nasty stay at home clothes. I LAV EET!) I checked out a couple of places that looked promising..but the rent!!  WTF??? How are you gonna charge 38 thousand bob for a place that overlooks the bus stop???  Eish. No need. Anyway, i found a halfway decent place for a halfway decent price.  Downside: tiny kitchen. But since he’s not a gourmet chef…it’ll have to do.

On to random musing no.2.

I think my weighing scale is broken.

I got on it yesterday and that wretched needle just kept moving to the right. Without stopping. I jumped off before i saw the awful number. If the scales are to be believed, i am slightly heavier than a young adult buffalo.

Rubbish.