Everyone’s in Mombasa. As Cape Town is to Jozi, so Mombasa is to Nairobi. And right now, as in Jozi, the streets of Nairobi are empty. Not a jum in sight. Driving is a pleasure. And even on the open road it’s not the usual split-second struggle for survival either. Everything is pretty chilled. Hakuna Mutata.
In the company runaround vehicle that I’m using (a little Suzuki 850cc that goes like the blazes), it now takes me 5 mins to drive to and from the Nakumatt Ukay (open 24/7). Normally, during the business week, you can expect to take at least 15 minutes on either of the routes, to or from (but not necessarily going both ways). Today I went all the way downtown looking for a particular CD shop (a shop that sells mainly East African product rather than the top-twenty selection at the mall). I found the store (Kassanga Music) closed, with its steel roll-a-door securely locked. But I managed to do the return journey, to and from Westlands, in 15 minutes (including the time it took me to stop the car and take a few of these snaps). If it weren’t for the holidays, this would be a complete fiction. I was even able to pull off the road and take a snap or two without being threatened by matatus or other oncoming traffic. (I have just noticed that the streets in these pics are entirely deserted (an entirely uncommon sight)!)
This ‘roundabout’ is the first of two I take on while driving to town on the Uhuru Highway. This is actually the view of this roundabout as you come out of town (you can see the slightly uphill gradient). The second roundabout is smaller, and leads onto University Way, past the University of Nairobi, and is one of the main routes into ‘uptown’ as well as ‘downtown’ Nairobi. From this second roundabout I can now find my way through most of Nairobi Central.You can’t see it in the picture, but somewhere in the mass of billboards there is one from S.A. Tourism calling Kenyans (or tourists currently in Kenya?) to Explore the Possibilities of South Africa, featuring a Kenyan woman smiling in front of ‘The Mountain’ (as seen from Blouberg, of course). A few people have commented on it already and it’s a little source of nationalistic pride for me right now.
There is actually a lot of respect here for South Africa, and South Africans. South Africa is recognized as the ‘powerhouse’ in commerce and the arts, and South African music features quite heavily on the microwave media, and on radio. Before his untimely death, Lucky Dube was clearly a hero of the Kenyan people and he is played often on Metro, the local reggae station. And Rebecca Malope, along with other gospel-ites, feature prominently on local TV.
However, parallel with the respect that Kenyans have for S.A., there seems to be a definite ‘suspicion’ of South Africa. I’m sorry to say that I can’t always allay the fear that Kenyans seem to have for what they see as something of a South African ‘mentality’. If one thing is clear; 45 years of home-rule independence has left a mark here that South Africa can only hope to achieve in another 25 years! (And Kenyans REALLY can’t believe that Jacob Zuma is even allowed to stand for President of the country).
The biggest concern that Kenyans seem to have is the xenophobia thing that was very widely reported here. And I think it worries Kenyans because they themselves have experienced ‘xenophobia’ in the form of tribalism, post-elections, at the beginning of the year. They know just how ‘real’ internecine violence actually is, with I-don’t-know-how-many “I.D.P.’s” (Internally Displaced People) yet to be ‘repatriated’ and living in tents (a year later!) all over the country.
But even without the suspicion of South Africa, and despite the cool pic of The Mountain, dude, I can’t imagine S.A. Tourism having much pull here. Yes, the youth are expecting more from their country, but Kenyans on-the-whole, seem pretty satisfied with their lot. And, anyway, who would want to go anywhere else when the President himself goes on holiday to Mombasa (and delivers his Christmas Address from there: dominated by repeated pleas for Kenyans to drink moderately over the season).
The plea/s was/were probably quite necessary because, clearly, Kenyans need little excuse to have a good time. I first saw this mentioned on the Internet and it has proven to be very true. I have been to clubs and pubs, both uptown and downtown. Everywhere, people are having a good time. The drinks are flowing but I have yet to see any form of violence break out. At one place, last week, there was a guy complaining bitterly about the fact that he had left his beer on the shelf and had come back to find it gone. Bitch and moan, bitch and moan. That’s as far as it went and it’s the only local incident of any kind I have seen.
On the other hand, at one of Nairobi’s main spots, a night or two ago (whenever I was there) there was a Christian Somali couple (who speak a Swahili variant), drunk as Lords, having a marital tiff outside the club. The passing police saw the commotion and stopped, climbing slowly out of their old teal Land Rover. For about five minutes they just watched the scene unfolding, outside and inside the taxi that the couple had hired. When things looked like they were getting worse between the two, the cops started to intervene. The long and the short of it is that the cops landed up slowly ushering them both (with extreme care and caution) into the Land Rover. She, by far the worse for wear, got to sit in the dog box in the back. He got to sit as a passenger. The doorman at the club told me they were being taken to the station to take it easy for a while….
It was evidently the bombing of the US Embassy in ’98 that really got the local police force armed to the hilt and word has it that they are on high alert right now – expecting a possible – but unspecified - terrorist attack. But despite their threat of clear and present danger if you fuck with them, most of the time they seem fairly chilled.
Here the police are Maintaining peace: without it there can be no future.The club I was at during the Somali incident, Madhouse, caters mainly for locals and features a wide mix of music genres in the night’s offering. The pop-dance material of Beyonce, Madonna or Cher drives the audience wild but it’s the Tanzanian Bongo Flava - or Arabic-inspired - tracks that create a frenzy! And I have to admit that East Africa’s indigenous sounds are talking to me. More and more. So much so that yesterday (27th December) I went downtown to find some Bongo compilation CD’s. No CD’s to be found, but for Ksh150 (less than R20 at today’s exchange rate) you can get a pirated DVD featuring a mix of videos of all the current chart-toppers.
The downtown streets are lined by only two types of shops. The first being shops selling mobile phones and electronic goods (run by Indians or Pakistanis). The other being shops that sell pirated music (run by black Kenyans)! Here and there one does find what we call a spaza shop on the downtown streets (also run by locals). In downtown Nairobi these shops will sell lots of different (often Indian) snack foods, along with some fresh fruit and the occasional stash of miraa (khat). (The Indian influence here is so strong that many Kenyans think samoosas are a Kenyan invention!) You don’t see it often, but chewing miraa downtown is more socially acceptable than in Westlands, as evidenced by this brand new sign outside the mall. (And it’s evidently the chilled folk of Meru, at the base of Mt.Kenya, that are famed for their “chewing”).
The biggest difference between Kenya and that place I call home, is that this is a highly literate society (despite the bad grammar on the sign). I get no less than three English language dailies delivered to my desk every morning (and that excludes the Nairobi Star). There’s the popular Standard – akin to where The Star or Argus are today – using popular English, but without colloquialisms. Then there’s the Daily Nation, which I consider to be good press. If I can only get to one paper during the day, this is my choice. There is also the Business Daily, printed on heavy Financial-Times-type paper and covering business in the whole East African region. Lastly, there’s also The East African, a Sunday weekly that reaches me on a Monday. All of S.A.’s big fashion fortnightlies and monthlies are on the supermarket shelves here, as are many of our stores to be found in the malls (Mr.Price, Standard Bank (Stanbic), Safaricom (MTN)). But Tusker Beer will beat any of SAB’s brands, any day. Often consumed warm by locals, I think it’s the only beer I have ever actually enjoyed! 
Christmas Eve was spent at Jane’s place where she held her annual Christmas Eve party for friends and selected clients. Catered largely by her two sons (both of some culinary bent), we had a great spread of traditional Christmas fare, and a layout of sweets that defied choice. As I left, I was presented with my Christmas gift from Jane. I nearly collapsed with joy at the combination Maasai blanket and Maasai carving (paperweight?) presented to me. With Jane being a Scotswoman, there’s something of the genes in her choice of blanket. But both artifacts will be treasured!
At the party I got to know my fellow Research Director (for Francophone West Africa), Jaime Laia; Jaime is from Portugal, speaks English, Portuguese, Spanish and French. His girlfriend, Melissa, works for the U.N. and speaks no less than six languages (but not Swahili, I gather). But most interesting for me was to find out that Jaime was a professional musician about five years ago! He owns an American Stratocaster guitar, a Gibson Les Paul guitar and has an array of classic guitar amps. Once we got talking, the joke quickly circulated that Jane has just lost both her new Directors (Jaime only started in March) to professional music. So what will happen now? Apart from Jaime and I as potential band members, there’s Scott (educated at St. John’s, Johannesburg), Jane’s eldest boy, who can sing (I heard him privately belting out some Seal at the party)! Never mind Jane herself, who was singing with the Bob Marley CD in her car, all the way to Naivasha a few weeks ago. (Jane checks in at work around 10.00am, twice a week, after she’s been to her Latin dance class). If I get to work before 9.30, there’s almost no-one there! But they all work late to make up the time. Flexi-time has another meaning here.
But having been here for nearly a month now, I am probably slightly qualified to comment on the weather: it is incredibly invariant, with warm, but not hot, days, and pleasantly cool evenings. I actually couldn’t imagine a more perfect clime. One is tempted to wake up and say “Oh no, not another fucking beautiful day!” The sky almost always looks full of bulky clouds but it doesn’t move to rain. Not till ‘rainy season’ anyway.
Amani na mapenzi
B
