THE PUNCHLINE IN MY JOKE

I like a good, prolonged, laugh
Mostly prompted by silly, unrealistic, stuff

Makes my spirits awaken, from a day so rough

Makes my chest enlarge, akin to a gargantuan graph

I like it much better, however, when I’m the joke-cracker

After folk get so serious, I be the circuit breaker

Sometimes, and those times are many, no one laughs

So for consolation, they tell me “aha, very funny”

…and then give me that ‘dry look’, and keep quiet

I soldier on, my motivation; a constant punch line

A punch line I well understand, a punch line I have encountered,

A punch line I…

Without the punch line, my joke, if at all,

Would be another foolish statement, rather fatal

Since, better a silent fool, as they are considered wiser

Yet my determination is to be called, “Yes Sir”

See now why I need the punch line closer? And not far at the border?

See why all need to know this punch line, to understand the joke?

God catapults my life, makes me go yonder, to resonate far and beyond

Without Him, life is meaningless, lifeless

He is the punch line in my joke!

© Peter Mwangangi, 2012

MGANGA KUTOKA ZANZIBAR, OR IS IT FROM THE VILLAGE?

Several metres from our village home, on your way to that big road used by people coming to the city, on the immediate left turning, is Mwenda Uthui’s homestead.

Uthui (not his real name), several years my senior, came to Nairobi (Kenya’s capital), to seek out for a well-paying job. Several days into his arrival, and Uthui has no money. Hustling becomes the order of the day. After months of doing odd manual jobs, which were hard to obtain anyway, including being a waiter at a smoky hotel in Mathare and moonlighting at construction sites, he gets tired of city life.

So much work yet very meager wages, if at all, enough is enough.

He decides to go back to the village. Life is not as costly there; at least 3 meals a day are assured, or even more, if anyone so wishes. Another problem ensues. He has no fare to go back! A man with a mission, and nothing to lose at that, can have ‘brilliant’ ideas. He decides to become a mganga (a witchdoctor/diviner). So he gets a traditional hat, two big birds’ feathers, a gourd with black spotting and some stones inside-the assortments of a typical mganga.

He then paints these words on an old rusty iron sheet, and pins it on an electric post:

‘MGANGA KUTOKA ZANZIBARI: ANATIBU MAPENZI, KUPITA MTIHANI, KUPATA KAZI….e.t.c PIGA SIMU 0725***555(DIVINER FROM ZANZIBAR: SORTS LOVE ISSUES, PASSING EXAMS, GETTING A JOB…CALL THIS NUMBER)’

Day 1 into the new ‘job’. Clients trickle in, escorted by their problems. Whether by sheer wisdom, fate, coincidence or something, he solves their issues. He earns good money and decides to stay a little longer-this job is paying! On Day 2, Uthui is excited, and enthusiastically does his job, continuing with it for a month, when the inevitable happens...

Image Courtesy of kabwelacomix.blogspot.com

A ‘client’, with whom Uthui once worked together at a construction site, recognizes his voice. The client chooses to ignore it, after all, if his issue will be dealt with, what’s the big deal? Unfortunately, it was not to be. 
His request? All he wanted was for him to be recalled the following morning to his former job where he had been sacked, to which Uthui declared with confidence: ‘Consider it done’

Come the day after, and there was no response from his former employer. He later learnt that someone else had been picked for the post. Out of anger, he organized a gang to teach Uthui ‘a lesson or two’, recover his money and jettison him out of town. And were it not for Kasee, a friend of Uthui’s, and who had also been recruited to ‘eliminate’ Uthui, who now informed him of the plot, he would have been turned into something more than a punching bag.

Late in the night, poor Uthui packed his few belongings and took off…his destination? The village, never to come back to the city again.

  

“Eneke the bird says that since men have learnt to shoot without missing, he has learnt to fly without perching” ~Chinua Achebe~  

*** 

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest,” Jesus Christ. (New International Version) Matthew 11:28 

How a villager duped Donors

There is nothing interesting about the commissioning of a well, however, this particular one was. Here’s why…

Situated approximately 600 kilometers to the South of Nairobi, lies the quiet Kimile village. Kimile is faced by water shortage and poverty, and so, when the villagers got wind that some Europeans, known locally as the Mzungus, or  Asungu, would come to inspect a well they had funded, they could not miss out.

On that sunny Saturday in August 2012, at about 7:30am, they all gathered at Mutiso Kivindyo’s homestead.They came in their hundreds. Some barefoot, some with mitungi’s (water containers), others with children on their backs; men, women, children, and even some goats. 

Some rumour had been spread to the effect that there would be freebies (mwolyo) being offered.  Therefore, some came with bags, just in case. At about 10am, two Mzungus-a lady and a gentleman-arrived in a four-wheel drive vehicle, accompanied by two officials, of African descent, from an international humanitarian agency, let’s call it AF (not the real name).

The two Africans had been present since the digging of the well begun. However, they had not revealed to the office that this was not a project undertaken by the entire community, as was required. It had been a well-concealed secret, only they and Kivindyo knew that all along it had been his own initiative. He had hired a young man to dig up the well. Prior to that, he had approached AF, and the two gentlemen promised to help him. In that area, AF has an initiative in which they identify a donor  who subsequently funds a water project.

There is a caveat! They only fund projects whereby the whole community participates in.  That was not the case at Kimile, meaning the initiative was ‘illegal’. However, AF provided Kivindyo with several stacks of wire mesh, close to 20 bags of cement, and even paid a mason to construct it. Further, they provided him with a foot pump, all these funded by the italians. This was a major boost for Kivindyo, for had he undertaken to buy the materials by himself, he would have incurred a cost of more than Ksh 500, 000 ($ 6,000). 

He eventually built the well, at a much lower cost, for his personal usage. However, since the donors had to be convinced that his was actually a community project, possible doubts had to be dealt with. Kivindyo made the villagers come with Mitungis to collect water at ‘their’ well. No chances, it had to work. To ensure that the villagers would attend, he called them for a meeting the Saturday before. In this meeting, the two men from AF attended and handed over Sh 200 participation fee to those present.

Villagers were then called upon to return the following Saturday for the major event, whereupon the Mzungus would attend. The residents then spread word, especially the bit about the token.  So much such that, on the material day, they toppled the previous number by far. Kivindyo had strictly charged the villagers not to act in a manner that would jeopardize the initiative; he therefore would be the Chairperson and spokesperson of the non-existent Kimile Community Project.

When the Mzungus came, he took them through a 30-minute speech on the project, and answered any questions they had. Satisfied, they went ahead and tasted the water. “Mmh, good!” said one. The other, with a smile on the eyes, leaned over, and using the hands, tasted the water. Wonderful! Came the comment.

They spoke for a few minutes, and since the villagers seemed uninterested in their speeches, they invited them to fetch water. The Mzunguz watched with pity as the villagers collected the rare commodity, and later on left, thinking that they had made water available, and also assured that the water was owned by the entire neighbourhood. It was not true.
 

Either way, water was brought closer to the villagers, a win of sorts for them. How they will be acquiring the resource, if at all, will be a matter for Kivindyo to determine.

Allow me to roll: A love poem

My dearest,

Allow me to roll…

Today my pen won’t dance as it’s used to,

Whatever I say it has to do-

Inscribing the ideas cooking in my oven,

The vocabulary highway better remain open

As your portrait in front inspires me often

I’ll start with a disclaimer

Lest you say my love sounds calmer

In school I was ever curious

And never took language classes serious

Of course that was until I met you

And then you made me think anew

So fresh & innocent u looked, then!

So much that my ego stooped, men!

And that’s how our love story started

And no one was afraid of being busted

How can I forget those former days?

And girl did we cross each other’s ways?

How can I forget the long long walks, thereafter?

Memories of the bridge in low love talks, the laughter?

Though mostly meeting at night,

Sure we did it right

For those who do it wrongly,

History will judge them harshly,

Dear, do you know

That your beauty does glow

Oh yes it does!

And the flame never dies!

It’s a beauty interweaved from the inside

And then intertwined with the outside

A beauty not only imbibed from the smile

To get it I sure had to run more than a mile

I consider myself luckiest

For of all maiden I have the fairest;

Even Belmont hasn’t produced one so finest!

Indeed many wonder how we came together

As usual, I let them guess it like the weather

My dear-this journey has the two of us

And God-the driver of our bus

So ignore the mass

And let’s do the love BODMAS

B-put you and I in (brackets)

O-Obeying God’s commands

D-Divide trouble and blessings equally between us

M-Multiply the love & respect for each other

A-Add friends and issues that add value

S-Subtract them who celebrate at our slightest downfall

Enough of the rhyming

Let me say why I’m writing

For my candle is slowly dimming

And the ink threatens of ending

In this year’s valentine, let’s let our love shine

Though we may not celebrate with wine

Isn’t it enough that u are mine-and I, thine?

Let’s love relentlessly

Showing affection endlessly

Bye bye my beautiful and lovely, My one and only

Assuredly u are never lonely-for behold, I am here...

(C) Peter Mwangangi 2012