Sometimes mafia bosses wear skirts and have thin eyebrows

"Afadhali ule mwenye anaomba kuliko ule mwenye anaiba. Naomba machungwa!" I don't know how that sounds to you guys, but to me it sounds more like a threat than a request. The sort of thing someone dangerous like a Mafia boss would initially say to you to make it seem like you have an option, but basically they're just letting you know who's in charge now. 

That's how I started my Monday morning last week and probably why I didn't post on the blog here. I was recovering from that threat lol. Okay, I lie. I didn't post because I was in Mombasa, I'd gone to see my two nephews. One spent most of his time sleeping and the other spent most of his time jumping on chairs hehe. One is 3 years old, the other is 3 weeks old. Guess who the jumper was and who the sleeper was. 

Before going to the Coast last week, I'd called a new cleaning lady, to come and wash clothes. (If you have a washing machine and a dryer and/or do your own laundry, you probably won't relate with the sometimes struggle of getting a 'good' cleaning lady to wash clothes. Good is in quotes because it's relative and specific to an individual. For example, for me, a good cleaning lady is one who comes early, is thorough, fast and doesn't have story mingi. 

Anyway, so this one I got, let's call her the mafia boss, came early, was fast but problem is that she had story mingi. So after finishing her work, I called her to the house to have some tea. Whole time, there were like 5 big oranges on the kitchen counter. It didn't even occur to me to offer her just simply because it didn't occur to me. I was in the kitchen frosting a cake so that's probably where I was concentrated on. So MB (mafia boss) looks me dead in the eye and then with a threatening tone, says "afadhali ule mwenye anaomba kuliko ule mwenye anaiba. Naomba machungwa." Guys, please read that with a tone that suggests an order. I froze a little. I wondered why there was mention of kuiba in the first place. In short, this is what I heard. "Hey, you over there frosting that cake. Look at me. I'm only going to tell you this once. Give me that orange. You're lucky I haven't stolen all five of them already. If you say no, I'll have my people come for your head and that cake of yours. And then we'll steal everything that belongs to you." 

Of course I gave her. Mama raised a coward haha. I'm joking. Mama raised a girl who takes time to process things. If she'd have said "naomba machungwa" we wouldn't even be talking about her. Needles to say, I will not be requesting MB for her services again. Also because she had story mingi which I don't want to get into because it will make this post have story mingi. Yesterday, there was a knock on the gate. Who was it, you guessed it. MB. I opened the gate peeping thing. She said "umepotea!" Haha then I said "ah ah, mi niko" Then she asked "hakuna job?" So I said "bado". She looked me dead in the eye "nimekuja juu simu yangu haifanyi na labda umekuwa ukinitafuta". Then I said "oooh. Sawa. Lakini nikikuneed, nitajua kwenye nitakupata. Asante" Then she closed the gate peeping thing. Still ensuring that she's the one in charge haha. Ain't no way I'll call her back. But please guys, help me pray over my safety. Sometimes, mafia bosses wear skirts and have thin eyebrows.

Please read these next paragraphs in a Ugandan accent. For no particular reason. Only because yesterday evening I chose to annoy my small brother by responding to him in that accent, but he kept 'ignoaring' me lol. No offense to Ugandans, but that accent cooks me. (That's how Gen Z's say something tickles them. They say ngl, that sh** cooks me.)

Anyway, it still felt nice to come back to Nairobi to clean clothes. One day, we'll talk about that dreaded feeling of coming back to Nairobi after some relaxed time away. It disappears after like three days. At least for me. Otherwise, have a lovely rest of the week. Hopefully, you don't encounter any mafia bosses. (Now you can release the Ugandan accent)

The stars are aligned

I'm baaaack :) I took a one week break because I'm a millennial and one thing we know as millennials is to take breaks. The generation older than us struggle with such little luxuries like breaks and therapy. Anyhu, in the one week I've been away, I'm now an auntie of two, from one and I have a tiny little tattoo on the base of my leg. The pain level of getting the tatt was a 15/10, I'm not sure I'd recommend. Oh also, I hate my new hairstyle.

 

It makes me look like a Truphena or Truphosa my brother even said I look like a Petronila. The hairstyle, not the tatt. No offense to people named that. On second thought how do you have such a name? Haha yes offense. Here's what happened: I went to the salon and accidentally asked for the wrong hair color. Instead of color number 2/30, I asked for 30. Throughout the whole braiding process, I'm like something is off, but I couldn't tell exactly what cause you guys won't imagine, they made me help them gawa the braids. Goodness me. I'm definitely not going back there. So I was too busy parting the braiding hair to recognize the color is too rich on my head and struggles to blend well with my complexion. Yikes. Although I'm not one of those babes who will undo the hair if I don't like it. I'll just be a Turu (Truphosa) for the next 4 weeks at least I have a tattoo so I'm still kind of a badass? No? 

Anyway, I'm writing this in the waiting room of a hospital. I've brought my pops for a cataract removal. We woke up early in order to be here early (6:30 a.m) so I'm kind of sleepy. I think we're number one on the line so that's nice, I hope by noon we'll be home. I'm thinking about how sometimes, the stars align themselves. Like being number 1 on the line is a great example if you ask me. 

When the stars align themselves: 

Let's say you're six girls sharing a two bedroom Airbnb. 1 California King size bed sits in each bedroom. Two of the six girls don't mind sleeping in the middle, the rest prefer to sleep on the edges. Each middle girl sleeps in each bed, the other 4 get to sleep on the edges. Because of that, the friendship lasts forever hehe. 

You're about to be late for a 2pm meeting/ date. You're not too sure whether it's a date or a casual meeting, but you kind of have a crush on the guy. You take a boda and arrive four minutes late. He's cool with it. You guys have a good time. You know it was a date when at the end, he gives you a peck on the cheek. Your crush likes you back. 

You don't book an appointment for the salon. When you get there, the hair dresser/ nails lady/ waxing lady doesn't have a client so it's immediately your turn. 10 minutes later, another client who'd booked an appointment 30 mins prior your walk-in walks in (meaning they're 40 mins late) luckily it's them that have to wait and not you.

You're on dinner duty but left the house early thinking you'd return in time for din dins, but you met your friends and the meet up turns into a fire sherehe. Just as you're thinking of leaving to go make Ugali for your (Luhya) Dad, he texts "Don't include me for supper, I'm having dinner with......" in response you text him "aah okay sawasawa. I'll be spending the night at Kinesh's, will be back home kesho.

You give yourself four hours to bake, cool and decorate two cakes. 1, there's electricity throughout and 2. they're both ready at the 4th hour. 

You're at a restaurant waiting for your small brother to come join you. He tells you it will be 30 minutes, so you wait as you write. 30 minutes later, he tells you it will be another 20 minutes sijui he has to add a watermark on his report. Corporate things. In this restaurant, a person you knew in highschool sees you and comes to your table. You tell him you're waiting for your brother, he decides to join you, as he was just leaving but can keep you company. You don't have any small talk in you, you just want to turn into a cabbage so that he can stop talking. As you're thinking of an excuse, your brother joins you, Mr yappa yappa got to go. Yaay.

You borrow "someone's" car and you return it with no incidences despite crazy boda and matatu people. Oh, also, you don't get lost driving round Nairobi and its environs.

You're out of body spray and as you're just thinking of getting another one, a friend's brother, who's now your brother.ish, comes from a Dubai trip with body spray for all his sisters.ish.

When you're playing Kenya at 50 and your teammate shouts "augmentin" instead of "antibiotics" as the answer to "the medicine you take when you have a bacterial infection", but somehow, your team still ends up winning.

You meet a friend in Uni, and you and her become close, then also get close with her brothers, they almost adopt you into their family. You share so many memories, the friendship lasts forever. 

You become an auntie of two sweet boys. 

You're in traffic, hungry as a ....... then those crisps people happen to pass. Immediately you pay for them, traffic is open. 

Those are the moments I could think of for now. Like I mentioned, I'm a bit sleepy so let me see if I can catch a snooze on these hospital chairs, the kind for gawaing shambas. For some reason, this is usually embarrassing but I'm a Truphosa anyway so it doesn't really matter. 

Ehee, for you, what are some instances when your stars have aligned themselves? 

(:

 

Awuoro!

 

This whole blog post was about to be in Luo. I’d heard Okello Max’s songs before, I liked them even, and they were on my Spotify favorites for a while. And then, he dropped his album ‘Boss’ and I couldn’t stop listening, despite barely understanding what the songs meant. There was the usual asking my luo friends what some words meant, but I had to do this slowly before they realized that I was using them and that the friendship was one-sided. 

From Okello Max, I discovered Coster (not Coaster hehe) Ojwang’ through their collaborations and again, I couldn’t stop listening to Coster. Hyper-fixation and dat. Both artists primarily sing in dholuo (I feel like a criaz historian using that word - dholuo). So that’s almost six months of at least listening to one luo song a day. Surely by now, I know some luo. It also helps that in highschool the song we danced to for house dance was a luo one but unfortunately till this day, my proposal to recreate and perform it to any of my lakeside friends has been immediately shut down. 

Anywayz, some time back, I experienced Coster Ojwang' live and had a spiritual experience. Like I always do with intimate gigs. Billy Black is another artist who moved my soul during his live gig. Story for another day.

 

I digress…

 

Awuoro!

Is this the same Nairobi and the same adulting process that our folks went through?

On Monday, I was running an errand for my pops at NSSF. He was finally completing something that he'd started when we were kids. For some reason (pms), it made me feel sorry for him. I thought about how difficult adulting has sometimes been for me, then I imagined being in his shoes at my age, 29. By this time, he was married, with one child who in the next three years, they would find out is autistic. In the next 12 years, he would have five children and be responsible for not only himself, his wife, his kids but also some of his relatives. Yikes! Then I imagined how lonely he might have felt being in a new town, as a first generation Nairobi migrant. Having to go through the whole adulting process. Personally, I'm a softie. Maybe to him, the whole experience of being in a new town was fun and exciting and bursting with many opportunities and he was happy to make it out of the hood. But one thing is for sure, adulting is a lot of the times difficult for everyone, I assume. 

Then I thought about my mum, at my age, she was a mother of two, expecting her third child. By now, she already knows her first born is autistic but this doesn't scare her from getting more kids. She knows God will help her. In the next 10 years, she'll have a total of five kids and be responsible for them, her husband and other relatives. At 29, she's also in nursing school, or has finished and is practicing, she is also in the church choir. Literally, no days off. She's grown up in Nairobi so she doesn't have to deal with the culture shock that is Nairobi. To be fair though, I've grown up in Nairobi but still get culture shock of just how fast paced it is. 

I don’t know how my folks survived adulting. But they did. Obviously if I go to them with these questions and admit how adulting is beating my ass, they'll ask me about the last time I went to church hehe. To be fair though, it's post pms and life is worth giving another shot. It can be difficult but it sure has its many fun and exciting moments and weird moments as well. Like on Tuesday, after teaching a baking class as I was leaving that house, unbeknownst to me, a boerboel would meet me at the door, immediately come in between my legs and lift me with it's head. My entire heart left my body. Thankfully, it did not bite.