JUST IN CASE THE WORLD ENDS THIS WEEKEND!

Plans for the weekend? Cancel them. The world is ending on Saturday May 21st at 6pm at every time zone. So if you had planned on catching an episode of your favourite soap or going out clubbing you might have to put those plans on ice, FOREVER. The end of the world is going to be an orderly event. Like I said it will be 6 pm for every time zone around the world hence the ones who see the end across the orient will be able to tweet what they see so we can know what to expect beforehand.Harold Camping, a radio evangelist from the United States (the Mecca of all world ending prophecies) has it all figured out. According to him and others who need to see a mental care specialist, it will have been 7000 years since the great flood (that's in the Bible for the people who are scratching their heads. Bible is the big book thingy supporting the short leg of your table.)

So judgement day comes this weekend. That would have sucked had it been on a weekday like with all the traffic and having to wake up early and work and school.......yeah who wants to be judged in rush hour traffic? As if your day couldn't have gotten worse, right? I'll hasten to remind you that Camping once predicted that the world would end in 1994. That would explain why we are all not in existence right now. It's been non-stop judgement since then. But he blamed bad math on that little blunder so he says he's got his calculator working right this time.We are so quick to assume he's a nut. I feel kinda bad for him just in case he's right. he won't get the chance to gloat because......well, we'll all be busy getting judged and whatnot. But if he is wrong he'd better have a planet to escape to.

DIARY OF A SOCIAL WORKER: CONTACT

Something about the way she leaned in towards her friend drew my attention towards her. They were to sign in at the tail end of the session and that tiny movement between the two women piqued my interest. As the paper was going around, the next one in the queue shook her head and whispered something to her friend. And then the realisation hit me. She couldn’t read or write.....and it broke my heart.

The week has been intriguing to say the very least. Kibera makes another entry into the pages of my life. The sights, sounds and smells come back in greater detail as the slum becomes a cog in the machinery that is my work place. I find myself seeing things in a new light. While my first visit had shocked me and left me feeling empty, this one opened my eyes to the things I was missing out on.

I find myself weaving through the narrow alleys with my eyes trained on the signs. Every corner seems to have a chemist, shop, ‘hotel’ and NGO to boot. The first foray was all about getting in and out but now I can take my time and take it all in. On the first day we are working near a school. Little children are scurrying everywhere and the uniform is anything but uniform. It’s a mix and match of colours and patterns as the kids run around during their break. Earlier I had listened to them answering questions in that sing song voice that only children have.

WASEE, TUVUKENI BO...ODA

Jaguar’s song has been ringing in my head for some reason. Not because Jaguar is known for his lyrical prowess but because of the “vuka border” bit. We have all started looking at the borders rather jealously. Don’t get me wrong. I’m a proud Kenyan. The thought of living amongst polite, Swahili spewing Tanzanians tickles me. Uganda is not an option. I can’t live in a country where walking to work means I’ll end up in the hospital. I also find it annoying that they try to convince me to say ‘Champala’ when it’s clearly written Kampala. We can read dummies. Fork jembe.



But the last week has just been a sad one to be Kenyan. While everyone was busy awwwing over the royal wedding and high fiving each other over the death of some random guy who likes to play with matches, things started falling apart. We are a country under siege. The Ugandans are trying to steal our islands. It’s like a weird case of toys at the playground. Uganda is that petulant kid who just wants stuff that doesn’t belong to them. Up north, Ethiopians are busy massacring Turkana residents and our response to this is to write a protest note. What in heaven’s name is a protest note? I’m imagining the president tore off a paper from his exercise book and quickly scrawled, “By the way tumejamabout hii story ya kudedisha wasee wetu. Sareni.”

MY WORLD!!

I live;
In a world in which ones heart beats only for themselves. Where we look out only for number one and the best friends are always me, myself and I. Where the selfless are trampled underfoot and the selfish live to amass more another day.
In a world in which kindness and friendship are words in a dictionary. Where morals are replaced by the lure of materials and the lifetime of a human being is marked by how much they are worth in monetary terms.


In a society where love is a memory; a distant one at that. Where the glint in a loved ones eye is replaced by lust and the warmth in their hands by a clammy claw. Where the wallet is a prerequisite for the heart and flowery words are assigned a particular day in February.

TODAY I WAS AFRICAN!

A few weeks ago my friends and I sat in front of a television screen and viewed as a panel of eloquent speakers delved into contemporary African ideas on homosexuality. Being an educated lot, we listened with horror as a Ugandan member of parliament spilt vitriol and bayed for the blood of perpetrators of this ‘heinous crime’. At the end of this all, his argument had been simple. It was unAfrican. And this word stuck. UnAfrican. And thus it got me thinking what does it mean to be African?

So today I figured it out. I have the answer. It didn’t come to me in a dream or in some ultimate moment of enlightenment. Despite that, it was a moment. There was no shaft of light from the heavens and neither was there an inspiring chorus from some choir. It was simple. I changed the channel. That was the moment.

The news had begun with the same old rubbish. Some MP’s proclaiming Uhuru ‘King of the Kikuyu’s’ while Raila’s party flip flopped over the ICC issue for the 56^th time. I’d had my fill of it all. This was Africa. This was what it meant to be African. Dread. Hopelessness. That focus on all that is pointless and irrelevant. And I had had enough of it. And I changed the channel. That was the moment.

COPS 'N' ROB US!

The cops are back on the news for all the wrong reasons. It would be funny if it wasn’t totally sad. Cops around the country are going on a rampage shooting their bosses and it’s making headlines everywhere. I don’t know about you but that would freak me out every time I would be up for promotion. The list of every single dude I’d pissed off would run through my mind and then I’d respectfully decline the offer. I’m guessing the extra money would count for very little when you have a bullet lodged in your brain. Pressure cooker doesn’t begin to describe the situation. While in other jobs, your boss is the subject of idle and angry gossip at the water cooler, in the police force, he is the having a heart attack every single time a car has a loud puncture.



Then there is the whole thing about the drug haul recovered from the Coast this past weekend. First, did anyone notice how high that OCPD was when he was answering questions about the stash? His eyes were darting everywhere and his sentences made less sense than normal.

“Yes, we found the ndrugs”

“Yes, a lot of ndrungs.”

“Hehe ngoond ndrugs…”