Saying goodbye

I will be leaving Lamu soon, it’s now official. Am not saying it’s a bad or a good thing because at this particular juncture, I honestly don’t know. There are probably better opportunities out there but nothing beats the good life, at least not in page 72 of this book of mine. I do have a book, more like a guide of how to live my life and although I haven’t put words to paper due to unavoidable circumstances namely frequent changes in principles depending on prevailing conditions and inability to prioritize the said principles. This means a few lines have being added, others deleted and today’s page 72 maybe tomorrows page one, and until a definite flow comes to mind, I’ll let it flex a little longer in my head.  Anyway, my dad thinks it will do me some good although am sure he likes the fact that I will be able to visit him more often now that I can’t use the excuse of distance from Nakuru anymore. Am not supposed to complain since I always wanted a busy station telling myself that am not challenged enough to really feel needed at my job in my current station, which totally brings to life the saying, be careful what you wish for.

Lamu, am going to miss this place. The food, friends, the people, the beach, and the friends some more. The parties too have being over the moon, including the full moon parties I’ve being a part of, the beach parties, and definitely the random house parties on gloomy Mondays. This place does not give you a chance to think about your woes tomorrow in a depressing way like the rest of this country does, the Lamu Tamu slogan says it all. As a student of this philosophy, I understand the concept of beer, drugs, girls, more beer, and lots more drugs....need I say more? Yeah, there is the leaving all your problems, drama, stress and everything that brings you down before you board that boat to this piece of paradise. The random parties at Matatas’ place, or Jay’s crib, or whoever decides that there is too much going on at Club Petleys for us to handle. Club Petleys, my stool at the counter of Club Petleys will definitely miss me; or rather I will definitely miss it. I have a few facebook notes credited to that stool at the far right hand corner of the counter with Carol, Nolan, Hulda, Yvonne or whoever happens to be serving me either a warm Tusker or double shots of Vodka making sure I feel at home.

Before the praising goes ahead, I’ll let you in on a little coast secret that I have come to understand and embrace. Coast is not made up of lazy people, it has a lazy environment. Procrastination is not optional, the environment requires you to. When you walk around the sea front and find grown men sitting on the barazas and sipping some “kahawa tungu” you do not have the right to judge them. You are also not allowed to understand how one can wake up at 0500 hrs for prayers and his business is never open before 0900 hrs, not until you live in this place for a while. You will wake up at 0500 hrs, turn on the T.V and just lay back for a little while waiting for the appropriate time to hit the shower, not realizing the rate at which time moves in this place. It only takes half an hour to move from 0600 hrs to 0830 hrs, and that is on a slow day. Don’t try and do the math because we never got the formulas too, we rarely do math but we do worry about it sometimes. Anyway, we never really procrastinate, time moves too fast and it’s already afternoon before you even start the days’ job, meaning as much as you wanted to beat that dead line, you can’t really work with the time left in the day.

Something else about this place is, it’s a small town and if you let the things that everyone talks about get to you, you won’t last for long without losing enough weight without justifying the finger pointing. You can take it as a negative but not us, we really have a problem with giving a fuck, President Bush kind of not giving a fuck was the only thing we or they learned from his presidency. As they say, the dead guys that people like to quote, if I don’t see you doing it, someone will tell me before I go to bed. That describes our little piece of paradise. What the dead guy forgot to let you know is the level at which Lamu people give a shit, Lamu people didn’t get the “giving a fuck” memo. The law too kind of skipped the area too, at least the ones that limit the fun. Mututho law leads the way with some of my fellow Lamu residents literally not having heard of the guy leave alone the law. Mary Jane has being banned from holding a session in 90% of this God’s masterpiece named earth; Lamu didn’t get the memo either. It’s a free world, it’s utopia in my twisted little world. (That was kinda too repetitive, but I really needed to drive the not giving a fuck point home)

Am going to miss Lamu productions, the beefs between the “rich bitches” (not coined by me), Winnie and Fridah has being, well, very interesting.  These are two women who can handle their own as far as money is concerned, but the difference is their income sources. Winnie married into money, an American marine came rolling with some very deep pockets, she got lucky. Her older sister had been in the game for much longer and got an even bigger fish, some white dude who owns a few clubs along the coast line, Mombasa, Malindi and Lamu, and she administers the Lamu branches. Together, they can literally hold a party hostage if they decide to, except at the one and only Club Petleys, DJ Feddy holding it down. DJ Feddy, the only DJ that fills up a dance floor on this side of the ocean.

Then there is Fridah, a self made “rich bitch”, holding down a well paying job, a few businesses, and a whole lot of ego. She carries the cool tag with all the girls rolling with her and the beach boys under her wing, most of them at least. I like her too coz she’s extremely generous with her liquor and as much as I try to deny it, liquor is my Achilles heel. The funny part is, these two “rich bitches” were best friends a couple of days ago until Winnie’s sister fell out with Mariam, and Fridah had to choose sides. She chose the fun side, like anyone else would, and now she has to prove to the Lamu world she’s the QB, which in this case doesn’t mean a quarterback. The drama has been so intriguing for the last couple of weeks, with Winnie and her click getting Fridah and her click charged in a court of law for public nuisance. Lola has being updating me on the goings on of this Lamu produced soap opera (better than cuandos sies mias). Jaguar should claim his dues since kigeugeu; his breakthrough hit has being the designated soundtrack for this gripping production.

GOING DOWN HAPPENING

The crew, my Lamu found family, Kama, Andy, Ticha, DJ Feddy, DJ Ibra, Were, James and my weed guys Lola, Mwenye and Nuhu have made this place an awesome experience. Matata currently in Amsterdam and his small bro Jay in Sydney with their everyday is a holiday policy knew just how to wash down the down side. Kama, should be an administrator of this blog, since he lets me browse for free in his cyber (he however has this ‘polite notice’, something about no free internet). DJ Feddy, all the entertainment, from the music on my iPod to the movies in my house, through the flawless sound at Club Petleys in conjunction with DJ Ibra, the dull moments have been minimal. My boy Were, you wouldn’t know he’s a doctor on first sight considering that doctors are expected to be some old boring men, and a few hot women, our go-to guy for medical advice and a few rounds of liquor. Andy, the manager of Petleys Landing, with all the free drinks, and free passes, I mean a beer is at Ksh. 180 and a double tot of vodka at Ksh. 200, he lets me sneak in with a little liquor every once in a while i.e. weekends. There are the nights we’ve  drowned the 1 liter Smirnoff vodka, throw in a KC after which we can’t account for the number of beer bottles that follow, get  ****ed...but definitely having a good time. I remember there was this one time I was seeing like 5 girls walk out of the bathroom (whether they were real or imaginary, we are yet to figure out) and I was just dumbfounded for like 5 minutes, wondering why the hell so many girls were in the bathroom. I vaguely remember telling some girl how beautiful she was over and over again. I was told I screamed out loud with my arms up "I W**T S*** P****!" That has yet to be proven and the witnesses were either coached or rather impaired at the time of this particular incident among other great memories created with this Lamu family.

TICHA PEEPING AT EM' GALS

Ticha and James are the oldest friends I have in Lamu. James was the first guy I met, he literally disapproves the theory of what you see is what you get. He’s older and not exactly the hip kind, looks portray him as a boring dude, but kid you not, he’s the funniest dude you’ve ever met, I mean I’ve ever met. He hasn’t been dealt the best cards in life, but it’s how he deals them back that totally make you understand, or wish you would understand how to make the simple pleasures of life count. You will lie to him, skip appointments, forget to call him, but he will forgive and forget over a drink, a meal, a spliff, or just a meaningless conversation. You will end up laughing about it.

Ticha knows every cave in this town. He has worked here for the last eight years; walking with him you’d think he’s the councilor or any other political figure. He knows pretty much every one and he’s not someone you want to walk with when you are in a rush. He is a fixer. Anything you want done, he’s your man. Being the coxswain of the office boat, it means he has access to that beauty anytime of the day, which is an added advantage if you need to criss cross the islands whether for work or pleasure.

WERE GOING DOWN

Lola and Mwenye, funny story how I met these dudes. These dudes always got some spliffs on them any day. There was this chic we used to smoke with every once in a while, Lucy, but on this particular day, none of us had some on us. Lucy knew Lola rarely rolls without a roll on him, probably coz they smoked together too when I wasn’t around. That’s how I met Lola. With Mwenye, it started with small favors, like get me some smokes, food, airtime, until one day we were drinking with this South African dude at the counter who wanted to know where he could get some of that. We ended up smoking three joints in a span of half an hour with him and Peter, the South African dude. Lola and Mwenye are a few of the people who ensure that my mind is stimulated whenever needed, and the best part, they do it for free. Nuhu too, a friend, workmate and an upstairs neighbor never disappoints either especially on Sunday afternoons when am not in the mood to go scouting.

Lamu, I will definitely miss this place. Hapa hapa restaurant, the best grilled chicken I have ever tasted in my entire life. When you are sitting on that table sipping on mango juice as they grill those breasts, wings, and the leg, all you can think off is how you will devour that piece of chicken laced with a lil cream and some things I have no idea what they call them but the taste, DAMN!!!!!! I am going to miss that big piece of chicken as I will that fish at lambada, grilled or deep fried. I could break it down to every restaurant I have ever feasted at but the point is, there is no food like Lamu food, home cooked (I do have friends who can cook) or otherwise.

The beauty of this place is compounded by the ocean. In Lamu, I saw the first sunset ever in my life. If ever I did before, it either never clicked or the site of this sunset did reboot my head disk. At the floating bar on a Sunday afternoon sipping on my warm Tusker and my feet dipped in the water, AMAZING is the only word that fits. The stars at midnight, literally shining down on you while you lie back on the beach, as the soft waves lightly brush your feet. AMAZING!!!

At some point, every one has to move on, and every one includes me too. Nobody says you have to like it, but as the dead guys keep telling us (wish they would just shut up); the only thing that’s guaranteed is change, or something along those lines. I might as well accept that the good times and our little affair with this place had to come to an end at some point. We had fun when we were, and I know for sure we will have a fling or a quickie in the future. Until then, goodbye my love.

THE BOYS BY THE SEA

Busy day that was

I had an extremely busy day today, depending on your definition of busy and your proximity to the beach, it’s highly unlikely that the definitions will come anywhere too close. I woke up at around 0630 hours and as a normal human being in the 21^st century I have to check my facebook page. You got to understand this generation is not like our folks’, we don’t watch the news, but we have to know what is going on around the world. Facebook comes in handy as the most reliable source of day to day happenings in the world, considering twitter is limited when it comes to the maximum words one can use. I can’t really say am addicted to facebook but am sure my definition of addiction is again a little different too. I prefer to consider myself very tolerant of a lot of things and people too, I hate to break hearts and promises made either by me or people in the M.O.D.’s (They call them the Merchant’s of Death but I don’t really like to view them in that kind of light).

Busy day as I was saying, at work at around 0832 hours. My boss had a meeting with some partners which was supposed to last the whole day and with his assistant out of town for a couple days and the procurement officer out of the office too, I was the only one in the office who got a lil power. That reminds me, we do have an Inspector, huh, people do forget fast considering he’s being gone for less than a weak. Gone as in visiting his family and not the big guy. 0900 hours, I decide to check if there is being any movement on my blog, and it’s finally hit 3,000 views. Okay I got to admit, am addicted to my blog, not that it’s not common in a lot of bloggers but since I added the feedjit gadget that shows where my visitors are blogging from and the number of hits in real time, it’s become like a drug. I can’t last an hour without checking if the numbers have gone up. It is sometimes depressing since it sometimes stagnates for hours; I hit the refresh button a couple of times, no change. I exit, give it a couple of minutes and then creep in like a mini ninja (like those remaining turtles, proven mini ninjas), and take another sneak preview before I go back to my work.

As I was saying, extremely busy day, 0952 hours  but before you get down to work, you have to see the paper but since am in Lamu where the paper hits town in the afternoon, the online version works just fine, except for the lack of the classifieds and the obituaries sections, it works pretty fine. I know you’re wondering why I check out the obituaries page whenever I get the paper, but if you must know, it’s because I believe at some point people will start writing honest obituaries. Case in point, Jim Adams, who didn't die the way he wanted: which was to be run over by a beer truck on the way to the liquor store to buy booze for a date and this was duly noted in his obituary. The classifieds are more for price comparison considering I have this habit of always paying less than the asking price, mostly; my bargaining power should be enhanced through research and the classifieds have plenty of information. Unluckily, I can’t really get that information when am reading my paper online. I do however love to be updated especially on Mondays since not much news are read over the weekend. You find out things like the Al-Qaeda mastermind responsible for the 1998 Nairobi bombing finally kicked the bucket, or rather somebody did him (do me I do you has finally being used to mean something that concerns National Security!! Finally!!) 

1042 hours, I decide I deserve a smoke, or rather I can’t go another minute without one, too dry a mouth at this moment. I don’t know why it always happens to me but when the craving hits home hard, my mouth feels like there hasn’t being much liquidity of fluids happening. Anyway, I light up my cancer stick at the Rangers lounge as I listen to a news update from Radio Jambo. Apparently the illegal liquor served with love to our fellow soldiers of boredom after work has claimed a total of 13 men!! The platoon is loosing too many men and the war being waged against us is reaching to a point where if we don’t do something now, we will end up riding the same boat. (BREAKING NEWS: The death toll has hit 17). It all started with that archaic  Mututho Law limiting the number of hours one can imbibe the magic liquid. 1700 hours to 2300 hours is not sufficient considering some of us have a larger tank than us, which means filling up may take a little longer than expected. If he ever attended an Economics class, he would have learnt government controls of any kind regardless of how well willing he is tend to kill the market, in this case people. What happens when you can’t drink in public for fear of the ever hungry Kenyan policeman? Drink in a den, where the no one is 100% conversant with the contents of the drink they are clearly enjoying. With the need to make ends meet, considering that the cost of living has almost doubled, and increasing the prices of these home made brews almost out of the question, a little catalyst maybe added to maybe speed up the process or increase the strength of this drink. Throw in the tax increases year in year out, you end up with a thirsty country whose people can neither afford the refreshment of the working class, nor even drink it in peace whenever they catch a catch a lucky break. The high unemployment level hasn’t helped much either, with these young men and women in search of either employment dealing this lethal liquid, or idleness drives them to these dens. But with the big shots preparing themselves for more important things like transport for their Hague buddies and 2012 approaching at a speed they least expected, the rest of us are just pones in their game of human chess. That’s just how being a Kenyan means, now time for a new story so we can forget about this little distraction  (did they solve that small matter of Wanjiru’s death?, or the grenades in Uhuru park a while back which claimed six unimportant lives?)

Sorry I drifted too far from my story, busy day I was talking about, 1117 hours, back in the office and there is a small issue of tax returns, mine and a few colleagues who need some direction. It doesn’t take long to show them the way and am back to my work, work, the reason I left the house this morning. I open my office cabinet and arrange my books in order of priority. My table has too much clutter I realize, a little space creation project before getting down to the important stuff. 1234 hours, lunch time. I had a heavy breakfast plus I need to make a few calls, I decide against leaving the office, too much to do. The office phone is pretty loaded which means one phone call will probably be long.

0157 hours, with my table pretty neat, I can finally get down to clearing a two week back log. Abba, a colleague of mine needs some help with internet on his phone and being a people person, I can’t really deny him one tiny little favor. Safaricom are not as friendly as they should be as they are taking a tad too long to send the settings to his phone. Luckily, I got a friend who works with Safaricom, I call up Frank and give him the details of the phone and he promises to send me the Internet settings. The phone has different line of thought and decides the configuration message isn’t compatible with its sexy self. This took us a pretty while before we eventually gave up and decided it would be much easier if he took it to a Safaricom dealer either in Malindi or Mombasa on his way to see the folks. 

0243 hours, I just remembered Biko had promised to reply to those who send him the best pieces. I had sent him a link to my blog sometimes back and I was really eager to here from him, but due to the events of the weekend just gone, I hadn’t checked my mails. I open my email but you all understand how the urban legend goes, the internet one on how you can’t just open one tab. I decide to check if my blog has a few extra views. Okay, I take it back, am not addicted to my blog; I do however love to see the numbers going up or high (the clean version). It’s also important to check your facebook page in case there is some news you haven’t heard yet or a tip that is neither constructive nor helpful in life, like how do you turn a sweet, honest girl to the cruelest, raging, most heartless bitch you'll ever meet? You break her heart. Anyway, tabs, you need a facebook tab, twitter, yahoo, gmail, your blog (or mine if you don’t have one) Arsenal.com, and in case you are one of those lonely or horny kinds, an extra one for the urges is allowed every once in a while.

Time moves really fast in the afternoons, so I’ve noticed, 0359 hours and I have another personnel issue I have to handle. Whenever I tell people to avoid bank loans like a plague unless someone is literally dying and you are out of options, they think I am being stupid. If you must, at least read the fine print and do a little shopping around for better offers, not the first bank that sends a smiley face. Anyway, am not sure if it’s Barclays Bank or Asili Sacco but one of these two is mincing this guy to the last cent.  None of the two institutions will give us a straight answer; at least we’ve established Barclays won’t which is better from none from Asili who won’t even pick up their phone. After realizing these institutions won’t give us s***, it’s back to our beloved HR guys who promised to check the information in their system and get back to us.

1631 hours, I still can’t believe this day is over that fast. I need to lock up so I can catch the 1700 hours boat. Make a quick note of things to do, buy and collect to make my work much easier tomorrow. I really hope that my boss gets another commitment tomorrow. 

It’s being a while since I had such a short busy day. I hope to compensate by doing lesser distracting things like just blogging.