Well, today Becky and I went
off to Kitale…( a big-ish town about an hour and 20 min drive away) she went to
get a tooth seen to, while I took the chance to go to the supermarket to buy
the holiday club food….
After carting the 50 kilos
of rice, tea leaves, 5 kilos of sugar, 1800 biscuits etc. around the shop and
then into to the car, we decided to treat ourselves to an imported Crunchie bar
for the road! (it’s about 5 times the price of back home, and tastes a bit… old, but still a treat!)
There was quite a commotion
- lots of Kenyan men seemed to appear, from nowhere, at my window, everyone was
shouting at the Matatu driver who made a lame excuse that we were parked
badly….... After it was pointed out to the driver that he was fighting a
loosing battle . . . . he had been insisting that
crashing into any stationary vehicle was not the fault of the one who crashed
into it . . . he kind of smiled, and said “I know, I know” (I kind of admire
the fact that even in more stressful situations, Kenyans manage to smile and
keep things light and positive.)
I found myself wondering
which of the 4 men who were talking ‘at’ me was actually the driver, and where
was Becky? What would she say when she came out of the Pharmacy to find this
commotion had erupted in under just 2 minutes...? And, more to the point, what happened to my
Crunchie bar?
So Becky came back - we had
to think . . . “Now erm… what’s the
procedure for this kind of thing in Kenya
It all sounded pretty simple
at this stage until it was apparent that getting that money is easier said than
done!! By this time, it was raining and everyone was hovering under the shop
veranda except us, we were standing in the pouring rain discussing the money
issue.
As time went by, the group
of men disappeared one by one, I think because they realised they might be
called upon to chip in for cash. Eventually we are left with 2 people - the
real driver and the Mechanic who suggested we go to their boss’s house… so we
got back in the vehicle and the two men squeezed into the back to sit amongst
the sacks of rice and bucket of cooking oil.
“ Where are we going? “ I
asked..
‘Just there’ - they point… “Ok, how far is there?’ I asked, hoping for a bit more info
“About 2 kilometres”.
….So, maybe 6 kilometres
later we pulled in at a small shop, where an old man and his wife were sitting.
At first they were excited to see white people, but soon they realised the
white people were there to take some money off them and the man’s face hardened
a bit.
It was a funny situation for
us as we felt awful demanding money from someone who wasn’t even involved, but
we had been instructed not to leave without the money so we had to insist,
explaining that we lived far away and were under strict orders from the vehicle
owner…
We could see the men were
scratching around for cash. . . one had about ‘a fiver’s worth’ on his phone,
another had a handful of coins, that along with the shop takings of the week
amounted to around 2000ksh but it was
still a long way off from what we needed.
I really just wanted to go
in my purse and pay it myself but asked “Is there any other way of getting some
cash?” The man’s face lit up, he had a
brainwave - “I have a sheep will you take it?
It is worth 4000ksh…” Well I
loved the idea, and at this stage we would take anything, we just wanted to get
home!
So we got in the vehicle and
went to the boss’s house, a tidy compound with a few sheep. The man went up to
one of his sheep; a big black one with white socks, and said “Take this one”….
Well I loved her, and how exciting to take home a sheep! But I wondered where we would keep her? The man told us there was a lot of meat on
her, so she could be slaughtered for a special occasion. I had to explain to him that I couldn’t eat
her but instead I would give her a name!
The men laughed and the mood
lightened again, except my sheep didn’t look too pleased about going home with
us. I was concerned that she really
might not survive an hour and a half journey in the dark against the piled up
food in the back seat. However, I took
the Kenyan attitude of “It will be ok!”
As we were loading the sheep
in the vehicle, the owner of the car phoned again to see how things were going.
We explained we had settled for a sheep as payment … but he told us we must not
take the sheep because it is bad manners to take a sheep from an old man…. (I
wondered which really was bad manners, since I had thought it was bad manners
to turn up at a stranger’s house unannounced and demand money - but what do I know?! )
So we had to give back the
lovely white socked sheep and told him there was a change of plan. He gave us the few coins he had collected and
the sheep was happy to go back to her patch.
After many offers of Chai
and supper, we explained that we had a long journey ahead of us, in the dark,
and needed to get on our way. It was
funny the way we all exchanged numbers, as if they were our long lost
relatives, or as if we had met under completely different circumstances. They
waved us off and promised to stay in touch; I took one last glance at the sheep
as we drove by, and found myself waving to her as well!!
On the way home we chuckled
to ourselves. Although I love it, I don’t think I will ever fully get this
country! (I also love the idea of having
a sheep now too. One of these days I may just buy one as a pet, although I
don’t think I will ever find a black one with four white socks!)
As we warm up and dry off
and even find our chocolate treat, we are once again reminded that no two days
are the same here.
No comments:
Post a Comment