Sometimes ignorance is surely bliss - Part 1

You are going on a long journey of some 700 kilometers or so so the logical thing is to start your journey early, know the weather prevailing where you are headed so as to carry the right attire and also plot a course where you can stop for refreshments and to stretch your legs and work of that benign deep vein thrombosis sitting just below the veins in your legs. Easier said then done............but think again!!

We set of at 7.00 a.m on our maiden journey to Uganda the Pearl of Africa in a hired minibus. We were 16 of us, three families inclduing adult kids and our luggage. We were 45 minutes late but so what? After all we were going a mere 700 kilometres or so from Nairobi to Kampala and at a sedate speed of 80 km/h we would be there in 9 hours.....10 hours tops, meaning that we would be greedily gulping in the fresh Kampala air by 5.00 p.m. The mood was euphoric and positive never mind the fact that some looked the worse for wear no doubt a reminder of their carousing the previous night. The route was decided upon as the longer Nairobi-Nakuru-Eldoret-Malaba one as the Mau Summit-Kericho-Kisumu-Busia route was said to be under construction and therefore very slow and difficult going. The weather in Kampala was focussed to be overcast with showers and thunder storms for the fours days we would be there.

Barely out of Nairobi, we encountered our first stop. The driver of the minbus had not been home for several days and as he was scheduled to be out of town over the Christmas period had planned to meet his daughter somewhere along the way to give her some money. This took but four minutes but should have been an ominous sign of what awaited us all day long. Soon after passing Uplands, one of us who suffered from motion sickness suffered an attack and we had to stop off at a petrol station for him to be sick and go to the toilet. Thankfully we had a doctor on board who presecribed some pills for him to take to control the motion sickness which were procured at a nearby pharmacy.

The driver having eaten his breakfast (it turns out he had arrived in Nairobi at 3.00 a.m), the patient somewhat cured, 30 minutes later we set off on our merry way, down into the escarpment and on into Naivasha where our first official toilet break awaited us at "Delamare" for15 minutes or so. On we ploughed thereafter - Mau Summit, Timboroa, Burnt Forest - and just as we approached Eldoret our first major hurdle, a massive traffic jam on the diversion where they are redoing the road caused by overlapping, impatient drivers in a hurry to get to their destinations. So there we were stuck for almost an hour and 15 minutes while the mess untangled itself. Our next stop was scheduled to be at Sirikwa Hotel Eldoret but just on the outskirts of Eldoret our sick friend unable to wait a moment longer decided he needed another toilet break so we stopped for another 15 minutes as he did his thing.

Finally we arrived in Eldoret, this one street town that has experienced phenomenal growth in the last few years but where no one seems to have thought to expand the road networks or even have a by-pass around the town for those with no business passing through the town centre. Traffic was at a crawling pace until Sirikwa Hotel, where after a well deserved toilet break and a light refreshment, chips and sausage for those really hungry we set off an hour later back into the crawling traffic that would take us another 45 minutes to get to the Kitale turnoff. It was now approaching 4 pm and we had another 130 kms to get to Malaba and then cross over into Uganda.

By now, a majority of us were in high spirits having partook of the drinks that inevitably accompany such a journey. The obvious downside to this is the need for a toilet break.....or two.....or three! Suffice is to say that we finally rolled into the outskirts of Malaba shortly before 6.30 p.m to find a 4 km long traffic jam of trucks waiting to cross the border which is not unusual since small vehicles, mini buses and passenger buses have right of way and merely overtake the line of waiting trucks and give way to any oncoming traffic. This was not the case on this particular evening because out of desperation, anxiety or whatever some of the large trucks had also decided to join the smaller vehicles leading to the inevitable overlapping and traffic snarl ups as the oncoming trucks now had no room to pass through the bedlam created by this effect. It took up almost an hour to get to Malaba, Kenya and get our documents stamped for us to discover that the driver had only his driving licence and log book for the vehicle but no travel documents!!

.............(To be continued)

Being ‘eaten’ by an animal:

I have a feeling that many Kenyans are more scared of being ‘eaten’ by an animal then of being run over by a motor vehicle. Let me explain.

How many times do you get to visit someone’s house in one of the leafy suburbs and the first thing that comes to your mind once you drive into their compound is if they have a dog? Next you ask the question if there is a dog in plain view, “is it kali”? Or while out walking or jogging you come across a strange dog on your path and the first thing you want to do is cross over to the other side or stop jogging altogether because we all know that a dog will ‘chase you if you are running’ as you fearfully cast your eyes over your shoulder should the dog take an unhealthy interest in you sniffing at your heels as a dog is wont to do.

Many times the size of the dog doesn’t matter and it could be the scrawniest, mangiest, scared looking mongrel but the inborn fear is still in us to fear a dog…………hell any animal. You even go off to the Masai Mara and the inevitable question when you get back is whether you were scared of being ‘eaten’ by an animal.

Seriously folks, I have seen people almost trampling each other when a horse rears up on its hind legs at the Ngong Racecourse or in the City Centre when the police are trying to quell a demonstration, or grown men almost breaking their legs running away from a snake, in all likelihood a non-venomous one at that, sunning itself 10 feet away and what of those of us who are scared of spiders, lizards, geckos and chameleons almost falling down in our haste to get away as far as possible from the offending creature…………….and possibly being run over by a vehicle for our troubles!!

We are taught and conditioned from a very early age that any animal, wild or domestic, has the potential to do serious harm to you, and past experiences are shared with wanton abandon by our parents, aunties and uncles of being mauled by a dog, kicked by a cow, chased by a bull, butted by a goat etc in their youthful day and this is the reality that we face each day. The fact that corpses in many societies in Kenya in days gone by were left in the forest to be devoured by wild animals does not in any way reduce the believability of being ‘eaten’ by animals. Further, recent stories of a baby being half devoured by dogs soon after birth, or lions attacking a Manyatta and eating the livestock and leopards stalking and killing goats, dogs and other domestic animals means that being 'eaten' by animals is the worst nightmare for many.

If only we were also told of the dangers of dicing with death while walking on the road verge and not on the shoulder, crossing a road while the pedestrian lights are red, dashing across Thika Road or any other major highway with scores of hulking metal vehicles hurtling past at breakneck speeds inches from you so as to avoid a 50 meter walk to the pedestrian overpass and its relative safety we would surely be a saner, less suicidal society! Maybe it’s time we thought of policing our roads and highways with animals that would scare the living daylights out of us lest we get ‘eaten’.

Thank you for the year gone by......!

I have now been blogging for just over a year because it was on 7^th December 2011 that ‘Wondering Allowed’ was born..............371 days ago to be precise!!

The infrastructure has featured in my blogs mainly about Thika Road along where I live, so has the game of golf which I have too little time to play and enjoy in my limited free time, as have issues regarding my family and my friends, stories that touched me and which I shared and those that I culled from my C: drive written some time back but now adapted and updated to reflect the current situation. Politics, being the staple diet of the average Kenyan out there and being prone to cause disagreements based on biases, innuendos and insinuations took a back seat but got a toe in comment somewhere along the blogway (is there a word like that?) inspite of my decision even before I started the blog that politics would have no airtime on it!

I can now imagine what the editors of the ‘Nairobi Star’, that erstwhile precursor of ‘The Star’ must have felt when they initially decided to forego politics (or so I heard) when it was launched  only to change their editorial policy to include limited political commentary after realizing that politics is what sold newspapers in Kenya.

As I celebrate this anniversary let me mention that I have enjoyed the ride and the thrill of blogging because it has been an opportunity to write about things close to my heart, things that bothered and angered me, my feelings and instincts, my political grouses, my disappointments and anguish at promises made and not met, of incidents and accidents and issues of a general nature.

I have relished writing the articles despite occasional writers block (the bane of many writers and which I had no idea about before) and sharing them on my Facebook wall and the number of hits tells me that there are those out there who appreciate my blog and come back for more.  My target in 2013 is to get at least 50 followers and your recommendations and sharing of my posts and articles to those on your social network sites as well as your friends would be appreciated. Thank you for being a part of this blog in 2012.

 As we come to end the end of the year and the start of the New Year with all its drama, intrigues and political machinations, let us remember that we are all one nation of a Kenyan brotherhood (and sisterhood………gender sensitivity you know!) and we should treat each other with decorum, respect and admiration for each one of us shapes Kenya in our own unique way and without each other we would not be the same!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR as I continue to wonder allowed in the coming year!!

How to tackle the Thika super highway:

As I live somewhere in the vicinity of Thika Road, I always take it for granted that it is easy for anyone else unfamiliar with the road to make sense of how to get to your ultimate destination anywhere along that superhighway! After all it is well marked with various road signages, numbered exits and off ramps and other assorted road furniture and basically everything to make the savvy person get to where they need to be. How wrong I was!

It was while talking to a colleague recently that it dawned on me that it is not as easy as it seems to the uninitiated to get by on Thika Road and it is apparently now one of the most feared of roads to those unfamiliar with its since “you could easily find yourself in Thika” as was exclaimed to me by my colleague.

Let us just take an example of getting to and getting out of Safari Park Hotel which was easy in the days gone by since you just turned left off Thika Road on the Thika bound side of the dual carriageway when you got to the hotel signpost. When leaving the hotel  you exited onto Thika Road drove a few meters and then turned right onto the city bound side of the dual carriageway to find yourself safely homeward bound. Not anymore because now if you miss your exit you will have to spend a great deal of time getting back to the hotel.

For starters, the multi-lane highway and service roads for much of the Thika Road development is a one way system. No oncoming vehicles are allowed to hamper the flow of traffic though boda bodas and some psychotic motorists often do so very foolishly and obviously without due regard to their safety and that of other road users. All the exits are now indicated well in advance clearly showing which destination each exit will take you to and with arrows to show those unable to understand what to do. I suppose the developers of this road in all their wisdom assumed that all the motorists using the road are literate enough to read signs and have been to a driving school and understand the basic Highway Code and what all road signs mean though this may be a little far-fetched given the zig zag maneuvers of many drivers caught on the wrong outside lane and desperate to get to the inside correct lane for them to exit the highway safely !

Back to how you get to Safari Park Hotel. You are required to leave the highway on Exit 7 (any of the earlier exits will get you there along the service road), well-marked with the various places it takes you to including Safari Park Hotel. Follow the service road until the top of the Broadways overpass then make a left turn towards Uchumi ‘Jipange’ following the roundabout that takes you onto the service road leading all the way to Safari Park Hotel. If you miss Exit 7 to Safari Park, the next one is Exit 8 which goes to Kasarani area and Kamiti Road. You will be forced to use this exit double back under the Kasarani underpass get back onto Thika Road then go all the way back to Exit 7 and then right onto the Broadways overpass to use the service road past Uchumi ‘Jipange’ to ultimately get you to Safari Park, almost 5 kilometres longer than using the correct exit.

The above scenario is replicated for much of the length of the (super) highway and one will need to be keenly aware of what the road signs are telling you and what you are expected to do given that the developers recognized the challenges they would face if they made it easy for motorists (read PSV drivers) to just drive over the road divide (where possible) if you bypassed your exit and therefore erected huge curb stones and road dividers  that even the most determined  and foolhardy PSV driver would think twice before trying to tackle.

The other side of voter registration

I registered as a voter at my local registration centre yesterday evening just before 5.00 pm the official closing time. The BVR experience was painless and flawless and took less than 3 minutes and I now have an acknowledgment slip to confirm this.

However, part of the process in addition to the photograph and the finger print taking of all 10 digits (with apologies to those with less), involves a manual process where you are required to sign an  indemnity form as well as provide your mobile phone number and email address, the first time in my recollection that this is happening. I assume this is so that they may contact you in future should any correction need to be made to their registers!

I am just wondering that given that 18 million Kenyans above the age of 18 years old expect to be registered within the one month registration period, I will not be surprised if the data being collected by the IEBC will also be used for other purposes.

Think about it for a minute!!

Here is an agency, for all intents and purposes an appendage of the government, charged with the biometric registration of Kenyan voters and whose target is to collect crucial data and information about 18 million Kenyan adults and rebuild their voters registers literally from scratch. The IEBC will have access within its database to the unique finger prints of you and I, our photograph, our specimen signature, our mobile phone number and our email address (for those fortunate to have this) of all who register. This is a watershed election since it is the first one under the new constitutional dispensation and it is expected that the registration turnout will be at an all-time high given the stakes involved.

Now which responsible government would not use such a database to boost its crime fighting capabilities, its ability to rollout a parallel system of facial identification and signature recognition software, its ability to eavesdrop on the mobile phone conversations of suspects and those that may be up to no good as well as to monitor and identify anyone who causes trouble in the period leading up to the elections and thereafter? Which agency intent on extending its reach and improving on its efficiencies would not go out of its way to lay its hands on such a massive and potentially useful data base?

By the same token, which rogue government would not use such information to harass and intimidate its populace and subject them to undue scrutiny and surveillance now that they have all their crucial details. I am not saying that this is what is going to happen, but I will not be surprised if this is the secondary motive why the BVR system was rolled out!

If as a secondary motive the information collected under the guise of biometric voter registration is able to prevent terrorists from infiltrating our borders, can assist in capturing and identifying criminals, weed out the bad elements from society, trace those that are in the country illegally and help to identify and trace criminal elements amongst us then it is acceptable to me. If however, the secondary purpose is to assist in spying on me and infringing on my constitutional rights then I take great exception to this motive.

Be that as it may however, the whole process is well grounded in our constitution and the IEBC Act and we have little choice at present but to accept it as is!!

Who is more ‘damu’ than the other?

Shameful scenes confronted us the other day. It was at a meeting called by officials in Kiambu County to discuss and agree on how the January 2013 TNA nominations for the county would be conducted.

The big guns had in all likelihood transported their supporters "en masse" to the venue in the hope of showing their popularity and perhaps to sway some of the ‘undecided’ to their side. Ugly and chaotic scenes of fisticuffs, hurling abuse and chair throwing ruled the day before some semblance of order prevailed and the nominations to the county committees were finalized. But, if this is the democracy some people talk about then I want nothing to do with it because if two people were nominated to the county committee after being read from a list and with the process having to be repeated in some instances as differing lists were forwarded, then this is not democracy!!

The forthcoming elections are going to be a high stakes game. With so many elective positions up for grabs and with so little time for nominations left, and with no ‘second’ chance once you fail at the initial nomination it will be a truly chaotic situation as all the contenders battle for the nomination ticket of the most popular party in their areas in a no holds barred, winner take all contest. It will make the actual elections in March 2013 look like a stroll in the park because the nomination process will be the final decider on who gets to be on the ballot box and on which party ticket!!

The Kiambu fiasco is going to be replayed across the country in one form or another as the current crop of MP’s, long forgotten former MP’s smelling reincarnation in the expanded democratic space, professionals looking for the excitement of competitive politics  to make a change and all looking to get the all-important party nomination for one of the various seats.

Those from the various counties in Central Province will fight tooth and nail for a TNA nomination, those in Luo Nyanza for an ODM nomination, those in Ukambani for a WIPER nomination, those in Western Kenya are still deciding, those in the Coast are still at ease waiting for direction etc, etc. There will be no negotiation and no consensus just a group of self-important people fighting for a nomination that in their own warped belief is divinely theirs by right and by virtue of the loudest praises to their party leaders and the strongest appeals to their tribal cohorts in support of their favorite candidate.

If this thing called democracy was alive and kicking in Kenya, then why the acrimony among those who claim to practice the same ideals as their leaders? Why the name calling, chair throwing and general bad manners if (as claimed) they will respect the nomination process and support the one who has won for the better good of the party? Or is it just a fallacy that your party leaders are democrats and have high ideals yet the truth of the matter is that they are mere rabble rousers content with a cabal of foul mouthed individuals only looking out for their personal interests?

I see democracy in Kenya taking a lethal body blow immediately after the nomination process and our courts inundated with petition after petition from sour losers unbelieving that even after emptying their bank accounts in a bid to woe the electorate to support them, they have failed to make the ‘cut’!

There will be a lot of very unhappy people out there once the nomination process is concluded and with nowhere else to go they will be licking their wounds and crying just how unfair the process was well after the actual election in March 2013.

And before I forget, and if you have not yet done so, make sure you register as a voter before the deadline expires on 18th December 2012!!

Celebrating Barack Obama's win

The euphoria with which Barack Obama’s presidential victory in the 2012 US elections was met with in Kenya got me thinking. Here we were in Kenya and like millions around the world,  excited and ecstatic about the goings on thousands of miles away in the USA. Is it because we have seen that someone from a minority with great oratorical skills, a political novice at that, can be the president of the only remaining super power in the world today? Probably, but it is more likely that he has galvanized us by his organizational skills, his focus on the changes he intends to bring to the US economy and his agenda for the American people and probably the fact that he comes across as one of us who values the family unit and has no skeletons in his closet having revealed all way before his historic victory in 2008. Barack is also a scion of one of us with Kenyan ties and Kenyan bloodlines and deserves to be celebrated if for no other reason than this.

We are also about to embark on our own elections in 2013 in our own little enclave called Kenya though serious campaigning has been going on for months now. Would we react with the same deliriousness if Ruto or Uhuru won next year’s presidential election? Knowing that the duo are gung ho on being on the ballot paper come election day in 2013 while they are suspects with crimes against humanity charges awaiting their trail at the Hague gives me goose bumps if any of them were to win.

What would we be celebrating if any of them were to win?  We would be celebrating a hollow victory, a win for impunity and a win for a lame duck president already a pariah in the eyes of the international community. We would be announcing to the world just how short sighted and petty we Kenyans can be allowing a criminal suspect to masquerade as a leader of a country and at its very pinnacle as a president. We would be saying that we prefer that the rule of the jungle overrides the very constitution that we fought so hard for since 1990 and that our President then swore to defend before a multitude of Kenyans and the world at large in 2010.

We would be the nation talked about as being the most hopeful in 2002 but the most hopeless in 2013 having extinguished our hopes and dreams at the pyre of self-interest and intense tribal emotions. Where the lure of the filthy lucre ‘cash’ and ‘greed’ infected all of us and imbued in us an uncanny penchant to act foolishly and disingenuously, begging to be the laughing stock of the world our past achievements rendered irrelevant.

From our world beating sports men and women, to MPESA that has revolutionalized money payment systems internationally, to James Mwangi who has led Equity Bank to the pinnacle of success and won international accolades for his visionary style of running a business, to Wangari Maathai a winner of the Nobel Prize (may god rest her soul in peace), to an economy at the brink of super expansion with recent discoveries of vast quantities of oil and other valuable minerals, to our world beating free Primary Education among other achievements, everything would count for nothing.

Future generations would accuse us of selling our souls to the devil for 30 pieces of silver and our history would be most tainted with tome upon tome written of a corrupt and inept populace that believed in the rhetoric that of the many unblemished presidential candidates in 2013 our choice was restricted to one of two that had a pending case of crimes against humanity at the international criminal court and whom we sanitized through the ballot box by electing him the president to rule over us from the Hague!

We would be thumbing our noses at our business and development partners telling them to get lost and stay out of our internal matters and shouting from the roof tops about our sovereignty and the right to govern ourselves away from the prying eyes of 'foreigners' and other ‘tourists’.

With our celebration of a presidential win by either of the duo we would be wiping away any meaningful legacy that we would have bequeathed to future generations of Kenyans and be consigning ourselves to the eternal hell and damnation that would be Kenya, since local and international crooks would find a safe haven to perpetrate their dastardly deeds secure in the knowledge that impunity and corruption have found a willing house mate and the rule of law has been effectively thrown out of the window!

Many do not like to hear the truth but I hang my head in shame when I think that this could well be what awaits Kenyans  after the 2013 elections.

I pray that the lords of impunity including their hangers on and allied associates get a resounding trouncing at the ballot box for even imagining that they will rule over us!

Leave me out of your political fundraising:

A disturbing trend is emerging where people vying for political office in the forthcoming general elections slated for March 2013 in Kenya are calling on their supporters and society at large to contribute to their campaign funding.

From leading presidential hopefuls, to gubernatorial and senatorial contenders, to women’s representatives and members of parliament expensive advertisements are splashed in the leading daily newspapers inviting people to dinners, goat eating sessions, strategy meetings etc etc. I am sure a lot of resources are also spent on invitation cards, SMS messages, email invitations, booking of hotels and other venues and whose sole aim is to raise funds for political campaigns. Figures of Kshs. 1,000,000.00 per plate have been whispered to me in the past as what some people are expected to pay for dinner in an upmarket hotel while for the not so well off (?) Kshs. 10,000.00 to Kshs. 20,000.00 per plate is expected of them.

I have been recently invited for one of these ‘meetings’ which I refused to attend and the person inviting me was promising me all kinds of favors when they are elected to their office of choice, including getting jobs for my daughters!!! Puhleeeze…………………………….I am quite capable of getting jobs for my daughters when they are done with their education thank you!!

I want to put it to these political hopefuls that standing for a political office is like participating in a lottery, you either win or your lose and there is no joy or glory in being runners-up. This means that since you will be the eventual winner, that is if you do convince the electorate that you are the best candidate, the victory is to you and you alone.

This business of playing the lottery with other people’s money is not only unfair but a downright con game if the only promise that you can make to them is that you will get their children jobs and access to the good things in life once elected yet your intention is to renege on every single promise you have made the minute you are elected to that high office. It is also not improbable that you are planning to raise the campaign funds with a dishonest motive because your intention is to carry out an unconvincing campaign using as little of the funds raised as possible with the intention of shoring up a battered bank account with the majority of the funds once you ‘lose’ because it is a known fact in Kenya that there is no transparency and accountability in how the campaign funds are raised and utilized.

So are these fund raising antics just mere distractions to fool the gullible people willing to fund your political campaign that you shall ‘look’ after them when you are in power? Or is it just the usual business as usual thing to get money from people by false pretenses even by those who can comfortably fund their own campaigns from their own bank accounts and not even feel as if anything has happened to their bank balances.

As the saying goes, a fool and his money are soon parted and to assume that just because you have wagered your shillings on someone who has promised you a ‘plum’ posting after he/she is elected or that they will honor that promise under the new constitutional dispensation which insists on certain minimum benchmarks for constitutional office holders one of which is not having donated to someone’s political kitty or/and having signed MOU’s with them is to wishful think in the extreme

Be warned, the season of political chicanery, tomfoolery and downright con games is here lest you get caught being called to 'buy' your way into some obtuse dream of being a somebody when you favorite candidate is in power while they may command no support even from their own family members.

As for me, I don’t owe anybody any political favors and neither am I owed any by anybody. I may be a fool but leave this fool alone as you go about your political fund raising!!

Be aware of what you criticise!!

I had a meeting this morning in the City Centre at 10.00 am. Knowing the unpredictability of Nairobi traffic into the CBD, I left early and was pleasantly surprised to find myself in the City Centre 20 or so minutes later. As I was early for my meeting I decided to pay my phone bills in one of the Customer Care offices in the CBD as it would save me a trip to Westlands later on in the week.

Those who read my blog know that I have an absolute zero tolerance to careless pedestrian behaviour on our roads and many times I have thrown a broadside at them for walking on the roads instead of on the sidewalks, crossing at non-designated places, walking against the flow of traffic amongst others.

Today was my turn because I was behaving exactly the same as those that I usually criticise as I cut a path across the city confidently striding on the road against the flow of traffic, crossing at non-designated places, crossing the road halfway and then waiting for a gap in the traffic  to make a mad dash across and generally making a mockery of the same behaviors that I have so often been critical about.

It dawned on me that the human being is  very fickle, quick to critique others while at the same time failing to see his own shortcomings. I am not sure why I was doing the things I was doing but to me I was doing no wrong. The only justifiable place that I recall in hindsight that required a wide berth was  a construction site along one of the roads where the hoarding had taken up much of the sidewalk leaving little space to walk and therefore forcing one to walk on the road at great inconvenience to motorists I am sure.

I would thus like to convey my apologies to any motorist that I may have inconvenienced today as my behavior was unwarranted, selfish and inexcusable. I don't know what foolishness got into my head but I can assure you that it will not happen again.........until perhaps the next time I am in the CBD!

I will now think twice before criticising anyone else in the future and I hope you do the same too!!

Thank God it was not in Kenya!!

As Hurricane Sandy roared into the Eastern United States on 29th October 2012, I said a quick prayer for my relatives in that country. I said a prayer for my sister in Maryland, my brother in law, his wife and their new born baby in Philadelphia and for my cousin in New York. I also said a prayer for my sisters and their families in Atlanta and Chicago because though out of the eye of the storm they could be affected and traumatised by the effects of the storm and I also said a general prayer for all Americans and Canadians that in one way or another were going to be affected by this monster of a storm as was predicted by the authorities in the US and Canada.

By the time Sandy made landfall in New Jersey, it had ploughed a path of destruction in its wake and left tens of people dead around the Carribean and mainly in Haiti a very poor nation and many more people affected by the storm. The leaders in the USA had all come out and urged the people that they are responsible for to evacuate low lying areas when requested to do so and also made an appeal for 'common sense' to prevail and many heeded the warnings and it is expected that the death toll should be minimal given that as I pen this blog the reports are that 16 people have died. It is estimated that a population of 50 Million people living in the Eastern USA and Canada will be affected by Sandy which is equivalent to about one fifth of the population of the USA or the whole population of Kenya and then some 10 Million more......affected by one storm!! 

I wonder what the position would be like here in Kenya if we had a similar storm? How many would die either from the poor planning or because they did not heed sage advice to evacuate. Remember Muranga, Meru, Kakamega, Kisii, Nairobi where scores have died and shall continue to die because they did not (and will not) heed the advice to evacuate after a steady rainfall for a few days? How long would we be without electricity and a reliable water supply? Would our roads and drainages cope with the sheer volumes of water and surface run off unleashed by a mammoth tempest?

Would we in any case be able to monitor the severity and intensity of an incoming storm? What would be the level of our disaster preparedness or would we all perish in our beds ignorant to the fact that storm surges of 13 feet plus are bearing down on us all along the Mombasa coastline and far inland? Would we be able to convince our matatu and private bus operators to suspend their business for a day or two in the interest of the safety and security of the general populace? Would the government declare a stay at home day or would they just turn a blind eye as all of us try and get to the offices by hook or by crook through the eye of a storm? Would be close our bridges and tunnels in the interest of safety so as to ensure that no one is able to get to to their workplaces?

Would our politicians who in many cases have national responsibilities during such occurences stop campaigning or would it be business as usual? Where would they be? Hunkered down in their cellars and houses or out there commiserating with the masses and providing words of comfort and solace?

We should thank God for his small mercies given that he knows we are so ill prepared for any natural disasters and that we only read about these massive storm systems in far off countries which have the experience and resources to handle them and whose early warning systems work and are monitored constantly around the clock. Where governments have put in place eleborate plans to cope with emergencies of all kinds and where the citizens can be relied upon to make informed decisions based on the levels of awareness and preparedness.

If Hurricane Sandy was to ever hit Kenya or any of our neighbors, people would die in their thousands. Property destruction would be in gargantuan proportions and we would need aid and assistance like never seen before to build our tattered and battered economies!

But for now I stand by those who have been affected by Hurricane Sandy in the Carribean and in the US and Canada and pray that you will continue to survive in the tough times ahead even as you are buffeted by the winds of Sandy and other storms in future and that you will rebuild your lives adn rise from the flood waters of Sandy.

Why I love my Monday’s!!

I don’t know why people don’t like Mondays. I look forward to them with eagerness and relish. I look forward to Monday as a day to dissect my weekend and welcome a new week because anything that starts must end on another weekend.

I also look forward to Monday because this is my designated day when I go for my weekly ritual, a ritual that I have tried to follow religiously over the years but have failed in badly often changing days of the week to accomplish it. It is something quite personal and something that you cannot do on your own very well except for a very few who are able to do it better when they are doing it to themselves!!

But don’t get me wrong, it is not what you are thinking so get your mind out of the gutter. It’s my weekly haircut and shave!

Now some would wonder why I look forward to this most intimate of rituals. After all, you may argue, it is just that; an action by a barber to trim your hair and give you a nice smooth shave that you can then live with for a week without looking like a rascal and then repeating the same thing next week!!

But for me, it is not the act of being shaved and getting a haircut that I look forward to, it is what follows after the haircut! You see I agree that there is nothing really exciting about the whole process but there is something really special about the excellent secondary service that you receive when you go for a haircut and shave. I don’t know about you but I have been having a haircut and a shave regularly since I discovered that I was greying up top because there is no better disguise to grey hair then a close shave. As for my beard which greyed long before my hair, it gives one a distinguished look when it is left neatly short with a starkly contrasting goatee to the little hair left on the head.

One way or another, in the past it made little difference whether I had my weekly ritual on any day of the week including weekends………..until I discovered a little out of the way barber shop somewhere along Kiambu Road that changed my routine completely. This is just like any other barber shop on any road, street or highway in Kenya. A place with a reception area comprising of a three seater lounge chair with a magazine rack and a reception desk, some barbers chairs facing some mirrors and a washing place somewhere in the back area. It is just large enough to fit four barber's chairs and with a staff of seven gets to be quite crowded when all the chairs are occupied. Three competent barbers provide the customary shave and haircut and there is no tea, coffee or soda served to bribe you to stay if the chairs are occupied.

But that is where the standard shave and haircut experience ends when the ladies take over and guide you in the back for a shampoo wash! When you get back to the barber’s chair all the next ingredients in this magical journey have miraculously arranged themselves neatly on the table. These include the various oils, lotions, portions and aftershaves that provide an integral whole to the experience.

Its starts with the customary, hot towel to the chin to kill any pimples that thought they would sprout after the shave, just hot enough to be pleasant to the skin but not to irritate followed by the rubbing of spirit and after shave to finish off any bad boys that thought they now had a chance to play and cause havoc to your face.

By now my skin is literally tingling as I await the next routine, the face wash and face massage. This is where your face is oiled liberally with a mix of...….I have no idea…..but which is applied in rapidly expanding circles around the whole face, around the eyes, around the mouth and cheeks. Any semblance of a headache, stress and fatigue is rapidly consigned to the dark corners of the mind and you feel rejuvenated and refreshed as the age lines are quickly worked on to make then disappear into your skin.

Next is my favorite part, the head, neck and shoulder massage………heavenly!! Here is where a generous dollop of oil is applied to your scalp and the overgenerous excess is then spread to your neck and shoulders. Words fail to describe the pleasurable sensations up and down your spine as the expert ladies work on your tired and aching muscles and rub away the tiredness and aching. Round and round, in and out, up and down they go until you feel as if you will conk out in sheer relaxation. But there is still one more stage before you can be released to go back to the big bad world of aches and pains!

The last and my second best part is the mid and lower back massage with a big massage machine that feels as if it grips metal bars for a living!! The sensation of this machine as it is guided expertly by the masseuse as it glides across your back needs to be experienced to be explained but many a time the ticklish me comes out giggling like a small boy in a pool of Fanta due to the sensation of this machine near the tickle zones of my body.

And there you have it, a magical 45 to 60 minutes of relaxing me time to look forward to every Monday, and the damage to the pocket, a mere 300 bob. Often the place is packed with men patiently waiting their turn for this most exciting of experiences for it is a men only salon. It’s amazing what great service will do to a place and keep them coming in for more and I would urge you to think of doing something similar on a Monday that will make you look forward to the day rather than looking at it as an interruption of a weekend.

And before I forget, the place is called “The Glamour” salon or just “TG” opposite the Hospital at Kasarini……………if you ever want to forget your troubles for an hour!

Just writing this story makes me tingle and I can’t wait for Monday to come!!

To abandon your vehicle is to ask for trouble!

A news item in one of the dailies today has caught my eye. It is about the stringent traffic rules that have been drafted and which now await presidential approval to become law. One specific issue that I noted was that anyone abandoning a vehicle on the road would be hit with a stiff fine and/or jail sentence and have their driving licence suspended.

The article however does not however define what "abandoning" a vehicle means given that in Kenya we come across vehicles many times left by the side of the road or on the road either because they have suffered a mechanical breakdown, have run out of fuel, were involved in a minor/major accident, have had a puncture and had no spare tyre or the driver was too intoxicated/sick/tired to get home and decided to park by the road and get some sleep........or in extreme cases as happened a few months ago a motorist died while stuck in a traffic jam and no one is any the wiser! To cut a long story short and put things into perspective, www.dictionary.com defines abandon as; 1. to leave completely and finally; forsake utterly; desert: 2. to give up; discontinue; withdraw from:

Just this morning on my way to work, a truck had stopped/stalled at the Pangani underpass causing a tailback several metres long. "Was this an abandoned vehicle?" is a question that came to mind when I read the referenced article though there as a policeman strategically standing a few feet away animatedly conversing with an obviously agitated person, perhaps the driver of the offending truck. Vehicles are routinely abandoned for one reason or another on our roads, as I have mentioned earlier. Many of our roads contain no road shoulders and instead have dangerous, jagged edges which would de-commision a small tractor coming into contact with it therefore forcing many otherwise law abiding citizens to abandon their vehicles on the road as they jog off to the nearest petrol station with a "mtungi" to obtain fuel or summon a mechanic to enable them continue their journey.

Many people in Kenya own cars without the foggiest clue that regular servicing and maintenance of a vehicle is important to keep it running in a mechanically sound condition and to reduce the risk of stalling along a dangerous stretch of highway where people with other intentions other than your safety will rob you at panga/gun/simi point and steal your tyres to boot. This lack of service is one of the causes of many vehicles stalling and being abandoned, albeit temporarily, where they broke down as the desperate driver goes out to summon assistance from a mechanic or towing vehicle to get him out of his predicament.

Could a stalled vehicle therefore be considered an abandoned vehicle? How long would it need to be left in one place to be considered abandoned? If one is still in the vehicle when the long arm of the law catches up with you, is it still considered an abandoned vehicle? What about those instances where a vehicle is abandoned by fleeing gangsters that have commandeered another vehicle to make a quick getaway? Who is responsible for the abandonment of the vehicle? The owner of the vehicle or the gangsters????

If you ask me the law is surely an a$$ because within the new legislation there exists loopholes that any enterprising law enforcer can now use to extort from those that have 'abandoned' their vehicles. I am not sure if the full act defines what it means to abandon a vehicle or whether it will be left to a magistrate somewhere to deliver an interpretaion on what 'abandonment' constitutes, but you can bet there shall be a lot of very unhappy people who have been accused of abandoning their vehicles and therefore risk a large fine or jail sentence in the process!!

You have been warned. Acquaint yourself with the new stringent traffic laws lest you fall foul of them and find yourself facing a fine or jail sentence!!

Thank you for why I feel special today:

So today - 10^th October - was my birthday and I have never felt so special. I have received birthday messages from my wife and daughters, most of my family members (including an uncle who works in Tanzania and an aunt who lives in Nyeri and who never forget our birthdays), most of my friends and some of my colleagues mainly thanks to the Social media and more specifically Facebook!

This is despite the fact that my birthday over the past 12 or so years has always been celebrated as Moi Day, a day when everyone got time off to relax with their families and friends but which was declared as one of those unnecessary ‘Moi’ baggage holidays and was therefore removed from the Kenyan holiday calendar under the current constitution. It was and will continue to be a normal working day in future unless you elect me President one day (wink, wink!!!) after which I promise to re-instate it!!

Today also marked the day that President Kibaki seemed to break ranks with the Members of Parliament (fondly known by their many haters as MPig’s) and announced that he was not going to approve the amendments to the constitution that the MP(ig)'s had voted for with their stomachs to award themselves a hefty send off package once their parliamentary term comes to an end at the beginning of 2013.

I am from a school of thought that believes that everyone has a job and a role to play within a country, a company or a home and President Kibaki’s role, which he swore before a multitude of Kenyans in August 2010, was to defend the constitution of the country which has been severely compromised by the MP’s in this latest attempt to steal from Kenyans. Therefore for doing his job, I don’t see what the big fuss is all about unless people are just surprised that he is actually capable of doing his job and are congratulating him as a result!! This is akin to congratulating a company CEO for showing a profit in his company after a year’s trading while it is his job to do so otherwise he gets kicked out by the shareholders along with his board in the next AGM.

But I digress because these are all issues that conspired to consign my birthday to the ‘pipa la sahau’ but failed miserably since today’s blog is a reflection of the day that I was born many years ago. The month of October is also a blessed month for many in my immediate family as well as my wife, brother, children and parents since I can count no less 5 birthdays spread right across the month…..............they could be more but short term memory loss has kicked in prematurely!!

My daughters term me as old but save for the wisps of white hair fringing my beard and hair, the protuberant and prominent belly, the eyeglasses, a slight case of short term memory loss (as mentioned) and the occasional twinges of pain in my joints on cold mornings out of the blue, I feel as if nothing has really changed over the years……...........I kid you not!!

My choice of music is still very much my choice as it was in the 1970’s and 80’s, while my choice of movies is still very much in the genre of James Bond early action flicks. I however do seem to command a lot more respect from many members of society, I am (very) occasionally referred to as “mzee” by accident (I believe) and I am sometimes given preference in situations where I expect my father to be given preference and I often wonder why! I assume that all this is as a result of my prominence in society at present which I have earned over the years but not as a result as my advancement in years.

Be that as it may, I have been blessed to have a truly loving and supportive wife, some super adorable girlfriends (whom some refer to as my daughters), a caring understanding family from my mother and father to my sisters and brothers and friends too numerous to remember right from my workmates, to my former classmates and to my golfing buddies in Kenya and around the world.

To all of you who remembered me today on my birthday whether in word, in thought or in prayer, I thank you from the bottom of the heart and may you and your families continue to be blessed in the years to come.

GOD BLESS YOU !!

The way not to behave

My wife was involved in a minor accident with a matatu in the Nairobi CBD last night on her way home from college. She was accompanied by my daughter and a friend and thankfully no one was injured.

 It was one of those big matatu buses - a ‘Star Bus’ - that go around menacing the rest of us with their loud and uncouth driving habits. I believe that Star Bus is a cooperative or a franchise model business that manages public service vehicles on behalf of individuals like you and me and who seem to pride themselves on their efficiency and cleanliness of their buses. Their crew however was another thing!

Since the vehicles were smack bang in the middle of ever busy Moi Avenue and impeding the flow of traffic, my wife after assessing the damage and seeing that it was minor prudently decided to move her car to the side of the road while the bus defiantly remained on the road oblivious to the inconvenience to other road users. Despite clearly being in the wrong the crew came out as being belligerent and uncouth, intimidating and harassing my wife and telling her that she had to pay them Kshs. 5,000.00 for the repairs to their bus which had a broken side light while her car had a dented rear door and with the paint scraped off. When she objected and told them that they were in the wrong they started telling her that her car was not even an expensive car and they did not see the reason that she should be making such a big fuss about it!! Mistake No. 1.

Those who know my wife will agree that she projects herself very well, is not loud or intimidating, will not throw her weight around and does not show her anger. But when push comes to shove she will not be intimidated. The harassment, bullying and abusive nature of the bus crew pushed her to her limit and she told them that she was not going to pay and that they should wait for the traffic police officers to show up and sort out the mess.

In the middle of talking with the bus crew she had received a call from her mother and they had conversed briefly in her mother tongue Kikamba. The crew then began commenting among themselves in their own mother tongue Kikuyu to the effect that they would wait all night if they had to and that they would tire her out and that “this kamama” would eventually have to pay them the Kshs. 5,000.00 that they was demanding. Mistake No. 2!

My wife happens to be fluent in Kikuyu in addition to Kikamba and this blatant show of disrespect to her increased and steeled her resolve to wait until the cops showed up, which they eventually did almost 45 minutes after the accident. In the intervening period, she had approached the bus crew so that they could proceed to Central Police station less than a kilometer away to make a report and they had refused - 'sitoki na sitoki' - unless she paid them the amount they were demanding or the police showed up.

The cops after assessing the situation and deciding that the matatu was in the wrong jumped into the Star Bus and asked my wife to follow them to the police station where the respective parties made their statements, with a now suitably mortified bus crew trying their best to distance themselves from their earlier statements which she had clearly heard them make in Kikuyu in addition to their extortionate demands for money from her.

The bus crew was then told to call their Manager to explain what had happened and to get the company to agree to repair her vehicle and she took down the number with the police officer telling her that if she encountered any problems to report to them since the incident had been recorded in the Occurrence Book. She was then released to go home while the bus was impounded by the police officers to enable them complete their investigations and hopefully prosecute the hapless bus driver who by now was in a state of shock the tables having been effectively turned on him!

There are several lessons to be learnt from this incident mainly to bus and matatu crews.

No 1. – When in the wrong, belligerence and intimidating behavior will not help you at all. Acceptance and a simple apology may go a long way in eliciting some sympathy from someone you have clearly wronged and help resolve a situation without reverting to the authorities.

No 2. – Common road courtesy is expected of you so that you do not impede the smooth flow of traffic or cause unnecessary and expensive time consuming mistakes. In this instance, the bus lost the additional three hours of income it would have earned, it cost the driver an alomost guaranteed deduction of his wages to repair my wife’s car, a possible loss of income to the owners of the bus if it continues being detained, possible prosecution of the bus driver and a loss of reputation to Star Bus as a deliverer of efficient public transport service.

No 3. – Customer service training for the staff and crew of all reputable public service vehicle companies is necessary and long overdue.

No 4. – Don’t say things in the heat of the moment assuming that the other party does not understand what you are saying lest you are forced to eat the words later and come across as a groveling fool.

To the rest of the world,

No 5. – When involved in a minor accident in a well-lit and safe area stand your ground if you know you are in the right and don’t accept to be bullied and intimidated by those that may have caused the accident.

No 6. – If you are involved in a minor accident move the vehicles to the side of the road to improve traffic flow and wait for the police if you must. Since most people have mobile phones with cameras nowadays, there is nothing wrong with taking photos of the accident scene before moving your vehicles but for heaven’s sake stop blocking the flow of traffic because of a minor accident.

Hopefully with the new Traffic Act that has harsh penalties for errant drivers some semblance of discipline will reign on our roads in due course more so with the PSV operators who are always in a rush looking for the next shilling.

NB - Her vehicle was repaired the next day at no cost to her save for the whole day that she spent getting the car fixed and reprayed