I went fishing recently on a weekend thanks to my brother who had invited all of us including my parents to a weekend stay at Mugumo House at Mweiga Farm in Nyeri. The fishing was at a dam in a neighboring coffee farm that is owned by his employer and where he is a senior management staff member.
The dam is stocked with Tilapia and occupies perhaps one acre or so. A trip around the dam at a natural walking pace takes maybe 15 minutes…..20 minutes tops! I was accompanied by my brothers and some of my brother’s children for this afternoon of fishing. Our fishing rods were rather rudimentary being a fishing line with a hook attached to the end and then tied to a bamboo rod. For the floatation a piece of slipper placed about a foot from the hook and our bait, those earthworms that are dug out and are found in any moist soil anywhere in the world and which you had to thread expertly head first (or ass first who knows) through the bend in the hook to make a tempting bait for the fish!
For those not aware, fishing is one of those activities that requires copious amounts of patience and on this afternoon unlike an earlier trip to the same dam 9 months prior, the fish were not biting. One by one my nephews and brothers who had enthusiastically caught many fish the previous visit, lost interest and wandered off and it was left to me to stoically soldier on the prospects of returning home with no fish too terrible to comprehend promises of plenty of fish for those waiting at Mugumo House looking as good as broken! As the afternoon wore on so did the tedium of walking up and down the banks of the dam tossing my rod into the water and looking for a place where the fish would bite. This was now getting embarrassing, three veterans (I and two farm workers) and not a single fish between us??
The tranquility and beauty of this dam and a cool calming breeze was however more than enough compensation for the disappointing fishing. The ducks lazily swimming on the water, the incessant hum of the cicadas and other creatures a sonorous background to my own thoughts weaved a tapestry of adventure and folklore. After all this place is adjacent to the Abedare National Park home to some very rare species of wildlife in Kenya and where a bitter war was waged against the colonial government in the 1950’s leading up to independence in 1963 fifty years ago. Is this how the dam had been all those years ago? What had changed in the intervening half century? Had any Mau Mau been fed from this dam and had it seen any action in those dark days?
It’s funny how ones thoughts causes them to lose focus on what is around them because I had been standing at one place lost in my reflections my line in the water when the bobbing piece of slipper indicated that there might be something at the end of my hook. A quick yank and voila, I had caught my first fish of the afternoon and the jinx was broken!! Now the action would start.
As the afternoon wore on the pile of freshly caught fish steadily grew in our bucket as the three of us continued to fish even as the number of worms reduced drastically for it seemed that the fish this afternoon were adept at nibbling on the bait without latching onto the hook. The final tally was a miserable 13 fish down from a record 45 fish nine months earlier but still enough for all of us to have a well-deserved meal of freshly caught and grilled fish for dinner that evening.
After dinner it was time to play some family games involving all the children, parents and grandparents. It was interesting to watch the children get the better of their parents and grandparents, a natural reaction given that they are in the digital age and the information age. It was definitely time well spent with family and bonding came easily despite the scarcity of fish at the end of our line in a beautiful setting overlooking the Abedare Mountains on one side and Mount Kenya Forest on the other.
We were truly in God’s playground that afternoon and even if I had not caught any fish, it was still time well spent.
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