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Does this offend you?

Oh well it should!! Because it is a sad reality happening in Kenya, the monstrosity of poaching by gluttonous human beings. But not today, because on this very day Kenya lights a fire so big the world will not be able to ignore it; the fire will burn stockpiles filled mainly with tusks belonging to over 6,000 elephants and rhinos as well as hides and skins belonging to other wild animals lost as a result of greedy poachers. This fire should send a message to the world that our animals are #worthmorealive than dead, they are our source of joy, our revenue and are part and parcel of why we Kenyans take pride in being one of the best wildlife destinations in the world. Mention Kenya to anyone and apart from acknowledging that we are exemplary sportsmen, they will admit that our wildlife scenery is a sight to behold and Kenya is always on the buckets list when it comes to safari destinations.


But yesterday when I visited the burning sites where the stockpiles had been mounted, I felt it all: shame, despair, disappointment and an overwhelming sadness. There stood an elephant graveyard, bloody and stinky, with a swarm of flies covering it. Innocent blood nonetheless, the elephant attacked nobody, neither did the dead rhinos, nor the lions, cheetahs and leopards. But their stinking carcasses were left behind to rot. The poachers didn't kill these animals because they were starving  and needed food, NO they stood at a distance and shot poisonous darts at them and cowardly waited for them to fall to the ground: helpless. Some of them even cut off the animal tusks while the animals were still conscious. That's how low humanity has stooped.

Stockpiles readied for the fire

Yet yesterday rangers stood in guard next to the stockpiles, guarding what their mates had died protecting. Proof that human greed had just hit it's epitome. We live in a time where we would rather discover new planets to live in than protect the one we are in, sad times where we fund museums to maintain extinct stuffed animals yet we kill and destroy existing species, it sickens me that some idiot out there would take a stupid dose of aphrodisiac made from to get their manhood going and feel like real men yet someone cowardly killed an animal for it, if they are real men why not try and fight the animals without guns or poisoned darts?

Other folks are on a whole new level of shallow-mindedness for assuming mounted animals hides and carvings look better in their living rooms than they would in the wild, not to mention thinking that ivory looks better on you as  trinkets and bracelets than they would on the real animals for Pete's sake!! Did I mention that rhinos and elephants threaten to be extinct in 15 YEARS? Yes that's the reality should this trend continue. The #lightafire gesture may not exactly solve our wildlife problems but it surely is the right move to put the ivory beyond use and the right step towards integrity. Kindly #jointheheard and spread the word that they are #worthmorealive. If the 6,000 elephants stood in a line it would run for 483 kilometers/30 miles long. Think about it.

If I had a say in the matter I would have tied the poachers together with the stockpiles and use them to fuel the fire since cruelty is their most fluent language. But I am just a simple Kenyan tired, frustrated and ashamed by this vice, soo tired.

Ivory is worthless, unless it's on a living animal

MY BROKEN BRAIN

Sometimes my brain breaks. It just stops functioning and everything about me crashes and burns. My life is plunged into a bottomless abyss and everything goes blank. I usually get the felling like a hard disk that has just been formatted, clean and empty, the only exception is that I am aware that I have been formatted yet I can do nothing about it. When this happens I usually have zero cognitive functions; I cannot think at all and whenever I try I just draw blanks. Physically, I become as useless as a statue, I cannot move not even a single muscle on my body. To make this relatable to you let me put it like this, I get the same feeling like I am sleeping except that I am awake and aware that  I am sleeping. Confusing much? Yeah get it. I know this sounds like a quite crazy but yeah it happens so bear with me.

First time it happened I was sure I was dead. It was an unusually cold and dark Wednesday evening, the rain outside was gushing down in massive torrents accompanied with the occasional bolt if lightning and a crack of thunder ripping through the house. I was alone in the house, curled on the couch with my warm and fuzzy Spongebob pj's, listening to Coldplay as I typed away my overdue assignment, while trying to sneak in a couple of chapters of Americanah. Then boom! there was a bright flash of lightning and seconds later the loudest crack of thunder I had ever heard, believe me I felt it in through my spine down to my toes. No that is not what broke my brain. After the horrifying thunder, the power went out and the house went dark leaving the light from my laptop as the only source of light. I stood up, obviously cursing the weather and went to switch off the main switch. As I fumbled for some candles on the kitchen drawer that was when it happened. I felt something on the back of my head, an explosive feeling as if I had been hit really hard by something and either the object or my head was broken. The pain was sharp but short lived before I went tumbling down on the cold kitchen floor.

I cannot accurately say that I blacked out. For starters, even with my eyes closed all I saw was white instead of black (pun intended). It was like I was in a white room with white ceiling and floors and white walls; except I couldn't exactly tell because everything was white. I fought really hard to open my eyelids in vain. I wasn't cold at all, if anything I felt a pleasant warmth, like someone had covered me with a nice and soft blankie. The most frustrating thing was that I was aware that I was on the kitchen floor yet I could do nothing about it. Then it occurred to me, what if I was dead? What if I never woke up again? Was this it? The end? Is this how it feels to die? And what on earth had killed me?!!

Panic set in. I couldn't just die. At least not yet. My mind went on an overdrive. I had my whole life in front of me, my studies, my savings... Hell I had not even had a decent relationship for heavens sake!! And dying like this? In my pyjamas, looking like a homeless person, I hadn't even brushed my teeth yet jeez. So if I was really dead was I going to heaven or hell? And are they even real? Where were the angels to guide me?  More importantly where was the little light?

After that a deep calmness engulfed me. My head went blank and everything was quiet. But I was aware when my friend came to check on me and started screaming. I felt it when I was being carried to hospital. I drifted in and out as my mother switched between praying and sobbing beside me. I remember my little sister telling me to wake up or she was gonna wear my clothes or mess with my stuff. Someone, I am not sure who even said "I love you"! But I was wallowing in this unknown realm, I felt like a kite in space: just drifting away.

TRUTHS Part 2*3

Welcome to my second part of the TRUTH series, in case you missed the first part here is the link. Today I seek to shed some light on my opinion about truths, not general truths like ‘the sun rises in the east’ or anything frivolous but real life truths. Things that happen to us or those stuff that we do, but are best left untold. You might note that in this case there is a thin line between secrets and truths. However, all secrets are not necessarily true and all truths don’t need to be secrets. It is safe to say that every rational human being above the age of eleven, this includes you and I, has some form of secret. These secrets may be good or bad and may elicit all types of opinions and emotions. But that’s why we are here today. So, let’s dig in.

My mother usually says “truth is like a dead rat, you might lock it in a drawer but chances are the smell will give it away.” We all have some stuff about us that we feel not so comfortable sharing with anyone regardless of the magnitude of our relationship. For instance, a lady or a guy who has been sexually abused in the past is not at liberty to recount his or her experience to everyone they get into a relationship with.

The same scenario may apply to a person who has done time in prison for whatever crime or in more dramatic cases one of their relatives was a sexual predator or some sort of societal misfit. We cannot rule out cheating on your spouse or partner and having different sexual preferences i.e. being gay. Having a drug problem or being former drug addict also falls in this category as well as having an abortion or kids out of wedlock, among other truths that we consider serious.

Some truths are never that serious. Say, getting wasted on spring break and you somehow end up flashing your boobs in public, only for the pictures taken to come and haunt you later. Or making a sex tape with someone you thought you loved and trusted only for it to go viral years later when you are happily married and a respectable member of society. We’ve all heard cases where people were strippers or exotic dancers as well as sexual workers to pay their way through certain situations in life like college.

But why do we hesitate to speak our truth?
1. Judgment
Like it or not we humans are judgmental creatures by nature. We see a teenage mother and assume she is morally loose, we meet a well-dressed guy sleeping in the streets and assume he has a drinking problem, anyone in jail we assume is a criminal, and a kid throwing a tantrum in public we assume is spoilt. In as much as we love judging, we are surprisingly in constant fear of being judged and so we burry our truths deep in the past hoping that they will somehow go away.

2. Fear of the unknown
There is nothing tougher in life than not knowing what exactly you are afraid of. Should you let your guard down and tell your husband that you had an abortion in college that’s maybe why you are having issues with child bearing, how would he react? Would he be mad or supportive? Would he wish you had told him earlier? What will happen to your 5 years of marriage? These unanswered questions pose more problems than solutions and it is only human to take the easy way out and feign lack of knowledge.

3. Previous experiences
Once bitten twice shy, we all know that too well. If you ever did tell someone you thought you trusted your truth and it backfires on your face, your truthmeter automatically gets faulty. You decide to hold your truths at heart and your awful experience paralyze you from ever trusting anyone with your truth.

4. Self-acceptance
Before you confide in anyone about your truth you need to have accepted it first. Many are times when we mentally block our experiences in hopes that by ignoring them, they never happened. We cannot erase the past, that’s for sure but we still have a shot at dictating our future. For instance, accepting that you were sexually abused at some point in life does not mean that you are letting the experience define you. Instead it means that you are acknowledging that it happened but you are willing to get help and take the necessary action to ensure it never happens again to you or any other person. It is easier for others to accept the truth with you than for you. So begin by accepting your truth first.

All in all, the truth is rarely pure and never simple. However, this does not mean that they define who we are. Be strong, choose wisely those whom you trust and never seek validation from any human being. Remember that how we handle our experiences can either make us or break us. At the end of the day we are only human we may falter, we may fall, and we may crush: but our ability to rise up and dust ourselves off is what defines us. Judge not lest though be judged and don’t forget every saint has a past, just as every sinner has a future.

TRUTHS. Part 1*3

February, what a month. I am more than glad to welcome this new month after the shenanigans associated with the festive season and January blues. Anyone living in Kenya knows that January is no joke because somehow everybody seems to be magically broke in January; it doesn’t matter whether you are good at saving, or that you paid all your bills in good time…that dough just doesn’t seem to flow jeez. Enough rambling for now, and allow me to indulge you in something intriguing I recently underwent in this three part blog series I call TRUTHS.

Last February, I helped a friend organize a surprise engagement for his girlfriend. They had been dating for a year and things were cozy enough between them to take it to the next level. Well, she did say yes and after the customary tears and declarations of endless love they moved in together and even wedding preparations were underway. So last week again this friend, let’s call him Mark, calls me as he needs ideas about their first anniversary celebration,

“I need something classy and authentic but with just the right amount of romance,” he said sounding love struck as usual.
“I got you, what’s the budget?”
“Same as last time.”



So today at 5.00AM Mark’s girlfriend calls me, sobbing and incoherent telling me something along the lines of “you should talk to him” and that she is sorry. I listen half sleepy not understanding a word of what she is saying, heaven knows I hate drama in my life. Besides I had been working the whole night and was in no mental or physical state to understand her. As soon as she hangs up I got back to sleep till around 11AM, when Mark calls and tells me to get ready as he is coming to pick me up in half an hour for brunch. FYI that’s code for we need to talk. He pulls up in front of my house twenty minutes later looking like a tractor ran him over. Then he answers my greeting with a nod as we speed off nearly running over my poor caretaker. This looks really bad.


A few cocktails later, I learn that he just broke off his engagement. Case and point, the fiancé had forgotten that she was a mother of two kids, yes KIDS, and in this case four year old twins! How on earth did he find out? He goes on to tell me that he stumbled across a picture that she was tagged on, on Facebook by some dude. In it she was heavily pregnant and when he asked her about it, at first she denied it… then went on to lie to him that the kid was dead. Seeing that it was a sensitive topic he didn't press on.

What intrigued me however wasn’t the news about kids, because everyone knows he loves children as he was always talking about how he needs at least six, but why did he call off the engagement? After the pregnancy discovery they hit a rough patch but he wanted things back to normal that’s why he called her sister to help him chose a dress for her, for the surprise anniversary. Long story short as they were shopping he asked her how her kids were doing. Surprised she told him she only had one child.
“What about the ones you were with at the Kids Festival?”
“Oh! You are confusing them, mine is older but those are Stella’s twins.”

An innocent remark, but that was it. That evening Stella went ballistic on her poor sister who had no idea her kids were a secret. They had a pretty nasty fight where she confessed to having kids (who are alive), and her reason for not telling him was cause she forgot. That simple.


“I cannot trust a mother who can deny her own children to be my wife and possibly the mother of my kids, how on earth," he said.

ART ATTACK

The past couple of nights have been not so pleasant to yours truly because I have been battling insomnia and painsomnia (lack of sleep due to severe  pain) in equal measure. My doctor prescribed some pain meds for me ‘Tramadol' which have been so helpful and pain relieving but my insomnia still needs intervention. Last week we tried meditation and I ended up sleeping in his office (lol) but when I self meditate I cannot sleep, but it does help me relax. During such nights I try channeling my energy into something productive and so I decided to do something I hadn’t done in a while...paint.

"Be productive not busy". Unknown

 I am not exactly what you would call an artist, but I can sketch, scribble or doodle once in a while. When it comes to painting I like creating patterns or painting abstracts but this time I wanted something slightly different. The following are the tools I used;

 Blank canvas/ sketchpad
 Pencils
 Rubber eraser
 Acrylic paint
 Artist brushes number 2-9

Pencils and brushes

Acrylic paint

Then I started sketching. Initially I wanted to sketch Queen Nefertiti but my sketching game was at an all time low so I settled for a portrait of an African woman, with what I intended to be a ‘colorful personality’, please don’t laugh it sounded better in my head.

Shaping the nose and the mouth was quite the task but I tried.

Then I started painting and opted for blue as my backdrop.

At around 10.00 am in the morning I was done and feeling quite pleased with myself. My social media pages and timelines were flocked with these images.

That highlight and contour game lol

I hate to blow my own horn but I think I did alright on this one, don’t you think so?

Final piece

CAMPUS BLUES

The school gate.            

Once more it is my favourite time of the semester, reporting week. Don’t get me wrong, to many going back to school sucks big time for various reasons: it could be  that they are being separated from their loved  ones and are genuinely distraught, others hate the school routine and would rather binge watch ‘Scandal' season after season while stuffing their faces with junk and live on vampire time zone (movies through the nights and sleeping at daytime), most hate school cause their minds have been preprogrammed to hate school since childhood and the last in this category hate school because their friends hate school, simple.

But for the other category, me included we do love reporting back to school. Not because we miss the endless, torturous lectures or the eerie environment of the Post Modern Library, no thanks but because school provides us with a much needed holiday camp. Some of us want a breather from the 9-5 internship we prematurely volunteered for only to discover that we are not ready for the career world and so we need to catch up on our sleep. I know of a some who want to reunite with their friends and loved ones, carry on with the mischief that the campus environment provides and participate in potentially destructive activities that their strict and God fearing parents would drown themselves in holy water if they found them partaking. The rest are a balance between those who are bored and tired of idling in the village and those who can’t wait to splurge their HELB money.

All in all, school is back on and boy don’t I love the signature atmosphere of a fresh semester. Pomp, color, fashion and glamour. I am talking about people with flashy hairdos, am talking weaves, braids and interesting haircuts died in all seven colors of the rainbow, destined to last them a month, or two...and a half? Fresh new outfits that will be converted to mitumba once the semester took a turn, and the same people would be hawking them for half the price in the hostels and the occasional group and clutter of students sharing the juicy details of their holiday escapades, roaring laughter being the only giveaway of how ghory their tales may be. Reporting week would not be complete without the signature view of majority of male students hunched over with massive sacks of maize, enough to feed a family of five for a semester, crawling their way to the hostels.

The gate, by night 

The guards call the students to pick their luggage from the the waiting tent and it’s the last call for registration. And as the sun sinks away in the horizon, I hear the fading vocals of some zilizopendwa song at the registration podium. Day 1 was a success. I cannot wait for the scramble for last minute online registration and fee payment by the remainder of the students famously referred to as #teamdeadline. This will in deed be an interesting semester.