When it rains, it pours!
One of the following could be happening to you as you read this, or two…or all! You are in a creased shirt thanks to a power blackout, you are calculating how you are going to pay Ksh. 200 as bus fare, you are stuck in traffic or you are calculating how to get yourself an umbrella. Of course there are those who are calling a friend that spins to inquire if they have left town (never mind he/she has to first finish a clan meeting at a café in Westlands yet you live in Imara Daima)
So the rainy season is here (which coincidentally starts falling at 3pm). Back where I come from, we regard rain as a blessing, especially when the smell of the moist earth gets to our nostrils. But as they say, too much of something is not good. With the rains, peculiar habits have cropped up with Kenyans. As CN once said, we are wonderful habits, with wonderful people.
It must be booming business for umbrella vendors. I hear they even have turfs and targets to meet. They are competing with stalls that have to replay that “Utamu wa Yesu” song with their chants of “Ubrera mia biri, kubwa thiri-fifty, dogo biri”. meet them when there is a dry spell and the same umbrella will go for 150!
Does your company dish out umbrellas as goodies? Then you are missing on a great advertising opportunity. Out of every five people with an umbrella, three are heavily branded.
There are those who are smart enough to penetrate a demographic of their own. Shower caps vendors. Yes, a lady has got to do what she has to do to protect her man, and her hair.
People, don’t be stingy…get an umbrella. No need to get to work looking like a jogoo that has been rained on, then start sneezing and spreading flu at the workplace. Don’t just use an umbrella that has a lose spike long enough to jab a cow. As for chicks, there is this one I was walking with, then it started raining and she looked composed. She opened her bag, chomoad the micro of micro-est umbrellas and acted normally. Selfishness, I think.
There are those who walk on the sidewalks with their umbrellas wide open, yet there is no contact with the rain at all. It’s my hope they don’t enter buildings with them wide open. Upon entering a building or a bus, they forget their umbrella is dripping and all of a sudden they become a rain-god, splashing others with water.
Quick question, how do you ‘hang’ an umbrella that is dripping? See, you don’t even know!
Yesterday it was too much and since the sidewalks were crowded (be wary of pickpocket buggers btw), I decided to enter a supermarket in town and window-shop. So long was the rain hadi I found myself at the baby section chambuaring diapers as I waited for it to end. I hope those guys don’t see me again today pulling the same trick. Much better than sitting at a coffee shop sipping one mug of coffee for two hours.
I know of those who have stopped hanging their clothes on the balcony, as the rain gets there and they have to endure a damp shirt the following day. They have taken to sharing their bathrooms with the clothes on the ka-line in that bafu.
For those living in places where you have to jump puddles of water, there are those smart Kenyans that will tell you they can carry you to the other side for 20bob. You fold your trouser/skirt and they begin the wading journey. Halfway they drop a bombshell: mama, hii maji ni mingi..itabidi uongeze pesa ama ushuke …
Dear mobile service provider, what is with your network and the rain? Each time it rains, I am offline. The same happens for a cable provider, when it rains thoughts of going to cover the dish with a big 20bob paper bag come into my mind. Get your acts together, we love you but don’t make us not love you!
I paid Ksh. 200 yesterday from town to where I stay here in Nairobi. I come from Kangundo where bus fare is Ksh. 150. Am sure me and my uncle who commutes daily from Kangundo to the city got home at the same time. If this is the trend, we shall be leaving work, getting home, having supper and breakfast together as we wait for the water to boil (@KenyaPower), change and go back to work.
Drivers, have some courtesy. Don’t splash us with water. Remember to close your windows as there are those matatus that splash water on your car. Let me not talk about vitz lest I get carried away like them when it rains (oops!)
Talking about Kenya Power, I think I have a solution. Leave work with all your gadgets charged, boil water using a stove (but you will smell paraffin beware) and invest in candles and if you dumped that charcoal iron box, revive it and use it carefully. I recall this time I was getting ready for a wedding, days back in the village and a piece of charcoal fell on the shirt. (story for another day, you’d have thought I was the groom). Avoid blind dates during this power blackout days and beware of manholes.
We have uncles and aunts in waiting. Rain, is indeed a blessing. Come January baby showers will clout our weekends. If you have to iron your bed before jumping in, pole sana. Water bottles have replaced FWBs.
The weekend is here, want to score some points? Be bold and tell someone: kwangu nina generator, network na duvet. Boat yangu iko kwa basement.
Am out (yikes…it’s raining again!)
