Running falsely – is it worth it?

Running falsely – is it worth it?

Yesterday was a memorable Friday.  I left Uthiru at one, got a matatu to Kawangware, and then another one to Adams Arcade.  I had not even settled and taken a breath when I was called into the dental room.  I was ushered straight to the reclining seat that I am now so used to.  There was no time for niceties.  I appreciate that DSes are busy people.  Additionally, I do not like anything that starts with ‘dent’ and I try to give such the minimum of the minimum time available.

I had already seen that dental crown for the few seconds that I had, before being ushered onto the recliner.  It looked so real!  That premolar ‘imposter’ was almost like the real thing.  It had been shaped like a real, had the colour of a real and even had the hardness of a real one when I touched it briefly.

“Let us fix him in there,” the DS said as he probably pointed at the crown, and waved in my direction in my recliner.  I could not see much from my semi-sleeping position.  I was already having on my face that large pair of goggles that I loathe.  Of course, I got to appreciate them soon, when water splatter and some flying debris from all manner of dental works started flying about.

I was now used to this dental chair, in this very room for the last five months.  I had started this in early October 2021.  I was finally ending in in March 2022.  I had second guessed my decision to get this prosthetic into my mouth to fill that gap on the lower jaw, the gap that had been there for over twenty-years with no effect at all.  I was comfortable with that gap as was, after all, it was these same DSes that extracted a premolar from that very spot, when they claimed that it was of no use, rotten, they called it.  Why did they want that gap now filled, when it is them who wanted it created?

The same DSes had now changed their narrative and told me that if that gap remained open, then the upper premolar would progressively grow longer and get into that gap.  This was surely impossible.  The gap had reduced in size as a result of the neighbouring teeth filling it up over time, though the gap still remained.  The upper tooth had grown longer than the rest, but with just a manageable bit, not as exaggerated as the dental surgeons, DSes, were stating.  Anyway, they are the experts.

The discussion to get that gap filled started earlier in 2021.  October just happened to be decision time.  I went for it.  It was more of I had no choice based on the Armageddon that the DSes had promised if that gap stayed for a day longer than October.  It is then that the procedure started.  That is when the implant was drilled into my jawbone in that three-hour operation.  This is already in the public domain, so let me not remind myself of it.

Five months later and here I was on this Friday, finishing what I had started.  A was paying up an instalment of almost 50k in each of those months, all from my pocket, after the insurance had declared such an important treatment as ‘cosmetic’, despite this being something that would be spelling doom to my life.  How can something that affects your life adversely, in the opinion of those who have our lives in their hands, be considered ‘cosmetic’?

Soon the temporary cap that had been affixed on the gum of that gap was unscrewed and the implanted screw exposed.  It was not long before that crown, with a hole brought it, was affixed onto the implanted screw.  A small wrench was fixed onto the small groove on the crown and this fixed the crown into position.  Finally, that groove through the artificial tooth was filled up with some materials, which I just heard them ‘mix it up’, ‘fix the primer’, ‘UV it up’.

Just when I thought they were through and….

“Try to close your mouth and try fit your jaws together,” the doc said.

I tried.

The jaws did not fit!

I could feel the very high level of the prosthesis preventing my already lowered upper premolar from settling onto the lower jaw.  I did not know that the upper and lower jaws have a natural comfortable resting position!  

“I feel a hard thing in the mouth,” I responded.

“OK, let me see,” he tried seeing.

“Bite on this, and move your jaws in a chewing motion,” he continued, after fixing something like a piece of paper into my mouth, on that right side next to the now filled-up gap.

A series of grinding sounds would soon follow.  Each grinding sound would then be followed by that chewing on paper thing, then another examination of that paper, then another round of grinding.  Four repetitions later and, “It is almost comfortable,” I said.

“One more time,” he said, “Get me the diamond,” he instructed the nurse aid.

The nurse gave him something that I did not see.

“This is when we usually need such,” he told the nurse in a manner of education, as he proceeded to fix something to one of the gadgets, but I could not see the motions from my reclined position, which was now completely flat – and I hate flat!

Another round of grinding of both the upper tooth and the new lower crown followed.  When it was done, I did the last chewing motion and all was just about well.  Not exactly OK, since I still felt that something new and hard was in my mouth.  It did not feel like a tooth, more like a piece of stone in my mouth.  The upper tooth was still hitting that new tooth and responding with some uncomfortable knocking sensation.  However, I had to live with it for now.  I just hoped that the strange feeling in the mouth would subside.

Hardly twenty-four hours later and that strange feeling in the mouth is gone!  I hardly feel any new different tooth in the mouth, nor is there a knocking action of the upper tooth onto the lower ceramic.  I feel nothing at all.  I have only experienced a sharp pressure pain once, when I chewed on a tough piece of bone.  Other than that, I am not even sure if there is a new tooth in the mouth.

WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, March 5, 2022

Running powerless and Paying for it

Running powerless and Paying for it

I am now used to staying without electric power.  The power fails every other day, albeit for short duration.  However, the power failure has progressively become more prolonged since the national power provider, KPLC, decided to get themselves into a scandal that was compounded with that nearly national power blackout of mid-January.

It is for this reason that I was not surprised at all when there was no power in my house last Thursday evening.  However, this was the ‘discriminative’ type, where some houses in the two-storey apartment have power, while others do not.  It is technically called a phase failure, where one or two of the three power cables becomes faulty.  This means only the houses connected to the faulty line fail to get power while the rest enjoy the goodness of electricity.

The phase failure has been a common occurrence in that plot.  I am not sure if it is only my pad that gets hit, but I can confirm that I tend to feel so, though I have no data to back my feeling.  I only see the times when I am in the dark while the rest of the houses are lit.  Maybe others are equally affected, but I do not know.

I was therefore quite OK with the power fail in my house despite the others houses having power.  I went to bed in the dark and surprisingly woke up in the dark the next morning, Friday.  That was strange.  I am used to such a phase failure being resolved by the next morning.  This one had not been resolved almost twelve hours later.  I left for duty dejected with lots of curses to the power provider, albeit with some hope that the evening would bring in some good tidings.

I was a bit surprised when I came back home around nine in the evening Friday to still find the house dark.  This prolonged power fail was surely setting a wrong record for the power provider.  I was just glad that I did not have a refrigeration equipment, otherwise I would be in a worse situation.  I was however not very surprised, yes, not very surprised.  The power company was capable of anything!  What else can you say of a company that allows a row of high voltage power pylons to collapse to the ground causing that national blackout?  And to blame scrap metal vandals for that national disaster is surely stretching it!

Anyway, I went to bed for a second night with lots of bad feelings for the power company.  I was however convinced that they surely would resolve the phase failure by morning.  Believe it or not, I woke up on Saturday with no power for a third day running!  Something had to give.

I called the caretaker to just confirm that many of us were suffering the power fail.  She usually gets to know of such, and on some occasions, I have heard her over my earshot talking about the failure and stating to whoever that she had called Kenya Power about it.

The caretaker was surprised that I did not have power, since there was no power problem at all in the last week.  Her first question was, “Umelipa kweli?”

I had not even imagined that I could be asked that question.  I had not even thought that the power fail could be a power cut.  I had not even thought of thinking along these lines.  I did not even want to take that line of thinking on this Saturday morning.

Of course I had paid, in advance.  I pay the bill on the date of issuance of the bill, two weeks before the due date.  I even I have a budget tracker that ensures that the power bill item remains glowing on the list until it is paid and ticked off.

“Kuna watu wa pawa walikuja kukata stima juzi, lazima walikata yako.  Kweli ulilipa?,” she reconfirmed.

I started to even doubt whether I had really paid up that bill.  Did the Njanuary month of 60-days get into me to the extent of not remembering to pay?  Did my budget tracker do a number on me?  Was it the December bill that I actually did pay and not this one?  I asked myself quite some questions, even as I spoke on phone.

I soon sent a query to the 977 short message code so that Kenya Power can check the bill against my meter.  And as sure as the earth is flat, I soon got a response that I had all outstanding bills and my account was reading -0.00.

“Phew!,” I exhaled even as I got my sanity back.  I would soon send the same confirmation to the caretaker, since she was in total disbelief herself, that I had paid yet my power had been disconnected.  In fact after getting that message we talked once more on phone and she even used the word “mlevi” while describing whoever was involved.

At that point I had the option of waiting until Monday to sort it out with the power company that made the mistake, hence add another 2 dark days to my bill, or go plan B.  That is when the caretaker told me that she knows someone who knows someone that knows another person who is authorized to reconnect erroneously disconnected meters, “lakini yeye hurudisha stima na thao,” she concluded casually.

“For crying out loud!,” I almost cried out loud!

My last bill was only four hundred shillings and I usually pay about five hundred shillings monthly for that power.  Now I have to pay up double that amount for reconnection caused by a mistake that is not mine!

Long story short, I got my power back the same evening, while my MPESA balance was seriously depleted.  Sometimes you have to do what you have to do, and just pay to Caesar what is his.  Maybe there is even a cartel to disconnect incorrect meters so that we pay up this reconnection fee ‘on the side’.

WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, Feb. 8, 2022

Running into a booster in the wrong right arm

Running into a booster in the wrong right arm

It is exactly one week since this happened.  I have tried to avoid telling the story so that I avoid having egg on my face, but the story is just too compelling to let go, so here goes…

Last week on such a Wednesday I knew that I would be getting a corona booster vaccination shot.  This had been made optional to the staff though it has been ‘highly recommended’ provided one had met the boosting conditions.  These conditions were few – basically the last full vaccination shot must have been 6-months prior.  My last one was in July, so I was qualified.  Being a vaccination day, there was no discrimination on whether one was getting a first, second or booster.  It is only the booster that had that stringent 6-month caveat.

Coincidentally, and for purposes of raking in the numbers, we also had a blood/serological camp, where anyone could volunteer to provide blood sample for purposes of testing their antibody response to corona.  Such tests would then confirm prior exposure to the virus and even details as to the effectiveness of the vaccine on the body, including whether the activeness of the vaccine (N-protein levels) was waning over time.

The first twist to this combined camp was that those already vaccinated on that day could not undergo the serology.  That meant that serology had to come first before the vaccination.  I saw a red light just there on how these two camps that were set at the same location would be managed.  Some were coming for one of the two camps, while other staff were coming for both.  The vaccination was a morning only affair, while the blood thing was full day.  The serology involves being taken through a ten-minute questionnaire session, while the vaccination was just a walk-in-walk-out setting.  This combined camp was going to challenge the very core of logistics, patience and perseverance.

I had to do careful calculations to ensure that I attended both.  I needed the blood works since I had travelled to Western Kenya in December and my exposure level to the population in the travels and while there was a bit higher than I would usually encounter.  I could have been exposed to the virus in that sojourn, though I had not felt the effects at all at any point in time.  The closest that I got to feeling ‘virused’ was when I got a chocking cough for about five minutes around January 10, a week after I had come back to the city.  This episode was quickly forgotten and there has never been any other feeling to make be believe I have or have had corona.  But you never know, the double dose of Asta-Zeneca has maybe been my saving grace!  I needed the bloodwork, I told you! The results of previous such works had confirmed no exposure since I took the first such test in July.

I was also a volunteer at the vaccination camp even as I sought this serology thing.  That meant that I had to first deal with the bloodwork then be free to assist in pre-registration of those coming for the vaccinations, then update their records thereafter.  I knew that this day would be different and even easier to manage.  Afterall, I was confident that the online pre-registration of those being vaccinated would make the process seamless.  However, that is not what happened…..

I stayed for over 30-minutes at the serology tent, where they were asking me for the fifth time in monthly intervals the selfsame questions that they had asked before.  Why can’t they develop an online form where I can answer these questions for myself?  Do they trust the interviewer more than the interviewee?

“Have you travelled out of Nairobi for the last one month?”

“Yes”

“Where to?”

I answered

“For how long?”

I answered.

“How many people on average did you interact with?”

For crying out loud!  When will private life become private?

Anyway, l eventually got through and donated my blood for science.  It was just about nine-thirty.  The queue to the serology tent was already long.  The three tents housing those coming for vaccination were also full.  I also had to get myself in the vaccination booth first, if I was to eventually take a seat and do the vaccinee registrations that was soon going to hit us, judging by the number of those seated and waiting.

I got into the vaccination booth and found the nurse and the data person taking tea.  They were gearing up to start.  We are used to having two nurses during such events.  Today there was only one.  I know that the vaccination throughput is usually fast when the process starts, but having only one nurse for this already big population was an overkill.

“I want to the first person getting the shot so that I can move on with registration work,” I told the lady and gent at the tea table.  Those were faces that I had met in the past vaccination camps.  We had some level of familiarity.

“Let me finish the tea, then we can start,” the lady responded, “I just have to mix the vaccines first.”

New info!  The mixing.  Or whatever that meant.  In another five minutes the mix was done, after I had indicated that I was a double AZ vaccinee, to which I she told me that Pfizer Biontech was the boost that I was to get as recommended by the GOK MOH.

I sat next to the vaccination kits on the table spaced at the middle of the booth.  I could see the tea table at the extreme end of the tent.  On my left was the exit position of this square booth.  I had already removed my coat as I knew the procedure as it has become.  I unrolled the sleeve and looked aside as I momentarily felt a prick on the upper arm, then a pressing of a cotton swab on the same place.  The swab was immediately removed and thrown into a medical bin, together with the ‘sharps’ of the syringe and associated items.

“Done, we are now ready to start, you may call them in,” she gestured me out.

I put back my coat and got my laptop from the side table in that booth and walked out.  I left the queue management to another volunteer as I quickly went to one of the four big tents to setup my computer station.  I knew that very soon we would be having an influx of those already vaccinated and in need of an update on the computer system.

I logged into the system and was ready to get the ball rolling.  Obeying the principles of separation of duties, I asked one of my three colleagues to update my vaccination record on her system, promising to return the favour when her time came.

“Your ID number?”

I told her on the next desk

“The vaccination taken?”

“Pfizer”

“Let me see, there are three listed, which one was it?”

I remember being careful to confirm the vaccine batch number when I finished my shot.  The batch would usually be the same for the whole camp setup of the day.

“The middle one on the list, the one starting with N”

“Oh, I see,” she responded, “How about body temperature?”

I remembered that figure from the blood tent, where you also get your vitals taken.

“Done!”

I knew that very soon I would be the one asking people these questions, and it did not take long, since I was soon registering the first, and second and third… and tenth, and eleventh… and thirtieth, and thirty-first… and sixtieth vaccinee on the system.  They were just so many coming for post-registration.  The pre-registration done that we had already filled in two days prior having turned out to be a non-starter hoax!  What a waste of our computing resources and time!  It remained a busy day until at some point I was updating the CEO himself on the system having taking his booster.

We took a lunch break and wrapped up with the last ten or so after the lunch break, upon which time the nurses, who were now two, and the data person from the MOH closed camp and left.  The serology camp continued in the afternoon though our data entry team had already left the ghost tents in the middle of the field.  We had taken one step towards slaying corona, despite the worldwide numbers* being 384M and 5.7M deaths, with Kenyan numbers being 321,671 and 5,593 respectively.

*source: worldometers

I woke up the next day with a pain on my right top arm, just near the shoulder.  I could feel the unmistakable sensation of a needle prick on that right arm.

“Oh emm geee!,” I woke up shouting to myself.  I had been vaccinated on the wrong hand!

WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, Wednesday, Feb. 2, 2022

New Year? Really!

New Year?  Really!

It is just yesterday, in the early hours, that I heard that customary shout…

“Happy New Year!”

“Happy New Year!”

It was all over the air.  Out there.  I could hear the sound of fireworks.  I could hear some random noises.  Some shouts here and there.  It was late night, but the darkness of the night could not keep the folks quiet out there.  

That was not all.  I could hear the singing.  The music.  The preaching!  It was all there.  In the dead of the night.  So, what was going on yesterday in the dead of the night.  In the wee of the hours?  I was just on the late-night watch…. Doing nothing but watching.  I have made it my custom to take a ‘real’ holiday when times like this come.  Times like a holiday break that I was having at the moment.  A time when I do nothing… but look at the screen.  I inter-switch between the live and the recorded.  I sit on a designated seat.  In the middle of the living room and stay put for over sixteen hours.  The only break I do take is to the restroom, and then back to my seat.  

I enjoy my holidays to the max.  I get my maximum rest during such times.  I usually do not even know which day or date it is once I start the rest.  Everyday is just any day.  I just know there is day and night.  It could as well be a Sunday or a Monday.  Well, it could even be February or October for crying out loud!  When I take my holiday rest, I do take the holiday rest… doing nothing – technically, taking a rest.

So, when those noises of the wee hours erupted, I was kind-a-taken aback.  What was happening?  How can the environment, the darkness of the night, just erupt into noises and sounds of fireworks and singing and music and preaching and praying and chatter?  In the middle of the night?  I had to halt the watching.  This halt must have been on the tenth-hour of events occurring in real time, out of the expected 24-hours of watching 24.

Well, this must have been quite something.  To interrupt ‘real time’ screen time was quite something.  So, I took the break, opened the door of the second-floor apartment and stood out at the front verandah.  I could see the dim light of the streetlights just beyond the apartment block compound.  I could just make out something like a firework in the horizon of the Eldoret town.  There was nothing else visible in the dark, just some flashes in the sky, and the sounds and noises that whiffed through the darkness and stillness of the midnight.

I got back to my seat and unpaused.  I was re-immersed into the real time on screen and life continued.

That was just yesterday.  It is now a new day.  It is today.  It is a Sunday, so they say, since from my seat it could as well be any day of the week.  It is January – another thing said, which may be true or not.  Tomorrow, I am told, schools reopen, same as offices and the rest of businesses for something called the start of the year in the month of January.  Then we shall count another twelve months of anticipation and waiting, to finally get to another such noisy night like yesterday.  Another day like yesterday, when we make resolutions on what we want to happen, simply because it is a new year.  What would happen if we made that resolution say in June?  Will it change the happening of the resolution?  What is this new year obsession thing?

I am now seated over the eighteenth episode, determined to get to 24 by the end of the day as I wonder what is the obsession that we as humanity have with this New Year Day thing?  Let me disclaim that I have nothing against celebrating the New Year.  Go ahead do it.  Enjoy to the max!  I would celebrate myself if I got to know when it was and was convinced that that was the real start of a new year.  Therefore, please, celebrate New Year as you deem fit.  Who doesn’t like a good celebration, even if it is just once in year?  I am not against anyone celebrating.  Just do it.  I am just wondering aloud why this is such a big deal and a big day, than say today?  Don’t the different days all have 24… I mean 24 hours?

Let me even disclose that I was an annual new year celebrant.  During my primary and secondary school days I did participate in New Year celebrations on the date, on the day!  Life at the rural areas did not allow us to celebrate in the midnight as it is done in the urban areas.  At shags we could not afford to light the midnight oil.  We should have gone to bed by eight to conserve the kerosene in the lamps.  Nights were (and still are) quiet and still.  No noises are made in the night.  The night is for quietness and darkness.  Nothing should interfere with those two whatsoever.  That meant that we would celebrate the new year on the new year day morning.  We would start with an early morning congregation at the local church, followed by loud resolutions of what the new year should bring forth.  Then we would move from homestead to homestead just feasting and reminding all that we had made resolutions.  Good old days, but unfortunately, New Year is no more!

Anyway, let me not keep you guessing for long.  I will go ahead and tell you when New Year ended.  New Year ended in 2020 when a virus called corona virus hit the world and people started suffering from the disease caused by that virus.  This disease, called COVID19, has since become the defining moment for the human race.  It has caused closures, shutdowns, curfews, lockdowns and everything bad.  It was led to cancellation of events, days and dates.  The 2020 Olympic games were even held in 2021 for crying out loud!  With all that disruption of events as we know them, do you really believe that we still have New Year?  With 290,054,489 infected* with the virus in the world and 5,459,176 dead?  5,384 of which are dead in Kenya? 

*source worldometers website

Have yourselves a Happy New Year 2022.

WWB, the Coach, Eldoret, Kenya, Jan. 2, 2022

The truth is out… there is nothing called Christmas

The truth is out… there is nothing called Christmas

I did not even think twice when I was told there was a private car to Eldoret for two-thousand five hundred per person.  I was already seated without hesitation, with the young runner travelling alongside.

“Umpatie fifteen,” the stage hand whispered as I settled on the back seat.  There was already another woman seated back left as I sat middle seat.  The front left had an elderly man.  We waited briefly for the driver.  All were quiet.

“Nakuru ngapi?,” a new person came to the driver’s window just as the driver got in and adjusted his seat.

The driver looked back at the full backseat with three seated.

“Naona kumejaa.  Utatosha kweli?  Ok, lete thao!”

We were wondering how a fourth person would miraculously fit onto that back seat and were already murmuring out protest.  In fact, I had told the young runner that we would have to abandon the ride and wait for another opportunity, than be squeezed with another person in that full seat.  The driver must have got our sentiments, since he momentarily acknowledged that the car was full and drove off.

It was now seven-thirty on this Thursday, December 23.  We soon got to the petrol station at Cooperation, hardly a kilometre from our pickup point in Uthiru.

“Lete hizo pesa tuweke petroli,” the driver held back a hand in my direction.

I handed him three notes of a thousand-shilling denomination each.  He counted and returned his hand towards the backseat.

“Hazi toshi.  Ongeza soo sita”

“Lakini tuliambiwa ni fifteen!”

“Ai, hapana.  Hata ilitakiwa iwe thao mbili mbili, lakini nikatoa ka discount.”

That is how I paid the balance by MPESA and got to know the driver’s name.  So, James drove off and we joined the traffic jam just before Gitaru.  The vehicles were jam packed and hardly moving.  We kept going slowly.  We diverted from the parking yard of the main road and got to a side road just before Limuru.  We endured that rough side road before rejoining the main road where vehicles were hardly moving.

It continued being slow going.  At Kinale we did another diversion to the sideroads to emerge somewhere past Soko Mjinga towards Flyover.  These diversions were helping us move albeit through rough roads, but we would be back to the traffic jam whenever we got back to the highway.  We kept going that slowly with the jam not relenting at all.  We hardly travelled at over 40km per hour at any time in the drive to Nakuru, where we reached at 12.30pm.  It took us five hours to cover that 160km!  That is like 30km per hour speed!  Even the train could have been faster!!

We took a short break at Nakuru and resumed our journey at one.  The road from Nakuru to Eldoret was equally jam packed, though not as slow as the first phase to Nakuru.  I even afforded a few episodes of a nap before I felt the car come to a stop at some point.  It did not take me long to realize that we were around Timboroa.  The weather remained sunny.  I soon realized that we were on at a police road block.  This was the first one where we had been stopped, since the other blocks were mainly targeting public service and heavy commercial vehicles.

“Lazima ni mambo ya pasenja,” the old name told the driver, “Yani mtu hawezi kubeba relatives?”

“License?,” the cop asked and presented a hand across the front passenger towards the driver’s seating position.

The driver searched around and presented a red wallet.  The cop left with the license and walked to the back to the car, then round towards the driver’s side.

The cop then stood just outside the driver’s seat and asked the driver to disembark, “Shuka nikuenyeshe makosa yako.”

The driver was just about to disembark when the front passenger called the cop, “Officer, hebu rudi.”

The cop made a motion of turning back.  He was already set to wait for the driver somewhere behind the boot.

“Officer, I am Mr. Okeno, the deputy county officer in charge of […..], and I am here with my family heading home…”

The cop did not even wait for the completion of that sentence, since the red wallet was soon handed back to the driver and we were on our way in a hurry.

We encountered another road block at Burnt Forest, where the driver was once gain asked for this license, then asked to hit the brake lights while the cop observed the hind lights.  The driver got his license back and we drove through the jam slowly but steadily all the way to Eldoret.  We disembarked at 4.30pm.  We had just done another three-and-a-half hours for that 160km distance – an average speed of just 45km per hour.  What a journey we had had!

It is finally a Saturday, December 25.  The day started like any other.  The sun still rose from the East.  The wind and cold expected of this town have continued to live to their expectation.  There is no shout or noise.  All is quiet.  The ‘silent night’ song has become ‘silent day’.  So, may I ask what is this Christmas that we are hyping about?

WWB, the Coach, Eldoret, Kenya, Dec. 25, 2021

A birthday run that never was

A birthday run that never was

If there is a time that I thought I had COVID, and specifically Omicron variant, then that time was last week Friday.  COVID due to the symptoms and that particular variant due to the fast progression of the symptoms.  I had started feeling the signs of a common cold on the Thursday but had not taken any second thought of it.  However, on Friday the symptoms had multiplied ten times in less than a 24-hour cycle.  My throat was sore, and my body was weak.  However, I was not having a running nose nor a fever – just the urge to clear the throat and feeling tired for no reason.

Had it not been for the evening meeting that I had no power to cancel, I would surely have taken an early break and taken a bedrest.  I nonetheless persevered through the evening meeting that was to run from six to seven on that Friday and was glad when it eventually came to an end.  I had struggled to stay online and pretended to concentrate, but my body was telling me otherwise.  I needed a rest.

I was still contemplating on how to drag myself home when the meeting ends when there was a knock on the office door.  I suspected that it must be the sentry checking on who was still in office to alert them to lock-up the block as they leave.  I was however getting irritated.  I think that people get unnecessarily irritated when they need a rest.  I had previously told the guard that he did not need to keep reminding me to lock up.  I would do that automatically if I was the last person leaving.  I therefore did not know why he was still insisting on reminding me.

“Come in,” I said and continued conversing with the computer screen, counting the last fifteen-minutes of the evening meeting.  I could not wait to get it done with.

The door remained closed.

Another knock.

“Come right in!,” I raised my voice.  I was not going to answer that door in case nothing happens after this.

The door creaked open.  I was still concentrating on the screen.  I expected the guy.

“Happy birthday!,” I voice shouted from the now opened door.

“Happy what?,” I reacted, slowly turning my gaze from screen to door.

“Daktari, what did you say?,” I heard a participant on the Google Meet event ask.  I had already cautioned that participant that I was not yet a Daktari but he refused to live in the now.  He lived in the ‘by faith’.  I had told him that the ‘Doc’ thing would be happening next year, but I was manifesting it now.

I had to mute the online meeting first, to absorb what was going on.  Into the room matched in the young runner, Atieno, with a big white box at hand.  She proceeded to lay it on the desktop.  That box did not need any imagination to figure out the content.  She laid a Club soda besides it, the two-litre version.

“Have a seat while I get this meeting done with,” I motioned.

The meeting was done by seven.  I was back to the reality of the situation.  It was December 17.  

“You know it is your birthday, right?,” the architect in training said once I had closed the online meeting.

“Oh, how can I forget,” I lied.

I did not know that adults still had birthdays.  I have associated birthdays with the young ones and any other person.  I was still wondering how this birthday event even came about.  Unfortunately, my body was still weak and my throat could not partake of that soda, nor did I have an appetite for food, leave alone cake.  This birthday would have to be postponed.  I just needed a rest.

I tossed and turned and tossed and turned on that night.  I had a fever.  Covering up with three blankets did not even work.  I still shivered and felt cold.  I feared that I had been infected with the corona virus, though when I woke up to reality of the Saturday morning, I was a bit better.  The chills had gone, and the sore throat had gone down.  My remedy had just been hot water laced with lemon, masala and honey.  It seemed to have worked.

But I still had some last minute COVID jitters to contend with….

“I am not reporting for duty.  I have a bad cold.  I suspect I have COVID.  I am going for a test today.”

That short text beeped on my phone at around eleven on Saturday.  A colleague who was to be on duty on this Saturday was cancelling.  We had discussed so many projects the previous day in the small office.  If she was suspecting that she was having the corona virus, then…..

Anyway, I kept getting better, masala and honey at hand, and was surely back to normal by Sunday.  My method of recovery has always been to identify the onset of the flu before it hits, and then take it down with some honey.  This modus operandi enabled me to have less than two-days of downtime whenever the flu hits.  That works for me but maybe not for others, since that young runner would report a flu of her own two days after that birthday surprise and be forced to seek medication in her case, incurring a bill of over 10k.

So, was it COVID?  The Omicron variant of COVID?  The very COVID that has now infected 276,724,130 people with 5,388,439 deaths globally*.  Kenyan numbers are 267,571 and 5,354 respectively.  Could it be the one?  Did that double-jab of Astra-Zeneca vaccine contribute to my low downtime or I was just having a normal flu?

*source: worldometers

WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, Dec. 22, 2021

Running into a taxi business with a twist... four twists

Running into a taxi business with a twist... four twists

Today I added one more view to the most viewed videos on YouTube.  I was just curious to know what makes the billion-view videos be worth their ‘B’ achievement.  It is a question that I had already asked a few members of a ‘friends’ group to contribute to not so long ago.  They had told me that such a B-viewer video needs to appeal to, or be for…. guess…. the kids!  And surely video number 1 was a kids’ video – with 9.81B + 1 from me!  It was a sobering reminder of what the innocence of the young can achieve.

But it was not long when I had another kids’ discussion, but in a different context.  That was last Saturday, just seven days ago.  I was eventually travelling from TRM on Thika Road on a taxi.  I was coming back to Uthiru after a day out, probably the first time out of my comfort zone in over a year.  Even that three hour stay in that mall had already been a too much outing based on circumstances.  You know what to blame for this situation of not going anywhere else don’t you?  Of course, corona, silly!

So, the discussion started with kids as I was seated on the taxi from TRM about seven in the evening.  The driver who had already told me to cancel the Uber request and pay the indicated amount offline was driving smoothly on the almost deserted Thika road towards Pangani.  He had already lamented that the app only benefited the app.  He had said that the drivers were hardly even getting the crumbs, since they had no say in how the fares were being set nor were they even employees of Uber.

We were discussing corona in general, and why we would soon be having another lockdown in Kenya, or even not at all.  The pros for a lockdown was due to the ‘new Omicron’ variant of corona virus, while the cons were ‘the youth’.  Omicron has just been ‘discovered’, of technically speaking, had just been ‘sequenced’ in South Africa on November 24, just ten days prior to this taxi ride.  

Of course, SA and another eight of its neighbouring countries had faced a travel ban from most Europe and Americas, hardly one-week after that sequencing activity, leading to much uproar over discrimination in how international bans were being imposed.  The argument being that the ban had been rushed, and that SA had just been forthright with scientific truth.  Keeping quiet was the alternative, and that is the alternative that many on the web were now advising SA, in hindsight, to have done, instead of speaking the truth and now being banned (plus its neighbours).

The new Omicron variant was believed to be more transmissible, though its ‘deadliness’ had not yet been determined.  Even as late as today, some three weeks later and its deadliness is not yet determined.  Nonetheless, it seems to be less deadly than other variants or than previously feared.  The corona numbers* now stand at 269,570,565 infections globally from all variants, with 5,315,126 deaths since December 2019.  Kenyan numbers are 255,932 and 5,342 respectively.  On that Saturday, as I sat on that taxi, my Uber app off, my phone also off due to lack of charge, the global numbers were 265,795,997 and 5,268,209 respectively.  

*source: worldometers

Interestingly, the infection rates had gone up on a week-by-week comparison, while the deaths had gone down in the same period in the last one week.  A new highly transmissible variant was therefore ‘in the air’ yet the death rates had gone down.  The general prevalence and case numbers were even higher in the countries imposing the ban.  A punishing ban in the southern part of Africa had come to naught.  What a contradiction!  It did not even take long before the variant was being detected globally anyway, including in places that had no links with SA at all.  The variant was already out and it was its turn to do the rounds – live with it, as we now say in these days of corona.

Back to the taxi, where my phone was about to go off due to lack of charge.  The phone that I attempted to replace hardly a week prior with little success, after the replacement phone developed a starting error forcing me to return it to the vendor, and now be reluctant to migrate from my old phone.  The young runner, Atieno, had already laughed at me even before that one-week-old phone got faulty, telling me that I could do better than an Umidigi, her words, not mine.  I had and have no love to any brand of phone.  I buy according to my money and live with it.  Anyway, with my phone almost off, I paid up the initially indicated fare on the app before I had cancelled, by MPESA.  I did not want to be reach my destination and fail to payup due to a phone that was off.

However, before we had started that corona discussion, and the pro-cons of Kenya shutting down soon, we had discussed this issue of phones going off before paying up for the taxi.  The driver, who had been on ungoverned talk since I stepped into the taxi, had volunteered his wisdom on this.  He had disclosed that some drivers can screenshot a different fare display and show it to the passenger at the end of the trip in cases where the passenger’s phone is gone off.  

It would usually need a keen eye to detect the deception, though by such a time it is likely to be too late, usually after the fact.  However, he then confessed that it was possible to report such cases to Uber for resolution and penalization of the offending driver.  This would usually lead to the reduction of the driver’s ratings and the eventual crediting of the passenger’s account with the difference in charges, ready for use during a next ride.

We discussed the joys and the ‘not-so-joys’ of being the in the taxi business.  It was now almost seven-thirty as we joined Waiyaki way from the Museum hill roundabout.  He has told me that he would be closing business after he dropped me, since it was already night.  This seemed a contradiction the expectations of the current business environment.

“But we no longer have a shutdown?  You can surely work for 24-hours!”

“I just fear the night,” he said casually.

“Must be due to bad people,” I nodded in agreement.

“Not bad people, the good people!”

This got me thinking!  Fear of the good people?  Was I missing something?  He then opened up the story telling session with the top four reasons why he feared the good people and hence would like to avoid them as much as possible.  Do not hold me to account or call me names as I state the list, his list.  I am just reporting what the driver told me.  We were now on Waiyaki way, heading to Uthiru.

Good people number 1 – the drunk girl

He said that these are the types that he picks up from some nightlife joint, already tipsy.  The girl settles on the back seat and stays restless, asking him why he is not getting to his destination quickly.  They get into the list due to what happens at payment time.

“Nipe namba ya MPESA!,” the girl says, slurring with every word.

He gives the number, taking maybe five or ten times just repeating the simple ten-digit number.

They have now arrived at the destination, but the MPESA has not yet reached the driver’s phone, who then complains about it.

“Yani, hujapata!  Hebu nipe namba ya MPESA tena!”

He says that this is the cycle that makes him avoid doing night rides.

Good people number 2 – the drunk girl no. 2

This was a particular girl, but the cab driver still gets the jitters just imagining how he got himself into this situation.  He had responded to another call for taxi and had ended up in a nightclub.  A lady approached his taxi and stood by the rear window, leaning of the boot of the car.  The next sound was that of shattering glass, as the hind window smashed through.  He got out of his seat and went out just in time to see the impression left by a drink bottle that had hit that window.  He still does not know how and why his car was smashed, but it ended well, with the girl agreeing to repay.

Good people number 3 – the guy who sleeps

This is a guy he carries from… guess… from a nightclub yes, already drunk.  He tells the driver to wake him up when they get to the destination.  Many things happen at the destination.  They start by arguing over the destination itself.  The Uber app would be showing the pin confirming that they are at the destination, while the guy on the backseat would be swearing that that was not it.

“Nirudishe penye ulinitoa!,” the drunkard would finally slur out loudly.

They usually, somehow, get the right house.  He had not returned a client in his experience.

At alighting time, the driver stops the app and presents the figure to the guy who is now just awakening from the usually deep slumber, now trying to figure out his current whereabouts.  I will never forget the gesture that the driver made at this point, as he impersonated the drunkard.  We were now just past Kabete Polytechnic, about to get to Uthiru in less than three minutes.

The taxi driver pointed ahead, and continued to say what he was told, his right index finger being wiggled towards the windscreen, “Wewe… we… we… wewe!,” he shook his finger, his tone changed, even as he kept driving with one hand.

“Unataka nikulipe mara mbili eh!  Unafikiria nimelewa!, Eh! We, wewe, we!”

That reenactment was just magical.  It was like the drunkard was in that taxi at that very moment.  I could feel him.  I could feel the driver’s shock at the turn of events.  He did not tell me how he resolved it.  I can only imagine.

Good people number 4 – the guy who does not pay

This one is a story that I have heard before.  I was even ready to tell him the story myself.  This is the guy who is dropped at an apartment block and claims to go to the house to bring back the money for the taxi charges, never to come back.  However, this was a story with a twist.

He had waited for over ten-minutes and the guy did not come back, nor did he have any idea of to which house among the many in the storied complex the guy had disappeared into.  It was in the wee hours, as wee as three in the morning.  He got his courage and alighted from the taxi.  He then approached the sentry’s cubicle at the gate and asked the watchman for help.  The watchie had been one of those who just sleeps the night away, and was now also coming out of slumber.  He had just opened the gate to let the taxi in and had resumed his sleep, not caring whether the taxi was to leave or not.

After jolting the watchie back to consciousness, he started to ask him where the person whose name he knew as James, from the casual conversations, lived.

“Ai, hapa kwa hii plot hatuna mtu anaitwa James!,” the watchie was categorical and now fully sober.

“Ule jamaa nimelete hapa saa hizi!”

“Hata sikuona umelete nani,” the watchie confessed, truthfully.

The taxi man was at a dead end.

“Pole,” I told him, “Such loss of money!”

“Not so fast,” he continued with his story.  We were now at the Uthiru roundabout.

He had proceeded to describe the guy to the watchie.  It happened that the description that he gave were spot on, since it did not take more than two minutes before the watchie had a smile in his face, “Ah, huyo anaitwa baba Angel, anakaa B6!”

He found the guy in B6 collapsed on the sofa set, with the wifey trying to revive him with some early morning bowl of hot soup, which he was not responding to!

We did not get to conclude the pros and cons of closing down the Kenyan economy, again, due to the new Omicron variant of corona.  However, just like the YouTube videos that are a hit due to young people, the country was not going to be closed due to the same young people.  If you guessed that the this is due to some young persons’ street protest or some social media anti-Gov movement by the youth, then you are wrong.  The reason is that corona has not had an effect in the schools and there is no reason to close the schools and mess up the status quo.  Life shall continue as is, as usual.

WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, Dec. 11, 2021