Running with babu during the September international marathon

Running with babu during the September international marathon

The September international marathon was to be a merry-go-ground run, as we call it, within the workplace compound.  Runners were to go round and round the 1.3km circuit on a tarmac route that had been crafted by the MOE*.  It is a route we have run once before, during one of the monthly international runs of last year.  It is therefore familiar, but a nightmare to many runners.  Many avoid this run, as either boring or difficult.  It forces you to run through a half route section that is uphill followed by another half route section that is downhill.  The run has three stipulations that determines when it should end.  You can either drop out once you have had enough go-rounds or be forced to drop out when the clock hits 7pm, for a run that starts at 1630hrs.  The final option is that you can drop when you have achieved your desired run distance – 5k, 10k or 21k, provided this is done by or before 7pm.

*MOE - marathoners-of-expert, the committee that organizes marathons for the team

Like any other monthly international, this run was being held on the last Friday of September.  However, it was just three days to the run that a new development came up, forcing me to update the marathoners that I would be on an ‘early bird’ edition of the run, on a Thursday before the real Friday run.  I was therefore set to be on the same route a day prior, and was even ready for any early-birds that I had extended an invitation to.  I had already calculated that I needed to do 16 go rounds to achieve the 21k, actually, 17, since the 16 would fall slightly short of the 21k.

The weather was just perfect on this Thursday as I started my first circuit at 4.40pm.  There were no other early birds.  I would have to represent them all.  The sun was still high on the western side of the sky.  It was not that hot.  It had rained two nights before, and more rains were expected as per the weather forecast, hence the cloud cover kept the overhead heat contained.  I did a first ‘route survey’ run around the almost oval shape of the course, technical, hand shaped circuit.  The route was as expected – an initial half circuit of uphill run, then a final rolldown to the starting line.  The tarmac was as tough on the feet as was expected.  The sharp turns were a real test on the braking and turning systems of the body.  It was the route that I knew, no doubt, no changes.  With the survey done, I now proceeded to keep a count of the number of rounds done as I went round and round.

I needed 17, I desired 21, but I actually did 22, finishing just after the time stipulation.  After all, what was I to do, when the last circuit started just a few minutes to the finish time and I still had to finish it?  But why was I doing an early bird?....

I left the city on the timely Easy Coach bus to Busia on Friday morning.  I call it timely because it was a 6.45am bus and it did leave at 6.50am.  I am used to such a bus leaving about an hour after the scheduled time.  The fare had been hiked by almost 30%, from the usual 1400 to a new 1800.  However, seeing my people was a must, and I just had to do what I had to do, to make this happen.

I had deliberately booked an isle seat, somewhere mid-bus.  I did not want to suffer the sunshine that hits those seated by the windows.  Being positioned somehow near the exit was strategic, to enable me get out easily when I would alight somewhere midway between Kisumu and Busia.  The online booking system had anyway prevented me from booking a window seat, with the ‘reserved for ladies’ caveat affix on quite a number of seats that were therefore unbookable.  

“Discrimination,” I almost said as I hit the select seat button on the phone app and picked 4C instead.

I am known to be a loud-mouth in the corridors of marathoning, and I can easily be heard when over one kilometre away, should I be talking.  I enjoy a good talk, and I talk loud enough for the world to hear – that is what I am told, I do not know for sure, so let me tell it as I am told.  I therefore got into the bus just around 6.40am with this talkative spirit hovering around me.  The person sitting on 4D was already there, if anything, occupying both seats by spreading paraphernalia and stuff on both seats.

“Excuse me,” I said, as I pushed my bag into the overhead compartment and tried to take my seat.

“Oh,” she said shruggingly, and removed some clothing and stuff from my seat.

I took the seat, belted up and pushed two earphones into my ears.  I connected the wired earphones onto the phone and opened the music player app.  I was going classical today.  The app has the bad behaviour of arranging play files alphabetically, even if they are arranged otherwise on the storage system.  I was therefore going to start on Bach today.  Beethoven would be next.  I would have to really wait to reach Mozart, and probably not reach Wagner, but the journey was long.  That is why we left early anyway.  Going home is a full day event.

I proceeded to take a nap, more of a sleep, since I completely blacked out and did not even notice any landmark past Uthiru which just within Nairobi.  I would find myself jolted back to wakefulness at Gilgil weighbridge, some 120km out of Nairobi, where the imposing bumps must surely wake you up.  Additionally, the bus had to do a 360-turn to go to the other side of the road to be weighed, before returning to the road towards Nakuru.  I took advantage of the wakefulness to appreciate the environment briefly, as I glanced onto the phone screen.  It was just about nine.  I found myself taking another nap, this time a nap for sure, since I was in between sleep and sobriety, and could hazily notice the going-ons.

We finally took the first break at Nakuru at a petrol station at eleven.  Nakuru is a familiar town, sorry city, since it got its city status by charter just two-years ago, so let us be politically correct about Nakuru.  It was my major town when still working at Gilgil, being just 30km apart.  That was way back then in the past history.  It was now a stopover like any other.  I alighted and took the break like the rest of the passengers.  This was the first bus to get to this stopover station.  There was no other bus there, or did any bus stopover while we were there.  This place would have been full, if the bus was to arrived around one, when buses going both directs meet up during the break.

I should have resisted, but I did not.  I told myself that I was being polite.  This happened just as the bus left the stopover at about 11.30am.  Coincidentally, this was the second time such an offer was being made in a period of about a year, same bus company, different routes, despite ‘do not accept food from strangers’ warning slapped all over the waiting room.  On that first time, I was on the Nairobi-Malaba route, and ended up getting acquainted with a top seeded Kenyan tennis player.  I was on 4B on that occasion.  I ended up conversing from Nakuru to Eldy on that day.  Today was different.  I was on the Nairobi-Busia route and I was on 4C.

“Have a sandwich,” the lady at 4D unwrapped the cling film from some slices of bread with stuff in between and offered a bunch in my direction.

Instinct told me to decline, but being polite ruled the day, “Thanks,” I took a sandwich and returned the rest.

“I have already taken enough,” she protested, and kept her hand stretched in a manner of take-it-all-since-I-have-had-enough.

“Ok, but maybe for later,” I responded and put the remain ‘wich into a woven carrier bag and dipped it into the front seat pocket.

I had planned to re-nap, but now I had to deal with the sandwich first, then see if another sleep was possible.  It was also getting hotter, and my sleep deprivation had now waned after that long sleep from Nairobi to Nakuru.  I was likely going to remain sober for the rest of the trip.  

This was not meant to happen, but soon the stories just started.  How they started, I do not know exactly.

“Imagine mtoto wa colleague yangu died, just like that,” she started, sandwich munch going on.

“How comes?,” I wondered.

“Wakumbuka that see-ee-oh who was found dead?  Yule alikuwa killed by the girl?”

I started flashing through my Brain-GPT.  I soon remembered that entry, where the Finance Director, not CEO, of a famous Kenyan hospital had been found murdered, with footage showing some lady jumping out of his house compound through a fence.

We talked about that for some time, as the bus kept going.

“Ingekuwa coast, such thing hiwezi fanyika,” she volunteered.

“How so?,  Yani mambo ya coast ni tofauti?”

“N’me zalima na kuishi huko maisha yangu yote!,  Sisi twa respect culture sana.  Mtu kama huyo should have been married off by the traditions by now.  Hangeweza kuwa bado ana pick tu girls that he does not know”

“He was probably bewitched,” I put in a word in the FD’s defense.

“Mimi siamini hiyo mambo ya babu,” she stated, “Mimi ni mkristo.”

“But waganga are all over, they even advertise themselves.  Hujaona kibao cha mganga anayetibu vitu vilivyo potea?”

“I can tell you my friend, kuamini mambo ya babu ni imani potovu tu.  Kuna wakati mimi na mme wangu hatukuwa na kazi, tuka ambiwa twende kwa babu atusaidie.  Ng’o!  Nika kataa.  Lakini waona sasa, sisi sote wawili tuna kazi, hata watoto wetu wamepata kazi zao vizuri.  No need for such.”

“But people still go to them?,” I protested.

“True, watu wengi bado wana amini babu sana.  Hata huko pwani kuna wengi wanapenda kutembelea babu, lakini they suffer in the long run.”

She would go on to tell me real cases where blood sacrifices had led to the death of some of her close relatives who had engaged ‘babu’, and sacrificing family members was a requirement in order to attain the wealth that they needed.

“Kwanza watu wa bara ndio wengi huko pwani, wakija kuona babu.  Do not trust many of these land cases you see in Nairobi.  Nyingi zao zina saidiwa na babu, wa kule Mambasani.”

Time flew very fast, and we were soon done with the Kericho and Kisumu stopover breaks.  I knew that my destination was near the moment the bus crossed River Yala.  So, as I finally alighted at Dudi, informing her that her Ugunja stage would be about 30-minutes away, I slowly forced my tired legs across the tarmac and onto the market centre.  The tiredness being from those 29km of run round-and-round the September international marathon route.  The run was also still done in good time, achieving an average of 5.04min/km.  It was now just around 4.30pm and I knew that the real run should now be taking place back in Nairobi, some 450km away.

WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, Oct. 7, 2023

Running with my uncle… the final run

The day started as normal as any other Sunday.  Corona was still doing its rounds, with global infections standing at 194,576,971 and 4,171,656 deaths, while Kenyan numbers were 196,745 and 3,849 respectively.  The cold July weather remained cold.  I have believed that I have developed a ‘thick skin’ and can walk around with a Tshirt, but today’s chill was just too much forcing me to put on a jacket.

The day would take a turn around ten, when I switched on my gadgets and soon the messages started popping up.  I got the usual alert about some machines at the workplace switching on after a nightlong sleep.  I would be getting another such message when they go off in the evening.  There were two I-tried-to-call-you type of messages from one unknown number.  There was a thank you note from someone who had just received an item that I had sent.  And just when I thought that it would be all good, there was a final message that was short and to the point… Uncle Gilbert died

Those three words would set the day into a different trajectory.  The supposedly good day had just been dampened.  The day become colder that I had imagined.  That jacket that has travelled over 10,000km could not contain the cold of the day, thought it tried.  I walked to the workplace unsure of whether to do the now customary Sunday run or to just sit within a warm heated office and forget about the torture of running through the sub-10 degrees temperatures.

Custom won and I found myself changed and ready to do the Sunday run.  I had a meeting scheduled for three, hence I decided to start my run early to enable me to be back and ready for that meeting.  I had intended to start the run at noon, but I found myself taking the first step at 12.15pm.  The once feel-good mood had now been damped with reflections and memories.

I was running on the same old route from Uthiru to Ndumbo, then to Lower Kabete road, before diverting to Mary Leakey school, then crossing through the University farm to emerge at Kanyariri road for the 8km loop then back straight to Ndumbo and back to Uthiru.

I was lost in thoughts even as I went round the circle-of-churches just off Waiyaki way as I headed to Ndumbo after about fifteen minutes of run.  I could hear the mixture of drumbeats from the different iron sheet church structures, each doing their thing oblivious of the neighbour.  I could hear chants and prayers.  I could hear songs and apparent dancing.  I could hear preaching and speaking-in-tongues.  I was marveling at how the various churches operating in different languages, doing different church activities, and being as loud as they are, were really surviving each other.

The collection of church noises would soon be gone as I now joined Kapenguria road and soon passed Ndumbo with its matatu madness, even witnessing the matatu that was reversing onto the road and almost knocked a saloon car coming from behind.  The matatu did not have any care or concern, despite passersby shouting in fear.  I was past that in a moment.

It would then hit me this Uncle Gilbert had died.

‘Uncle’ as I had known him was a smart gentleman.  I knew him as a sharp dresser despite his advanced age.  I would get him in a tie in the few occasions that we met.  He kept reminding me that I was his favourite nephew.

“When I see you, I see my late sister,” he always reminded me in the manner of greetings whenever we met.

“You even look like my sister Leocadia,” he would continue, “Ayi, yawa!  However killed that my sister shall also be killed by the worst death ever,” he would continue to lament, his once smiling face now serious.  His grip on my hand still tight.  He would continue with the nostalgia and keep that curse going for a moment, before he would come back to the normal world.

“Okewa!  My nephew!  My favourite nephew,” he would continue.  He would normally get into this trance for about ten minutes, then he would be back to normal and he would release his grip and let me be.

I did not know my mother much.  I probably did not know my mother at all.  She died when I was about nine, while in class three.  I do not remember much about her.  I cannot describe her much.  I cannot draw her from personal experiences.  I wish I could have been old enough to know her well and to have memories that I can hold on to.  I only remember her through some two black one white photos that I saw about thirty year later, when my father passed on.  These photos were unveiled as part of the eulogy preparation.  

In one photo there is a lady who is quite young, in military uniform, but without a cap.  This is a passport size photo.  The other photo is a group photo, with my father on one extreme end while my mother is on the other extreme end.  Seated between them are four boys.  One small one, probably seven or eight is me, so I am told.  I can hardly recognize him.  That photo has both my parents in military uniforms, including caps.  My father has the impression of a tough commander, just by his facials.  My mother on the other hand looks so polite, so down to earth.  It was therefore ‘uncle’ who kept the memory of my mother alive in me, by his constant reminders.  Including that my mother was a prisons warden of high repute.

The last time I had a full day with uncle was during the funeral of my aunt, his sister, at Kendu bay.  Uncle was smart as usual, despite his advanced age.  His wide tie was hanging on his neck.  I had also known uncle as quite strict and a disciplinarian to his children.  I had visited his home near Sagam in Yala several times, and I saw how he handled his children.  They would never dare do anything nonsensical near him.  But if my uncle was strict, then his wife was double that.  

My auntie, his wife, would actually beat up the children, even the over eighteens, right in front of all and sundry, and she would feel nothing.  The children knew her so well that when she called any of them to ‘sort an issue’, they would never come over, since they knew that a compulsory slap would be awaiting.  Though uncle and auntie never tried anything on me, I had already learnt and known their temperaments and I had learnt the limits of dare.  I had got enough lessons in discipline by observation rather than participation.

On this last meeting with uncle, he had pulled me aside and proceeded with his firm hand grip and went through the usual trance once more time, ending finally with, “Okewa!  My nephew!  My favourite nephew”

He reminded me of my roots in Yala, in Ahono, from the Dholuo people of Gem clan.  He reminded me of how my mother was his favourite sister.  He reminded me that I had come from a clan of the learned, people who chewed books like grass and studied upto the best universities in the world.

“Your mother was an educated girl,” he reminded me.

“She went to school, unlike other girls of those days,” he continued, “It is just by good luck that your father got her from school to Luhyia land before she got to university”

“That is the clan that I am talking about.  You must remain true to the clan.  You must continue learning since being brainy runs in the clan,” he told me, taking some time to reflect on that statement.

“Okewa!,” he laughed, visibly happy, “You know Ngolo Rangorango?”

“Who?”

“Yes, Ngolo, the great scholar who read all the books in the world,” he updated me. 

That name was distantly familiar.  It was a name I had heard when I was young.  I even remember someone pointing at some fenced homestead compound when I visited my uncle during my formative years.

“You are of the same clan.  I want you to read books like him.  You already have the brains of the clan.”

That would turn out to be the last meeting.  How I wish that there would have been another meeting before this news of his demise.  How I wish that he would have updated me on the full history of the clan all the way Gem and his brother Ugenya.

So, as I did the run today, not noticing even where I was most of the run, absentminded with the memories of uncle, I knew that I was doing the last run with him.  He would not finish the run of today as he had retired midway, when the mental imaginations of him faded away.  He urged me on, asking me to keep going and never look back.  On I went to run in almost under 5-minutes per kilometre average.  The first time that I have managed such an 'almost' speed over that 24k route this month, missing it by only 4-seconds average.  Maybe the secret of some great runner from the clan is yet to be told.  The one whom I have taken after.

WWB, the Coach, Nairobi, Kenya, July 25, 2021