I jump off the bus downtown to a street that’s crammed with buses and cars, kiosks with neon lights. Women in long ponytails, pencil skirts and killer heels walk side by side with those in full Islamic robes; their kohl-lined eyes making them even more mysterious. There’s a sense of belonging no matter who you are. The crowd’s light on their feet and people walk like they’re late for a meeting with the president. The sense of purpose is tangible and exciting. This is the only city I know besides Johannesburg that’s charged with zeal. Nairobi gets under my skin in a way I know I’ll never recover from. It’s in how cosmopolitan I find it, and how Pan-African it is.
Looking up to see the name of the street I’m on, written in black over a white narrow wood panel, the name is Tom Mboya. The trade unionist and anti-colonisation activist is considered to be one of the founding fathers of Kenya. This moment is the reason I believe in streets and public spaces named after our liberators and black heroes; because these are the names we encounter whether we are interested in history or not. They make us ask ‘who are you and what did you do to be here?’ I want being out and about to be a celebration of Africa’s liberation.
I keep walking with my eyes glued on street names. From Tom Mboya, I turn into Luthuli, as in Chief Albert Luthuli and Africa’s first Nobel Peace laureate for his contribution to the fight against apartheid. My smile turns into a wide grin that plasters my face whenever I’m in the city centre. By the time I get the bus back to the backpackers, I’ve been on Nkrumah Lane, and Gaborone and Accra roads. I’ve strolled around Monrovia Road, named after the Liberian capital city and home of freed slaves who returned to Africa. There's also Harambee and Taifa streets. Taifa is Swahili for nation and Harambee is the concept of pulling together to get the job done. Banda Road is a nod to the first president of Malawi, Hastings Banda. Whether it’s named after Ghana’s second largest city or not, Kumasi Road reminds me of shopping for kente cloth in the Ashanti Region.
On Kaunda Street, I’m not just reminded of President Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia and his country’s support in the fight for my liberation, my mind flashes with a picture of me buying an orange in front of a bright red building next to Intercity bus terminal in Lusaka. Down Kigali Street trailing a hawker with red roses and white lilies, my heart beats wildly with anticipation – Rwanda’s capital city is my next destination after Kenya. Mama Ngina is the wife of liberated Kenya’s first president, Jomo Kenyatta. The street named after her has banks, electronic shops, kiosks with airtime vouchers in low shilling values so that a voucher for 500 bob comes as six 50-shilling vouchers, and Prestige bookshop, where the selection of New York Times best-sellers is anorexic and the collection of literature about Africa by Africans and from the diaspora is thick.
Along the street is a dreadlocked statue of the leader of the Mau Mau uprising against the British rule, Dedan Kimathi. In my capital city and hometown Pretoria, the statues that loom the largest in public are of Afrikaner leaders whose ideal of freedom didn’t extend to black people.
Being on Mama Ngina street is bittersweet: it’s rare to see women honoured in public.
At the corner of Tom Mboya Street and Haile Selassie Avenue, my mind recalls the Emperor’s 1963 speech to the United Nations General Assembly. It says: ‘On the question of racial discrimination, the Addis Ababa Conference taught, to those who will learn, this further lesson: That until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned; that until there are no longer first class and second class citizens of any nation; that until the colour of a man’s skin is of no more significance than the colour of his eyes; that until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race; that until that day, the dream of lasting peace and world citizenship and the rule of international morality will remain but a fleeting illusion, to be pursued but never attained. And until the ignoble and unhappy regimes that hold our brothers in Angola, in Mozambique and in South Africa in subhuman bondage have been toppled and destroyed; until bigotry and prejudice and malicious and inhuman self-interest have been replaced by understanding and tolerance and good-will; until all Africans stand and speak as free beings, equal in the eyes of all men, as they are in the eyes of Heaven; until that day, the African continent will not know peace. We Africans will fight, if necessary, and we know that we shall win, as we are confident in the victory of good over evil.’
My right hand shoots up in the air with all the power and pride in me. ‘Amandla,’ I shout. Nairobi, capital city number fifteen in my travels around Africa, is the one. I hum Miriam Makeba’s ‘Aluta Continua’; Nairobi’s Pan-Africanism is my affirmation. This is why I call Nairobi johari – my jewel.
Other cities have zoos. Nairobi has a national park with lions, rhinos, leopards and buffaloes. I don’t have money to pay tourist prices that are significantly more expensive than what locals pay, so I visit the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust instead for my wild life encounter with rescued elephants. They splash water at each other and nuzzle visitors with their trunks. It’s in the national park anyway and even though the lone black rhino is caged, it’s still a close enough encounter with it.
I’m in a matatu from the trust back to the city centre when the most beautiful person I have ever seen walks in. I have never looked at people and thought ‘this is what I would look like if I moulded myself’. Her tall and lean body is in fitted black pants, her crisp white shirt decked out with a thin cotton scarf layered around her neck and her long nails shine with a purple lacquer. Her thick, jet-black hair is bundled into a top knot. She has a radiant dimpled smile and kohl-lined almond eyes. She meets my gaze and holds it with her smile.
‘Excuse me, are you from South Africa?’ Don’t ask me why, but I love pretending that I’m from Ghana and have a weak accent to prove it.
‘You are from South Africa; you look like it and sound like it. Anyway, the conductor isn’t scamming you, fares go up during peak traffic,’ she says, answering the question I pose to the conductor when my change comes back with 20 bob less than I pay from town to the trust. The matatu engine has been off for more than fifteen minutes and the only movement in the road is from hawkers and monkeys chasing each other on nearby bushes.
Her name is Arrot. She’s obsessed with South Africa, I’m besotted with my Pan-African dream city, Nairobi. When we arrive in town and I ask the conductor where I can find matatus to the Somali neighbourhood of Eastleigh, she suggests hanging out in town instead and planning the trip to Eastleigh for a day when she can take me there. She has a meeting she can’t get out of this afternoon. We have lunch at a Somalian restaurant. We don’t see each other until two and a half weeks later when I ask her for a favour.
My introduction to Nairobi at downtime is from my friend of many years, Heidi Uys, who spends most of her time working on TV productions in Lagos and Nairobi, where she has just wrapped up filming a reality singing competition.
She takes me to Blankets and Wine on Sunday afternoon. If Nairobi is my deal, Blankets and Wine seals it for me. The monthly gig is held at a school’s sporting grounds for live music performed to a picnicking audience that makes me fall hard for Nairobians. The vibe is hip and urban and the dress code Afropolitan. Maasai shukas double as picnic blankets and wraps, some have been turned into dashikis. Kitenges, kangas and kikoyis have been turned into shorts, playsuits and jumpsuits and mini and maxi dresses. Everything that the world is wearing at the moment has been given a trendy, African twist. Dreadlocks have crowns of cowrie shells, earrings are shaped like Africa, belts are decked with Maasai beads that are also on necks, wrists and ankles, including on the men. Several people have poodles in their arms.
A hipster boy band called Sauti Sol is on stage when the power goes off. The music dies but the party goes on while we wait for a generator to be set up. When that plan fails, Sauti Sol performs acapella on the field, surrounded by a crowd. The moment turns up tempo when someone starts playing drums. The sky is becoming darke
r and a full moon hangs behind the abandoned stage. The party moves to a bar in Westlands, where, in keeping up with Nairobians, I drink like it’s the night before prohibition. Joburgers drink and party like it’s a national sport; Nairobians do it like it’s for Olympic glory.
My next stop after Nairobi is the Swahili coast, but not before I meet my Facebook friend David Odhiambo, who calls himself Kenyan Zulu on social media. He loves South Africa and adores all things Zulu. He feeds his interest by reading City Press newspaper online. This is where he encounters my travels, joining me in them digitally from my time in West Africa.
We meet at a nyama choma joint close to the post office in the city centre, where the love for grilled goat meat that West Africa puts in me is reignited. Here it’s served with ugali and I once again remember my love for kachumburi, as the combination of raw tomatoes, onion and fresh coriander is called.
David is soft-spoken and one of the sweetest people I know; the reason he insists on meeting me before Christmas is so he can give me a Christmas card. ‘In case you miss your family and get lonely, know you are not alone,’ he says. We are still friends.
A few days before I get the bus to Mombasa, a Kampala Coach bus becomes the target of a bomb blast that kills three people. I call my mom in case she hears about the attacks on the news to tell her that I’m going to avoid the area and show up two days later at the said River Road area for my trip to the coast. Security is always on high alert after an attack. It’s the safest time to travel, I think; when every passenger and their baggage is scanned with a metal detector.
It takes just over eight hours to get to Mombasa, which, as expected, announces itself with the Mombasa Tusks, the aluminium moulds put on Moi Avenue for Princess Margaret’s visit in 1956. After securing my seat on a Tawakal bus, I pass time by getting a tuk tuk ride around town. Mombasa has everything I’ve come to love about the Swahili coast; language that rolls off the tongue like a melody, boubous that flutter in the wind, the fresh coconut water I drink with a plastic straw from the fruit before eating the soft, white flesh. In Mombasa town, the rambling aged buildings add a tinge of fading splendour that’s messed up by the piles of human crap I keep side stepping. The Mombasa of white beaches and crystal waters is a ferry ride away.
The eight-hour trip to Lamu goes through other enchanting coastal towns and villages that only come alive when the bus drives by, when people sell mangoes and grilled mealies before going back to their comatose state. Our final stop, Mokowe Jetty, is in a yard with sandy ground and an area with empty, ramshackle cafés. The pier is a slab of crumbling concrete that leads to the dhows, where boatmen hold our hands to help us jump in. Other than the two boatmen, I’m with a young European couple on a backpacking adventure in East Africa, and a burka-clad mother whose toddler’s eyes are lined with kohl. The mother’s hands and feet are completely covered in red henna designs. For the first time since dhows and pirogues have become my mode of transport, we are given life jackets.
All arrival to Lamu is by dhow, even for people who fly to the coast. Getting out of the boat takes two boatmen holding my hands while I hop in and out of other boats to get to the jetty. I walk over to a man sitting next to enamel kettles he’s put over a fire to boil bitter Arabic coffee. Small ceramic cup in hand, I plonk myself among other people sitting on the pavement and look out to the sea and around me. Other than the half-empty restaurants with menus written with chalk on black boards left at the entrance, there are also tables with Maasai jewellery. After several cups of kahawa, I find a donkey to carry my bags from the waterfront to look for a hotel. December is high season, and sometimes, I play the hotel version of musical chairs, going from Stopover, to Pole Pole and Yumbe, which I can’t afford anyway, until I find a hotel that isn’t brimming with white travellers. I find myself opposite Ali’s kanga and tailor shop. Other residents are Mombasa families who are holidaying in Lamu; the oldest town on the Swahili coast and its most magical destination to me, where we dine under a starlit sky while a taraab orchestra plays softly on their string instruments.
‘Allaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahu akbaaaaaaaaaaar, Allaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahu akbaaaaaaaaaaar, Allaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahu akbaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar.’
The adhan echoes around the Old Town, each declaration of Allah’s greatness chanted in long notes that sound like a prayer relay, with notes carried across town from one mosque to another. The first call to prayer is my favourite morning sound, and the reason I gravitate towards Muslim countries and Christian ones that don't tolerate Islam on condition that the muezzin muffles his voice at prayer times. The laid-back atmosphere from last night has made way for streams of people on their morning shopping trips and chores; boubous and kanzus fluttering in the breeze.
The main square is dominated by a large tree. People – mostly men – sit on the concrete benches around the street, reading newspapers, cooling down with glasses of concentrated and home-made juice. A spirited game of bao is in session on the concrete platform where slaves were displayed for sale. Along the street, another of many that are also called Harambee, heavily perfumed women huddle at counters in kanga and beauty shops. The men gather around newspaper stands that hang the daily reads on makeshift shelves and we all peek at the table of Nollywood movies without stopping to buy.
We constantly press our bodies against the walls of the narrow streets to make room for donkeys – there are no cars other than the ambulance that stands on bricks instead of wheels and the commissioner’s car. Everything we use and eat that’s not from the earth or sea is brought from the mainland and carried around the town on wheelbarrows and donkeys. There are six thousand of them. They have names and a hospital at the water front. They get taken for walks and coddled lovingly while being bathed in the sea. In a mural with Scooby Doo, he’s depicted as a donkey instead of a dog. Even with its varying states of ageing faster than it gets renovated or spruced with fresh coats of paint, Lamu Old Town is a wonder to experience.
There is a house between the Old Town and Shela that acts like a border between these two different sides of the same coin. It doesn’t shock me later when I discover that it belongs to Princess Caroline of Monaco, although I’m surprised to discover that Lamu is the playground of people who holiday in St Barts and yacht around the Mediterranean coast, people Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss. This year’s celebrity-in-town is Jude Law. Rumour of his presence spreads around Shela beach and follows me to the floating bar at night; I never see him. Shela is also the coastal paradise of well-off Europeans who have bought prime property from locals, making them move further into the island while they turn the waterfront and houses around it into villas.
It creates an almost rarified atmosphere in Shela. Everyone is lean and sun kissed. Their kikoyis and kangas aren’t worn; they are styled to look perfectly laid-back without losing their wearer’s sense of vanity. Here, the Maasai beadwork is perfectly put together instead of having some of the haphazard final touches of pieces on sale at the Maasai market between Shela and Old Town. Sisal coffee tables have thick collections of photographic series set in Africa, the clientele don’t utter a word of Swahili and treat everyone, close friends included, with a detached coolness. They’re not here to be one with the people or break free from their European lifestyle. If anything, Rafiki complains, they are here to turn Shela into mini versions of cities they still keep homes in, where everything is in perfect order and the sound of the muezzin is silenced at prayer times. So, while Shela is beautiful and always gleams with newness that only money can add to a place, it’s only good to look at. Its warm African soul is making way for Western sterility. ‘Perfect’, I overhear a bronzed woman whose taut face doesn’t match her significantly wrinkled neck say. For people whose bank accounts aren't always on the edge of broke, there’s windsurfing, deep sea fishing, sunset cruises and camel rides, which I can afford but pass on because I’m almost as scared of camels as I am of snakes.
It’s a few hours before 2010 ends and I still don’t have anyt
hing special to do. Moonrise restaurant in Old Town has a three-course dinner and cocktail evening planned and other than being a waste of money I’ll definitely regret spending on tuna steaks and dawas, the crowd isn’t the type that share their space and emotions. I’ll get a smile, at most, not the joie de vivre that has come to define my life on the road, when groups of friends invite solo diners to join tables and replace silence with laughter.
I’m friends with three tour guides-slash-beach boys from Nairobi. They’re at Petley’s with the European girls they’re trying to romance for visas and one-way tickets out of Kenya. Their meal-tickets are girls who are barely out of their teens, who firmly believe in peppering all conversations with how fulfilling it is to visit Africa and how heartbreaking it is that the education and development given to Africa by colonialists have been neglected in liberated Africa.
‘You have to admit that colonialism wasn’t all bad,’ as one of them argues with me. I stay away so my boys can work them without me turning into Teacher Lerato who admonishes bullshit; besides, I’m not here to free Europeans from their mental slavery.
One of the Maasai guys I’m friends with, Joseph, invites me to hang out with him and his crew at a shebeen between Old Town and Shela. He’s into me, and refuses to believe that not every single female traveller dreams of falling in love with a Maasai warrior. Or as I tell him, ‘I don’t fetishise African men.’
I don’t want to spend my evening rebutting his attempts at seducing me with admittedly fascinating stories of his village life or the time he and other morans circled a lion before killing it as a show of manhood and bravery.
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