I was enjoying the easy camaraderie of the place and my earlier misgivings had evaporated. Uncle Kuka, who I soon understood to be the Papa in the place, had the stocky women refill my tin from the special brew reserved for his special guests. One sip of the stuff, and I could lay it bare on my tongue layer by layer. My master brewer taste-buds could discern all the shortcuts Uncle Kuka had taken, as well as the various industrial chemicals they had employed to aid the fermentation process along. This was the city, and cutting corners was inevitable in the pursuit of profit, but I knew that if you attempted to sell this swill in Apac, you would not see a single customer the following day.
“We have heard a lot about you, cousin Apuka. Karibu bwana!”18 said most of my relations as Papa made the introductions, pumping my hand in the customary manner—the left hand clasped around the other’s right bicep while the two right hands clasped in a shoulder-wrenching shake that lasted the better part of a minute. Uncle Kuka, or Papa as he was popularly known, made sure I was introduced to everyone that mattered in the business. As expected, it turned out that most of my clansmen fared no better than I on matters vertical, making up for the shortfall with excellent musculature and wit—I was quickly aware of the special talents amongst my kin. The majority of our clansmen were short, reaching approximately five feet, and a handful of us were pygmies, for which there was an explanation.
For generations, our clan kept a little stock and did a little farming, but our primary income was established by trade, and this was the reason for the old tribal joke that “money ran in our veins.” Our clan operated as smalltime vendors, selling measures of cloth, spices, and leather products from door to door; or, they sold mitumba19 at open-air markets, or acted as loan sharks, giving the banks cutthroat competition for the lower echelons of the money-lending business. Senior members of the clan dealt in gemstones, which entailed both greater rewards and greater risks. The most familiar way of making a living for our clan, however, was in the brewing business. For years the government had sought to control and legitimize the brewing industry and would hunt down small-time bootleg dealers. Our clan forebears had long understood that brewing was a goldmine comparable only to the church, witchcraft, and prostitution. Brewing, like witchcraft, could thrive underground, especially in a big city like Nairobi.
I am told that one of the reasons why our clan women are so hardy is that they have always traditionally served us as carriers, traveling even into the Congo to trade. The most credible explanation for the scattered pygmies in our midst was that our women had had intercourse with the Twa during their long absences in the vast Congo.
But then, this was not to say that we—the special talents—were despised or looked down upon by the clan. For we were walking computers when it came to accounting, and the clan relied on our wily foresight when it came to speculation. For just like ants, we could predict a rainy day with uncanny accuracy. We were special. It was for this reason that when I was introduced to my pygmy cousins, Babu and Mbiko—who ran the show across the valley in Kangemi—our handshakes were from the heart, like blood brothers meeting after a long estrangement.
Later, as the place filled, we settled into a long drinking and dancing session by the lake, our faces lit by the fiery glow of the fading sun. As the night progressed, Papa, reappearing by my side, asked whether I possessed sufficient energy for some late-night entertainment. A slim brown girl—with an artificial gap between her front teeth, just as we liked it—stood, looking eager, by Papa’s side. Papa needn’t have bothered. I had already made my own overture toward a stocky waitress who, like most women in my life, was eager to discover whether I was a “man” or a “boy.” She had fallen immediately into my spider’s web. As the evening wound up and we danced to the progressively vulgar lyrics of the four-piece band, I no longer felt any regret about traveling to Nairobi—I was home, in good company, and we, a bunch of crafty dwarves, were running the entire show.
The following day Papa took me to the local police station to introduce me to the OCS.20 I had dressed that morning in a brown suede jacket that I found draped on a chair by my bedside. In the inner pocket, I discovered a fat brown envelope. Sitting on the hard bench in the police station, with Papa to my right and Mbiko to the left, I felt an icy sweat of apprehension snaking slowly down my side. I have never learnt to be comfortable around those in authority.
It was to be a short meeting. Papa formally presented me as the special representative of our other Papa across the border, a rep who had come to take care of the latter’s business in Nairobi. The OCS, a dark sweaty fellow with a tummy that wouldn’t allow him to bend over without a fart, eyed me carefully, perhaps trying to assess whether I would fit in with his own end of the business. In the end, with the fat manila envelope tucked safely in his pocket, the OCS’s face crumbled into an awkward grin and he rose, pumping my shoulder in a mighty hug.
The rest of the day was spent in a tour of the clan brewery, deep in the Mau Mau valley that separated Kawangware from Kangemi. I was introduced to the rest of the clan, who worked the sooty drum-ensemble that fed the city’s hooch industry. Other than grain beer, the Nairobi branch also distilled a modified version of the waragi21 we brewed in Apac; a gin which borrowed from the local chang’aa22 and was laced with additives to give the Nairobi customers more kick in their tipple. This gin was predominately sold in small joints that dotted the ghetto like hydra heads and which were mostly operated by our clan women. It was a tight set-up that left the local drunks with little choice but to deposit their Caesar’s coin into our purse.
I opened my own joint the following month with a loan my Uganda Papa had sent by an Akamba Bus courier and the assistance of the clan. The first month, I learned the scene and became acquainted with the regular drunks. The stocky woman, with whom I had shared my bed and my confidences, helped me assemble a working team. Her name was Ida, and she made it known in Congo that she would be taking care of me—as if I needed taking care of. In Apac, the men were responsible for the brewing, while the women ran the shebeens. The brewing industry in Nairobi operated similarly, although the men were obliged to hang around the bar during business hours, just in case some rough characters refused to pay up. Shebeen fights were also commonplace, especially around mid-month when the guards received their advance pay, and at month’s-end, when everyone else was loaded. This was debt-collection time, when women working the counter needed to collect IOUs from those who had taken goods on credit during the month. While we were very persuasive when pursuing a debt, we can turn real nasty real fast when push comes to shove—which can happen quite often in a business that skirts the law. And so, whenever a call for help is sent by any member of the clan over a business matter, you can be certain that the entire brotherhood will turn up to lend a hand. And we do not forget old scores; it is said we have the memory of an elephant. This was one of the many comforts of belonging to the clan—the knowledge that if something untoward were to happen to you, you would be avenged.
The first year of business was a loss. I set out ten drums every morning, and had barely sold half of them by the end of the day. Residents had yet to warm to me, and the club owner across the street, Kaka, had what we called in business a “stronger hand,” cutting me from below the knees. Although, strictly speaking, he was of the clan, and a pygmy to boot, Kaka was of the minority Wambilangya family, who were slowly emerging as our rivals in business. The Wambilangyas were closely related to the Bukusus from across the border, and had been dismissed in Apac as “fringe cousins.” I had little imagined that this far from home, these differences would amount to much. I was wrong.
As I watched the customers flock to Kaka’s club, it slowly became apparent to me just why my Apac Papa had sent me to Nairobi. I was the fire-forged piece that was to put a spanner in the works of the ambitious Wambilangyas—no doubt these were the instructions I had carried for my Nairobi Papa in those grubby letters that I had brought with me. I tried all the
usual tricks. Normally, after we had completed our daily brewing, a clan elder came to “doctor” the brew before we opened for business. Each family had a specific elder assigned to this delicate, closely guarded duty in exchange for a token of the takings. This had been our custom since the beginning of time, and we continued its practice wherever we emigrated.
One evening, after the club had been closed for the night, I had my ten drums ready for the old man to bestow his blessings, having previously discussed with him my predicament with Kaka. At the appointed midnight hour, the mzee23 knocked on the back door and I let him in. I watched him from the corner of my eye—for typically he preferred to be left alone with the brew—as he extracted a small dead field mouse, with black stripes running across its back, from his shoulder bag. It was the kind of mouse that could be found on dumps and in the hedgerows surrounding the wealthier quarters of Nairobi. Next he produced, crumpled into a ball, the soiled knickers of a menstruating woman. Where he had gotten that was a mystery that only he knew. The old man worked the drums with a sense of indifference, and I felt, with a sense of unease, that I was on a losing streak; and my instincts were seldom wrong.
Then, before removing the most revered object from his worn bag, the mzee gave me a stern glance and bade me leave the room. I knew this mysterious object to be the special stirrer that every brewing family invests in, and which singly determines the direction of the business. There had been a moment of carelessness on the part of the Apac mzee, and I had seen the stirrer gripped between his bony, gnarled fingers. And so I waited while the mzee went to work on my investment.
The following day, I opened as usual and left my hired hands to conduct the business. As anticipated, sales continued to be meagre, little better than the day before. I opened early and the usual crowd of nighttime workers arrived in twos and threes. But later in the day, after Kaka had opened his doors, the usual pattern played itself out. One by one my customers ambled over, sometimes to greet a friend they had seen on the other side of the street, or to take a sample of Kaka’s daily brew. They never came back, despite the fact that I had invested heavily in “pimping” up my club, with a 42-inch LCD TV and a powerful stereo system; I even had plans to acquire pay TV in order to cash in on the English soccer craze sweeping through the town. And this was how the ungrateful idiots paid me back!
I had never taken failure lightly and quitting was unacceptable. As I nursed my losses, Kaka was smiling all the way to the bank. I watched him mingle with the customers—his clean-shaven pate shiny with sweat, his single cut-glass earring shining in the dim light, a wide smile permanently frozen on his broad face—and I felt a furious jealousy well up from within me, and, for the first time, I thought of employing other means to get what I wanted.
Whenever men make the mistake of courting one of our women—who I admit are most attractive—we always encourage them in their amorous pursuits. This is one way in which we have spread our tentacles. The lovesick man probably never finds out that he has been marked from the start, that we are waiting in the wings for him to sow his wild oats. Thereafter he becomes one of us, whether he likes it or not. In this manner, we have obtained a number of “clansmen” from the highest echelons of government, from the judiciary and the legislature, and many a one from the clergy. This method of recruitment is the secret ace that we keep carefully up our collective sleeves, and one which we use only when absolutely necessary.
I knew of two influential “relations” in neighboring Lavington. One of them was married to a girl from our village, and she happened to know my Apac Papa well; her folks had worked at our brewery before migrating to Nairobi. The other had been ensnared by his city wife, a pygmy like me, who had set her claws so deep that her husband had practically abandoned his family upcountry. Naturally, due to our foreshortened height, she had become my special sister. The first fellow was in a position to cause mild trouble in regard to licenses and other legalities required to do business in Nairobi. The other was a big shot in the Public Health Department. It was easy to have someone block the makeshift sewage lines serving Kaka’s pub and cause the stuff to flow back inside on a crowded day; alternatively I could arrange to have dead sewer rats dropped in the beer drums and then have the health inspector’s van turn up before anyone knew what was going on. Attractive as the two avenues were, in the end I decided that a more permanent solution was required.
After closing the doors that evening, I paid Papa a visit at his club. He had a private room in the back where he usually retired when he did not wish to be disturbed, whether to run a check on the business records, to meet with a business partner, or entertain a woman. I was accompanied by my good friend, Mbiko. Together, we found Papa lolling on the overstuffed sofa smoking weed, his head resting in the lap of a curvaceous dark woman called Serah, their faces lit by the glow of a fourteen-inch TV set.
“Ah, karibu, my two favourite uncles, Apuka and Mbiko!” he said, sitting up. “I’ve just been thinking about you and our business. Come, take a seat.”
Papa ushered us to the easy chairs and snapped on a switch that lit a pink overhead bulb. A half-empty bottle of Borzoi sat on the table together with two glasses and an overflowing ashtray. Papa’s woman brought two clean glasses over from the cabinet.
For a while we spoke of politics and the latest news from home, working our way down the Borzoi bottle. Papa’s woman slapped together a delicious meal of fried beef and matooke—just the way it was made back home. I found it amusing that as we partook of the finer things, our customers swallowed freshly pressed sisal juice, menses, and embalming fluid. But then it occurred to me that the Borzoi, too, might have its own secret ingredients known only to its maker.
Papa’s woman interrupted the meal to usher in our tribal mzee, who had just arrived from his day-long jaunts.
“Ah, there you are!” said Papa cheerfully. “I and my little uncles here were just skirting around the business problem I was telling you about. It is good you came.”
The mzee, looking troubled, washed his hands and joined us at table, placing his bag with its precious cargo gingerly beside his chair where he could keep an eye on it. As the discussion became increasingly grim, Papa sent Mbiko to fetch three more of our uncles who were supervising the business outside. As the night progressed, the discussion turned from the broad needs of the clan to the particular difficulties of our family. The Wambilangyas were not only wrecking havoc with business in Congo, but were starting to infiltrate other slums around the city where we maintained a presence. We were informed, by one of our uncles who had kept his ear to the ground, of their exploits in Mathare, Mukuru and Kibera, where they had the Kundos by the neck. And with every revelation, all eyes turned to our tribal mzee.
“We all know what the problem is,” said Papa, summing up the matter. “And we should not pretend about it. The Wambilangyas, for some reason, have the stronger hand.” In other circumstances, saying this in front of our tribal mzee would have been high treason punishable by a heavy fine, or even banishment. But these were clearly not ordinary times. In any case, Papa and the mzee were of generally the same age, both revered elders, and Papa had the advantage of being host, which permitted him some liberties. The mzee’s heavily lined face remained lowered, sagging jowls working pensively, his cross-eyed gaze trained on a point on the floor.
“We have a problem; on that, we are agreed,” Papa continued. “And unless we find a solution, the Wambilangyas will eclipse us.”
In the course of the tense and lengthy discussion that followed, Mbiko and I more than once inadvertently offended the discredited tribal mzee by looking him in the eye. But our carelessness was excused, thanks in part to the second bottle of Borzoi that Papa had produced from the drinks cabinet. By the time we were ready to leave, the club had emptied, save for the few drunks who had passed out on the floor, and who would spend the remainder of the night locked up inside with the guards. As we made our way home through the
darkened alleys, we came to a decision.
The opportune moment presented itself six weeks later, when the news came that Kaka’s teenage cousin had been killed by muggers at Mau Mau Bridge on his way from school late one evening. Whether by accident or design, only the perpetrators could tell. The boy had lived with his mother at the back of the chang’aa den she ran in Giĉhagi, Kangemi. As was the custom, the entire clan was expected to help organize the funeral. Unlike other migrant tribes in the city, whenever a clan member died we held a fundraiser to cover the cost of transporting the body home—in this case, to Uganda. The roots of our clan were firmly entrenched in Uganda, and custom demanded that the dead be laid to rest among their forebears, even if they were so far away as London and Johannesburg.
It was a drizzly Friday night, and the fourth and last day of our night funeral meetings. The fundraiser had been successful; one of the deceased’s uncles had donated a minibus that he operated as a matatu24 on Route 46, and we now needed only cash for the fuel, coffin, and other minor expenses. The close family members would travel with the body on the matatu hearse, with the rest of the attendants using public means of transportation. We secured the necessary travel documents, thanks to our strategically placed “relation” in the Immigration Department. The body was to be collected the following day from the City Mortuary and the cortège intended to set off at sunset.
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