The Gunny Sack

by M G Vassanji

  Fateh was supported by kindred spirits. Drifters and dreamers. Idealists. Edward could not help but support the rabbit, whose praises he had sung for so long. It was more of an aesthetic choice. The underdog rabbit against the torch and the wheel; it was irresistible. And Bahdur Uncle, who had known Fateh since childhood, was drawn quite naturally into the excitement and rhetoric of the campaign. He had the bearing and the habits that others, more responsible (Hassan Uncle for one), disliked: he liked to have fun. He was rather stylish, sometimes in white shorts and shirt, holding a cigarette in the style of Gary Cooper. His wife Dolu was not unlike him. The fact that she sported a beret on some occasions is indication enough. They both loved to see films, and when they enjoyed a film, they saw it again and again—even when they were broke.

  Fateh did not have enough money to have flyers printed, and the 500 shillings he had to deposit to register his candidacy he asked to borrow from Bahdur Uncle. Bahdur Uncle of course did not have 500 shillings, and came to Kulsum with some story, taking the money from her emergency fund, money reserved for the Downtown wholesalers. Thus was Fateh the Coalseller’s campaign financed, at least to a good extent, and my mother never forgave her brother. The next time he came to her for emergency funds she refused, as did the rest of the family, and he spent a month in debtors’ prison.

  On the day before the election Fateh rented a loudspeaker from Rajan Radio and he and Bahdur Uncle drove the streets of Kariakoo exhorting people to vote for the rabbit.

  Kimbia na sungura

  Fateh ukimchagua

  Ataleta mbio na furaha

  CHAGUA FATEH! CHAGUA SUNGURA!

  Run with the rabbit

  If you choose Fateh

  He’ll bring speed and pleasure

  CHOOSE FATEH! CHOOSE THE RABBIT!

  It brought smiles, his manner, his familiarity, his slogans echoing from the building walls. Children ran after the Chama Chetu, running with the rabbit. Old men in kanzus, who had known him since he was a boy, would look in pleasure as he passed, as if to say, Our own Fateh! But so what? The rabbit is fast and clever, as Edward would say, but what can he do for you? The rabbit is kind-hearted, he takes children to school free of charge, while Mzee Pipa extorts 15 shillings from poor families who have no choice. But can he talk to the Governor? Or to the reporters who come from England and America? He has style, but it is the style of a Kariakoo loafer. He is not a gentleman.

  On election day of course he offered rides to the polling booths to his supporters. A few mamas who had giggled at his carefree manner went. A few old men went. Children ran after him. But most of the people on Kichwele and Viongozi went in TANU cars or on foot or, as did Kulsum, in one of Dr. Kara’s rides.

  After the voting Bahdur Uncle went with Fateh as his counting agent. The two, one holding a cigarette in his best Gary Cooper manner, the other carefree in the Raj Kapoor manner, walked among the working teams at Arnautoglu Hall like a pair of foremen, watching them carefully put a cross over a name on a graph paper for every vote counted, seeing their opponents’ tolls rising higher and higher, finally coming to terms with the fact that the steady wheel had snuffed out the lofty light and run over the crafty rabbit.

  The election had been multiracial, each race to be represented in the Legco, but the winner was TANU, only TANU was represented. For in the past months Julius Nyerere had gone from village to village asking young men to leave aside loafing and join TANU; he had patiently followed the old men who would take him to the very spots where their tribesmen had been hanged by the Mdachis, and they had asked him, could he really get rid of these people who had defeated the Mdachis, and he had said yes, follow me. And even as our own Queen Begum was confidently telling Kulsum, “Do you think the people who defeated Napoleon, and Hitler, who hanged Kimathi and put Kenyatta away, will just pack their bags and leave?”—TANU’s strength was growing. And after the election, which TANU won for the Africans, Asian started telling Asian, We must change, we must diversify. The duka is doomed. We must go into industry, into the professions, into farming, we must move into other economic sectors. Wait and see, said others, the British have not left yet.

  When Sir Richard Turnbull was announced as the new Governor, we said, Oh him? The District Commissioner—the one who was in Moyale in the NFD and in Isiolo, who was in Nairobi during Mau Mau? Oh, he knew our daddy! We did not write to him, or to his daughter, reminding them of the fact, but the thought did cross our minds. Reminded of her past glory, of five, six, ten years ago, Kulsum was not willing even to listen to the stories I brought from Ji Bai. Stories from a remote past, from a village on the coast, stories of black ancestry and a murder …

  Taratibu, taratibu. Patience, patience. Don’t cry, my beloved, said a Swahili love song to the tune of a Hindi film melody. Song to a black Radha, coming from the blaring loudspeakers of the Kariakoo market, reminding me of my greatgrandfather, the fair Govindji, who got her for cold nights. I would see her in every black woman I laid eyes on, looked up and down upon. The modest but by no means docile Swahili draped in black buibui and exuding the sticky fragrance of halud; the short and fair Chagga, the shy Makonde … I had visions of Sabini our night watchman, bringing his wife to say goodbye … Did she look like her, my great-grandmother Taratibu—a shy Makonde woman with a face marked by stripes and a large black button on her upper lip? Her mouth stayed open, and she had large teeth, and she just said yes or no, looking at the ground in front of her. Sabini left to become a church minister in his home town south … At night I would stay awake thinking of her, of what she had looked like. I would say her name forwards and backwards, backwards and forwards … Tara-tibu, tibu-tara, tara-tibu, tibu-tara, conjuring that name from the past until I felt hot and tired and Jogo’s father drew nearer … “Man’s mind is fickle … the world is a fair …” in clumsy Swahili to an even clumsier tune.

  A slave woman kept by an Indian trader in a small town. Think about it, about her. Perhaps she always hated his guts, hated it when he touched her, undraped her, screwed her … or perhaps she liked him a little, or even a lot … her name was Taratibu, she was not incapable of love … and he risked damnation for their son.

  Black ancestry was not something you advertised. Kulsum had two girls’ marriage prospects to think of. A whiff of African blood from the family tree would be like an Arctic blast, it would bring the mercury of social standing racing down to unacceptable levels.

  “Do you want to see a festival?” asked Edward one day. “Yes,” I replied, and off we walked to the bus stand and caught a bus to Illala.

  We got off at a shopping area, rather dead at this time of day, with two dry-goods stores side by side in a squat, yellow brick building called Rupia House, a few men sitting on the cement floor outside, doing nothing … A sound of drums came from the interior, behind Rupia House; we took a side street and made another turn into a long narrow alley, past mud houses in various states of completion, and joined the current of men, women and children hurrying along it. All around us, women in buibui, the scent of halud and Bint-el-Sudan and Jasmin, men in clean, pressed trousers, long white kanzus … The sound of drums was drawing nearer, the beat was taking a shape, the jingle of tambourines was now audible, the current of people poured into a clearing beside a house frame, and men, women, children hurried towards the festival of the Prophet’s birthday behind the house and beyond a mound of earth. The square enclosing the band was five deep and we craned our necks to see inside, between black-buibui-clad female and white-kanzu-clad male figures. Like other boys and girls I pushed my way in through a group of women to the front, and watched. The band was beating a constant, tireless rhythm to one side, nearby the elders stood in a line moving to the rhythm of the drum, holding up ceremonial walking sticks, and in the centre two males improvised a sword dance with sticks, parrying, jabbing, hopping away in a circle and returning, and a third person, a tolerated lunatic, was doing a solo. Men from the crowd, elderly men usually, stepped inside the square to relieve a dan
cer, challenge a foe, exchange parries … Edward went in, cutting a striking but incongruous figure in his bright green shirt and white trousers, refusing a challenge but moving gracefully away in a circle, doing some kind of a shake, stick held vertically in his hand. Behind me, around me, as I watched my friend dancing, the crowd pressed in, black bodies I’d never been so close to, scent of soap, of perfume, of sweat, flaps of buibui fanning my hot dusty face, soft warm curves of women pressing through filmy buibui, enveloping, inviting, absorbing as I stood there senseless in the heat, the flying dust, the odours, all the while my dukawallah hand clutching the hard silver shilling in my pocket that would take me home. After the dance the square broke up and we drank sherbet, he a bright orange one and I a red one, and we ate peanuts and like experts we stood discussing the performance. People now noticed me, boys ran by mischievously close, provoking, shoving …

  Kulsum had gone frantic with worry. The servant Ali had been sent to the school grounds to search for me, Sona was dispatched to Alu Poni’s, Jogo’s, and various other households. As the afternoon drew to a close, Uncle Goa’s help was sought. In his green Morris he first went to the school grounds, then he went up and down the main streets and alleys, questioning boys playing in the streets. He tried the Khalsa, Goan, Patel Brotherhood, and Gymkhana cricket grounds to check if I had stayed to watch a late practice. He was returning from the police station when I stepped off the bus, and he drove me the rest of the way home. The store was open and filled with family, not a customer in sight, a stern and worried-looking Kulsum, perched on her high stool at the counter.

  “Here he is,” said Uncle Goa genially in Swahili, with a flourish of his hand. “All safe and sound!”

  “Where were you?” cried the chorus.

  “We were worried sick.”

  “Look at his feet! His clothes! His hair!”

  “What have you been up to?”

  Uncle Goa had slipped away.

  “I went to see a Maulidi with Edward.”

  Pandemonium. “The rascal!” “What made you go with him?” “Don’t you know you could be robbed or killed?” “Wait till he comes tomorrow!” “Fire him!” “There are djinns and ghosts there!” “Drunkards too!” “Beta, don’t you like our company that you go away without telling us?”

  Poor Edward. He knew what awaited him, for he came late the next morning and suffered Kulsum’s lecture in silence. But the next few nights they all watched me with amusement as I demonstrated to them the sword dance with my father’s rusty sword from the red scabbard.

  With an elected majority of supporters in Legco, TANU demanded more and more. The new Governor had placed an open tray before it and asked: What do you want? And TANU, Nyerere, with an eye on the whole tray politely asked for one thing then another. And Sir Richard, with all the intention of giving the whole tray away, offering one thing and holding back another, just to see how badly they wanted the whole works.

  The key word, of course, was self-government. Not yet independence. Everyone was cautious. Ask for everything at once, and you’ll look greedy, uncivilized.

  What do we want? asked Nyerere. What we want in this country, sir, is that anyone, irrespective of his race, as long as he owes allegiance to Tanganyika, is a complete and equal citizen as anyone else. Hear hear! Hey … hmmm. The background sounds of approval in Legco. How avidly the proceedings were followed. It is not every day you watch history being made, and know what you’re watching is history in the making. The Herald was euphoric, the Ngurumo roared approval, as the Legco members, one and all, said Equality, equality of the races. A reasonable chap, people said, a gentleman, a statesman!

  On Mnazi Moja ground, behind Arnautoglu Hall, they enacted a little skit.

  “Nipe coffee,” says the man (barefooted, shirt-tails hanging out, but trying to look tall and imposing) who is playing the European boss, to his servant in stiff accented Swahili. The servant is alarmed. “But, Bwana,” he says nervously, “to give you a kofi … how can I do it? You are the boss, I am the servant …” “Nipe coffee,” says the boss impatiently, “haraka.” Quick. “Please, Bwana, don’t ask me to give you a kofi, tafadhali, ask someone else … the Mhindi’s servant, he is a cad … the taxi driver—” He trembles. “Mimi nataka coffee! Haraka! Coffee moto. Moto sana!” Hot coffee. “Haya, Bwana,” says the servant finally, in resignation. “You asked for it. Moto moto.” And he gives the boss a resounding slap on the face, a kofi. The crowd is hilarious.

  Matchbox tops began showing TANU flags and jembes and torches and political slogans instead of Swedish steamers and clippers. People from the Labour Union and TANU and the women’s union kept coming and took the fundis and servants to a side and whispered with them … Watch the green colour, advised Hassan Uncle to Kulsum, in his cryptic way, there lies safety. Buy flags, buy badges, pay the fundis day to day, make them sign for everything.

  “What do I want?” asked Oman our expert tailor, the fundi. “What I want, madam, is backpay for six years according to Labour salaries … what I want is vacation pay for six years and what I want is end of term bonus.” The fundi Omari and his friend Idi, who now worked at the Union headquarters, and sometimes wore “Release Jomo Kenyatta” shirts, estimated that when he was paid the arrears Oman could just walk into the shop and own it. Omari bided his time and calculated, ready to pounce with the backing of the Labour Union. And Kulsum, in an exact literal translation, was scared shitless.

  We would like, said Nyerere, to light a candle and place it on top of Mount Kilimanjaro, to shine beyond our borders, giving hope where there was despair, love where there was hate, dignity where there was only humiliation …

  Spoken like a statesman, sir. A Tanganyikan emblem of liberty … fair, flaming Kilimanjaro rising from the plains in place of fair Columbia with the torch … Why not? We also have dreams we would like to share, and worthy ideals, and hopes not only for ourselves but for everyone … if they will let us.

  Miss Castelinho, with the wide sexy mouth and the beauty spot, usually walks to school from teacher’s quarters holding a parasol against the sun. Sometimes Mr. Ramji gives her a ride on his scooter and they are seen disappearing into the bushes to do what the boys, rightly or wrongly, speculate graphically about. Miss Castelinho is the class teacher of Standard VIA, now collectively undergoing the pubescent itch: excitement at the sight of a kiss, excitement at the mention of a kiss, excitement at the thought of a kiss. What was once the outing period is now used for singing. Out are “Sing a Song of Sixpence” and “There Was a Little Nut Tree.” In are Elvis and Cliff and Neil Sedaka and Pat Boone.

  Consider a typical period.

  Hassam, the Hassam, Elvis, later Iblis, is singing and Castelinho is beaming proudly.

  “When the moon takes its place … of the sun in the sky … I’ll call for my girlie, we’ll go walking by …”

  The beaming Castelinho walks to the door, chats with another teacher. “He’s a good singer, isn’t he? This one’s brother. He’s handsome. Smart too. How the girls will fall for him!”

  Behind her, Hassam continues, “… we will make love—” and the class sings in chorus solemnly after him, “We will make love!”

  “Oh yes,” Jogo thumps his desk in joyful affirmation, but not understanding what he is singing, “We will make love!”

  That year, Miss Penny Mrs. Gaunt was leaving for England, and Miss Castelinho organized a goodbye event for her: eleven boys dressed as fairies holding up cards, singing Bing Crosby’s “May the Good Lord Bless and Keep You.” The class groaned. It was not the attire that the boys objected to but the song. “Oh, that budha,” groaned Hassam. To which Miss Castelinho responded a pert: “Who says Bing is old?” and stood there red-faced, her weakness exposed, answered by whistles and catcalls. Bing! Hey, Bing! What a first name, Bing! Ping! Ding! Bing Bang! Bang Bang Bang!

  Eleven pretty boys were chosen, but of course none of the coarse breed from Kariakoo. The Kariakoo boy stands out. The shirt is faded and the collar somet
imes frayed. The shorts have the requisite creases but they don’t stand out, as in newer, freshly laundered garments. The shoes are cobbler-made, the checkered designs on the socks scream “Hong Kong!” He carries a kikapu, not a Japanese-made plastic satchel or a little trunk. And when his mouth opens—we kumamako, stop it you motherfucker!—venom in three languages. Every third or fourth word is a swear word, observers have noted. Thus stands catalogued the Kariakoo boy. But someone must have whispered into Miss Castelinho’s ear, Better take this Juma boy, Mrs. Gaunt likes him. How else can one explain why Snivelling Alnasir was chucked out and yours truly asked to replace him? Even when Snivelling Alnasir cried and sniffed all afternoon? But his family were not nobodys, they owned a fleet of lorries, had moved out from Kariakoo into a brand-new bungalow, and his elder sisters were by no means the snivelling sort. They came, two of them, and khus-khus-khus, whispers in the corridor with Miss Castelinho. Alnasir was reinstated and I was chucked out, after only two practices. “You don’t want to take part, do you?” she said. I looked at her in bewilderment. “Do you want to take part?” she asked impatiently, as if talking to an idiot. “Yes, yes, Miss!” Here goes Alnasir, I thought. But no. She kept quiet. Some time later Mr. Ramji came in. “Eh budhu, come here.” I went. Two cool fingers caught hold of my ear. He played with it, tenderly at first … how cool and delicious they felt, those fingers! Then he started twisting it, this way and that, and like a scrap from the Daily Herald, it caught fire, it felt burning hot, and oh, it hurt. It hurt like iodine on a wound, red chilies on the tongue, a kick in the groin. But now I was smart to their game, and I kept mum.