I keep a little diary of things that happen to me. Some sad. Some quite funny. Some just weird. Others life changing. I guess that has been my way of keeping record of the process of growing up. I usually sit down at the end of the year and read the journal I keep and choose the things that touched my life most, the things that stood out of all the others and the things that just make me laugh. As I read the old journal and pick up events for my Growing Up Diary, I learn and relearn lessons. I laugh at myself sometimes. I cry for what I hadn’t allowed myself to grieve for. I see things in the light of retrospect. And I know that some things I will never repeat and that I would do other things just the same if I were given a second chance. I know what I would do differently if I were given the chance.

This morning, I looked at my diary and March 26, 2001 reminded me of the time when fireants invaded my home in Mtwapa, Mombasa. I woke up to the strange rustle of the fireant armies crawling everywhere. In a panic, I peered over the side of the bed and the site of the crawly insects made me do the exact opposite of logic. Instead of staying on the bed where I was safe for at least a while, I jumped off the bed to try and make it to the living room. Bad idea, I soon found out that fireants can move very fast. One found its way somewhere I would rather not have had it and decided to take a bite, too. I tried to get to it but couldn’t do that fast enough. It bit me again and I kept trying to get it off while still running out of the house. Out on the little dusty street in the respite of the morning breeze, I decided that the best way to deal with my furious little foe was to deny it of clothes to hide in. So I took off the one little scrap of clothing I had worn to bed. I heaved a sigh of relief as the pesky little thing fell. Then I realized that my sleepy little village had woken up and everyone was out on the street. All of them….

Then there is the entry for November 10, 2001. It was a day that might have been very beautiful. By 8.00am there was blue sky and ideas of going down to the beach for a dose of beach soccer and a swim. That was cut short when my cousin showed up at the front door. I was excited because he lived all the way in Malindi and his job made him pretty much unavailable, so I hadn’t seen him in a while. But a look on his face killed my excitement and infused a feeling that something horrible had happened. By the time he sat down with my mother, I knew the horrible that had happened even without his saying so. My brother had died. That ushered in a period of denial before I accepted my loss and allowed myself to grieve for my brother.

August 15, 2003 was just weird. I walked into the Public Library on the Island, and bumped into a very short person. I felt a strange jolt of recognition but just could not place the face I saw, a face not old, not young, not unique in any way such that I can still not describe it in detail, yet a face I knew. I ignored the feeling and went into the library for a few hours of reading. When I came out again, I bumped into the same person. This time, he grabbed my hand forcing me to stop. I thought I was being mugged or something like that. But he looked straight into my eyes and said quite clearly, “You will find the answer.” To this day I still think I might have had a minor psychotic episode that day. I never saw that person again once he walked off leaving me feeling shaken. I still think I recognized him from somewhere. I am not sure what answer he meant I would find. But the thought comes to me when I am in pain or uncertainty of one kind or the other. That with time, I will find the answer to it all.

There have been a few more entries since then. Breaking up with a lover here. Some revelation there. A new friend here. Life in general. Keeping my diary reminds me. Decisions. Mistakes. Events. Changes. It reminds me of the course I want to take, and the mistakes I never want to repeat. It helps me to evaluate what is important now, and what isn’t. I can move on, because I can look at my past.

PLOT 10

Back in 2003, I was a semi-independent semi-adult working and living on ‘my own’ in Mombasa. I lived in a two-room ‘flat’ that my mum had secured from a friend who was leaving the country for a while. The two rooms were joined by a connecting door and were part of a block of other rooms collectively called a Plot because the whole building is built on a piece of land 1/8 of an acre generally referred to as a plot. The building itself is made up of the 8 or more ‘flats’ arranged on both sides of a long corridor, perhaps roofed and surrounding a courtyard which is used as a communal laundry room and general recreation room. You might have to share bathrooms, too, usually situated at the farthest end of the courtyard.

If you have ever lived in Mombasa, on the village side of it, then you know that it was rather unusual for a kid in her very early 20’s, not married, and with no kids, to be living in a two-room flat. You just need one room, I was told. In fact it was quite strange, at least in my neighbors’ viewpoint, for a good girl my age not to be married. The neighbors had no scruples about telling me just how I should live my life, sometimes getting offended if I seemed not to listen to the ‘older ones.’ I was respectful, I tried to be, but it is rather difficult to listen to advice that dictates ‘some nice young man who has a steady job at KPA as a husband as soon as possible and 12 kids in rapid succession.’ The only thing on my mind was how long it would take me to save up to buy the cool laptop second-hand, and then maybe pay for part-time classes at The Institute.

Having moved from my mum’s three-room apartment on the other side of town, I was quite unused to the interactive nature of life in the Plot. I was even more unused to the interfering and bickering nature of the women in the Plot. The Plot I lived in was known in the village as Plot 10, in the style of the old KBC program by the same name. Plot 10, if you ever run into one, will be characterized by nosy, gossipy and simply malicious neighbors, chiefly the women, but sometimes a man, most likely a pastor, will be at the helm of the bickering gossip. Now don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against pastors. It’s just a generalization from the fact that my run-ins have involved one. I am still not very sure what I do that sets them against me.

The gossipers, not many, maybe two or three but enough to make you hate everyone living in the Plot, will gang up to gossip, for some reason always making sure it gets back to you. If you are like me, and you prefer to come home and rest in the solitude of your room, (solitude ha!) someone will make sure they say what they have to say loudly enough for you to hear. There is no privacy; there is no locking the world out. Your music is too loud. Your cooking stinks (dude, I never cooked anything but coffee.) Then there is the one who sings loudest, taarab, just as you are making your way down the long corridors to go to the shops. She might sing something like, “Vishindo vya mashua havishutui bahari.” (The sailboats rocking do not terrify the sea.) And you spend the rest of the evening trying to figure out what in the world it has to do with you, and fail every time.

Wait till you wake up the next morning and find a pile of rubbish on your doorstep. Then as if all that isn’t enough, someone ’sympathetic’ shows up to tell you that the Pastor is complaining about your mode of dressing and telling everyone that you are a twilight woman. Of course, if you are like me, you will stare at the messenger with a gaping mouth, and then when you are alone, tell yourself, “I don’t care what anyone thinks of me. I am working honestly at a job, that may be low-paying, but that does not involve sacrificing my dignity. My mother raised a decent human being and I will not let myself be drawn into Plot conflicts. And if anyone has a problem with my way of dressing they can…shove it.”

It can quickly escalate from what you ate last night, to the place from which your parents originated. I was a common victim, by virtue of the fact that I was from Bara (upcountry). There had to always be something I was doing wrong. I tried to conform at first. Then I realized that I just couldn’t. So I did not find myself a nice husband fast. I did not bother to change from my ragged jeans into kangas and lesos, even though I do admire the bright colors and the creative sayings printed on the back of them. (You should know, that if you don’t have a large bosom, uh breasts, and a thin waist, there is virtually no way of looking classy in the kangas and lesos, even less of a chance at holding them up in a decent tie over your chest which is how they are commonly worn.)

I still do not understand why it is so important for people to be uniform. Differences are not tolerated, not encouraged. Anyone who is different becomes a target for ridicule and sometimes malice. The thing is, we are all different. We can never all be the same. So the ridicule and malice is likely to go in a cycle. The perpetrator today maybe the victim tomorrow. So I wasn’t very surprised when the Pastor started fighting with his gossip buddy over use of the laundry area. The Pastor called his yesterday buddy ‘a witch’ because she prefers herbs over conventional medicines. She called him ‘a womanizer’ because most of his flock are women.

I moved into a smaller Plot. Later, I moved into my mum’s home, now she lives in Nairobi. Our neighbor is the local Deliverance Church pastor. When I first arrived, I was pretty much a recluse from being ill for very long. I had managed to buy the laptop and mum could afford to pay for internet connection. I studied at home, wrote from my room and pretty much didn’t bother anyone. Guess what, that’s different and it’s not acceptable. There has been talk of my ‘real’ occupations which vary from highway robber to, more recently, because of the number of cats I own, the witch.

What would it cost anyone to try and understand the differences before they ridicule them?