Do you boo!

This is going to be a long post. So if you need to go susu or drink water or gossip with the neighbor or whatever… go do that first then come back. Because I want your undivided attention, because I’m needy like that. Sue me.

I never really make New Year’s resolutions because most of the time I won’t actually do them. And if I do I will do just enough to tick it off the list to make myself feel better. Plus it’s too much pressure. So why bother? There was this time when Amani was being interviewed and she said that she makes resolutions on her birthday. This way they are more personal. Which is pretty cool if you ask me.

This year I did something that I swore I would never do. So because everybody was making these elaborate New Year plans, I got sucked into the bandwagon and I caved. I decided that I was gonna eat healthy this year. I mean I’m not growing any younger and sooner or later my metabolism won’t be as cooperative as it is right now. Normally we are advised to consult a nutritionist before embarking on the journey to healthy eating but yours truly didn’t do that. Because why? Because nobody *clap* tells*clap* me*clap* what*clap* to*clap* do.

What did I do? I’m glad you asked. I was drinking more water, avoiding soda and all junk food. Basically doing stuff I’ve heard fitness/health gurus harp on about in the interwebs. Being the good sport that I am, I threw in some fruits too. Everybody knows when you wanna be healthy, fruits are the bidness. 

My skin actually improved which gave me the motivation to continue. You should have seen me running in the field with the students. I was on a roll baby!!! I was actually getting fitter (can I say that?) than I’ve ever been in years. Or so I thought!

Fast forward to a few months later. I wake up one morning feeling feverish. Like I had been hit na gari ya Miraa. Everything hurt. My head, shoulders, knees, duodenum and toes. I assumed it was malaria because I live in Homa Bay County and it’s the common disease here. By ten I was now shaking and feeling nauseous... one of my colleagues called a boda boda (chauffeur from some of you) to take me home after the school nurse had given me some drugs. I took the drugs then went to bed .Aint nothing like a good nap to cure an ailing body , right?

Wrong! At 7pm I wake up and I think I’m dying and I call my pal to take me to the hospital. I wouldn’t want to die in the house only for the neighbour's cat to feed on me before I’m discovered days later. It can happen man, I saw it in a horror movie once. lol.

We get to the hospital and I’m asked for my AON card I don’t have it. The medical scheme for teachers was launched tene but I just never knew how important it would be until now. 

Teachers are so awesome they are insured twice by the government.(Don’t hate me coz you aint me)   

My pal asks me if I have my NHIF card or just the number and I can’t remember. For some reason I couldn’t remember anything. I didn’t carry shit. Just my very sick self. My friend is livid and I can see him seething with rage because now he will have to pay for everything in cash. Imagine even before the doctor says ‘hi!’ to you, you have to part with “consultation’ fee.

“You can’t be sick and stupid at the same time. Pick a struggle” .

OK! he didn’t say these words but I know he was thinking it.

After paying I’m sent to this room to have my pressure checked then later get on the weighing scale. I wasn’t worried because knew all the measures I had in place ensured that I maintain my weight. I get on the scale and to my horror I’ve added 5 frigging kgs.  Now it was not only my body hurting but my soul too. After all the discipline I exercised in staying healthy this is what I get? The diet gods must be against me. I sweater gawd my ancestors forgot to make one sacrifice. Lol  . At this rate I will look like Winnie the pooh wearing a t-shirt by the end of the year.

I’m told to wait for the doctor and he finds me seated with my head in my hands looking like something the cat drugged in while in my flimsy night dress and hair(ok it was a weave. But its still mine.i bought it. i got receipts to prove it) all over the place. 

And just when I think the day couldn’t get any worse they send in a youngin, fresh from college to come and examine me. When you meet a fine man you want to look your best not like a homeless person. I’m not Beyoncé , can’t go out with my I-woke-up-like-this face. If you squint a wee bit he looks like Denzel Washington. I explained my symptoms to him calmly wishing he would stop looking at me straight in the eye.

Wait. My day got even worse. I thought he would just take my temperature and tell me to open my mouth and say “aaah” ,but noooo? He tells me to lay on the bed for an examination. 

Why lort, why? 

Then now I start getting nervous because I’m tryna remember if I wore good underwear. Grandma always insists that we wear good underwear. Now I know she was preparing me for a day like this. I don’t know why for the love of anything sacred I could not remembered the underwear I wore. This disease must have gotten into my head.

I’m now praying that it’s the good one. I look down and luckily it’s the good one. Then he starts feeling up my lower abdomen.

 ( the closest I have come to action in a long time). lol

I tell him I aint preggers. He tells me when treating a woman my age, they gotta rule out pregnancy. Here we go again. I tell him I'm not pregnant and if I were I would know. He realizes there is no need arguing with miss-know-it-all. He continues doing his thing like I don’t even exist.

Young people these days!! Living with my Luo peeps has taught me one thing. They have no time for being politically correct (pun so intended). They tell it as it is. A while back I had a skin infection and the doctor told me to my face “madam wega ruako mtumba”. He durn heart my heart and bruised my ego mayne. I cant buy couture on a teacher’s salary. Mitumba is life.

Anyhu long story short- they do a couple of blood test. And guess what was ailing me? Frigging ulcers. Apparently I’m not supposed to eat all fruits as someone who has ulcers.and a bunch of other things which i ate in my quest to have a beautiful alimentary canal.

Eating healthy has now turned into a night mare. It durn near killed me. Moral of the story, dieting sucks- let nobody tell you different. If they do, punch them in the throat. You don’t need that negativity in your life chile. Eat what you want, when you want boo. Do you chile!

Ta ta lovely people!

Wall to wall

I woke up on Friday morning and I immediately knew that something was wrong. For one my hair was soaking wet in an afro and I was shivering. It turns out the previous night it had rained heavily and I left the window open so you now what happened. When it rains, it pours...sigh(no pun intended!) But that aside I had an awesome day, I visited Eastleigh, Mathare, Gikomba and some other centers whose names I can’t remember thanks to a good friend of mine who wanted to show me around. We ate some good pilau which can make you slap your mama (more like double b*tch slap your mama) at the “hotel De Chelsea” opposite that mosque in Eastleigh which put Mr. Balala on the spot some time back! There is also some mama who sells deep fried viazi with some sweet curry near the stage and it tastes so divine. And no I wasn’t paid to advertise.

So we finished off with Gikomba and came home with mud all the way to our knees. So my good friend tells me to go to her house and shower. Now all that was awesome until it came to the time when she gave me the knickers (or should I say what’s left of it). It seems she didn’t get the memo that I do not wear thongs unless they are going to my feet (read thong sandals). Now according to her she calls my knickers “wall to wall”.smh

Now people I think am about to give in to peer pressure. I done sold my soul to the devil. I have no spine...sob...sob. I decided to actually try it on. I think you need to sit down for this! So I put the stringy thingy on and I walked to her full length mirror and shock on my duodenum I looked like a Sumo wrestler. I shite you not! 

And don’t get be started on the uncomfortable feeling that you are walking with a permanent wedgie (how do chics do it?). Anyway I went home (using the dark shortcuts of course) and brave the draft blowing up my nether regions...sigh!

random

I got a link via one of the social networks about a comedian who was giving insights as to whats wrong with the black woman, apart from the fact that we are angry! Most of the time i watch the stuff on youtube purely for entertainment but this one touched me so i decided to do a post.

The young man said that the thing that is wrong with the black women is that we lack compassion. Out of all the definitions of compassion this was my favourite:

The deep awareness of the suffering of another coupled with the wish to relieve it.

He went on to explain how on his birthday his girlfriend brought him a gift that wasn't wrapped and gave it to him then left. His side h*e gave him a wrapped gift with a card written "Thank you for being you". His new woman took the time to put some heart into the gift, she showed how caring she was in picking and wrapping the gift while the girlfriend did it like a chore.

This young man was onto something but he didn't know what to call it. I think he meant that women are becoming insensitive and uncaring. I almost agree with him because i have witnessed and experienced and even dished out some of the hurt to people.

A few months back a woman came on telly saying how she burned her own child with a hot panga. She was on camera explaining how she took the panga placed it on the jiko and burned her own flesh and blood. She didn't even try to hide it or lie that it was an accident.

A few days ago me and some lady were chastising a girl who had done a mistake which i had done earlier. No sooner had i started talking that the heifer
lady decided to bring up something i had done in the past and throw it in my face telling me how sijui she was coping me... bah ...blah...I kept quiet hoping she would get the picture and shut the fuck up, but she didn't. I have never been pissed in my entire life. I thought of saying something but i counted the cost of the battle and realized i had more to lose. What got my goats was when the lady turned around and did something worse to the very person we were trying to chastised and she felt justified.This lady was not sensitive to both the situation.

I remember in college our lecturer in our poetry class used to insist that when we do term papers in groups we would follow it up with a presentation such that he can make sure every one is pulling their weight. As i was presenting this lady kept asking me stupid question...testing to see if i knew what i was talking about. I started getting pissed and the lecture noticed and told her to stop. The funny part was she hadn't done her presentation.

As i was going to my seat , i went over to her and leaned in and whispered in her ear "in the next few minutes you will be there and i will be where you are seated". When her turn came , boy did i give her grief! that was the last time for the rest of my poetry class that we ever talked. This lady was insensitive she did not know that her turn will come and she would want people to be decent to her.

These are just a few scenarios showing how some women are very inconsiderate. This may have come about by growing up in households where men ain't shit and now to prevent what their mother went through they are ruthless in their dealing with men. They think the men treated their mothers badly because they were soft.

I was reading a blog talking about Hill Harper's book 'The conversation'. The female blogger thought Hill was biased against women by asking them to lower their standards. Personally i haven't read the book but if The eye-candy did write it then am definitely going to search for it.lol.

I still think what Hill and the comedian was going about is still sensitivity and understanding. Women need to treat men the way they would want to be treated. The standards you put for your ideal man is the same that you should be able to deliver your self. Like those women who insist that their man should have a stable job, car, well educated and healthy, when they themselves went to third floor colleges and have nothing to their name. Why would you want a man to have achieved all that when you your self haven't achieved anything near that? You attract what you are! If you want man who is successful, be successful yourself- then you will attract a man who is successful.

I was talking to some young man who told me how this lady always flashes his phone if she wants to talk. She has never spent her money calling him. No compassion whatsoever! I have noticed that sense of entitlement in some women ever since i came to Nairobi. This is the city, life is expensive and this young men work upto three jobs just to make ends meet, instead of being considerate and help each other, some women think it is ok to take and take and take ...but give nothing in return. The fact that they feel nothing means that they are inconsiderate and insensitive.

Right now i am tarmacking(job hunting for some of you) and i have noticed the different ways in which my female friends and male friends are reacting to my situations. My male friends just send me mail or links for any vacancies that they now i would fit perfectly and there is less talk. e.g. Some guy we were with in college found out am jobless(i don't know how) and started linking me with jobs and sites like LinkedIn etc but never once has he tried flapping his mouth. Now some of my female friends are so insensitive. They interpret my not getting a job fast enough as my lack of trying. They call every few weeks asking why i haven't got a job? kwani what am i doing in Nairobi? Why am i not serious? blah blah blah!

There's this one annoying friend who always calls me telling me how lucky i am staying at home doing what i want. How my life is perfect n isht, makes me want to kill myself and everyone around me. I want a job more than she does...it is the first thing i think about when i wake up in the morning and the last thing when that i think about before i go to sleep.

I have applied for jobs at 2am in the morning because i could not sleep.I am the one without a job not them. I want a career, i want a car, i want to wear nice clothes, i want to hang out with my friends and pay for my plate of chips. I want to buy my grandma cool stuff and call her instead of her calling me. I remember when she found out i don't have a job she told me " nyinga(that's what she calls me)do not to be afraid of calling me even if you don't have a job. I still love you even if you don't have job" -Now that's compassion. She is so sweet!

When someone is unemployed they are low on self esteem. A job you have held for more than six months means a lot to you. It is part of you, loosing your job is like breaking up with someone important in your life so the constant nagging from the insensitive friends strips you of the last shred of self esteem that your trying to hold on to. All one wants is some patience and compassion from friends and family- not constant nagging.

There is a thin line between encouraging someone and nagging them and women have erased it. If am a woman and some of my female pals are running off the mouth, imagine what they are going to do to their man who has lost his job? No wonder men lie about their accomplishments to measure up, if i had known i would have hid my current situation from some heifers people.