Have you ever looked back at your life and wondered how the hell you got past some obstacles? Well, that’s what happens when you move forward in life. When you are so used to victory, sometimes you forget exactly where you are from. And you wonder why, in some areas like Mombasa, folks are called lazy. Before you give people names, surely walk a mile in their shoes. How on earth do you expect us to be active when our energy is sapped away by an intense and unforgiving sun that rains nothing short of Sodom-and-Gomorrah kind of brimstones?
I had a lot planned for my trip home—to visit places that built memories in me. Like visiting the lake, just slightly over 5 KMs away from our home. I couldn’t because the road is terrible. And the moment you hop onto a motorbike, the baptism by dust and sun will leave you craving for a bath with the kind of soap that can wash away sins. I’m not exaggerating. I mean, people in Kano are full-time advocates. They get admitted into the bar every day because the dust that has settled on their heads over time is more effective than that of my learned friends.
And when it comes to food, people here eat like they are feeding other grown men in their stomachs. The kind of ugali that is swallowed here by one man can feed five grown men in Nairobi. The trick is very simple: cook a huge mountain of ugali, the kind that can build a wall, but serve it with a small stew. As the prayer goes on, I looked at my father, secretly though, as he was folding his sleeves. No sooner had “Amen” been said than he descended on that ugali with the wrath of a mob on a thief. If that ugali had life, it would have cried like a dog that has been beaten—the kind of voice of agony that can drive chills down your spine. If the ugali had a voice, I assure you that it would be draining its tears until it sweats out the entire water in it.
Talking about stew, how is it that folks in shags know how to balance the ratio of ugali to stew? Because most times, they usually have stew left even after leveling mountains of ugali.
I was surprised to find out that such stuff still happens in this village. I thought that with the introduction of TV and electricity in the village, we would have our own house parties and cut down on the task of walking at night, risking panga-wielding rowdy men on the way. But the habit is still here with us. In 2017, people still attend disco matangas.
I did a few menial jobs here and there. I washed a cyber in exchange for computer training in Norwich Union. I packaged steel wool in Napro Industries in the industrial area. I became a mtu wa mkono in my brother’s tiles construction industry. To cut the long story short, during my December leave days that I partly spent at home, it hit me how lucky I am to have survived the Kano plains. Fellas, the sun that shines in Kano is hot. Maybe you can’t relate, but let me bring it closer to home. Well, that sun can effectively crush a man’s will and resign him to desiring nothing from life except water and a shade. I kid you not. A fully-grown, bearded man can forsake every single ambition and decide to strictly long for shade every morning.
When I asked around if the heat used to be like that when I was growing up there, I was told that it has always been like that. But I disagreed. The heat was bad, yes, but not to this extent. It doesn’t take a genius to diagnose the problem. Trees have been cut mercilessly, and so people are bearing the brunt of an unforgiving Mother Nature. When I was growing up, the fence of our home alone was covered in tall trees. A stone’s throw away, we had a swamp that was also covered in trees. But because of poverty and lack of information, people descended onto the habit of burning charcoal and selling trees. Less than ten years later, this village is slowly degenerating into a desert.
The lakeside county of Kisumu, on the other hand, has 1,184 hectares of forest cover, which is 0.44 percent of its total land mass of 267,000 hectares. The number of trees planted was 147,320. According to statistics, Kisumu County has one of the lowest tree covers in this country. It’s less than the UN-recommended percentage of 10%. This 10% includes shrubs, figs, and normal trees.
The situation is dire. If nothing is done urgently, then we are on the brink of an all-out desertification in a region that boasts of sufficient rains during the year.
