kiwayu dreaming...

i still can't quite believe that i am on holidays. i keep waking up and thinking, christ, got to get to school. and then that blissful feeling of, ah, yes, holidays...and i lie back and snuggle deep into the covers and listen to the rain on the roof, watching the mist swirl past the attic window and feel good. so good. it's these small moments in life, when you add them up, that surmount bigger problems. that keep your ship sailing true.
and friends. good friends. who love you and think you are brave and graceful and funny. who still believe in you and restore a certain sense of self.

i am just back from a wild hootenanny up north with all my besties, with some of my most favourite people in the world. i went up to lamu, a little island off the northern kenyan coast.

i stayed with one of my oldest friends in the world, from the good old bad old zambian days. she put me up here:

i felt like a princess.

you are lulled awake at dawn, with the gurgle of a boat starting, the silky heavy slurp of the little manda channel tide against the shore. lines between dream and reality are smudged.

it was insanely hot. there was nothing to do but sleep away the midday and afternoon heat.

 in the cool of twilight, we sat on the old Peponi veranda, drinking dawas (one of the finest drinks this side of the Somal border). lime. honey. vodka. two of these and you're right as rain. we'd stumble back home through the romantic narrow alley ways, breathing in fragments of jasmine and old times, swim naked under the stars and slept like drugged  babies under whirring fans. (normal babies don't sleep, remember?) we walked up the lamu beach, past the fort house. jemima showed me where the tides uncovered an ancient, ruined village last year, but now the sand has covered it up again.

early one morning, we took a speed boat up north to Kiwayu, a little island 30 kms down from the Somalian border.

lots of people are scared to travel up there because of the pirates. i think there is still a travel ban for the region...? which is sad for people trying to make a living up there....and for the isolated communities who rely on tourism. we met some fisher folk who said they hadn't see a somal in a year and a half. these shores are wild and desolate and beautiful. mike's camp nestles between the sea and a maze of mangroves.

(www.mikescampkiwayu.com )

 it's idyllic and far from any maddening crowd, miles from your troubles. it's a new world. with its own secrets.

( www.mikescampkiwayu.com)

we boated up to milz's camp, which suffered the tragedy of a pirate kidnapping two years ago. it was sad to see the camp derelict and struggling along such sparkling beaches and shores. but the pelizzolis are a tough kenyan family, coming from a long history of explorers and adventurers and they will not give up. the camp will start again, perhaps smaller, but probably even better than ever before.

after a of lunch of freshly caught king fish (caught by luca, aged 12, a passionate and dedicated fisherman)

... grilled with ginger and chili and coconut sauce, milz said, "let's go look for turtles." i've never seen a turtle in the wild. we sailed across the bay and spotted FIVE! the joy of seeing a large plated back emerge through the emerald blue water, an old reptilian head surface for breath, then torpedo down for safety, was indescribable and novel and made me feel humble and extremely fortunate. we swam for hours in perfect waves with not a person in sight. we walked for miles up empty beaches, popping blue bottles with our bare feet, delighting in the pop sound.

and, oh besties, i met a wizard. he had no words but i knew he was a wizard. you can tell these things straight off.

...and a puffer fish cat who dealt with the torpid heat in a solid and sensible fashion...

conversations were never dull.we sat under fat monsoon stars, watching russian satellites float slowly by the pleiades. we swopped tales and laughed until our faces hurt. one night, we heard a boat. i felt a little scared and tried to remember where i had left my flip flops, in case i had to run into the dunes to hide. but dreams were stronger and far more seductive.  and the morning arrived anyway as it is wont to do, pirates or no pirates.

and now i am back on the rainy little green hill. home. living rather like a hermit but i am happy to be here. the boy is studying for his exams, albeit reluctantly, and i am watching the trees grow and listening to the grass. the rain makes me feel alive. wild flowers unfurl in the green among scatterlings of mushrooms. the girl is in zanzibar, so i must look for fairies alone. great storms sweep across the maasai steppes and the karongas gush brown and furious down from the monduli mountains. it is too wet to ride, so the horses run free and fat and wild in the green.

my heart is full, with dreams and seas and hills and skies and all is well.

toodely toot y'all. bisous X.X.X. wild pirate ones, on yer lips, gold earrings and everything. x j

love an' hosses...

"..Finally he said that among men there was no such communion as among horses and the notion that men can be understood at all was probably an illusion..."

All the Pretty Horses- Cormac McCarthy
Luis, Chapter 2.

i cain't say it prettier than that, y'all...

Rhino: A Eulogy...

mwali and rhino: monduli: maasailand : tanzania

(all pics by craig doria www.craigdoriasafaris.com)

the horses were poisoned. i don't know. perhaps in the food. or they ate something. one still lives. she is young. she has a hopeful name, Sun Rise. but this one, the one in the picture, called Rhino, didn't.  this was a fine soldier of a horse. he was born in kenya. his official name on his certificate is Taverna. but he wasn't a Taverna. that sounds like a bar. he was a Rhino. he played polo for a long time in kenya. he lived somewhere out on the athi plains, where the winds batter the plains flat. when his legs became tired he was sold to grumeti reserves in the northern serengeti. to do safaris.  he was the brave one. never hesitated.  he was given to me because "he throws his head" and one day he's "likely to smack a client in the nose and we can't be having that." i took him unseen. i had no idea what was coming my way. i knew he was a flea bitten grey and claire told me he had a heart like a lion. 

he travelled by truck through the serengeti, by night, so the tsetses wouldn't bite. i rode him over from Burka Coffee Estate to the Ngorobobs. he spooked at a log on the way and i thought, "humph. lion heart, eh?" tati was my outrider on her new horse,a 16 hand dark bay, Jefferson. it was a hot day. white sun. bare ground and sunflowers to the horizon. he spooked at some maasai women and their donkeys, carrying water in bright yellow plastic containers. i nearly fell off. "lion heart se gat," i thought.

he was the fastest horse i ever rode. sometimes when the bottom field was ploughed, just before the rains, i'd let him gallop home. he was like lightening and at the slightest shift backwards in weight, he'd scream to a halt, dust flyin', hocks deep under his belly, tossing his head high.  he acted in our little play that sunday when gabby and i dressed up as shifta. she was the princess, in hot pink and gold satin with a crown even. and i let her wear lipstick. she rode sirrocco, another fine and sturdy steed gone to greener pastures.  i had to get her through a valley full of swarming hordes of christians. i carried the old musket which corbett gave to craig for...what was it for?... a lake manyara canoe to grow herbs in....? but we have both...? i can't rightly recall. 

rhino and the musket: ngorobob hill:

he became the school master. he faithfully taught all the watoto on the hill to ride. if they kicked too hard he'd trot faster to bounce them off. if they were gentle, he'd canter like a rocking horse.

he bolted with emily at a trot, towards the popadopalous flower farm, through a maize field. he carried safari c 'cross the dust plains in maasailand, chasing zebra. god he was a fine horse.

so it was with deep regret, that on Sunday, i put him down. he had bad colic. i couldn't bare to see him struggle. he wouldn't give up. he'd fall. struggle up. fall again. struggle up. i watched him. 

"now that's a lion heart,"i thought." he's not giving up."

horses are like that. they fight all the way to the end. you want to say, "look. enough. just bloody die now won't you? please?" 

you can't watch an old soldier like that go down rough. i made the call. 

we tranquilized him and when he finally lay his head down, we found the vein and did it.

a horse's soul explodes from the body and leaves it so crumpled behind. 

raise yer glasses one and all...thanks for the rides, Rhino,  babu with a lion heart...

happy shop - Part 2

if i owned an Happy Shop these are the things i'd be selling. these are the things i'd be buying in bulk.

 free and wild children who still play with sticks and mud, who don't wear shoes and who believe in majiks and ghosts and fairies.

food glorious food. carrots sliced and olives and dips and fanta and pineapple juice and pies from the eastern cape. 

puppies and dogs....and girlie wirlies.

colourful bicycles every day on the way to school with shirts and scarves to match the ensemble.

music music music and the time and space to make it.

i'd buy a way to give smiles, even costly ones, because they make happiness.

and lastly, horses horses horses....who could live without your friend?

...(to be continued)

happy shop

Skies are dark. Storms loom on the horizon but there is no hope of rain. Only this dull heat. We’ve forgotten to fill the bird bath with water for too long. Even the birds have given up. Skies are full of curved balls and flaming arrows. And thirsty birds, obviously. I’m not sure how much longer I can keep this blog going because I don’t like the idea of not writing the truth. Is this not the purpose of anyone who dares to sew words together?  I could carry on writing about the sky, the weather, how the children make me laugh and weep and stretch my heart wider and wider, so gladly, so gladly, but all those shiny things are not the only fabric of our lives. It takes more dark blue to weave a beautiful carpet.

Pain is so stark. So present. So eina. No matter if you lie still on the cold stone floor and wish it away. It’s there. Like the black dog. When you wake up in the morning, you have a brief respite of say 2 minutes before the dreaded realization, the awful reality, swims into focus and you can barely get out of bed. Pain gobbles up words and notes and leaves you ship wrecked, reaching for the vodka.

I wish it was as simple as swinging by a shop to pick up some happiness. There. Pop it into a  brown paper packet tied up in string, take it home and eat it fresh, like we did as kids, picking out the inside of the hot loaf on the way home, knowing everything’s going to be ok.

Betrayal, on any level, is a dark and dangerous beast which needs to be sjambokked to death by kindness, love, compassion and humor. The saddest people are always the funniest.

But, across the wild tangled wood drear, on the other side of the mountains, over the rivers, ‘cross the whip lashed plains, there is hope. There is light which shines courageously, which will not be snuffed. Like a lighthouse, it will guide me through these treacherous seas. I went to the sea, a wild and beautiful cold sea, where the white horses pounded the jagged rocks, hungrily wishing for a boat to smash. I saw eight dolphin spinning by in the silver dawn. They tattooed themselves behind my eye lids.

My chest breaks wide open with the beautiful weight of the world.

Thank you for reading. Thank you for leaving comments, which at times have been like life blood, reasons to keep going. Silly, I know, but there you go.

And, Andrew, your translation was right. But you caught the drift anyway. 

Not everything is lost in translation. Thank god.

the piggery of time...

"dashing" into town. not. the road home.

As you’ve both summized by now, I live on the top of a beautiful little hill in Tanzania. It’s a bitch of a hill when you run it…by the time you get to the top you want to faint,vomit and possibly die. All the children at the bottom of the hill laugh and point at me as I shuffle past like an old man of 75. My ascent hasn't even begun. "Mimi ni mzee, " (I am old) I growl back at them, huffing and puffing and shuffling. They answer, "Hapana!! (no) heh he heh!" I’ve only ever made it twice without stopping and that was, oh, two years ago. It’s enough to put anyone off running a marathon for the rest of their lives. The hill is conquered far more painlessly in a car or on a horse. There are, apparently, 34 bumps from the bottom to the top. (The children have counted them. Some say there are more, others less, so let’s round it off to 34.) These have been built to save the road from the torrential summer rains. They work. But they’re bastards. Because they slow you down. It’s a real pain when you get to the bottom on a school morning and someone says “Ma. I’ve forgotten my PE clothes/my guitar/ my homework”. Tough luck, you want to say. Instead a string of expletives stream out of your mouth, smooth as milk, as you start your 48 point turn and head back up, the clock ticking mercilessly on. The turn around gobbles up at least 15 minutes which eats into your 8am on the dot Monday meeting. Time time time. I hate time.  There is simply never enough of the stuff no matter how hard you try.

I think that’s why I love this story about a Mexican man, Jose, and his pig Juanita. If you've heard it, stop right here. He was old and also lived on top of a very steep hill, not a dissimilar one to the Ngorobob Hill, by all accounts. Every single day he would walk down to the bottom, with his pig, Juanita, so she could drink at the water trough and roll happily around in the mud. He would sit under the shade of a tree, catching up with his village friends, and after a small amount of time, when his dear pig had finished enjoying herself, they would slowly make their way back up the hill. The entire round trip would take around three hours if not more.

One day, a very smart, young and handsome anthropologist recently graduated from Harvard, moved into the remote village to complete his PHD on people and time. For a few weeks he watched as Jose and Juanita would make their way up and down the hill. It bothered him that the old man wasted so many precious hours of his day. He thought long and hard about it and came up with an ingenious idea. He was thrilled about it.

The following day, he stopped Jose at the water trough, while Juanita oinked and snorted and rolled, as pigs are wont to do, and presented his proposal. “ Jose I have watched you for weeks making your daily journey up and down your hill, bringing your pig to drink and lie in the mud. It takes approximately three hours out of your day. Now. What if I connected this pipe to this pump and pumped water up to the top of your hill? Juanita could have her own water and mud at home! And you’d save yourself three hours a day.” He felt very proud of his simple solution. The old Mexican looked at him, nodding his head wisely. This was a very smart, educated young man from America.  He replied, “ Si signor. That is a very good idea indeed but….” and he paused, thinking carefully, “What is time to a pig?”

It’s impossible to rush around here. You can’t just “pop into town” or “dash into Kisongo”. No. There’ll be either a traffic jam, a political cavalcade, a broken down truck blocking the way, a police road block, an accident. Or you’ll arrive at the bank, pressured to get back to work in an hour and there’ll be a queue from here to Timbuktu or “I’m sorry Madam. But your account has been blocked.” Or “ I’m sorry madam, there is no money in the bank today.” And you want to roar and cry and tear your hair out. Instead you let it go. Let. It Go. (although I didn’t quite manage anything remotely as guru like as that the other day…I’m sure if I’d been anywhere else in the world security would’ve been rallied, especially when I tore up a form under Ernest’s nose and said “ You can shove that up where the sun don’t shine!” tear tear tear )

What to do?

Time is a pig.

I need more of the goddamn stuff.

And money.

Kitchen Board: Tuesday 5 February 2013.

"fix hole in lounge"...yes. there is a big hole in the floor. and out of that hole crawl things like centipedes, scorpions and...snakes. first born and i found one last night. well. mama paka the cat did. i suspected it was a burrowing adder, a nasty lil fucker, so i stomped on it with my birkenstock. they should use that in their ad. Buy Birkkies For Your Health: And Kill Snakes Too. i felt bad. i did. i don;t like killing little baby snakes. but if it was a centipede eater (as it might have been) i am sure there are other babies wriggling around and a mum and a dad and i hope i haven't dented the snake world too much. sorry snakes! must fix hole tomorrow.

toodely toot y'all. bisous. X.X.X. reg'lar as a clock, on yer neck. x j

double digit girl

I’m trying to remember when I turned 10. I think we had just moved from Zambia to South Africa, a very different animal in every way. I remember sitting slouched on a chair in the St Catherine’s Convent staff room, meeting Sister Jane Francis for my interview. I don’t think I had ever met a real nun. I peered at her down my nose, curious. It was a little school in a tiny farming town called Empangeni. My mother wouldn't send me to the local Afrikaans school "run by the bloody Nats." It was a rainy day. I wore Lee jeans tucked into my gumboots, which were covered in mud and a Rhodesia Is Super T Shirt tucked into the jeans.  I wanted to look like a horse girl from the north. And I did. I remember my mother saying to me “Sit up, darling! Stop slouching!” I was ten. I was new. I spoke differently to everyone. They said “Police poss the jem.” I called coloured pens, neomagics. They called them kokis. They called biros ball points. My language was so different. So was my world. I came from a 1970’s Zambia, slightly jaded from the last spluttering fireworks of liberation and the fading splendor of a newly founded independence. It was a Lusaka of AK’s, ivory on the streets, armed robberies and afros deluxe. My mother was fiercely liberal and took great pains to point out the apartheid architecture of South Africa whenever she could. It was utterly incomprehensible to me.

I dreaded my first day at the convent because you had to wear white socks and black shoes and I didn’t know any Afrikaans. I was used to beige socks, brown sandals, navy blue pleated skirts and sun hats. I don’t remember any birthday parties when we went to South Africa. I only remember the boarding school ones. That’s odd. I do remember the Christmases, though.

And now here, on the hill, the last born, the girl, is turning 10. “I can’t wait to be a double digit, mama, ” she said, eyes shining with expectation. (Confession: I hate children’s birthday parties. Period.)  We decided to have this one over the week end, because her real birthday is this Thursday and everyone will be at school. So I took a deep breath and told her to make her list. The Birthday List. First born, the 16 year old, helped her design the invitations. I told her to be sensitive when she handed them out so nobody would feel uninvited. We all know how we feel about that now, don’t we?

I’ll spare you the  insanely boring details of “and then they did this and here is the cake" and the inanities of all that was said.” There was nothing for it, but to spend the day by a swimming pool. The heat has been insufferable, white treacherous days stretching into one another. The children tumbled like otters in the water for hours, taking breaks to lie like lizards in the midday sun on the hot rocks, munching on cake and pizza and sipping periodically on hot sodas because they’d forgotten to leave them in the shade. When the sun started its fast track west, I piled them into the car and we headed for the hills. They slept in tents, made a fire, roasted potatoes and marshmallows and ate the left over pizza from lunch. I told them ghost stories, all the favourites: the Zanzibar Flip Flop Man, The Office Ghost and Mohammed And The Silver Bicycle Searching For Fatima one. I was allowed! For once!  I realized they are much loved, in fact. And I gleefully realized I am an excellent story teller. I know how to scare ten year old people good and proper.

I left them sitting around their fire, shoes forgotten despite stern scorpion warnings, and watched a dainty paper moon float up over the salmon pink snows of Kilimanjaro in the twilight. My ribs softened into ribbons in the warm summer night wind. The appaloosa sighed nearby. Yes. This was a good double digit party. The children were free, barefooted, wild, dirty, riotous and high, runnin’ on sugar ‘cross the moonlit hill.

I left last born, with her head peering out of a tent crammed with girls, saying, “Mama I feel like vomiting.” I said, “Too many sweets. Fresh air’ll do the trick. Just make sure you vomit outside the tent, hey? ”

“Thank you mama. This is the best party I have ever had.”

I walked quietly down the hill, following the pathway down which the horses have cut, which winds through the short tufty grass, remembering the Nairobi morning, almost ten years ago, when she arrived; how my heart burst through my bones when that little fat baby girl was handed to me, her hair in tight black curls, her fingers curly with her little wings neatly folded against her perfect spine; how she latched onto me, furiously and with intent, her neat black eyebrows still and arched. Who knew that love could grow so giant?

 My little beautiful baby girl.

 And now she’s 10 already. A Double Digit Girl.

In the quiet hours of the dove grey morning, the owl visited, hooting soft as velvet, his talons scritch scratching on the tin roof. He hasn’t been for a long time. What invisible scrolls has he left for me this time, I wonder?

Kitchen Board: Tuesday 29 January 2013

it's already been a busy old week, as you can see. the "hela" is going to be a slight problem. barclay's bank has blocked my account along with thousands of other ones because we hadn't handed in our details, ya know, passport info, work permit info, salary slips, residential details and on and on and on it goes. so they just blocked the accounts WITHOUT WARNING. rather a tetchy problem what with pay day comin' up. still. the world keeps spinnin', we're all double digits, some bigger than others, and kesho ni kesho. (google it goddamnit. you should nearly be fluent by now) And today, just after lunch, sitting in another English literature class, the thunder rolled and it rained and rained and rained and my heart danced up up up and away to where the giants played bowls in the sky.

toodely toot, y'all and bisous X.X.X. double ones, obviously, smack on yer lips.. x j