The NIGGERS WHO 'FILL' MATATUS

Greetings niggers? If though you deserve greetings.

This is a small stupid expression from your view which I think would rather be left unsaid than lift up my f* mouth to speak of what least concerns me. Why can’t I just get the ass off people’s businesses and do what takes me from one point to another? If I don’t shut I’ll find myself in the gutters, isn’t it so? You are capable of a number of things, I know. It is your music that teaches me words that mama never could allow.

You are playing tricks that I am interested in knowing. How could I know if I had my own cc?  It is sometimes amusing to see how I can be fooled…or rather see you stupidly fool people…You are clever, you know?

Today as I entered the almost full ‘Manyanga’ from KU to town little did I know I was the first comrade. I did not mind about the occupants for people are always engrossed in thoughts of whatever errands. Some honest with the rest dishonest. One side of the bus was full- the rest empty. The seats facing the driver’s right hand side were not occupied though it was past evening and the blazing sun was tough on these guys sitting by the windows. It was funny…wasn’t it? I did not notice at first.

The distribution of passengers in a bus is always not the matter. But how can passengers decide to dwell on one side of the bus when it is ‘equal’ to the other side? If it was an old Kayole bound machine, with three sisters on one side, passengers always enter to fill the window-penned two-side before others coming in later take the agony of sitting three.

As others 'pretend' to travel, some forcefully take in passengers. Even those who din'y intend to travel with the bus.

It was understandable. Of course people who enter an empty bus, all strangers don’t sit on the same chair amidst vast space…Or else the neighbour will confuse the other as of different intentions. It is so in cafes. We rarely get into stranger’s arena. If it makes us better humans, that is a next article.

People like to sit by the window side because of a childhood mind- anxious to adventure. In high school, we fought and hated each other due to that. We carry such ideas to adulthood and excuse them with fresh air need. TB can b contracted anywhere. If you are allergic to diesel, how foolish is it to puke out of the window! The peaceful man is he who takes a center position and relaxes to a nap.

One thing had prevented me from boarding immediately-the music. I could hear it out!  Another thing convinced me otherwise- the caller boy was a high school mate. I could not wait for the hands to take me in.

Your hands are used to pause on people’s arms, ladies waists and hurry suitcases in. They coarse and tend to force passengers in. Do you ever know that commuters do know where they are coming from and going? They standing at the bus stop don’t indicate a confused and in-need-of-direction-fellow. You have decided to be shouting us in and so untrustworthy that we would rather bargain for fair at the door. When some of you fight for passengers, a common Machakos Bus Station culture, we get irritated. Many a times have passengers entered one vehicle and the luggage in another. Or their wallets openly pick-pocketed. Once in, one departed.

I guessed the comrade had changed his mind. Youth hood is complex and never constant. I was not moved.

I was turning to the latter page of the novel as I waited for the roaring engine to pick and collect more passengers on the way when a lady entered. She was in glasses and now that you requested me to keep to what concerns me, I will not speak about her though I like looking at the brains behind some looks. She sat beside a guy who moved from the window side and thought a gentleman’s gesture. There has never been anything like gentlemen attitude but a keep-nice-before-I-eat-you relation. He walked out and this time I sensed the game. It is not the first time.

I guessed I was going to do a few chapters before we zoomed off. A book reader has his own patience of concentrating on the pages. Were it not so, I could have alighted, walked over the foot bridge and met a Roysambu-Allsops-Town matatu that would go on stopping from station to station and finding itself in every jam and stopping before ever bump only to reach in town an hour later. Patience told me that once we take off, sometime thence, we will fly all the way to Nairobi.

Each ten minutes brought in one more city traveler. Most of the comrades live in Ruiru and Kawaha. Only a few commute from away- maybe due to their own wanting or pesa nyingi. After half an hour, when I really needed a pause for the next chapter, only three had entered. Just then another one stood up. Oh! Grrr… He didn’t look like a manamba. He must be taking classes! Alight or not alight?

The next chapter was on.

Sour saliva followed and was quenched when staffs break time reached. May session is a favouriite session for there is least crowding. It is a bad time for mama mboga and matatu business. They made the remaining heads quickly leave and had hi-fives out there for a good job well done. We were zooming away an hour since I boarded.

These men. Do they ever have something to do? Do they have future goals? Do they ever think of their actions? Some seem failures by their demeanour- high school dropouts and comrades serving suspension terms around the school. When politics is off-session, this is what they do. They habit will be soon be felt everywhere if stupid people don't get born today.

The sons of soil crammed at the door with an added passenger who was lured that there was a free seat. If it was a Githurai bound matatu they would have squeezed us four-a-row. The music levels were switched to the desired point in line with the pollution and friction between the tires and the best road network in East and Central Africa. The beats increased the heartbeat if it dint made me notice my own heart beat. It was painful to the ears. Yes, kinda piercing. Only a careless youth turns the radio full blast in his room. 

The then boring book and Valley road awaiting traffic kept me from ignoring the remaining few for some had alighted on the road. It was not a good time to travel. It was also not the best road network to use.

Next time I’ll be much careful though it is hard to play the game of a fool.