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The struggle with many a rigid Logooli cultural practices

  The Logooli community is one of the deeply cultured societies – with near everything supposed to have been done as per custom – to allow another custom to follow. One example is that for a mature man (with a child or more) to be buried, there must be a house structure at home. Another is that a boy must be circumcised and nursed in father land. If maternal family decides to, the boy will have a hard time reconnecting with father people - a dent on his masculinity. There were two children who got burnt to death in a house in Nairobi. The single mother had left for night work. Elders were told that one of the children was Logooli. The other, the woman had sired with someone else. The Logooli family wanted to burry their little one and long discussed the do’s and don’ts. Of a man who died childless and the grave was placed as if he had died as a man with children. It should have been dug on the sides, the grave. A real thorn should have been thrust in his buttocks, his name go...
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The pain of receiving technology in the Village.

My father possessed a phone a few years back long after people subscribed to what used to be a rich man’s toy. A letter (of inadequate money) used to arrive home weeks after dad gave to a person he thought would reach mom. He used to know people from other ridges and directed them to the home by a family name. One time, a messenger asked for a tax and mom complained. What followed was a case. It ended in grudges.

An owl hooting from a compound tree.

Akamba and Kenya Bus Courier Services were also unreliable. Once we hiked a long path to confirm what was not there. Heart break. Every 5th mom hoped something had been sent because that is what Dad said when he left. It never followed that regulation.

A river that has been reddened by musengeri.

Then once, anxious of Christmas day, using a village rich man’s phone, I dialed the neighbour to Dad in Nairobi. The ten numbers were too long to master. I had not overcome network problems to hear my father before it cut short. I took a lame response to mom- ‘He said he will come 20th December’- so that she may not be angered by the much she had to add on top for the call.

A death cry in the silent night.

It may not only be a village problem. It is a son of soil problem. Technology comes in with such stress. I do not know why. It was hard to own this computer. It is criminal-minded to think of owning a latest phone. I will access them long after people have exploited them. That is the fate of son of soil- clinging to the past.


Tomorrow we will harvest sorghum. Birds are wasting it.

The rate is now 4/- a minute. Gracious!

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