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Heavy responsibilities for elder aunt among the Logooli

With Seenge Fonesi. She is the elder grand daughter of Isagi and elder daughter of Amugasya. She is often present in functions involving the family of Amugasya. Pic taken on 18/4/2024. The elder sister soon becomes the elder aunt. It is this “seenge munene” (elder aunt) tag that she is tied to many cultural responsibilities – back home. To her marital family she may appear as any other woman, but she is not so in the eyes of her people. Marriage does not steal her away as it would happen with other daughters of the old man. To her, as days go and the old man and woman of the estate are dependents, she becomes increasingly present.  Her brothers also need her for almost all traditional markings. They are marrying, she needs to welcome the new wife. They are giving birth, she needs to come to midwife or “bless” the new born. They are paying dowry she needs to lead the women delegate. There is a conflict she needs to come for a hearing.  And many others. Traditions does not expect her to
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It is but an era of dishonesty

The National Health Insurance Fund officials will be coming to visit our office this mid-morning. It is part of their requirements to visit new subscribers. In case they visit your office as is their curiosity, tell them that I am one of your volunteers. Your volunteers aren’t insured, right? Yes.  As the lady talked, he was kissing her palm.

Police officers stood round the high fence of Moi International Sports Centre Kasarani preventing the fans from jumping over the fence but using the main gate by show of tickets. Two of them, affiliated to the Gor Mahia and AFC playing clubs allowed anyone who could jump over by only giving 50 bob. It was the best option considering that tickets were no longer being sold yet the stadium wasn’t yet warmed.


She quickly took away last year’s Audit pamphlet when I asked which mentorship was done that had been accounted. The one mentorship session I was in charge of the previous year was poorly supported.  I could also sense disparities in the amount allocated to other areas. But you know, whistle blowers should be people of wealth- not a poor school leaver.

A man was travelling from Kisumu to Thika. He bought his daily paper to keep him occupied and updated. The front page was about Raila, the Nyanza Kingpin. It was not until he arrived in Thika at the end of the day that he doubted whether he had bought the day’s paper or yester’s. Uhuru was the man on the front page expressing a hearty laugh. He did not like that.

Her fiancĂ©e suspecting that she was truly sick due to the reddening skin on her neck, he took her to the hospital for checkup. The doctor asked her and she directed the answers for everyone to believe that she had eaten pork which sometimes does her so. No blood sample please. Then they walked away one proud of being caring and the other just free from yester’s promiscuity.

Our office is housed in a building that is registered as residential. We therefore keep the gate locked, knowing who comes in and goes out. The rooms inside have been micro-leased to different back-door enterprises to maximize on the profits. Just in case of anything, we are registered as NGO’s.

Two months ago I started following the Director to one of the Environment and Natural Resources department after being referred there. For one full month I called daily during workdays, waiting at his office and later met him after five weeks. He only then asked one of his departmental men to guide me through. It may have been a way to get rid of me because the junior is more unpredictable.

And later in the day I will have to walk back to my room that I wish to shift from. It is funnily made beside a mansion. Such rooms are illegal because creators benefit from the rent illegally. One day, when the city council officers will rummage the place, I will have no one to lean on. But I wanted to live there for the  want of safety, serenity, proximity and reliability.

It seems that corruption and general deliberate compromises are part of normal lives. It depends on what side of the moral fence are you standing at that time. You may be strong and sufficient to postpone a compromise but it may not last long. Your consideration for ‘self-guilt’ may be your own undoing having grown up in an environment that considered such bad.

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