by Ted Simon
I looked at the vegetation alongside the road, trying to recognize it or fix it in my memory, but I could not make out anything characteristic enough to attract my attention. There were various wild flowers that looked to me like wild flowers everywhere, and low shrubs and bushes that looked the same as any others. I was annoyed by my inability to see plants clearly and remember them. It was a great drawback. Above all things a traveller should have an eye for natural detail, I thought, since that is what he sees most of the time. There was some bamboo and I was glad to find at least one thing I recognized, not knowing that there were over two hundred different species.
Beyond the low vegetation, where the land had once been cleared for road making, were trees, equally unknown to me, leafy and of medium height. I walked to the edge of the wood to relieve myself and wondered whether some enormous beast was at all likely to come crashing towards me through the undergrowth. Probably not, I thought, since I had seen small farms through the trees as I rode along. In fact, just a mile or so back I had passed a petrol station at a crossroad, with a sign. What had it said? I looked at the map. This must be it. Kibwezi Junction.
I was wondering what to do next when I saw Pius coming towards me, though of course I did not yet know his name. He was a fat man in the best sense of the word, not gross or obese or flabby or bloated, but of a prime meaty plumpness to make a cannibal's mouth water. His black body was enticingly wrapped in a gaily flowered shirt, and he sat astride his little Yamaha motorcycle on jovial terms with the world and with a measured sense of his own importance in it. I waved to him and he stopped beside me.
'Can you help me, I wonder ..." I said.
'Absolutely,' he said. 'Most definitely. I see you are having trouble, isn't it. A spot of bother.'
'Well, my tyre's flat . . .' and I went on to explain.
‘I will introduce you to Mr. Paul Kiviu,' he burst out enthusiastically. 'Definitely he is the very man of the moment. He is manager BP station Kibwezi Junction and he is my friend.'
Mercifully the road was level at that point. As I pushed the loaded bike along on its flat tyre, Pius bobbed around me like a butterfly, calling encouragement, imploring me to believe that my troubles would soon be over. His good nature was irresistible and I began to believe him.
In any case I was happy that something was happening and I was in touch with people. At the time it seemed to me that what I wanted was to have my problem solved quickly to get on my way. I had a boat to catch in Cape Town and the journey was still the main thing. What happened on the way, who I met, all that was incidental. I had not quite realized that the interruptions were the journey.
Paul Kiviu understood my problem. There was nothing he could do about it, but he understood it and, as they say, a problem shared is a problem halved. Pius did not so much understand my problem as appreciate it. He revelled in it, celebrated it, but Paul understood it because he had problems of his own. He was accustomed to them, and he was the first African I had met who was marked by them. He was small, thin and intense, and showed signs of worrying.
His BP station had a servicing bay and pumps. The main building was a sheltered area with coloured metal chairs and tables, served by a small lock-up kitchen where a girl in a headscarf pushed sweets and drinks and snacks across the counter. It was clean and polished and quite the most
modern thing for miles around. We had some fizzy drinks and potato chips and thought about what to do.
It was simple really. I needed a new tube and it would have to come from Nairobi. The punctured tube could be repaired of course, but there was a very long way to go before I could expect to get a new tube. There would be nothing in Tanzania, I guessed, or Zambia, and in Rhodesia, with the blockade, it might be difficult. When I saw how the old tube had perished it made me unhappy to be without a new one as well as an acceptable spare. So I would call Mike Pearson, the Lucas agent in Nairobi, and ask him if he could get an inner tube to me somehow. And a rim belt too.
Meanwhile the bike could be safely locked up at the BP station, and I would wait in Kibwezi.
'Definitely. This is the solution,' exclaimed Pius, and we had another fizzy drink and some cigarettes. A little later, when a person could see his own shadow again, I sat on the back of Pius' Yamaha and we went into town.
Kibwezi was a jumble of painted wood-frame buildings with tin roofs, mostly single-storey, on a crossroads of baked earth. It was well away from the Mombasa road and could not be seen from there, but buses came in and turned round, throwing up a fine dust. Kenya was very dry and crying for rain. Many animals in the reserves had already died of thirst.
Prominent on the corner was 'The Curry Pot Hotel'. On the other corner was the main store, run as usual by Asian traders. There were other small shops and bars, and in the road were fruit and vegetable stalls.
Jammed between the store and the next shop, in a space no bigger than a large changing cubicle, was Kibwezi Post Office. Much of the space was occupied by a fine old wooden switchboard, and in front of it, earphones clamped over his head, sat Kibwezi's determined postmaster. He was scolding one of his customers on the telephone. For years he had laboured to drag the people of Kibwezi into the Twentieth Century. He had lectured and cajoled them on the proper way to address an envelope, on the disrespect implied by sticking first the Queen's head and then Kenyatta's head on upside down, on the need when sending a telegram to have some idea of where it was intended to go.
'Who is this Thomas N'Kumu? I have no knowledge of this man. He is not the Prime Minister, is it? Prior importance must go to his place of residence. First we must know where is this N'Kumu, and then we can look about messages.'
His patience was exhausted.
'That is the correct method for dealing with this matter,' he shouted scornfully into the little black tube, and with the wrath of a god at Judgement Day he pulled out the plug.
I faced the tyrant with my number, exchange and name of party in faultless order and he had no choice but to proceed. He manipulated the controls of the machine through which he ruled the world and, with surprising efficiency, I was connected to Nairobi and my business was .concluded. They would do their best to find the tubes and deliver them. A telegram would be sent to me the following day. I took up temporary residence at The Curry Pot Hotel'.
Pius took me back to the BP station to fetch my red bag with my toilet and shaving kit, and clean socks. Most people in Kibwezi walked barefoot or in sandals, but I had not got any sandals yet and had read somewhere about parasites that burrowed into your feet, so I wore shoes and socks. Sandals would have been kinder to my sweltering feet and to everyone else around, as well as saving socks, but they were too far down on my list. I had a long list of duties that I meant to perform when I had time. They included notes, letters and articles to write, jobs to do on the bike, and modifications of my various 'systems', and they took priority over sandals. Once I had had a pair of sandals but could not wear them because they took the skin off my toes, so they went right down the list again. I only allowed a proportion of my time for things I did not feel like doing, since I found that the list of things I ought to do was endless and would otherwise take all the joy out of life. If at any time I really wanted to do anything on the list, of course I did it regardless of priority, but sandals never came into this category because of the painful recollection of skinned toes. That, by and large, was how I arranged my life. The list was not written down, but in my head and it tailed off down my spinal column where it sometimes gave me backache.
Paul had another friend visiting at the BP station, a big well-muscled man called Samson with a placid face. He was a policeman but off duty, so we whiled away the time until Paul felt he had worried enough for the day, and we set off for town together.
We went to the bar that was a few doors down from the Post Office. It was after dark and the room was lit by softly hissing paraffin lamps. I liked this light very much, preferring it to light bulbs and the horrific fluorescent tubes which have
probably been installed by now.
The room was square with a counter down one side, and about half a dozen tables on a plain wooden floor. The doors and windows stayed open, as they did everywhere else. There were already several groups of men there, and we took an empty table, and ordered. The beer was served by bar girls, and there were three of them, so they were not very busy. They liked being there because they could sometimes get off with a man they liked the look of and enjoy themselves, and if the man was feeling generous they could get some shillings as well.
I did not know about the bar girls when we sat down, but found out
about it as the evening advanced. The conversation was very animated, full of fun and laughter as they answered my questions and I tried to answer theirs.
The girls all wore the same loose pink overalls, buttoned down the front, and headscarves. Under the overalls they wore only a nylon half, slip. Of course I was completely used to nakedness by then, not just in the European way of feeling free of embarrassment and not going goggle-eyed at the sight of a thigh, but in the African way of not even discriminating between different parts of the anatomy because when they are all on display together; a finely arched back or a beautifully poised head can be just as exciting as a breast or a buttock. Only the sexual organs were kept hidden for special occasions.
The pint bottles of Tusker kept coming from the ice chest, and Paul was getting anxious to fix me up with a bar girl. At first I was only amused by his efforts. It had been several months since I had been with a woman, but I did not consider that a long time and, in another way, I had got used to celibacy. The travelling was so intense, I was receiving so much stimulation, that it was completely satisfying in itself. Once out of Europe there was little artificial erotic stimulation, particularly in the Muslim countries, and I had begun to think that we made too much of it in the West. In any case, prostitution would have been my only recourse, and not feeling the need and considering the risk too great, I let the whores go by.
But I liked these bar girls. I liked the lazy way they swung their legs around, the loose-jointed walk. And it was clear that they were choosy. There was a freedom of expression and movement which liberated me too, and one of them in particular appealed to me, so I told Paul and he redoubled his efforts.
'The problem is this,' said Paul - itching for a problem - 'these girls have not slept with a M'zungo before. They are afraid. They are thinking that a M'zungo will be different. But I will persuade them.'
We laughed loudly at such preposterous ignorance, and eventually one of the girls promised to Paul that she would come back later, but she did not and I was a little sad.
In the morning there was a telegram to say that the inner tube would be delivered during the day to the BP station, so I walked down to the junction and got to work again on the wheel. The day moved by slowly and I let it, working a bit, and talking and watching people come and go at the pump. A van arrived in the early afternoon, shiny and brisk from the city, with two tubes and two rim belts, and I viewed Nairobi through Kibwezi eyes as awesomely efficient and remote.
So the hot hours drifted by in work and idleness, until it was dark, and drinking time again. The 'Curry Pot Hotel' had several features that distinguished it as one of Kibwezi's principal landmarks. The first was a most imposing wooden grill along the counter which faced the visitor as he entered. It was here that I was given my room for a few shillings, and a form on which I wrote 535439A 10 Sept. 73 10 Sept. 83 London Foreign office British Hamburg Germany St. Privat France Builder Nairobi Mombasa 18 Jan. 74 Edward J Simon without even looking at my passport or lifting my ball pen from the paper.
From there one walked through an open door into the bar, and from the bar into an enclosed courtyard. The arrangements at the bar were rudimentary but satisfying. You could have beer or toddy. I dare say there was whisky and gin for the better class of clientele, maybe much more.
At the far end of the courtyard was another feature which impressed me. It was the gent's piss house, under its own tin roof, a very neat affair of charcoal in a cement trough. The guests' rooms were ranged down the far side of the courtyard. They were a series of compartments made of corrugated iron nailed to a wooden frame with a hard earth floor. My room had a mat, a bed, with a sheet and a mattress still in its protective plastic wrapping, a small table with a jug and basin, and I think there was even a mirror. It was entirely adequate and I considered it rather high class. The metal walls were painted silver on the outside to adorn the courtyard and give pleasure to the drinkers.
The silver paint glimmered softly in the lamplight as we all gathered again on the second night, Paul and Pius and Samson and I. Paul was wearing a white shirt and a perky little felt hat with a curly brim, Samson was dressed in black trousers and a midnight blue shirt with cloth-covered buttons. He was the darkest of the three, and as the night deepened he dissolved black on black into the shadows. Pius was, as usual, garlanded in floral print, and his broad pumpkin face gleamed brightly.
Paul and Samson had both been on duty until sundown, and were oppressed by thoughts of human bondage.
'Employment is really a bother,' said Samson. He rocked his chair and thrust his legs further under the tin-topped table.
'Oh it is a bother indeed,' said Paul. He nodded his jaunty hat, and turned to explain to me.
'You see, this fellow is not free. He is going round town even after his duties are finished and some person may come at any time saying his attendance is sorely needed in case of a sudden crime, or it may be a fatal accident and what and what.'
Paul himself was expected to be at his post at Kibwezi Junction from seven in the morning until seven at night every day of the week including Sundays.
'You saw I had to leave this company for two hours yesterday evening. I was forced to go, isn't it. Some stores came for the canteen so I must go to
search the stocks. This can happen at any time . . . and I do not know if I have a job tomorrow.'
The voice was neither angry nor complaining. It described in sorrowful tones the loss of tranquillity. Responsibility and guilt were eating into their lives, and brought not security but increasing uncertainty.
Thirty miles up the road to Nairobi was Paul's shamba, a plot of land where his wife and children lived. Once a month, roughly, he managed to visit there.
'What is needed here,' he went on, 'is a thousand and five hundred shillings. Then I can build a tank for water on my farm and grow many things.'
Two hundred dollars, I thought. I was carrying five times that amount on me at that moment. What difference would two hundred dollars make to my future? Tomorrow I might lose it all, and tonight it could transform a man's life. I felt the excitement grow in me, but could not bring it out. Then what will you do tomorrow, I asked myself, when you meet someone who needs it to save a life? Isn't that it? Either you keep it all or you give it all away. How can you hope to travel as a philanthropist? I decided to think about it more carefully, later. At the back of my mind was the doubt whether things were exactly as Paul said.
Pius was enlarging, meanwhile, on an insurance scheme that Paul could not afford. There was something both touching and symbolic I felt about this trio, the small African trying to turn an honest penny, with the muscular forces of law and order on one side, and the plump power of finance on the other. Who was Samson really protecting, and who was Pius trying to con?
'What is this insurance you are selling,' I asked Pius, lapsing involuntarily into the dialect.
'Persons are looking to me for protection of life and property,' he replied proudly.
I wondered what kind of accident was most common.
'Snakebite is a common matter. My policies are not covering for snakebite,' he added, as though this were a point in their favour.
I saw that Samson was moved by this information. He stirred and said in a surprised tone, 'What is this? You are selling accident insurance and you are not covering for snakebite?'
I was astonished
myself.
'The snakebite is not an accident,' said Pius. 'How can you say it is? The snake is not biting by accident. It is wanting to bite.'
To our gathering amazement, he went on to his triumphant conclusion.
'Where it is the agency of a living thing, this is not accident. That is the policy of my company.'
We all thought this outrageous.
'What about the man who was killed by a pig falling?' I cried. 'The pig was kept on a balcony in Naples, and the balcony broke, and the pig fell on a pedestrian and killed him. That was an accident!'
'This was caused by persons putting pig on a balcony,' he said smugly. 'Definitely this was not an accidental happening. It is all the same whether it may be a pig or a lion or a snake or what and what.'
'Well,' said Paul, 'When the pig was hitting the man it may be already dead from heart attack, isn't it. So to be killed by a dead pig is an accident.'
'There will be an inquest on the pig also, and a certificate showing time of death,' Samson contributed darkly from the shadow.
T am not insuring for pig falls or snakebites in the Kibwezi region,' Pius said wildly. 'Definitely.'
‘I hope you explain all this to your clients,' I said.
'Absolutely. They like it very much,' he said.
The silliness stopped and we sank back into the peace of the Kenyan night. More Tuskers came. It seemed possible to drink any amount of beer without much effect. The table was almost invisible now under the empties, but I felt only a comfortable affection for the company and a frequent urge to visit the charcoal bed.
They were sad that I was leaving. We had come to like each other quickly because there was no obstacle to our friendship. All we wanted from each other was time and respect. Of course they were flattered by my attention, and it would bring out the best in them. I, who had come so far already on such an unimaginable journey, had stopped and given my undivided attention to three men whose entire lives were described within a hundred mile radius of Kibwezi. This would be no time for mean or petty behaviour.
