And Then Life Happens: A Memoir

by Auma Obama

  I dreaded those checks—for I knew, as my father did, that they weren’t covered. There was simply no money on hand. It was extremely rare that my father’s friends kept their promise to support him. And so I was sent home more than once within a few days and had to ask my father for the school fees again. This was particularly bad during the time that he was in the hospital, because I knew beforehand that I wouldn’t get anything from him. With each visit I had to grow a thicker skin in order to cope with the terrible situation. The skin thickened and thickened until I had distanced myself completely from my father and all the pain I read in his face.

  7.

  THE DOMESTIC DIFFICULTIES left their mark; I became quiet and reserved with my family. Although I had a reputation at school for being extroverted and self-confident, someone who always had a joke on her lips and was up for any mischief, at home I withdrew into myself and became very taciturn. I felt misunderstood—because in comparison to what many other family members had to suffer, my problems were not considered too bad. My sensitivity was called “European”—and I was teased about that. Yes, my stepmother was gone, but I still had my father, it was said. Even though he was in financial straits, he nonetheless managed somehow to pay for my excellent education at the expensive Kenya High School. At least I still had that. On top of that, no one doubted anymore that my biological mother would soon return. It was the time when Abongo was making an intense effort to get her back.

  How that was supposed to happen, however, I could not imagine. We weren’t living in a traditional, polygamous Luo household, in which each wife had her own lodgings and the man his simba, as the man’s house was called in the Luo language. On such a homestead, even spouses who preferred to avoid each other could live together relatively free of strife. We lived in the city, in a single-family house. How would the married and family life work, if my mother came back only for our sake? What would happen if our parents did not get along?

  My brother apparently did not ask himself all these questions. All he cared about was having our mother back with us. But when he finally achieved this goal, she stayed only one week. I was fifteen years old at the time. The same number of years had passed since the time when my mother had lived with my father, and it was eleven years since we children had been separated from our biological mother. Too much had happened in the meantime. However much Abongo wished it, our parents did not reconcile. And that did not surprise me. My father felt trapped and my mother neglected.

  The single week the family experiment lasted was, in a word, a disaster. My father kept away from the house and my mother was restless and irritable. It was obvious that they both felt forced into a situation dictated purely by Luo tradition. I still remember that I was getting ready for a school trip at the time, an adventure expedition into the wilderness that included the climbing of Mount Kenya. Before the journey began, I spoke to my mother. I sat down with her, looked her directly in the eyes, and told her that I did not want her to stay with my father for my sake. If she was there only on our account, she should know that she should not force herself to live with us for me. With my fifteen years, I was now old enough and no longer needed mothering. It was too late to make up for the lost years.

  When I returned from the expedition, my mother was gone. Not until years later, with the death of my father, did she become part of our family again. As his first wife, she buried him in accordance with our traditions and took her rightful place again as the first wife of the first son on the family homestead in Alego.

  Whenever I was back at boarding school after break, I felt as if a huge burden had been lifted from my shoulders. The girl who at home didn’t speak much and was most content hiding behind a book vanished, and in her place appeared the rambunctious child of my primary school years. Like most of my classmates, I was loud and playful. At school, I successfully suppressed the family problems that weighed on me at home. When there was laughter, I laughed loudest. When antics were hatched, I was game from the very beginning. I did not want anyone to notice the anguish that was gnawing at me.

  * * *

  Then Peggy Flint arrived, a young American teacher who had been sent to our school by the Peace Corps to teach music. What she found there did not at all meet her expectations. As she later told me, she was already wide-eyed on her arrival. From the window of her taxi, she glimpsed the imposing entrance gate to the school grounds, on the wrought-iron bars of which the impressive motto of the school was displayed: Servire est regnare (“To serve is to rule”). And above these three words was a roaring lion. When the taxi drove through the stately gate, Peggy Flint found herself on a campus reminiscent of the atmosphere of a British private school. Her eyes wandered over a well-tended lawn, along green hedges and flower beds. In the distance, she made out an open-air theater half hidden by tall trees. A sign showed the taxi driver the way to the school garden and the sanatorium. Then he turned and stopped in front of a massive, three-story building, one of several that served as dormitories for the students. Just within sight, she glimpsed the pretty chapel.

  During her later tour, Peggy Flint discovered excellently maintained tennis courts and hockey fields, a gymnasium, and a large swimming pool. The well-equipped classrooms appeared no less remarkable to her; there were no ramshackle desks anywhere. On top of that, Kenya High School was located on several acres of lush land. No huts or windowless flat buildings with corrugated iron roofs could be seen far and wide. No barefoot African children who had to walk for miles to their school with their books on their heads struggled there to acquire knowledge in a language they could scarcely understand, let alone read or write. At Kenya High School, it was easy to forget that you were in Kenya—if it weren’t for the many black faces.

  Peggy Flint had come to this country with completely different visions. From my conversations with her, I gathered that she had assumed that her job would consist of helping needy African children, only to be disappointed. Most of the students she would henceforth be teaching by no means suffered from a lack of money. There was not a trace of poverty about them—at least not visibly. For most of them came from well-off families, who did not in the least correspond to the image of poor, underdeveloped Africans. Therefore, as I later learned, after a short time Peggy Flint made an intense effort to be transferred to a rural, more “indigenous” school.

  But apart from her disappointment in the face of the “Europeanized” students, Miss Flint, as we called her, got along very well with us girls. I gravitated toward her from the first moment on. She was a genuinely cheerful spirit, and unlike me, she showed her feelings openly and wore her heart on her sleeve. She entertained us with exciting and amazing stories from her life in the United States. There she had taught in a poor neighborhood at a high school attended predominantly by black children, where she made it her mission to help them out of their misery. Now she wanted to do the same thing here in Africa.

  Miss Flint lived on the school grounds, and because she at first knew barely anyone, she spent a lot of time with us students. Often I talked with her for hours about everything under the sun. Because I liked to read, she recommended books to me; in return, I explained Kenyan customs and traditions to her. She was particularly interested in why we “Bomanians” were so “British,” so different from what she had expected. I watched with amusement how she tried to arouse our enthusiasm for African culture and music. But her efforts had to compete with our passion for Michael Jackson, Marvin Gaye, and Luther Vandross, and in that contest, the American R&B singers always emerged as the clear winners. In our eyes, those musical preferences were by no means in conflict with our “African identity.” We took that identity for granted, as something we had grown up with. We did not question it and did not try to prove it. The “Britishness” that Peggy Flint saw in us—which, as our musical taste demonstrated, was infused with a great deal of “Americanness”—we either scarcely noticed or experienced as a mere addition to what we were anyhow. Thus this teacher who promoted everything �
��indigenous” only confused us with her zeal, instead of freeing us from the “yoke of imperialism” as she intended.

  Despite her passionate fascination with everything “African,” she was a great help to me in difficult times. I trusted her and felt like I could tell her anything, without her judging or rejecting me.

  * * *

  I also received support from some other teachers in those years, such as Miss Wyatt, who was from England, and Miss Ismail, a Kenyan of Asian descent. Miss Wyatt taught home economics, but encouraged me to get more involved in my sport of choice, swimming. Miss Ismail, our physical education teacher, also promoted my athletic skills. Plus, if a teacher complained about me at faculty meetings, she always put in a good word for me. It was also Miss Ismail who provided me the opportunity to give swimming lessons at our school at an early age.

  Although other teachers helped me, these three in particular created the necessary space for me to express myself, make progress, and develop my potential. Later on, my German teacher, Mrs. Kanaiya, who was from East Germany and was married to a Kenyan, would also play a part in that.

  Our German class was made up of only four students, all of whom were highly motivated. Mrs. Kanaiya taught us with great enthusiasm and worked with us not only on a technical level, but also interacted with us personally. From her we learned a lot about the German language, German culture, and German history. We had extensive discussions about human rights, the position of women in society, and numerous other topics that we never would have been able to cover in such depth in a larger class. She gave us Stern, Der Spiegel, and other German magazines and newspapers to read. It was Mrs. Kanaiya who shaped my early image of Germany and laid the groundwork for my later entrance into German society.

  In the meantime, the problems with the troublesome school fees had fortunately been overcome because I had received a scholarship from Kenya High for the last two years before graduation. It had been donated by a group of women in England who met regularly and raised money for various humanitarian purposes. I was chosen by the school administration as the beneficiary of this support.

  Now I could focus, free from worries, on life and learning at school. My achievements as a swimmer and swim teacher soon made me popular with the younger girls. We also laughed a lot and thought up pranks together. I thereby incurred the disapproval of the house matron Miss Ndegwa. She did not especially like me anyhow and did not take kindly to my self-confident and assertive nature, so that over time a sort of ongoing battle developed between us. I made sure to avoid her as much as possible. If it hadn’t been for my good relationships with some teachers, Miss Ndegwa would probably have managed to get me expelled from school. In a moment of anger, she had assured me that she was working on that.

  Unfortunately, I was not entirely free of blame for her antipathy toward me. Like many other girls, I got a kick out of making fun of the matron for her strong local accent and her somewhat ill-proportioned figure. And instead of trying to win her over, I showed her only too clearly that I didn’t care whether she liked me or not.

  On top of that, Miss Ndegwa was somewhat fearful of my father. Whether that was due to his imposing baritone voice or something more, I never found out. In any case, she did not threaten, as she often did with other girls, to tell him to punish me for my misdeeds. Instead, the mere mention of my father reduced her to silence or made her resort to the feeble threat that she would get the school administration to expel me.

  Miss Ndegwa did not understand why an African girl did not simply do as she was told, but constantly questioned everything and even spoke her own mind. When I learned to my great surprise that I had been appointed deputy head girl, I was convinced that this happened partly because with this new function I had to move to another residence hall and Miss Ndegwa was finally rid of me.

  As deputy head girl, I was responsible for ensuring order. That meant that I had to attend to the disciplined behavior, manners, and well-groomed appearance of the students. In addition, together with the head girl, I had to represent the students before the administration and the teachers. One reason for this “promotion” was most likely that I was very popular with the younger girls, and the administration as well as the teachers wanted to take advantage of this. While I had previously, as a “mere mortal,” worn the regular school uniform—gray skirt, short-sleeved white shirt, red and black tie, and gray sweater—I now became a prefect and got to wear a blue sweater. From that point on, I was one of the powerful “Blue Rags.” At our side stood the “Red Rags” (also prefects, they wore wine-red sweaters and ties), who were chosen from the upper grades, but had far from as much responsibility as we did.

  * * *

  Years later, when I taught at the University of Nairobi after my studies in Germany, I lived not far from Kenya High School. One day, as I was heading for a telephone booth, Miss Ndegwa, of all people, stepped out of it. I was startled and felt as if I’d been transported back in time. Instinctively, I wanted to turn around and get out of there. But because I was standing directly in front of her, that was not possible. She, too, looked at me uncertainly and seemed to want nothing more than to vanish into thin air. But then she composed herself, put on a friendly face, and greeted me with a cold smile. I had no choice but to greet her back. She asked me a few superficial questions, behind which there was no discernible genuine interest.

  “How are you doing? What do you do now? Are you married? Children?”

  Inwardly, I told myself that she would definitely not expect a success story in my case, but would be more inclined to assume—as she had always predicted—that I had “amounted to nothing.” I answered her questions succinctly and said good-bye, without making my phone call. Although many years had passed, my antipathy toward the house matron had not abated. As I walked away, I smiled to myself, filled with satisfaction. I had told her with relish that I had come from Germany some time ago, was currently teaching German at the University of Nairobi, and would soon return to Germany to pursue my doctorate there. Not bad, I praised myself, and thought: Her prophecies did not come true.

  * * *

  Despite my differences with Miss Ndegwa, I enjoyed the years at Kenya High. But eventually the school days neared their end, and the closer that end came and the more space the preparations for the final exams took up, the more tense I became. I had not yet thought about what would come next. Though I had applied to the two public universities in Nairobi and looked for an international scholarship, I did not know how things would go on at home in my family. I simply could not imagine returning to the domestic void.

  My pent-up fears vented themselves in roundabout ways. Such was the case on a school trip with the Blue Rags. We were on our way back from an evening at the New Stanley Hotel, where we had seen Cilla Black in concert. About thirty girls had seen a worldwide star and were exuberant and exhilarated. Everyone was talking at once. Each of us wanted to give her commentary on what we had seen, and the noise level in the bus rose tremendously. As always, I sat all the way in the back and took part enthusiastically. The two teachers who were accompanying us, Miss Oluoch and Miss Doyle, had a great deal of trouble keeping our volume in check. Just as we were entering the school grounds, one of us made a dumb joke, and we again burst into irrepressible laughter. It was loudest in the back of the bus.

  Suddenly, Miss Doyle, a British woman, stood up and came marching to the back.

  “That’s enough! I’ve had it up to here with you!” I realized with surprise that I alone was the target of her anger. “Who do you think you are?” she shouted at me. “I will not tolerate this behavior. Do you understand me?” Her face was completely red with rage.

  “What did I do?” I asked in shock. I had been behaving no differently than all the other girls.

  “You must think I’m stupid. But I’m not! I know for a fact that you started this noise.”

  For a moment, I was speechless. Why me? Weren’t all of us laughing?

  “We—” Again I tried to
defend myself.

  “I don’t want to hear another word from you!” she broke in. “You will be quiet immediately!”

  It had gone dead silent on the bus. All the girls were staring at Miss Doyle. We had never seen a teacher so angry, and none of us comprehended what had made her so furious.

  “But it wasn’t me!”

  “Don’t say it wasn’t you. I know it was you. You think you can do whatever you want. But not with me!”

  She did not let up. I was the instigator, I should admit it and stop lying, she shouted.

  Then something inside me suddenly cracked. Completely unexpectedly, I burst into tears. I doubled over. Like a limp rag doll, I sat there and wept uncontrollably. A floodgate had opened, and the flow of tears could simply no longer be stemmed. Everyone was shocked, especially Miss Doyle, who now tried every means to calm me down. But it was futile. However hard I tried, I could not stop crying.

  And suddenly, to the utmost surprise of my schoolmates and the other teacher chaperone, Miss Doyle began to weep as well. No one knew what to do. In tears, the British woman said that she had always known that I hated her. That was why I was constantly making fun of her, just to provoke her. Sobbing, she apologized for her angry outburst and for not handling the situation differently.

  I didn’t understand what she was talking about. My crying fit shook me and would not stop. When she tried at one point to draw me consolingly toward her, I recoiled. Then she started weeping again. None of the stunned girls left the bus. There was a pervasive sense of helplessness. We had long since arrived at one of the boarding school houses. It would not be long before the lights went on inside and the sleepy faces of curious girls appeared at the windows.

  Suddenly, one of the Blue Rags suggested fetching Peggy Flint, because it was known that I got along well with her. Shortly thereafter, my favorite teacher came on the bus. Thirty pairs of eyes watched her intently. When she saw me sitting in the back weeping, she immediately came over to me, bent down, and asked what was going on. I tried to answer, but instead of words there came only sobs and tears.