I Built No Schools in Kenya
Page 18
‘Okay, I’ll let Khamisi know not to worry about lunch.’
I’m too late: he’s already made a start on a curry. He’s humming as he stirs the pot on the stove. And he is very upset when I tell him we won’t be having lunch here after all. ‘But I am making the Indian curry today!’ he protests. ‘I have prepared it with all of the spices. Look – I have the cumin, and the ginger and mustard seeds.’ He lines them up on the bench.
It does seem a little sacrilegious to miss out on one of Khamisi’s meals. He was trained in a five-star hotel and is immensely proud of his mastery of European cuisine. Before the Smyths, he’d been working for a Swiss family, until they returned to Geneva. Fiona found his résumé and letter of recommendation among the dozens of flapping papers pinned to the noticeboard at the shops. Most expats and wealthy families find their Kenyan household staff by word of mouth, but occasionally get lucky picking from the hundreds of pleas for a livelihood thumbtacked to crumbling cork.
‘I know – I’m so sorry, Khamisi.’ The smell is making me salivate. I really would much rather stay and eat his curry than drive Walt to his mother’s funeral. ‘Maybe we can have it for dinner instead?’
Khamisi throws his hands in the air.
I feel terrible for having offended him – he takes his work very seriously. ‘Why don’t you have it for lunch?’ I suggest. ‘You could share it with the other staff!’
Khamisi laughs, pulls a face. ‘No, no, no, you know – we Africans, we do not like these flavours.’ Well, he can’t be speaking for all Africans, I think. Esther’s in the laundry folding washing, so I call her in. ‘Hey, Esther – do you like curry?’ She gets all bashful, covering her smile with her hands while she shakes her head. I realise it’s probably rare that she’s asked to offer an honest, personal opinion on anything in the Smyths’ house. ‘You can have this for lunch if you like – here, have a taste!’
She comes over to the pot, smells the spoon in Khamisi’s hand, and screws up her face. ‘No, no thank you. Asante.’ She breaks into a fit of giggles.
‘You see?’ Khamisi says. ‘It is too rich. I prefer to have my sukuma wiki.’
‘Huh?’ I say. ‘How can you cook so well if you don’t like the taste of what you’re making!?’
‘I had very good training in the hotel kitchen,’ he says proudly. ‘I know all of the herbs and spices. I make this for you,’ he pleads.
‘It’s the bwana,’ I try to explain. ‘He is very wasi-wasi today – we have to get him out of the house for a bit.’
Khamisi softens and comes to a compromise. ‘I will make the curry and I will keep it warm. You will try some when you come back.’
‘Yes, okay, deal,’ I say. If I have to eat lunch twice to keep the peace, I’ll do it.
He resumes his humming and stirring, though in a decidedly morose tone.
I find Alice waiting by the car with Walt dressed in his crumpled suit. ‘He insisted on wearing it,’ she says. ‘And I promised we’d stop to buy flowers on the way.’
Walt is pacing, frowning, rubbing his face, sighing. ‘Oh no, oh no,’ he keeps muttering. ‘My poor, dear old mother.’ He’s grief-stricken, I realise. What an awful mental place to be stuck at.
‘Should we drive ourselves, or get Peter to take us?’ Alice asks.
‘Peter,’ I say. ‘That might help remind Walt he’s in Kenya.’
We wave Peter over from his chair under the tree near the staff quarters, and pile into the Mazda. And sure enough, by the time we’re through the gates and turning onto the road towards the Club, Walt’s asking who we’re meeting there for lunch.
His mother is long dead again, may she continue to rest in peace.
Marguerite is due back in a couple of days. I find the thought of it exhausting. On the one hand, having her around can sometimes make Walt easier to handle in times when he’s searching for a familiar face. On the other, Marguerite often requires her own handling – help resetting her Kindle or finding files on her computer, or explanations of the carers’ roster and how it all fits in with her diary, even if we’ve been over it a dozen times before. Not to mention the ongoing family tensions that she doesn’t know we already know about, meaning we have to feign ignorance when she complains to us that Fiona is making her life very difficult. The most draining part of this job, I realise, is the psychological juggling act of trying to keep these two women happy.
Around eleven that night, Alice and I finally collapse into bed. But we’ve barely closed our eyes when the door opens and the light turns on. It’s Fiona. She’s got another plan.
Step one is to make Marguerite realise just how bad an idea hiring a local nurse is – by hiring one. She calls a friend who’s involved with an aged-care agency in town, asking if they’ve got any ‘big, fat African men’ on the books who could come and do a stint with Walt next week, once Marguerite’s back.
‘That should call her bluff once and for all,’ Fiona says.
I wonder if the big, fat African man they send out will be in on it. I wonder how much more of being complicit in this terrible shit I can take.
Step two is to disappear me and Alice before Marguerite gets back, but that all goes out the window when a taxi pulls into the driveway on Tuesday morning.
It’s Marguerite, a day early. Alice and I look at each other, confused.
‘I thought she wasn’t due in until tomorrow,’ I say.
‘She wasn’t,’ says Fiona, apparently unfazed, pouring herself another coffee.
‘Surprise! I’m back!’ Marguerite sticks her head sideways through the doorway. ‘Did you miss me? I know I’m early – I just had a spur of the moment brilliant idea to leave before the snow got too much. Couldn’t bear the thought of getting stuck at Heathrow with that ghastly blizzard on the way. So, here I am! Oooh, is that a fresh pot of coffee? I’ll have one, please. How lovely.’
But later that day, on the baby monitor, I hear Marguerite telling Walt how great it was to arrive ‘when they were least expecting me, so that I can see what they’re up to’.
So, both women are right to suspect the other of plotting against them. And I’m about to become a domestic mercenary double agent.
The next morning before breakfast, I go into Walt and Marguerite’s room to help Walt get ready for the day. I make sure his clothes are laid out in order on the bed, that his razor and comb are carefully placed in just the right spots on the ledge above the basin.
Marguerite faffs about in her nightgown, setting her own toiletries out on the dresser. I still feel a bit weird about looking after another woman’s husband when she’s right here beside us, but she seems to have accepted Fiona’s insistence that a carer should always run him through the morning routine. To be fair, Marguerite would probably struggle to remember every last detail of the regimen. And maybe she finds it actually is easier having us in there to help.
‘Now, tell me,’ she says, ‘is it your sister Brenda who’s coming to stay in January? Or the other one. Alice. Does she have a sister? Oooooh, you must smell this lov-er-ly new hand cream I bought at a nice shop in Heathrow.’ She holds out a pink tube of Crabtree & Evelyn moisturiser.
I take a sniff and am overwhelmed by the floral scent. I sneeze.
‘Bless you,’ comes Walt’s voice from the bathroom. I look over and he’s still emptying his bladder.
‘Um, yes – that’s my sister. Bridget, not Brenda,’ I say. ‘But she’ll only come if you want her here – you can talk to her on Skype first if you like.’
‘Oh, bit late for that – Fiona says it’s all arranged,’ says Marguerite, only just masking her annoyance. Then she immediately brightens up again. ‘I say – will Brenda be any good at fixing the printer and all those computery things for me? Like you girls are? Oh that does smell nice, doesn’t it?’ She rubs the rose moisturiser into her hands, then smears them across her face.
‘Bridget. Um, yes …’ I say, noticing Walt start looking a bit lost as to what to do next. I go through to the ensuite t
o reposition him at the basin. I put the plug in and run the taps – just hot enough – for him to have a shave. ‘She should be able to help with all that. And I think she’d be very good with Walt – she’s got a lot of experience with this sort of thing.’
‘Oh, splendid!’ says Marguerite. Then to Walt, ‘Do you hear that, darling? You’ve got another nice Or-stray-lyan girl coming to help look after you.’
‘What’s that?’ Walt turns around, shirtless, pyjama pants tied around his waist.
‘Kirsten’s sister, Brenda.’
‘Bridget.’
‘She’s coming to help when Kirsten goes home.’
‘I don’t need any help!’ says Walt.
‘Yes you do, darling. We all do. We’re both getting on a bit.’
Then, while Marguerite is in the shower and Walt is shaving, Fiona beckons me out into the hallway, where Alice is waiting with a bag.
‘I packed your joggers, togs, some gym clothes. And is this the book you’re reading?’ she says.
‘Yeah …’ I say, ‘Where are we going?’
‘Down to the Club. Quickly – let’s go,’ says Fiona, pushing us out the front door.
‘Shouldn’t I tell Mar–’
‘No,’ Fiona says, ‘I want her to realise just how hard it is to look after Dad on her own – then she’ll have to admit that she needs you around.’
She just did, I think, as we pile into the Peugeot and take off, without telling anyone – not even the Kenyan staff – where we’re going or when we’ll be back. ‘Don’t answer your phones if she calls,’ Fiona says, as we pass a group of Kenyan women walking along the red dirt on the side of the road, balancing baskets of fruit piled high on their heads. ‘She needs to learn this the hard way.’
We spend nine hours hiding out at the Club that day. Hardly a prison camp, granted, but that’s a long time to twiddle your thumbs in the shade. I read a whole book. I email friends. I go to the gym. Fiona spends a lot of time in the computer room, Skyping Jonathan in England. By lunchtime, we’ve run out of wholesome things to do, so Alice and I spend the afternoon sunbathing and drinking gin by the pool.
Marguerite only messages us once, around three o’clock – ‘Hi where every1 at?’ – and doesn’t persist when she gets no reply.
‘She probably knows what’s going on,’ Alice says, rolling over to get some sun on her back.
‘I still can’t believe the big-fat-African-man thing,’ I mutter, pulling my hat down over my face. ‘Deliberately setting the poor bastard up, to be subjected to a demented old man’s rudeness, just to prove a point to Marguerite.’
‘I know,’ Alice murmurs back. ‘That’s really quite disgusting, isn’t it?’
Lots of this, let’s be honest, is really quite disgusting.
Close to sundown, Fiona decides it’s time to pack up and head home. Via Michael and Lorraine Kirby’s house. Unannounced.
Alice and I barely know the Kirbys. They’re acquaintances, more than actual friends of the family. I think we’ve met them twice, at the Club. Michael’s the guy Marguerite calls when we need a fundi (a handyman – literally an ‘expert’) to come around and fix things at the house.
But Fiona pulls me and Alice out of the car and has us stand on their driveway like unwanted children, pink-skinned and red-eyed, sunburnt and half-cut, as she tells the bewildered couple that they might like to have us stay in their cottage a few nights a week.
It’s pretty clear that Michael and Lorraine wouldn’t like that at all. They wring their hands and shuffle their feet and bite their lips. Neither of them can bring themselves to make eye contact with us. It doesn’t help that I start hiccuping.
They use the guest cottage quite regularly for their own visitors, for a start. And you know, it’s not really set up for a long-term thing – just the one bed and a small bathroom! They’d have to light a fire in the afternoon to make sure the water was hot. And they wouldn’t always be around to show us in.
‘Oh, that’s not a problem – the girls can look after themselves. Tell your askari to let them in,’ says Fiona, either not detecting or not yielding to their reticence. ‘Just name your price. I can have them bring their own linen, and make sure they’re gone by nine in the morning?’
This. Is. Mortifying.
Eventually, she wears the Kirbys down. Or maybe they just take pity on us. ‘Well, look, alright then – but only when we don’t have visitors,’ Michael says. ‘Shall we say a thousand bob a night?’ I suspect he is trying to price himself out, but Fiona readily accepts.
‘And only if Marguerite knows about all this,’ Lorraine adds. ‘Please, Fiona, we really don’t want to get involved with any of the drama between you two. You know, we got that letter you sent –’
Oh my god. The letter. The Letter. That letter. I feel sick with guilt.
‘Yes, of course!’ says Fiona, cutting her off. ‘Wonderful, then. Can they come tomorrow?’
‘No! Not tomorrow,’ says Michael, letting his irritation show. Christ, it’s excruciating for us all. He pulls himself back and says, apologetically, ‘We’ll need to clean it up for you first, it’s not ready.’
By the time we get home from our AWOL adventure, Walt and Marguerite are having dinner. Marguerite acts like nothing’s amiss; doesn’t ask where we’ve been or admit it’s been a difficult day without us.
But Walt is wearing a tie with his pyjamas, and all his tablets for the day are still in the dispenser.
The next morning, things escalate. Fiona bursts into my room before breakfast, this time with a fistful of cash and another order to evacuate. ‘Pack your bags. I need you to go away for a few days,’ she says, handing over a wad of US dollars to cover the time I’ve been working.
I don’t know whether it’s sheer spite, or a genuine effort to demonstrate just how vital Walt’s carers are, but this time Fiona is forcing Marguerite into a weekend-long crash course on ‘Life Alone with Walt’.
Which means Alice and I need to leave the house, and we have about five minutes to figure out where we’re going to exist for the next seventy-two hours.
Alice has a friend growing oranges in Tanzania she’s going to visit. Of course she does. Alice has random friends doing random shit in random places all over the world.
‘You should come!’ she says. ‘We can take a bus to Arusha, and he can pick us up from there.’
‘I can’t!’ I moan. ‘My passport is still with the Rwandan Embassy. I can’t leave the country.’
Now would be the perfect time for me to lean on my newly discovered cousins – but they’re out of town on a camping trip.
I text Sarah and Jack, desperate.
oi. we’ve been kicked out of the house – long story. can I crash at ur place for a few nights?
we r flying to mombasa for the weekend. wanna come?
ummmmmmm YES
Within the hour, Jack has booked me a seat on their plane, and I’m on my way to Wilson Airport with a sunhat and a beach bag.
What a turn of fortune.
We take off and fly low over Nairobi National Park, giraffes and herds of elephants scattering as they’re touched by the plane’s shadow. A smoggy haze hangs over the city behind us but it’s clear blue sky ahead, and to the south the plains stretch for miles. Suddenly I hear the riff from ‘Africa’ by Toto – Sarah’s playing it through her phone, holding it up to my ear. Jack pulls out a cold Tusker from his backpack and passes it to me. Only a beer could make this moment even more glorious.
The pilot pokes the plane up above the clouds and there, just out the window, is the snowy top of Mount Kilimanjaro. What’s left of the snow, anyway – the famous white caps have shrunk dramatically over the past few decades.
The drone of the props, and the fresh air and sunshine and alcohol all combine to replace my sense of frustration with one of frothy elation. In that moment I don’t ever want to leave. I commit to putting up with the Smyths as long as I can stand to, and to trying to find another job in Kenya.
Everything is a bit slower here, like it always is where the tropical air is heavy. The garb of the people is different, too: more women in hijabs, more men in white kofias. Much of the city feels like anywhere in the urbanised world, but in the Old Town the buildings have a distinctly Islamic aesthetic: smooth domes and archways pierce the Swahili whitewashed coral stone and lime mortar walls, mysterious rooms are hidden behind brass-studded Gujarati doors thanks to the Indian influence. Faces peer down from ornate balconies at the twisting, meandering streets that stretch and narrow on a whim. At first glance it seems as though the Old Town sprung up in a disorganised mess, that it’s just a chaotic cluster of structures. But if you look carefully, you realise that’s a design feature – the angle of every facade, double-louvred window and courtyard has been set to corral coastal breezes through the buildings and flush out the heat.
The city itself is separated from the mainland by a channel and a creek. It was originally inhabited by the African Bantu people, though Persian and Arab traders have been coming here since at least as far back as the tenth century. Since then, Mombasa has been repeatedly squabbled over by the Portuguese, Omani Sultans and the British. Its Swahili name – Kisiwa Cha Mvita – means ‘Island of War’, reflecting the many changes in its ownership throughout its history. The shadow of these conflicts is most pronounced at the outer edge of the harbour, where children play soccer on the sand and the Indian Ocean kisses the feet of Fort Jesus. This imposing fortress was built by the Portuguese in the late sixteenth century and bears the hallmarks of each power to have since controlled it: Koranic scripture is carved into wooden doors and beams while creaky British and Portuguese cannons still point out to sea. The English used the fort as a soldiers’ barracks and then a prison when they first colonised Kenya, before declaring it a national park in 1958 and turning it into a museum a few years later. (In 2011, shortly after our visit, Fort Jesus was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site.)