Mr Survivor: Of Wa Kahiu, the Happy Valley butcher

The ‘countrysider’ is notoriously sentimental deep in his heart of hearts and looks for the slightest excuse to break in to song and dance. And partying is a highly respected ritual in the calendar of events in the countryside.

With parties galore come many colours and shades of professionals, ranging from marriage brokers, masters of ceremonies, prophets, among many other valued personalities.

No ceremony is complete in the countryside without blood being spilt. That means that there is one indispensable man in the village – the butcher. This man is loved and hated in equal measure. This is because his services are highly valued, but, often, his demands and behaviour are a cause of great concern. And in Happy Valley, the butcher is a necessary evil.

He is always armed with a sharp knife in its scabbard, stashed in a pocket of his overcoat. Although Wa Kahiu ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­ (one who carries a knife) is ordinarily­­­­­ a quiet man when walking along the paths of Happy Valley, he turns out to be very talkative when he is on a job. He is not old enough to have taken part in the fight for independence but he regales his listeners, as he slaughters, with stories of his purported exploits in the heart of Aberdare forests.

“We used to eat raw meat in the forest,” he starts. “How did you survive the worms,” asks a countrysider. This makes Wa Kahiu’s eyes dance with excitement as he entertains the gathering. “The worms you talk about came with the white man. He was looking for a market for his medicine.” 

Within no time, the unlucky animal he was slaughtering is ready to be roasted.

According to the rules governing slaughtering an animal in the countryside, there is a reserved share of the animal for the butchers; known as the ‘slaughterers’ meat’. These are the animal’s intestines. This is where Wa Kahiu’s melodrama starts.

First, he does not clean out the contents of the intestines as expected. Before anyone knows what is happening, the whole lot is on the fire. “The intestines are sweeter as they come from the stomach,” he says. Before anyone complaints that the intestines ought to have been cleaned off the inner contents, he cuts a huge chunk and is busy cooling it in his mouth.

The hissing sound that Wa Kahiu produces and the vapour that makes a rainbow as he spins the hot chunk in his mouth makes people turn away. This gives him a chance to cut huge pieces of meat which he hurriedly wraps in polythene papers and stashes in the many pockets of his oversize jacket, specifically designed for that purpose.

His theatrics are, however, not without some disastrous but hilarious anecdotes. One day, so the story goes, he cut a huge chunk of hot intestines and threw it in to his mouth. Unfortunately, he had accidentally included a red hot piece of charcoal. It became so difficult to spin the hot combination in his mouth. He sat down in pain, with tears freely flowing from his eyes.

“What is the problem with you?” asked the men present. No one knows how he managed to swallow his helping, but the story has it that he swallowed everything. His answer is what has remained the most hilarious part of the anecdote: “When I remember the problems we went through in the Aberdare forest fighting for independence, my tears flow freely. We really suffered a lot,” he replied.

And every time the story of Wa Kahiu and the hot chunk of intestines is given, people laugh so much that tears flow freely from their eyes.

The amount of meat that Wa Kahiu can consume in one sitting is contestable in the whole village. However, mean estimates have it that a quarter of an adult goat is his average in one sitting. To support the claim, the rumour mill in the countryside has a story to it. One day, his wife left him in a huff for a reason related to one of his many embarrassing meat eating escapades. While on the way, she remembered a goat she had won in her chama’s raffle the previous week. Knowing what kind of a meat-eating man she had for a husband, she turned back in the company of some elders intending to rescue the animal.

The aroma of roast meat welcomed them to the compound. He turned to look at the elders and asked what business they had with his wife in his own compound. Remembering his sharp butcher’s knife, they all ran for their dear life leaving him to enjoy the goat in peace.

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