The Ngugi I know and live with

For Njeeri wa Ngugi there are no grey areas in life; only black and white. This way, she says she is able to visualise things more clearly and make informed decisions.

Some of the decisions, while routine to her, would leave others thoroughly dumbfounded. A case in point is when she travelled to Kenya, from her base in the US, “to deliver a message to the people of Limuru” from her husband Ngugi wa Thiong’o, during campaigns ahead of the 2007 General Election.

The ‘message’ did not sit down well with one of the contestants for the Limuru constituency seat, where the acclaimed writer hails from. That message was delivered to an attentive church gathering.

Stung, rowdy supporters of the candidate in question decided to teach Njeeri and her group, including their two daughters, a “lesson.” A life-threatening car chase only ended when her pursuers realised the drama was being filmed by journalists.

Three years earlier, Njeeri again had stunned the nation when she came out in the open and announced that the people that had attacked her and her husband had actually sexually molested her.

She overruled doctors who were trying to cover up the issue by saying that she had been merely assaulted.

In an incident that left the whole country shocked, Ngugi had just returned to Kenya after a lengthy 22 years in exile when they were subjected to the brutal attack in their hotel.

This was yet another example of her doing the totally unexpected thing, but which according to her, is common sense. Judging by the severity of the attack, one would expect her to clam up when the topic was mentioned.

On the contrary, she is surprisingly open about that dark chapter of her life. She is also a lively conversationalist, giving witty anecdotes, often breaking into giggles and hearty laughter.

Naturally, going by Ngugi’s larger-than-life status, news of their attack quickly spread around the world.

“When we went back to California, crowds carrying flowers, expressing solidarity with what had happened to us, received us,” she says. “It was so touching.”

And as it turned out, Njeeri’s openness had not been in vain.

“A lot of people in the university made appointments with me, and they ended up telling me about terrible things that had happened to them but had kept them bottled up,” she says adding that her experience taught her that there are many other people out there who are still living in the closet.

“In fact, I had a session with one woman who later went to her father’s grave and ‘told him’ of an incident when she been raped, but had decided to keep it to herself,” Njeeri reveals in solemn voice.

It was easy for the people at the university to open up to Njeeri; after all her job entails taking care of the mental health of university staff.

She is today the director Human Resource Faculty and Staff Conflict Resolution Services at the University of California, Irvine, where her husband Ngugi is Distinguished Professor, Comparative Literature School of Humanities.

As a first step in healing, as a therapist, Njeeri says she had no hesitation going to see Dr Frank Njenga for therapy. She however admits that it has been tough trying to recover from it all.

“My recovery has been an ongoing process, it is not like an antibiotic pill,” she says reflectively.

Njeeri, who has spent the better part of her career attending to people who have undergone traumatic experiences, including abused children in some of the toughest American neighbourhoods, had never imagined herself as a victim.

“That experience made me realise that I had been naïve,” she says. All in all, Njeeri says that being together with Ngugi had made her recovery easier. “My husband is a very strong person and has been very supportive,” she says proudly. “He is an excellent problem solver.”

She, however, does not see the fuss about Ngugi’s larger-than-life stature.

“I live with him and what I can tell you is that he is a humble, down-to-earth person, who will go the kitchen and make a sandwich for the children when I am away working. He also occasionally drops and picks the children from school,” she says. “At home he is a loving husband and caring father.”

She is, however, quick to note that in the entire period Ngugi was writing his novel titled The Wizard of the Crow, she virtually took over driving.

The book, which is more than 700 pages long has very complex characters, and uses magical realism as a literary device.

A new idea would strike Ngugi, say at the dinner table, and the writer in him would get into the world of his characters.

“All of a sudden, he would start gesticulating and talking to himself,” she says with a smile. “Any person who didn’t know what he did for a living would recommend that he be committed to a mental institution.”

With a conspiratorial tone, Njeeri leans forward and recounts an incident, when their daughter Mumbi was four and she was giving her a bath.

“The bathroom was upstairs near my husband’s office where he was busy writing,” she says. “I had forgotten the towel downstairs so I told him to watch over her while I dashed for the towel.”

Ngugi dutifully stepped into the bathroom to watch over their daughter, abandoning his writing and his characters, but had he?

“I had to run up the stairs after Mumbi started screaming shouting mummy! I found her terrified. She told me that daddy was doing weird things with his hands,” she recounts with a cheeky smile.

Apparently Ngugi was oblivious of all the commotion and was gesticulating.

“He had again gone back into the world of his characters,” she adds.

Clearly, Njeeri did not wish to take chances with her husband, and his fictional pals, on the steering wheel. “That is why I took over the driving during the whole period,” she observes. Well, this took the better part of seven years!

“When he finished writing the book, I suggested that we go watch a movie. It was such a relief,” she says, her eyes lighting up at the recollection.

Apart from proving moral support for her husband when he is writing, Njeeri is always at hand to give valuable input in the form of ideas and suggestions.

“He lets me read his manuscripts before he takes them to the publishers,” she says.

“People out there associate writers like my husband with the glory of the finished products, but it is not always that rosy, especially when the book is being written,” adds Njeeri.

She says that as a wife, she has to be very supportive of her husband during such trying moments.

“You have to be supportive and understanding,” she explains. “If you bugged him, you would be killing a part of him.”

Would she put her experiences on paper? “I have been told that the best way to heal is to put it down on paper,” she says

thoughtfully. “Maybe I will someday when I am completely healed. Right now I have kids to raise.”

The Ngugis were in the country for the Kenyan launch of the first part of his memoirs; Dreams in a Time of War.