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Mantalk: How a haircut turned me into a philosopher
What you need to know:
- Get into the matatu, find my seat, backbencher ndani ya nganya when this lass in sweatpants joins me.
- “You have a pretty smile,” I’d told her, as vanilla a way as any to break the ice, but which still managed to be effective.
The tell was there. I had just left the kinyozi, my face massaged and pulled up, down, sideways, my moustache trimmed to Ezekiel Mutua’s pastoral standards. Having thus edited God, it would not have been a shock if I appeared in a Sauti Sol (shirtless) video, to the extent that the barber lady told me I have a nice smile. She had a big bust, and I know I say women should not be in the barbershop, but we can make an exception for her, for she has a good heart somewhere behind that Saturnalian D Cup. Whether she took my number is irrelevant, but I was feeling myself, and it was a pity there are clinically blind men around, for they could not witness what a nice taper fade could do to a man. And believe me, a good haircut can make anybody believe in God. It is also true that I have often wished I had time to cultivate modesty...but I am too busy thinking about myself.
To ensure as many people as possible see me, I walked from Luthuli Avenue, also known as the wrong side of the wrong side of town, crossed Tom Mboya Street into Moi Avenue, and floated to Koinange Street to pay homage, if you know what I mean. These are the small pilgrimages that give a man his sense of self-worth. Satisfied that Nairobians have been blessed with optical nutrition, I made my way back to Ambassador, to board Kawangware 46 buses, because deep down where only my girl knows, I am still a local boy in the process of making it, where I can jump the fence to Lavington, also known as the South Sudan capital outside South Sudan. Soon, by the way. Kuna deal inaivana. For now, Kawangware is paradise.
Get into the matatu, find my seat, backbencher ndani ya nganya when this lass in sweatpants joins me. “You have a pretty smile,” I’d told her, as vanilla a way as any to break the ice, but which still managed to be effective. She looked high, and was. But we get talking. Actually, she’s talking, and she could talk, and she wanted to talk, and I wanted to listen. It’s about six-fifty-something PM, and she is chewing jaba and drinking something brown from a bottle. Outside the nganya it smells of fresh air, and inside it smells of air freshener. If society has changed, we can’t tell through the window. She decided to give some sex education. Her life had been remarkable. All lives are extraordinary in their own way, but hers was extraordinary in the way strangers could easily understand. Told me she was a Christian girl, never mixed her ugali and Sukuma, as someone’s daughter also tells me. But then she backslid.
As a 20-something-year-old, with a body that men leave their wives for, she had become aware of her effect on boys—almost all of them. She carried a sadness in her eyes, those twinkling brown eyes she had inherited from a mother who had seen only the morning, afternoon, and evening of domestic work. She was older than I anticipated, but beautiful all the same, statuesque actually, and her black cornrows indexed a middle finger to society, and her smile indeed pretty. She carried an innocence about her that transformed boys into fools. She told me that she can only be a body, never a person. For that is what men think when they see her. One more body count.
I don’t know why she was telling me all this, so I asked: Why are you telling me all this?
She told me she was about to get married when it all changed. First, her pastor tried to get it on with her, which is how she left the church. Then, her man left her because of her past. She told me she’s getting bored with the dating market. Everyone’s on sale but there is no real value. Soko ni chafu na SHA haiwork. I nod, like a scientist collecting data but trying not to interfere with the observed experiment.
Now, she says, either she gets married to a bisexual closeted man, or waits for a divorcee, or gets one of these smooth-talking, speakeasy, greasy hombres who can seduce a bird out of the trees. It’s what one of her friends did, anyway. Even paid her own ruracio, “But the husband will refund, you know, he is in between jobs.”
Ha! Ha! I knew she was funny. I told her no man ever refunds money from such a scenario. I gave her the example of that trending “pastor” guy whose girlfriend apparently paid for the wedding with his wife. What? I know. It’s a smörgåsbord of craze, a mashakura of entanglements, the LinkedIn of situationships. I tell her, that—speaking as a woman—that perhaps most women just want the title of wifey. Freedom without that responsibility. Which is why men take advantage; it’s a whole scam, and we are all complicit. A man who has made his money through a scam is more respectable because the ethic of Kenya is that we are all hustlers, and therefore everything—and everyone—is a hustle. That’s how you build a New Singapore. It’s the same reason people get life coaches. How do you have a life coach, and we are all doing this life for the first time? Scam, I tell you!
Here's my theory. We only want what we get when we can’t have it. Which is why the standing joke at country clubs is that the average age of the residents is 40 – that’s a 60-year-old man and a 20-year-old girl. It makes sense when you don’t think about it.
It is like comparing marriage to a scam, which, for reasons I won’t go into, is like having to explain why eating people is wrong. But let’s do it anyway. What’s wrong with marriage? Because marriage has become the coin of our personal happiness, which makes it a savage business, and most of the married folks should still be married, but to other people. Now let’s talk about scams. A scam shows good business sense and a quick mind. And a well-executed scam? Now, there’s a thing of beauty! Like, how society has been convinced that Pilau Njeri and watermelon are the official wedding food. And because we are here, let me say this: The flavour of Pilau Njeri is ineffably sad. It’s a taste of mourning, of grief mixed with happy memory. Which I am made to believe is what marriage feels like. I probably should not talk about marriage like that. Truthful speaking, perhaps the most compelling reason why scams could be wrong is if I am not participating in them. I don't actually believe any of that, but I just wanted to know what it feels like to actually write it down.
The question I asked her is perhaps more important than the answer she could give me. I asked: Do you want to be a wife or do you want a husband?
The thing is, Jaba Girl, I am calling her Jaba Girl from now on, she and I hit it off. Was it the jaba? I don’t know. I think I have a thing for misfits, crazy girls who can steal your heart or TV. Maybe I am the misfit? Doesn’t matter. One of us is conning the other, and I am just happy to be participating.
