Kenya: Samosas, carjacking, coffee and corruption — Kenya believe it?
Until this week I’ve pictured Kenya as a post-colonial paradise of functioning towns, nature reserves and ice-cold Tusker beer in the sun. This is surprising as my only real Kenyan interactions have been meeting: someone who left after being carjacked while pregnant; reading Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s 1967 novel A grain of wheat which portrays the run up to independence as being pretty hellish; and drinking room temperature Tusker beer in the rain. Somehow though I still believed that independence had brought prosperity and joy.
It turns out I was wrong.
My adventure started, problematically, with the film Out of Africa. I am aware of the irony of learning about Kenya from some white peoples’ syphilitic African adventures, but in the end, I enjoyed its one-sided romanticised picture of coffee farming in colonial times. As Kenya was only a British protectorate from 1895 and a colony from 1920–1963 (a remarkably short time for a land with 1.6 million year old homo erectus skeletons in the closet), I felt the need to also watch a more recent film. Putting aside the worryingly titled Nairobby, I plumped for Nairobi half life the story of Mwas, a happy-go-lucky youth from a Kenyan village and his journey from there to Nairobi. I am sure you can already guess that this is a bildungsroman where he is schooled in a capital run by hustlers, gangsters, pimps and corrupt police. As it was extremely popular in Kenya, I fear there may be some truth in it.
These fears seemed to be confirmed by this week’s book One day I will write about this place, by Binyavanga Wainana. Like the film, it is clearly not written by Kenya’s tourism authority, but it is certainly a work of art. It takes the “show don’t tell” concept to its logical conclusion by crafting a narrative based on Wainana’s mental state at each stage in his life. In his early years, ideas jump all over the place and reality and imagination are interchangeable, in his depressed years the prose is slow and languid, and in his final years it punches hard, with a clear and determined message about the future and promise of a united Africa.
Talking of a united Africa, having found little in the way of vegan cuisine in my journeys round the continent so far, I was delighted to come across a blog by a British Nigerian about plant-based Kenyan cuisine, as it seems there is a lot (not all of which is linked to Kenyan Indians). For example, turmeric coconut milk Ndengu, a delicious, healthy dal-like dish that went extremely well with these Kenyan chapati. If that is not enough for you, here is Githeri an anti-inflammatory, immune supporting dish made by the Kikuyu tribe. And finally, for now, Sukumu Wiki, a dish of greens that is so cheap that it is known as “push the week” meaning it will help you stretch the week to payday.
As always, I cooked and ate while listening to my own personal Kenya playlist, which starts with the incredible “Aunty what happened to me,” by Nah Eeto, a woman who will surely soon be taking the world by storm. There is so much joy in the music that it gave me hope that Kenya is now on the way up! Certainly my brother went there recently and said it didn’t feel like the representations I found — but maybe, that’s just because, there are Kenyas, rather than one Kenya — I mean there will be people still listening to Richard Chelobani while Nah Eeto takes over the dance hall, and Zuhuru and Party’s Taarab music sounds positively Indian.
And so to end with drink! I bet you are expecting me to hit you up with some Tusker? Well you are wrong, instead I went heavy on the caffeine with some strong-as-hell Kenyan tea (good enough to keep you going all day) and some wonderful decaf fair-trade coffee (good enough to put you to sleep at night)! The Out of Africa plantations are still going strong it seems. So that’s it! Thanks for listening and see you next week in Kiribati.
