I know I am nervous because my left temple is throbbing. It is still dark as I hurry across town from the Railways matatu terminus where my matatu stops to the Odeon Cinema matatu terminus for all matatus heading to Eastern Province towns. The morning chill bites at my nose and I can feel a hint of a muscle cramp working its way up my hamstring.
My name is Pumbaa. Do not laugh. My father loved the cartoon show Hakuna Matata. My mother did not think allowing my father to name me after the cartoon character would be any kind of prophecy, or that it would scar me for life. Thankfully I have two other names, behind which I can hide my name. My friends call me Pumbaa. And most of the time I live close to the full meaning of the name which is ‘slow, dazed….”
Anyway, the reason I am struggling against the cold, the painful hamstring, and my own fears, is that I am going to attend a book fair in Meru. Well, yes, I am a nerd, too. I love books and nothing, not even the persistent slide of my very thick eye glasses down the bridge of my nose will stop me from reading more.
I have a date, too. No not that kind of a date. He won’t be waiting with a bunch of roses and a smile. It is too damned cold anyway. Hs name is Kenji. Yes, someone in his family loved animations and cartoon shows.
I’ve met Kenji before. Everyone who knows him will probably agree with me. He is dark, good-looking with an aura of mystery. He always wears dark clothes which add to the air of mystery around him. A thespian and a part time comedian with the most serious face I have ever known. He always makes me laugh, with his face frozen in a laugh-less cast. I admire his skills, but I want to make him laugh someday, too. That is one reason I am nervous.
The other reason is that I’ve never been to Meru before. I love adventure. Yes, I’m an adventurous nerd. Just like Pumbaa in Hakuna Matata. Unfortunately, like that Pumbaa, all the bad things could happen to me on a trip like this. From falling flat on my face at Kenji’s feet to having my worn out jeans rip apart at the seams leaving my ass exposed. Well, I can imagine the worst.
I’ve never been to Meru before. I guess I am curious, too. I love going to new places and noticing the differences from all the other places I’ve been to. More often than not I notice the similarities in the nature of humanity everywhere I go. It is fascinating. Always.
I have arrived at the Odeon terminus now. I am huffing and a bit sweaty despite the cold. Or maybe my heart is beating fast for another reason. That is confirmed when Kenji steps out from behind a shadow into my line of vision. I experience an uncontrollable urge to giggle.
I am struggling to suppress girlish giggles. Why? What do you mean ‘why’? I already told you why. And yes, girlish giggles don’t quite go well on my large frame and tomboy attitude, but girlish giggles anyway. So as dark, handsome mysterious walks up to me, I push up my eye glasses and shake his hand with the coolest attitude I can muster. Then I let the other side of Pumbaa take over.
You see I figured out a long time ago that the only way to survive stressful situations is to rise above them. I do that by looking at the funny side of every situation. A lot of times, I look like a clownish imp, but I always get to the other side. And now I am determined to survive this, by getting Kenji to unfreeze his face and laugh.
It’s kinda hard to be an imp when you are dead nervous. Kenji’s freeze is not encouraging either. But I’m Pumbaa. I’m Pumbaa. Tall, large, awkward, clumsy. Don’t need to try very hard. He is trying hard not to laugh, when I stumble, bump into a grouchy old man, stumble again, and get into a matatu chair headfirst.
“Are you ok?” He asks with amused concern.
I right my body push my eyeglasses back, sniff hard and nod vigorously. He doesn’t settle in the seat next to mine. He gets a window seat on the farthest end of the matatu. Okay, that’s that. I scoot to a window seat, too. I feel gloomy.
That four hour long ride is the longest ever. I read 45 pages of Dayo Forster’s Reading the Ceiling. I give up on that when I realise that the newly built Nairobi-Meru Highway has been fitted with very, very, many road bumps. It doesn’t help that the matatu’s shock absorbers are worn out. I feel every bump in the pit of my stomach and the base of my heart. With every bump my innards are tossed clear to heaven and back into my body in painful disorder. I suffer in silence until the moment I look across the aisle just as we ride over a bump. Kenji’s face crunches up, struggles with a grimace, then settles into a pained look. I giggle every time after that when we hit bumps. Well, just until the cruel driver rides really hard over a bump and I’m sent crashing into the roof of the matatu. Well, I did not break past the ceiling but my head did not wish to forget that bump for a while.
Soon we are in rice land. I stare in curiosity at the miles and miles of rice paddies we pass though. Then we get into Mwea town which is officially Rice town. I sit up soon enough and yell with excited discovery. “Have you noticed that all the shops are marked ‘Rice Store’?” Kenji pretends he has never seen me before but the other passengers glance at me. I mean, we are in rice land. No one else thinks it is ridiculous for all the stores in rice land to be called rice stores? Okay fine, I thought it was weird.
I fall asleep at some point and when I wake up, we are winding through valleys and hills, beautiful green and in the distance Mt. Kenya stands majestic, quite visible in day time, which is amazing for me. When I visited my grandmother in a town near Nairobi, Mt. Kenya was only visible on a clear day and only very early in the morning. Imagine that, and now I can stare at the mountain for minutes on end in intervals between moments sending Kenji crunched up faces that make him smile just a little bit. I think I’m doing great with my unfreeze-the-face-Kenji project.
We finally…after a very long time, finally, land in Meru town. I am now in full force imp mode. Of course I am exhausted, my head hurts and the guy in black still fascinates me. So I am turning on survival mode. It helps that I have no idea where the hall where the book fair is being held is. Then when we finally get directions, I realise that we have to go up quite a hill. I try to keep up with the make Kenji laugh plan but my body has better plans. Halfway up, huffing, a little hungry and quite pressed for a bathroom, I stall. Kenji stops a few steps ahead of me, looks back sees the expression on my face and raises a brow. I hop onto one foot, then the other, and bite my lip. He bursts out laughing, right then, he laughs so hard I want to hit him over the head and tell him while I am at it that he has no right to laugh at me! But I need a bathroom more. He figures that out, and points to a restaurant while laughing hard to the point of tears.
With a huff, I head to the restaurant and demand for a bathroom. The waitress looks at me with a perplexed look. ‘Bathroom? You want to shower?’ Kenji steps in behind me and says, “Anataka kujisaidia.” The girl’s face lightens up with understanding, but she pauses to look at me with a ‘where-are-you-from-anyway?’ look. I just run off in the direction of a sign I have just noticed. Kenji is still grinning when I get back. Hey, I was not trying for beauty queen in the first place was I? But a little dignity would have helped just then.
Now, we walk up the hill, me ignoring him, him still grinning. Well, mission accomplished. But man, could you try not to so obviously laugh at me. I have to change tactics now, to protect myself. So here I go down traffic-jam-psychoanalysis road. Why does he wear black? Why did he go into performance arts? Why is it that when he is on stage he is vibrant and entertaining but in a one to one situation he is totally quiet? Why does he keep people at such a distance when so many people admire him? What is the dark secret in his life?
I keep at the psychoanalysis until after we are through the book fair and walking through the town. I am certain that I have never devoted that much time trying to figure another human being out. I watch him, I take mental notes, I ask shrewd questions (okay not quite so shrewd), and watch more. He is now obviously very uncomfortable with my behaviour, but I don’t mind, just as long as I can win one battle.
I think at some point he gives up on fighting with me, and starts giving me information. The information has quite an effect on me. Now that he is talking, I listen avidly. I ask more questions and he surprises me by answering them. Then halfway through the drive back to Nairobi with him sitting next to me in the front passenger seat next to the driver, he announces, “You are insane, do you know that?”
I grin, “You did not know that. I did. And now you do, too.” He laughs. I laugh too. I am not so nervous anymore. And I think I found my new best friend.
He pulls out his phone, and loads his collection of animations, selecting Hakuna Matata, and episode ‘Stand by me’. I watch on the little screen as Pumbaa goes through hell, fire, rock, brim, meteorite crashes, stampedes, while her best friend sings in dream land, ‘…long as you stand, stand by me.’
Yeah, that’s me… Now, he stands by me. It has been a few weeks since the Meru trip. I am still pushing for Kenji to laugh more. He is pushing for me to learn how to avoid the stubs that make me stumble. He is learning to point out bathrooms when I stand on one foot. He will grin when I come back with my fly open. But that’s alright. Today, he came to the Coffee World where my girl friend and I were waiting for him. He was wearing an orange jumper. And he actually talked to my girl friend, about himself.
So when I stand by him, he looks at me, I grin, he grins. We are both fine after all.
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