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tall tales and all
Fiction
Poetry
A Tale of Exile
Literary Monuments
Thotlines
Audience Response
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So today I mark another year lived. It’s a big one, one of those with 0 at the end. It feels altogether mysterious and fearful; severe and introspective… The more I stare at that 0 the bigger it seems to grow. I feel as if I’m walking through the blended brains a Dostoevsky character and a Stephen Hawkins clone, caught in a paranoid rise to contemplatia.
What’s inside the 0? A vacuum of valuelessness? A black hole of forgotten dreams? The laughing eye of God tickled by the joke of predetermination? Light at the end of life’s oval tunnel? Such a big 0! Except that I know there’s cake, and I’m suddenly buoyant and boundless. That’s what good cake does. On it is your name and flaming candles declaring the number of years you have lived. It’s a platter of identity. There is cake. What a relief.
Except when I turned 18, there was a different symbol of identity. I was required by law to acquire something called a national identity card, simply, an ID. The card marked one’s transition to adulthood, the end of dependence, the beginning of responsibility. It marked one’s branding into the fabric of nationhood. If a police officer found you loitering around Kenya as if you belonged, happily chewing big-G bubble gum and whistling a song of joy, and you did not have your ID with you, you had two choices: empty your pockets and give the officer the bribe he demands or spend a night at the grime and louse-infested local police station. Either way, you came out humiliated, piecing together broken dignity with what little honor you had left. You must never walk about your own country as if you belong without the ability to prove you existed.
Here’s how it worked. When you turned 18, you had to travel to the place you legitimately called home. That would be the place your ancestors came from. Forget that you may have been born and raised in a completely different part of the country, or that you probably lived in a town hundreds of miles away from your ancestral home. Your identity card would bear your name, your ancestral home area, and a number that put you in your proper place as a statistic. The authorities did not care how far you had to travel to process your national ID; they just wanted to make sure that tribal identities were supremely enforced and stamped permanently as part of your identity. Ethnic pride is a good thing; institutionalized tribalism is an evil thing
And so it was that when I turned 18, I had to make that journey to Taita-Taveta district headquarters in Wundanyi to acquire my proof of existence. Now, I happen to have a mild affliction called procrastinitis. It is a kind of mental myopia where one’s perception lens is a tad too oblong so that objectives appear farther off than they really are. While driving through the course of life, a sufferer will tend to collide with deadlines all too often. But when one has made peace with this short-coming, one often shine heroically from time to time, seeing as such one learns to perform near-miraculous feats when put under pressure. Close to the official day of presenting my particulars for a national ID, I had everything, except my birth certificate. Well, that was very scary.
“Mao, do you know where my birth certificate is?” Mama knew I was in my last-minute helter-skelter mode
“Up in Jangara” She responded as if she knew the question was coming.
“Huh??” That would be a day long grueling climb to our homestead, up an impossible hill that defied gravity so that one’s head was touching the incline of the hill as toes dug into earth and pushed torso and pelvis up inch by inch.
I needed that birth certificate. Without it, I could not get my ID. Then I could not prove I was an adult. I could not get a job, I could not vote. I could not walk about freely. I could not join the legion of statistics called citizens. I did not exist. I looked up towards Jangara where my father’s house stood on a hill, took a deep breath, and set off to find this last piece of priceless particulars.
When I finally got there, I dug into vast mounds of decades of documentation, and therein found my birth certificate. Actually, what I found was a certified copy of the original. Let me repeat what I just said because this bit of information will feature prominently in this strange tale of identities. What I found after a grueling journey up the steepest hills God ever created was a certified copy of my original birth certificate. I now take an oath upon this here holy book and upon the living memory of my ancestors that I was there when dad was getting some of our important documents certified by the magistrate. This was a few years back, and he and I had gone together to the Voi magistrate to get this job done. It was a wise move by a parent who was transferred a lot and had to ensure his children’s paperwork was available when needed. Now, by law, a copy of a birth certificate certified by the magistrate was admissible in lieu of the original.
So now I had all the paperwork I needed, and I descended those hills heroically like Moses bearing the document that would brand his people with their spiritual identity. The next day, I took the matatu up the windy road from Mwatate to Wundanyi. That twenty-minute journey always felt like a death ride, up and up and swing around the blind bends while the driver chewed on a wad of miraa stimulant, held a Fanta bottle in one hand, steered the matatu with another, and spat out animated stories from the corner of his mouth that was not in use. The matatu’s name was “Mpaji”, the Giver. It reminded you that your life was entirely in its hands; it gave and it took, blessed be its name. You prayed that you would get to your destination before it took your life. I was 18 and about to acquire my ID so I could begin my life. I had no wish to make an early exit.
When I arrived at the office where the IDs were to be issued, there was a multitude of humanity crawling all over the compound. They had all turned 18 and had come from all over the district to acquire the same document. I suddenly felt very disturbed. I looked around, taking time to dwell momentarily on the faces of young men and women who had lived a life of struggle and hoped for nothing but a door-way to prosperity. Life is not easy for the average youth who spent their teenage years in a school cramming knowledge into a brain that was weighed down with the burden of expectation. Pass exams, go to college, get a job in an office, make money, get your family out of poverty, save Africa…
The faces stared blankly into the sagging space called waiting. Eyes sat deeply within searching sockets, beads of sweat dried up lazily on smooth skin restored to health after the shock and awe of early teen acne eruptions. I was looking into the faces of emerging adults, handsome young men and ladies of striking beauty, saviors of families that had sacrificed greatly for them to have an education, soon-to-be parents, a nation’s workforce in waiting, the shoulders we hoped to stand the coming generation upon. These, in the hundreds, had been given only this one day, in this one office, to acquire the ID that allowed them to set off into the world and measure up to society’s demands.
Then a kind of sorrow overcame me. How could we overcome when the start of our journeys was bottle-necked against us from all sides? It was a futile thought. Kenya’s youth are overcomers, I thought. Except when life pressed them ruthlessly against the hard place of joblessness and the rock of poverty. Then they had nothing to lose, and destruction was not a far-fetched thought. I joined the throng of hundreds haphazardly strewn across the compound, waiting for the clerks to come out and give us instructions. Most would spend the day hungry, waiting, hoping that they would not be turned away over a missing document. Then they had to travel the miles back, use up resources they did not have, and wait another day, or another year.
Soon the process started, and as it went on, I begun to observe something strange. Many came out with heads hung low, as if ashamed to face the sun. Very few came out with a silly grin on their faces. Then I noticed that those with a silly grin seemed to be better dressed the type who would have some change in their pockets. Occasionally, I thought I saw some hiding tears. It was as if there was someone in there telling them a relative just died. Very strange.
When my turn came to present my papers. I walked into the large office. There were at least six government clerks seated behind drab desks. The process was simple: present your papers, fill out forms, get your finger prints taken, prepare to pick up your ID.
“Papers!” One of the clerks shouted at me. There was an unnatural sense of joy in the room, like a gang enjoying a roadkill roast by a dangerous highway. I approached him and handed him my papers. He looked at them, coldly shifted his gaze towards me, and blurted out.
“I need your original birth certificate.”
“Excuse me, but that one is a certified copy, acceptable by law.”
“I said original copy.” He was getting irritated.
“The Magistrate signed and stamped it herself. It is acceptable.” The fighter in me was waking up.
“Don’t waste my time. Either produce the original or produce something else.” I was puzzled. What else could I produce better than a certified copy?
“Eh?? Toa kitu!” He glared at me.
Then I understood. How could I have been so dumb and slow? He wanted a bribe. He had found a hard place to push me against. He was a taker of other people’s earnings, a thief who reaped where he had not sown, a destroyer of society’s moral fabric, a discourager whose corrupt practices wore out one’s soul to the core. I now understood why I saw so many shamed and broken spirits walking out of this office. The few with the silly grin had given the bribe and come out feeling like heroes, tributaries of new rot joining the river of corruption.
I looked at the clerk and felt my tired temple tremble with rage. I had waited outside too long under the scorching sun. I had worked so hard to get the right documents. I had travelled miles to get to this place. Now I stood before a thief and a bully who demanded to control my destiny.
My rage stung me, and I felt utterly helpless. They were probably all demanding bribes in this office. It was common practice. Only it was the first time in my life I had been hit with it. Our generation stood not on shoulders of heroes but on the soggy sands of social putrefaction that drained into gutters of hopeless tomorrows. I fought back my tears for I did not want this bully to think for a moment that he had found a weak victim.
“
“Bure tu (Useless)” He muttered and waved me out when he realized I had nothing to give him.
From that moment on, I shall always know that corruption had a human face, and it made one shiver with rage and helplessness, until one found a superhero that could fight the bully for them.
I took back my forms and walked out, shamed, head hanging low.
I took a matatu back to Mwatate where dad had endless meetings with people on everything from land issues to employment, hospital bills and school fees. I had no intention to disturb him with my small broken dignity. But Mama had questions.
“Did you get your ID?” She asked.
“No. I was not successful.” I answered.
“What did you forget?” Her question was quite relevant as I’ve been known to have a small issue with forgetting things.
“Nothing.” I could not give her details because my hurt was still too raw. I hated bullies, but I had yet to figure out how to stand up to institutionalized bullying that pumped a fist of arrogance and impunity dead in the faces of people who only needed services to help them go about their lives productively and efficiently. I flopped in a chair and stared into a swirling fatigue of dying dreams.
A few minutes later, dad appeared, followed by groups of people who wanted his attention. He saw me and asked casually,
“Did you get your ID papers processed?”
“No”
“Why?”
“They said they needed my original birth certificate. They refused the certified copy from the magistrate” Now, let us pause for a moment. What followed next was something I will never forget, the reason why I tell this story.
“They said what??” Dad asked. I was alert because dad’s voice had suddenly acquired a different kind of energy.
“A clerk said he wanted the original birth certificate.”
“Daudi!” Dad called out.
“Mzee.” Daudi responded.
“Twende Wundanyi. (Let’s go to Wundanyi).”
And just like that, he cut short his conversation with the person he had given his attention to. The others quietly sat down and waited, hoping he will come back soon. I was shooed into the pick up where I sat sandwiched between dad and Daudi the driver. The atmosphere was charged with strange emotions, unspoken thoughts, approaching thunder. I quietly gave dad the details of the incident, trying my best to hold back my tears. There’s something about narrating a humiliating incident when it’s still so raw. I nursed the bland sting of the memory as we rode back to Wundanyi.
Daudi parked the pick-up, dad got out, and I followed close behind, saying nothing. He stormed into the ID-processing offices, faced all the clerks that had been processing papers, and with a presence that felt like Samson bringing down the temple of Dagon, he demanded to know,
“Who asked for my daughter’s original birth certificate?”
Pin-drop silence. No one dared move. A Samurai sword seemed to hover above every clerk’s head. Only the hero was no Samurai warrior, just an unarmed ordinary father.
“I asked, who among you demanded an original birth certificate?”
They all started to fidget in their seats. The culprit owned up meekly.
“Mzee, I was going to ask her to come back…” He stammered and stumbled through lies.
“Here. I am the original birth certificate!” Dad said, thumping a finger at his chest, his voice projected for greater effect. I watched. They were all frozen.
“I said I’m this girl’s original birth certificate. Now, what’s next?”
Thunder. Lightning. Fire. Revolution! I was 18, and I was having cake!
The bully now had his tail tightly coiled between his legs. If he was peeing on himself, I did not see, but I submit it is a possibility. The other clerks watched, not daring to breath. They had never seen a live birth certificate before, standing right in front of them. They sure hoped it was the last living and breathing original birth certificate they would see walk in through those doors.
My paperwork was processed. I had now officially transitioned into a responsible adult.
This weekend will be Father’s day, and today, I remember this lesson from the fountain of fatherhood. When an important birthday comes along, you will be called upon to transition to higher ground. Stand up. Stand out. Stand steady.
It’s my birthday, and I’m having cake
For Dad. On Father’s day and always
For all the birthday girls turning _0
For the youth that look for strength in my generation.
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