Blackberrryyyy!!!!

Wednesday 2pm...I was bored senseless with a nagging report I was trying to get rid of from my desk and a not so good looking outlook into my evening. Then I get a call from my small bro (been asked why I call him Wacko Jacko...I really don't know..the name stuck!)..Anyhow he asks "Kwani today you aint popping for the K'ogalo game?" I am a Gor ultra (violently fanatic supporters associated with the Juve club of Turin) and i did not need a second asking...."Nunulia mimi tikiti bwana!", I told Wacko. My plan was to go home , change into my green K'ogalo jersey and dash for the floodlit match in Nyayo stadium. I estimated leaving the office at 6pm would afford me sufficient time to speed up Langata road and back....As usual , whenever I make such plans, traffic makes its own plans...to cut the long story short, I found myself heading into the stadi win my suit (ok, I chucked the coat and tie to blend in.

I found Wacko waiting for me. He had bought me and my cousin (Mr.Sio) tickets to the main stand. This time round unlike the Ingwe match, there were no hitches checking into the stadi. The main stand as usual was packed to the rafters, with the K'ogalo faithful breaking into chants and their usual anthem..K'ogalooo...Goooor..Gor Mahia..K'ogalo eeeh, Gor timbe duto yuakni!.. which translates loosely to Son of Ogalo..Gor Mahia..all teams cry for you! The Liverpool legend Ian Rush was in attendance, and we was in for a PARTY!

As usual Jalas, the radio presenter was in his element conducting the choir of ultraz as they set the stands ablaze with their chants. Gor did not disappoint and dominated the soldiers as they made them chase shadows all over the pitch. The soldiers (as is expected of one) had a solid defence (not too solid though) and midway through the first half, Gor had scored , rattled the crossbar and had been caught offside a trailer-load of times.

Second half had its own drama. After the halftime entertainment from the chanting k'ogalo fans, Gor had a player sent off and the coach sent to the stands (he had strayed from his technical area to be honest and was protesting too much to the ref)..This had the K'ogalo fans baying for the ref's blood as some started hurling missiles into the pitch! Game was temporarily stopped as the ref gathered "evidence" and the linesman got hit by something flung from the terraces. Somehow play resumed, and ten man Gor managed to get the soldiers on the counter with Blackberry waltzing through almost five men including the goalie and slotting a second to send the crowd into a maaad frenzy! At this point, the ref was forgiven (I think)

Well Gor closes the gap on the top of the table now, Can't wait for the next one!

Gor biro..yawne yoo!....Gor biro..yawne yoo!

Random stuff

"I'm going to graduate on time, no matter how long it takes."..This is an actual quote from a basketball player in some Uni team. I wonder how he managed to get into Uni in the first place, but I need not point out the obvious in this case.

Have you ever sat and wondered what mechanism some people's brains engage before they speak or even do something. Well, I guess I suffer from the "look before you leap" syndrome which though a good trait, holds you back from plenty of experiences. It is usually painful, especially if you lack patience, to sit and listen to people who think they know it all make a mess of things and you can't do anything about it, moreso if it is your boss or a guy bigger than you who wouldn't mind showing you how brawn beats brain...literally.

It reminds me of when I weighed 30 or so kgs and was at the receiving end of some terrifying primary school bullies. I was four feet nothing, but extremely satirical getting away with subtle smart-ass statements at those I could not match in biscep size. Anyway..I dare them now to flex their bisceps and issue those threats of theirs.... niwatandike kama nyoka! While they exercised their bisceps, I exercised the muscle between my ears, becoming a smarty pants whose homework got copied by the bullies (protection money is not only a mafia concept you know!) Not that I completed my homework all the time. Reminds me one time when I hadn't done my homework and some dudes wanted my books to dub. I couldn't concentrate on my work with them hovering over my head and snatching my book every now and then, so I told everyone I wasn't going to do it ..tuchapwe sisi wote na mwalimu leo..Anyway, with ten minutes to the bell ringing for parade and onto the first lesson (when homework was checked and punishment dished out in generous proportions), I did the last ten sums which was enough to fill about three pages. The trick was do the first ten sums, skip s few blank pages, do the last ten sums and be very nifty when the teacher comes to check your work. You point to the text book where the first sums are visible, then you flip the pages expertly to the final pages pointing to where you have completed. I was a teachers' pet, so there was some level of trust (ok maybe it was because they never saw the point punishing me for stuff I already knew anyway..but do I say!) So everyone knew we were all going to get the beat today, well as it turned out, the teacher would come check your book and anyone whose work appeared incomplete would remain standing at his desk. After going through all our books, It was Eric and the girls who remained seated (someone tell me why only chicks in Primo always completed their homework all the time!) Anyway I got very angry eyes thrown my way (if it were a solid, you would cut right through it!) While the teacher was going round after falling for my tricks, I would fill in the gaps in the interim. For about twenty minutes, she went around dishing on the spot justice. Good thing is boys never snitch no matter the circumstances, so I would get away with it, and hide in the toilets over break time to avoid the hunt that was on for me for not aiding the first bodie with his homework. The funniest thing would be when I was asked to come to the board and show others how I did a particular sum (which I had not done in the first place). I would carry my exercise book to the board, open some random page and pretend to be copying the contents onto the board, in the meantime, I worked out the some from scratch..and that's how dishonesty got my brain thinking at such ridiculous speeds.

Anyway, this was a work of fiction....I never did my homework, I was never bullied in Primary skool ( i was actually the bully) and i got beaten like a snake by teachers more often than I can remember...but the homework thing was true..worked every time like a charm! Was just thinking..what if I did this at that time.

Internal combustion madness!

The madness that is driving in Nairobi has gotten most of us behaving like thugs and adapting to it. I doubt anyone remembers the days when you were squashed in that driver's seat with an instructor on the passenger seat shouting "kanyaga mafuta...usiachilie kiratchi namumna hiyo!". More often than not you would get bullied by other drivers in traffic when they spotted the red "L" stuck on the car windows. Man,..life was hell. Then the sweating and trembling when doing that driving test. Anyways, after a few weeks of driving you become a makmende, climbing kerbs, cutting lanes without indicating, ..the works!

Matatus, and the worst of them being the Hoppers, have this habit of bullying people off the road, scratching your paintwork, denting your bumpers, etc. So guys are scared of them. On Sunday I was very proud of myself the way I dealt with one ruffian (learnt that from my boss who has a car with like thirty dents...each with it's own story - I collect stamps,... he collects dents). Lights are red, and we all stop. Well...not all of us. The mat@2 jumps onto the kerb and tries to squeeze to the front of the queue (where I was) and jump the lights. I made sure there was hardly any space for him to squeeze through, and the bugger starts hooting. Well, I ignored him, after flipping him the bird. The guy was outraged and when the light were just turning tried to accelerate and push me off the road...Thanks to my Need for Speed skills on the playstation, I evaded the dude as he almost dislodged my side-mirror. "Hasira, hasara!"..Road rage aint a good thing, and the mat@2 met another idiot jumping lights on the other side and bazinga! collision right tharr. I braked, smiled at the frustrated conductor who had now alighted as the cops strolled towards them. Not wanting to be involved in witness statements, I slowly pulled away from the spot, very happy with the outcome. I am no masochist, but it did serve them right.

Somebody (like an old neighbour I used to have) should work with a horsewhip, to teach those guys on-the-spot for basic traffic transgressions. Fines don't work that good. Maybe flogging for traffic offences will reduce the madness.

As I walked down the road at set of sun...

The rest of that song goes like.." the lambs were coming homeward one by one!". Reminds me of my rabble days in High skool, when we used to go through the rigours of compulsory choir practice. this particular piece was a Christmas carol. Anyway got me to appreciate music in all its forms (except lingala). Back to my yule-tide melody (ok Christmas...don't split hairs on this one). There is an element of closure, end of the day, close of a chapter and the birth of Christ in the song, we have some new beginning. Moved house the other day, which usually comes with several adjustments to adapt to the new surroundings. I have lovely neighbours by the way, and still border the Shire of Kibira!

I have made some resolutions (8 months too late), and I aim to stick with them in this spirit of renewal. Of new beginnings, I was slapping myself into reality the other day, reflecting on how short life is. In the space of a week, I had lost both a cousin, and a grandfather. A real sad turn of events. Well death does not discriminate, and we will all fall victims at our appointed time.Me and my procrastinating self got me thinking, ...anything can happen at anytime and the things I have been postponing may never be accomplished. I have several "vision 2015s and 2020s", and time is flying by. Hopefully without chewing more than I can swallow, I will start ticking off my "to-do" list.

Hopefully al get my act together and stick to my schedule. If you want to know more "nipate kando nikupashe uhondo!"