Bound to Tradition, By Akinyi Princess of K’Orinda-Yimbo [fiction book recommendations txt] 📗

Jungle Combat, February 1967
The Journey
Elizabeth’s daughter, Khira, Erik and their entourage set out for the journey shortly before sunrise. In the night the temperature in the Highlands fell to zero or even below that. But by sunrise it rose just as suddenly, to reach eighty degrees Fahrenheit by midmorning. The drive to the farm this Monday morning was therefore hot and dusty and they could not have the sunroof nor the windows fully open because of all the dust that streaked into the car. They drove through the majestic Rift Valley and the Escarpment, passing people already displaying fruits and vegetables or colourful woven trays and beadwork for sale on the roadside.
It was just after seven in the morning and the frost of the night still clung to the bushes and thorn trees, but now as dewdrops. Vendors and buyers alike waved to the car as if to old relatives. A woman with a generation’s worth of children, from the one turning her into a dromedary to the ones sorting out fruits and vegetables on a makeshift table, was delegating duties to them. A seller of boiled eggs on a metal tray was so eager at his profession that he thought it in order to share half the road with the vehicles, making Joseph, the chauffeur, almost swerve into the oncoming traffic. A mile farther in a dangerous s-curve, an ancient bus had broken down, the fact announced by green twigs and branches strewn on the ground several yards from the bus – both at the rear and the front.
Around Molo were vast carpets of nothing but the luscious green tea plantations for tens of miles, shining under a cloudless blue sky, until the land rose into the undulating hills of Naru Moro with their dense equatorial forests. In Uasin Gishu over half an hour later, the terrain alternated between thickets, shrub land and carefully cultivated fir and pine forests from the colonial era.
Joseph, the driver, with Aunt Nyowuor in the passenger seat, seemed to find a lot of ruts in the road that belched dust smoke especially in the wake of lorries or country buses that barged about and had no intention of giving anybody any right of way despite traffic signs. These vehicles stopped haphazardly in helterskelter groups to scramble for passengers which included domestic animals and poultry but strictly excluded dogs. Humans, animals and birds were yelling simultaneously at the top of their voices. As Joseph manoeuvred his way through, a few people pounded on his window offering a couple of extra Shillings for Joseph to take them on as passengers. Through the darkened oneway windows, they couldn’t see Khira and the two bwanas in the backseat, a fact that would have saved Joseph all that pounding. You just never ever pound on a car with bwanas inside.
Joseph and his élite passengers consumed pints of orange and passion fruit juice. Erik swore often and excused his language to Khira. Aunt Nyowuor ranted on and off about "not being there more than ", meaning she wholly distanced herself from the entire purpose of this drive, in between reading her Bible and mumbling prayers. But Khira felt wonderful and for the immediate future looked forward to impressing the daylights out of everybody at her family’s farm in Kipkarren River, by arriving there in a limousine with a uniformed chauffeur and two bwanas. JeanMarie, the obligatory companion for a Luoland visit, sat in a pensive mood studying the terrain except when Joseph’s soliciting passengers seemed to present a personal threat to the Frenchman. Not even in Madagascar had he ever been exposed to such a situation.
But when you worked for Erik Lindqvist you had to be prepared to go into orbit any time.
The Assessment
When the limousine rolled to a stop in Grandfather’s compound, Aunt Nyowuor was the first one out, determined not to be associated with the entire maneno. She hugged and kissed the swarm of children who milled noisily around the car and the strangers, half awed, half thrilled at the rare occasion of touching the second car they’d ever seen in their lives.
Grandfather, looming large in khaki shorts and a shortsleeved scarlet shirt, approached the car, commanding the children with mock threats to step aside. He was well groomed as always, his snowwhite hair emphasising his complexion.
“My father,” he shook hands with Aunt Nyowuor. “You’ve brought us guests in a fine nyamburko,” he gestured towards the limousine using the Dholuo word for a carriage, now also applying to cars. “Even if you didn’t give us prior notice as to their status. You’ve become a city dweller in manners.” Protocol demanded that visitors be announced in advance so as to spare both host and guest any embarrassments at reception  unless giving prior notice was impossible.
“Well and I’ve brought the guests all the same, my grandmother. But there ends my responsibility.” Terms of endearment in Luoland defied logic. And with that Aunt Nyowuor walked away cooing to the three children in her arms.
Erik stepped out and helped Khira after him. Rahab, seeing her favourite cousin, bounded for Khira and hugged her, nearly upsetting Khira’s balance. JeanMarie came out and stood next to Erik who was busy surveying the compound, his brain whirring away in overdrive.
Khira with her arm around Rahab approached Grandfather and shook his hand  very delicately. She introduced Erik to him, “This is my...erm...Migosi Lindqvist, Grandfather.” She didn't introduce Grandfather to Erik.
The man with a battalion’s worth of children and still marrying young girls, thought Erik.
Khira saw Mahma a distance away as that tonguetwister of a name tried to uproot Grandfather’s tongue into some decibel – low, high or normal – he decided not to bother with. She skipped off quickly, squealing and grateful for the convenient escape, dragging Rahab with her.
Joseph remained behind the wheel beaming at the swarm of children with affectionate words, rechecking his handbrake for the sake of the crawlers around the wheels. Solomon shook hands first with JeanMarie since he was obviously the older of the two halfhumans, then with Erik. The big halfhuman’s handshake nearly made him wince and Solomon’s rough hand nearly lacerated Erik’s. Then his sons and adult grandsons shook hands with the scorchedskinned men, followed by the older children who were not too distracted by the limousine, but then skipped straight back to it after the brief handshakes. The maidens and womenfolk did not shake any hands because they were either married or betrothed maidens of good breeding, and therefore never to have any physical contact with strange men, not to mention strange halfhumans.
“Come with me, guests, and be welcome in my compound and house,” Solomon told the halfhumans in Kiswahili. “And what about your friend there,” he pointed at Joseph in the car. “Come, guest, and be welcome in my home. Come.” Turning back to the halfhumans he continued, “You will have to do with whatever we have since we were not prepared for your visit.”
Joseph joined the group walking to Solomon’s house.
“Forgive us, Solomon,” Erik said, making Solomon stop in his stride, “But we are not discourteous guests. The journey had to be made as we have done it.” Erik had rehearsed this with Khira dozens of times. He had spoken in Dholuo. And, although he had spoken politely indeed, he had also deliberately broken the first code of conduct  he had addressed Solomon by his first name before the man introduced himself and established whether he was to be addressed formally or informally by his guests.
Erik the Red, that wily Viking who conquered Greenland, knew Solomon would interpret this as masculine fearlessness.
“Then you’re no strangers, alien friends,” Solomon gave Erik one of Luoland’s convoluted language. As Khira had warned him, out here nobody quite called a spade a spade. “Accept what you find before you in my home, however humble or sumptuous."
Erik entered Solomon’s house feeling pleased with himself. When the four of them plus Solomon’s son Samuel were seated around an unpretentious table covered with a colourful cotton cloth, Erik again beat Solomon at propriety and introduced his companions to him and his son. True to his race, Erik was forever aware of time, a thing as distantly existent in the conscious perception of the likes of Solomon  whose clocks were significant events  as their taste buds or skins. Solomon sat on his faded old armchair while the others sat on the threeply chairs. He introduced himself and his son Samuel, who was as big as his father, but darker in complexion. Erik noticed that the old man was even lightercomplexioned than Khira. But she had his eyes  enormous, almondshaped, lambent and minkcoloured.
Erik’s mind was rattling away. He enquired about the health of the children, the health of the mothers of the children, and provoked lusty laughter when he said that the health of the maidens of the land only got ruined by strutting bucks. He didn't ask about the health of the men. Males were never sick, however sick they got.
Solomon was at this point talking to Erik in Dholuo  which was a privilege rarely accorded any jamwa  while Samuel interpreted.
Presently Doreena, the latest of Solomon’s young brides, brought in spiced tea made from half goat milk half water with freshly pounded ginger. A special treat in Luoland. She demurely served the guests after a general verbal greeting. When Erik sipped his tea, it was so sweet that he could hardly drink it. And here was Dory, the family’s number one beauty. He snatched the golden opportunity. Disregarding his host, he addressed the man’s wife directly and in front of Solomon, in Kiswahili  and thus eliminating Samuel's interpreter role as well. “The tea is too sweet, too sugary for me. Make me some fresh one and without any sugar.”
This one was straight out of Freud’s centrefold. Doreena sweetly smiled and apologised to her husband, not to Erik, and hurried off to make the tea.
“You have a very pretty wife. I almost envy you,” Erik twisted the knife in the wound, grinning.
It was enough for Solomon. Who did this jamwa think he was, arriving unannounced like the uncultured creature he was and now being liberal with his barbarism even to his own wife, ordering her in his own house right under his tongue? Did he feed, house and sleep with her for him? Well and they were indeed halfhumans, and this one was of the halfplant variety, judging by the colour of his hair and eyes. They have ears but they never hear correctly. And with these strangecoloured animal eyes that kept shifting colours like the composure of a greedy courtesan or a faithless wife, stories from the Old Wise Ones say they never see anything like human beings should. They say one thing and do another, or do one thing and say another.
Solomon now did exactly what Erik had angled for: he came to the point. Erik had no time for niceties, The Lindqvist Group was waiting. Vexed, Solomon turned to his son and said, “Ask these mwache whether they only came here for a visit or whether they came with another word in their chests. Their course is turning more barbaric and the sooner I get rid of them the better.”
Samuel interpreted, editing out the last sentence.