Rhumba airport run: The scenic route that refused to stay quiet

A row of three jacaranda trees came up on my left and I lowered the window to take in the purple splash. Nairobi felt pretty with cool air, blue skies above the canopy of mature trees in bloom. We were driving through some back roads that I wasn’t familiar with and as if reading my thoughts, Fathe had some history to share.

“You know, before they built this monstrosity, this used to be a soccer field and the whole of this street was just single bungalows with mature jaracandas on both sides”. 

I tried to imagine what he was talking about. All I could see now were high-rise apartments and walls.  His Nairobi story had open spaces for roaming. My Nairobi was constantly stuck in a traffic jam.

We were in a posh-looking Toyota Land Cruiser Prado. It wasn’t ours. It was Uncle Bob’s. Fathe’s buddy from college who had all the nice things. Fathe argued that we needed space for the suitcases and, importantly, comfort. The leather seats were shiny and they felt soft. Fathe drove it like a hearse. He took an odd detour and they started arguing with Mathe again. 

“Where are you taking us, I thought we were going to the airport?”

“We are taking the scenic route”.

“No, no, no, please use Google Maps, I don’t want us getting lost, you have already rushed me through my day, don’t make it any worse.”

“I am using Google Maps” Fathe barked and he pointed to the dashboard screen at the blue cursor trailing a blue ribbon.

“Fathe, are you avoiding highways and main roads?”, I asked from the back seat. He nodded and kept driving. Mathe didn’t push back. She just whipped out her phone, and stopped talking. 

We left for the airport six hours early. Fathe did not want to use the Expressway. They got into a fight about it with Mathe. She wanted something quick and convenient. Fathe wanted to be safe rather than sorry and true to character, he had factored in any eventuality. This was Nairobi after all, a city he was born in. The most predictable thing about this city was its unpredictability, and he was not taking any chances.

Mathe pushed back hard when Fathe suggested that we leave the house at 2pm for an 8pm check-in and I saw my father capitulate in the face of the argument. He stopped talking and retreated into a shell. He looked exhausted in a way that wasn’t familiar. So I used my veto and said we leave at 2pm.

We took a turn that took us straight towards Kibera and I saw Mathe look up from her phone when suddenly we were stuck behind a matatu that had stopped to pick up passengers on the road. “Why are you going through Kibera, this place is always congested and dangerous?” She slipped her phone into her hand bag and removed it from her lap to the floor of the car.

Then she warned me; “Pumpkin! please bring up your window”. Every inch of the road was occupied. People walking, hawkers weaving between traffic, boda boda motorcycles on both sides and then we encountered a man with cows. 

We drove right through Kibera, from the Kabarak gardens, past Fort Jesus, Olympic and Ayany estates and then we came upon a curtain of trees, the Ngong Forest and Fathe was off again.

“I went camping here as a scout in primary school. And we had guard duty. Imagine you standing in the pitch dark outside a khaki tent with only an aluminium cased torch, a wooden staff and a whistle. It was the first time I had heard a hyrax at night. Do you know what a hyrax sounds like? 

“What does a hyrax sound like, dad?”

“Like someone being strangled”

I was glad Mathe spoke up because Fathe had a dark sense of humour

“Can we not talk about such morbid topics today”.

We were now driving through the Karen suburbs. They were called leafy for a reason. Fathe was navigating back roads with the familiarity of a taxi driver and he had some music on. Now that gave me road trip vibes! The sound system in this car was crisp. Rhumba had never sounded so melodious. Fathe started tapping his fingers on the steering wheel and then imitating the lead guitar as Mathe turned her head between the front seats to run me through a check list,

“I packed a thick warm jacket…“

I protested in vain, “Mathe, I told you I got a thermal jacket, its heat tech”

“You don’t know winter, I have been to Estonia in February, you have to stay warm”.

Mathe had woken up early to cook chapatis. In the afternoon she roasted groundnuts. I tried to dissuade her with stories about strict border customs officials, but she dismissed my concerns. The customs officials would have no problem with cooked stuff and anyway, I was not going to Australia. 

Fathe was lost in concert, singing along to Madilu System and Franco and then he burst out in his terrible imitation of a Congolese accent, emphasising every syllable for the people in the back. “Madame et Madesolille, le presente Le Grand Maitre, Le Maestro. Franco Luambo Luanzo Makiadi et T.P.OK Jazz band presente Madilu System” 

Those formerly dreary long ass songs that I had grown up with a background noise in the house came alive in my ears. I could hear instruments, all of them, an orchestra and the clear voices of two men in dialogue. 

We dissolved into it, Mathe and I and if there was one thing we shared in common, it was our fascination for the fascination, the likes of my father had with Congolese Rhumba. 

Fathe had a piece of history that he just couldn’t keep to himself , “Do you know how Kisumu got the nickname, Mboka?”

“How did Kisumu become Mboka, dad?” “Have I told you this story…anyway, it was inspired by Franco. This was the 80s. He was calming down the crowd that brought down a wall in Moi stadium and stampeded his concert in Kisumu. He kept saying, Bana Mboka! Bana Mboka! calm down and then he unleashed the guitar on the people. The rest is history. After that night, Franco had a town in Kenya named after him”.

Mathe had something to say about this, “Your father has convinced himself that he understands Lingala but doesn’t speak it”.

I remember there was an obsessive season where one of Fathe’s cousins kept sending him English translations of Lingala songs and I reminded him about that time.  “Your mother knows my cousin Atwech, who has never even been to the Busia border, let alone leaving the country but he speaks fluent Lingala just from studying Franco’s lyrics. Franco’s music is therapy”.

Mathe wasn’t letting up, “Do you even know the meaning of this song, all you do is just wait for is the part where it goes, “ Mamou, eeh! eeh! eeh!”

You cannot win a Rhumba argument with Fathe and he retorted, “These days you don’t have to know any language fluently, you can use AI and you will be surprised by how well Franco could unpack society”.

The arrival at the JKIA airport gates ended the Franco debate and I looked at the life size animal sculptures at the round about, the rusty brown of the scrap metal strikingly beautiful against the blue sky. I took a picture for the gram and looked up the artist. Kioko Mwitiki.

The Prado had a special pass, so we got a convenient park slot and it wouldn’t be a long haul with suitcases to the baggage hall. We stopped at the first cafe we encountered because Mathe said it looked clean and she needed to use the bathroom.

The cafe’s terrace was packed, all tables taken, but that did not deter Mathe. Fathe had parked the trolley of suitcases at the entrance and looked resigned. Mathe just stood at the entrance, and her commanding presence soon drew the attention of a polite elderly waiter with grey hair. 

He addressed Mathe with deference, “Madam, come, I have a table for you” and we were led to one that was occupied. There were three men seated at the table and the waiter told them with a menacing tone to get up and when Mathe inquired, he replied with a polite smile, “No madam, they were just leaving.”

Mathe ordered chai and the evenly brown succulent mandazis visible from the glass display and then made an order for me as well as an afterthought, reminding me that I would “Miss ndaoz like this in Europe”. 

Fathe ordered a beer and asked if I wanted one. Mathe thought it was completely inappropriate for him to suggest drinking before my flight and Fathe shot back that I was not the pilot. The joke did not land well with Mathe. She looked stunned in disbelief and Fathe buried his face on his phone. I turned down the beer and asked Mathe to get me a cappuccino instead of chai.

A queue had started building up at the entrance to the boarding gates. Mathe asked him about ‘his cousin’ and Fathe told them they would be picked from the cafe’. But that was 40 minutes ago and Mathe had a point, the queue had built up. TO BE CONTINUED NEXT WEEK...