Of Neighbours & Babies

Now, I need somewhere to air this and you guys fit the bill. What's my problem you wonder? My neighbour.

Ok .. here's what gives. I've had this neighbour for more than 2 year .. lives 2 doors down. He's a quiet sort and doesn't seem to have too much going on in his life. He lives in a 2 bed roomed house and I've idly wondered what he does with the tonnes of space since, to the best of my knowledge, he lives alone. Yes he does get guests who'll come and live but there aren't really any permanent fixtures. Well that was true until about a month ago. Out of the blue I start hearing an infant wailing. And an infant indeed - day's old. And out of the woodwork comes a house-help who washes said baby's clothes and hangs them all over. My issue? I've never seen a woman there - whether pregnant or fresh out of childbirth. Who is the baby's mother? Where did the baby come from? What's going on?

I'm not a terribly curious neighbour but this is something that has me bothered. Then I noticed that the kid had gone for about 2 weeks or so but is back today. I mean we always hear of strange things going on. Bwire (the Al Shabaab guy) had neighbours who said he was quiet & kept to himself ... There may be a perfectly good explanation, but then again, maybe not ... I've never seen the child, which I consider normal bearing in mind their tender age, but a mother somewhere? Come on! Should I ask/tell someone? If so, who?

Poor Show Standard Newspaper

I've always thought that the Standard Newspaper was a paper of questionable quality & not one favoured by most. I mean why else when asking for a paper from a street vendor do they automatically reach for the Nation unless you tell them otherwise?

As if in a bid to prove the poor quality of the paper, the editors have outdone themselves today. I've reached for a copy of the Standard today (as someone else was reading the Nation) and on the frigging first page there's an error. Look at the top left hand corner where it declares that the nation is eagerly awaiting KCPE results. It's KCSE. The Primary results were out sometime back leading to teachers being beaten by unhappy parents, etc.

I shrugged in disgust and turned to the 2nd page. There's a pictorial on the second page that has something to do with a church. So I read and was surprised to see 2 mentions of 'Freemansions' before this was corrected on the third attempt to 'Freemasons'.

I threw the paper aside and turned to the reliable 'Nation'!!! A paper should at the very least be proof read!

Of Kids and Suicide

I've had so much to write about in the past 6 months but life kept getting in the way. My apologies and let's see if we (read I) can't do better in 2012.

Anyhoo, let's start the new year, not by exchanging views on the Nancy Baraza fiasco but by pondering the sanctity of life. Everywhere I turn, I hear the story of primary school kids killing themselves. There are the 2 who chose to leave us as a result of their performance in KCPE and I swear I heard on news the other day the story of a boy who killed himself because his father refused to buy him new school shoes.

Pause. Ponder. My class 8 results were important to me. Really they were. But I must say they weren't that important. I hoped to do well but I also enjoyed playing shake with the other neighbourhood kids. What happened to the young? Remember the girl who killed herself coz her folks wouldn't let her go watch Shaggy in concert?

Where did society take that wrong turn?