How the city's finest entrepreneurs messed up my budget

I rarely venture into the city centre unless I am attending an important AGM or someone has managed to bulldoze me into a wedding planning meeting.

As a result of my prolonged absence from the city, my situational awareness levels have dropped significantly and I am not as street wise as I used to be a few years ago.

I was therefore not surprised when a few weeks ago I was caught in the midst of a physical argument between peaceful picketers and another group that comprised of successful businessmen in the city.

As I waded my way from one corner of the city where we had spent a miserable day listening to the directors of a land buying company where I am a shareholder telling us that we are not entitled for a dividend, I got myself into the thick of things.

PEACEFULLY PICKETING

On one side of the street were people who were peacefully picketing and urging the main Headmaster of this great country to vacate his office and go back to his ancestral village and become a sweet potato farmer.

They were insisting that they had a preferred occupant of the big white house on the hill who had also promised them a free trip to a promised land in the Ancient Near East.

On the other side of the street was another team of successful businessmen who don’t visit their barbers very often and whose trademark look is long flowing hair.

They were remonstrating that the peaceful picketers were obstructing their business dreams and nearly collapsing their thriving business empires.

PERSONAL DESIGNER

My personal stylist Man Kamaa is a business mogul who is the National Executive Director in charge of Sports and Women Affairs and the Chairman of Business Community Moi Avenue Chapter.

He has a day job in Saba Saba town back in the slopes of the Aberdares where he is a renowned livestock farmer.

Every morning he leaves the quiet village via the first matatu at around 3am carrying three jerrycans of milk and five trays of eggs of tradition headed for the city.

Eggs of tradition are the eggs that have been laid by hens that are married.

Renowned nutritionists have come up with research findings that postulate that the eggs from stable chicken families are more nutritious and are especially good for men who are approaching retirement from their domestic duties but need some energy rejuvenation in the knees and back.

After delivering the milk and eggs to his Kamaa and Sons Butchery and Restaurant located in the deep recesses of Eastlands where he secretly keeps a deputy wife, he passes by the big open air exhibition that sells previously enjoyed clothes and eats camera.

Eating camera is the act of being the preferred candidate to open a clothes bale and select the choice designer clothes that are likely to attract premium clients.

As soon as he gets camera (he specialises in male boxer shorts, sweat pants, jumpers and vests), he has me on speed dial and he flashes my number a few times.

Despite his vast wealth, he has never called me and he always insists that his phone has swallowed his air time.

‘HOT THINGS’

“Baba Brian, you have abandoned me a lot. What is wrong person of my house? I have very hot things here for you my friend. These are the original ones that were worn by Michael Jordan and Tupac.”

This call will catch me off guard, sometimes in the presence of very respectable citizens. I pretend to be receiving a call regarding a serious million dollars deal with my financial advisers, but only to camouflage the fact that I am discussing reconditioned boxers with my personal designer.

“Keep for me two extra large ones, preferably with red stripes, I will sort you out in the evening,” I try to keep the professional face of a stock broker. Although I am currently wearing two vests on loan, my designer is benevolent enough to let me accumulate debts so long as they don’t split the five hundred shillings mark.

One thing I like about my designer is his jovial nature. Unlike those girls with heavily powdered faces that sell clothes from Turkey in the Tom Mboya exhibition stalls who are always angry and grumpy looking, Man Kamaa always exudes a jolly nature.

He is always upbeat even when the law enforcement officers from City Hall have confiscated his stock and thrown him into the back of their steel grille reinforced pickup truck for a tour of the City.

Maybe he should hold a seminar on happiness for those girls who man the exhibition stalls. Even when I have been paid and I am in the mood of making them rich by buying new clothes without negotiating the price, the girls wear that constant mournful look.

On a better day, they will not even look up from their phones even as I struggle to select and fit the clothes. One would assume that they start their morning with heavy whipping from their employer. They need evening classes in anger management.  

My other friend Ras is the Non-executive Director in charge of Legal Affairs and Strategic Direction and is the Chairman of Kimathi Street Chapter.

He has managed to drive his barber to bankruptcy because he has never visited a barber in his adult age.

He has also been hosted in several government sponsored correctional institutions where he has honed his legal skills to near perfection.

RAS OF RAS WEIGHTS AND MEASURES

During the day he runs Ras Weights and Measures Limited whose assets include a mobile weighing machine.

During peak hours, he places the small rectangular weigh machine along a busy street and clicks coins in his hands to attract people to take their body weights.

The last time he tricked me into taking my weight, it gave a variance of ten kilos. He accused me of eating unhealthy food and gaining unnecessary weight. During the night, he runs Ras and Associates Confectionaries.

The business model includes an empty carton with a cloth spread on top from where he sells sweets and cigarettes.

He also deals with what he calls premium holy herbs imported from Jamaica. He claims that it is a franchise business under the registered license of a popular reggae musician.

Every time I pay homage to Ras or Man Kamaa they hammer me with balance sheets to show just how much income they are losing from the unrest in the City.

Ras claims to have a consignment of pharmaceutical products from Jamaica that are accumulating demurrage at the port.

Man Kamaa on the other hand mourns the fact that his creditors are knocking because customers are carrying designer garments and not paying a cent.

ADDRESSING PRESS CONFERENCE

I was therefore not surprised when I saw my two good friends addressing a major press conference where they promised to ensure that those who were picketing did so without endangering their thriving business enterprises.

Later that afternoon as I found my way out of this big City whose head boy is a flamboyant politician, I encountered the two warring factions.

Separating them were the boys in blue who are trained in peaceful conflict resolution in an institution in Kiganjo.

Because I am no longer as street wise as I used to be, I ducked into a nearby eatery from where I could safely monitor the peaceful confrontation outside.

A waiter soon approached my table and pointed to a sign that reads that idling is not allowed. In other words, I was not allowed to beat set inside the hotel.

I was supposed to order something. I ended up spending a whooping fifty shillings for a cup of tea, an item that I had not provisioned for in my annual budget.

The hotel proprietor did not seem to mind the confrontation going on outside so long as customers kept flocking in to seek refuge.

He must be the Supply Chain Director for the business community in charge of culinary activities and strategic food reserves.

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