It was a Monday morning. I heard my phone ring. It was my boss.
“Magigi”
“Yes my boss”
“Could you please come to my office?”
“Yes, I will be with you in a minute”, I told him.
It is very rare that my boss asks me to come to his office so early in the morning. I tried to figure out what could be the issue or if there was anything that I had done that could have made him summon me that early on a Monday morning. I found him on his desk reading the daily papers.
“Magigi”
“Yes, my boss”
“There is something that has come up that needs your urgent attention in Mogadishu, Somalia. So please arrange to get there in a week’s time”. He said this with some finality and I could see there was no room for discussion. “Mogadishu, of all the places” I wondered silently. Then while all these thoughts were fleeting through my mind, I saw him pick the phone and call.
“Hallo, General Kahugira”
“Yes, Bwana Kunyamba”
“How is Uganda?”
After they had exchanged some niceties, I heard him ask something that almost made my heart pop out.
“Anyway, we will talk about Kampala and the Kabalagala girls later” He told General Kahugira. “The reason why I am calling is to ask you if you have any more Mi-24 attack helicopters flying into Somalia through Mt Kenya. I have one of my staff who I want dropped somewhere in Somalia and he will find his way into Mogadishu”. At that point I came to realize that not only did my boss want me dead but also dead immediately.
From that point going forward I started seeing myself as a corpse, a walking corpse! Mogadishu? Of all places on earth! I told him that it was fine and that I will make the necessary arrangements. He handed me a file with documents of the assignment he wanted done.
As I was driving through Ngong road, I looked sideways and spotted The City Mortuary. I quickly turned and drove in there. I went straight to one of the attendants and asked him if they issue death certificates upfront!
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I am traveling to Mogadisho and since I am going to die I thought it wise to solve some of the problems I see people going through as they go through the process of sorting out issues of the dead”
He looked at me and quipped, “Yes, going to Mogadisho? You are dead, buried and forgotten”. He gave out a loud funeral laughter that made me start thinking that I was actually doing the right thing. “Come back tomorrow. I will have arranged one for you. Na ukuje vizuri”. I told him it was okay and left.
At home I found my son drawing the picture of a lion. He asked me, “Dad, are you a lion or a cat” I took a deep breath and remembered the tough journey ahead of me. “I am a lion”. I screamed!
Sunday morning found me at JKIA ready for the security checks. As usual I almost stripped to give the security guys some easy time. But just when I thought I had made life easy for them, one of them looked at me and said, “Sir, please remove that Maasai rungu in your pocket and go through the checks again”. I looked at him and wondered who could have put a Maasai rungu in my pocket. “Please remove the Maasai rungu and try again”, he repeated. I looked down and then it dawned on me that my 18 inch tool was threatening to pop out. I adjusted it and told him that it was part of my body but not a Maasai rungu. After consulting with his supervisor, he told me that he will have to check it and ascertain if truly it was part of my body. I told him I can’t allow a man to touch me because that would be tantamount to gayism. He went and talked to another lady who led me to a secluded place. The lady started squeezing it and I could see she was enjoying every bit of it. Me too. She did it for about 2 minutes while closing her eyes and I could certainly imagine what she was thinking, feeling. She asked me, “Do all these blessings belong to one person?”
“Yes, but I do share when the need arises”.
“When will you be back?”
“In 3 weeks time”
“Please share when you get back, here is my number. You can proceed to gate no 5”
As we waited to board I sat and enjoyed Wa Maria’s song
syindu sya mutongoi in my Ipod. As syindu sya mutongoi was blasting my ears a lady came and sat next to me. I looked at her. She was slightly different from the other Somali girls I had seen. Though dressed in their cultural dress, her’s was a bit scanty and different. I looked at her again and our eyes met.
“Hi”
“Hi”
“I am Magigi”
“I am Shukri”
“Pleasure meeting you Shukri”
“Pleasure too”
We chatted for some time and again I looked at her. She was very good looking, chocolate skin and a gap between her front teeth…She was not timid and was not scared of talking to me. She narrated to me how her and her family had fled to Australia during the war. She had come home two years back to work in Somalia and help her people. I told her about myself. After one hour of talking it was like we had known each other for years.
We boarded the flight together. She got a window seat and I sat next to her as this was a free seating flight. “You are beautiful”. I murmured. “You are handsome too”. She hit back. Well I wasn’t sure of that because the last time a lady told me I was handsome was many years back…and it was a prostitute! Twenty minutes into the flight, I was holding her hand and she was clutching it tightly. I squeezed her hand tighter and she did the same. I lifted the arm rest that separated the two seats. I felt her buttocks, exploring with my hands to look for her party lines. I could not trace any and knew that she was ngothaless. My hand did some more walking and found itself on her groin. As soon as I placed my hand there, she opened her mouth wide and let out a groan. I knew
a woman like this had not messed around with her. I knew I was winning. Ideas started flowing through my mind…What if I rushed to the washroom to check the possibility of …I went to the toilet and explored every possibility. Was a laptop possible, no. What about a scissors? No…mmmmhhhhhh…Dog style…Yes…I was going to shove from behind…I was going to attack from the rear!. I rushed back and on my way I almost knocked down the air hostess who was serving tea to a passenger. I guess it must have been the 10th cup of tea to that passenger! Never be on the way of a lion that has spotted its prey!
I sat down panting, took her hand and was about to say something when I heard a booming sound from the cockpit, “Ladies and gentlemen”. It was the Captain. “We are now commencing our descend to Aden Abdulle International Airport. Please fasten your seat belts and get ready for landing, Weather is fine, temps 40 degrees Celsius….” I cursed out loudly. The 1hr 20 minutes seemed like 20 minutes.
I looked out and we were flying along the coastline. It was like the plane was going to land on the Indian Ocean. What beautiful scenery! I closed my eyes and imagined myself and Shukri lying on the beach enjoying the ocean breeze. When I opened my eyes and looked out again at the beach we were flying over, all I could see were 3 ragged soldiers patrolling the beach and was disappointed. The plane landed. As soon as we disembarked, she bade goodbye and disappeared. And it dawned on me that we were in a new environment.
Three weeks passed rather quite quickly…All the time thinking about Shukri. As the plane lifted off and flew along the coastline back to Nairobi I knew I would go back to Mogadishu and look for Shukri and that Al Shabab would be no more and Somali would be a peaceful place to live.
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As Steve Harvey always says, "These ain't nothing but jokes" and I would say, "These ain't nothing but stale jokes"