Watching Florida 1000 (popularly known as Madhouse) go down was a teary affair. Over the years, at night, on my way to my place of abode from Westlands, I have always passed through K-Street. As my friend Plato tells me, passing through there on your way home is a good natural aphrodisiac. By the time you negotiate that corner at Holy Family Basilica and the last whore lifts her leg for you to see
minute 4.07, you are already set to cause chaos in your own bedroom, chaos akin to those witnessed in Migori, but this time love chaos! From Nairobi University turn off all the way down to Holy Family Basilica, what you see if translated into monetary value is a million of dollars of pussy. But I did not intend to tell you about K-Street. My focus is on Florida 1000 and the memories it brings to my mind.
Sometimes last week, I stood there as I watched Masons with their heavy machinery remove one block after another to sound a death knell to Madhouse. I could not help but reminisce with nostalgia the beautiful entertainment spots in Nairobi that have been killed, never to be seen again. If you consider Nairobi your shags, you will identify with me. I am not addressing those people @Alma talks about who came to Nairobi the other day, got a job with a Kalasinga, rented an SQ, got a loan to buy a Toyota whatever and feel like they own Nairobi. I am talking to those who have seen Nairobi change over the years. I am talking to those who were partly brought up in Buruburu or Mugoya or Nairobi West or South C or South B etc and consider those places as part of their shags. That target audience would identify with what I am yapping about.
After that painful eyewitness of a Nairobi landmark going down, I found myself walking aimlessly, deeply wounded. The thought of a citadel of a Nairobi history being no more was too much to bear. My aimless walking brought me to Java Coffee House where I placed an order for massala tea. As soon as I placed my order my mind went back in the day….
I am in Mombasa where I had come visiting my sister. It is 10 pm. I am at Casablanca club having a beer with Kasamu and a girl who has joined us, uninvited. I am still green and have never laid a girl – I am a virgin if you want. Those who know where Casablanca is know what it is and things that happen in Casablanca remain in Casablanca. The place is filled with sailors. It is a beehive of activity. Two ships docked at Kilindini yesterday with over 1000 ‘Mamen’. The girls seem to be making a kill. Business is good! I order a beer for the girl and ask her to kindly let me and my friend discuss an important engagement. The ‘A’ level (Form 6) results had been announced earlier in the day. I am not in the mood of talking to any girl. My mind is all focused on my performance as I had put in all the necessary effort to study and wanted so badly to join the university. I and my friend decide to go home but not without passing through Salambo Club. I pay ksh 20 to gain entry. The DJ is just doing the right thing and
Michael Jackson’s Thriller is filling the air. Girls are wriggling their well formed bottoms on the dance floor. The air is just the right one for one hell of a groovy night. But I am not in the mood. Kasamu is in the mood and his eyes, like those of a chameleon, are seeing everything in the house. ‘pauuuuuu…..’ he mutters, these babes are cool’. I don’t show any interest. I have to know my exam results. We get into a matatu back to Bamburi.
I wake up early in the morning, rush to a telephone booth with 50 shilling coins. I place a call to my former school in Nyanza. The Headmaster, Mr Kanyua, picks the call. I explain to him who I am and before I can finish, he is already congratulating me….’ngoond mboy, congratulachons, yu ndind the school pround’. I think he is either a relative of @Famooz or @Kingfisher. ‘Thank you’, I tell him. ‘Very very ngoond my mboy”, he continues muttering. ‘My mboy, you scored very highly, you ngot 15 points, 3Ps and IS’. Come for your results’. ‘Yes, I will, sir’. As soon as we finish talking, my mind recalls that day he found me kissing a girl from Nyabururu girls Secondary School at midnight in the playing field during the District Schools Drama festivals which were being held in our school. ‘Mboy, why are you mbiting a ngirls mouth? Dind you come all the way from Ukambani to come and mbite ngirls mouths? Don’t move. Let me take a photograph as evidence of what you are ndoing’, He used to carry a camera wherever he went because he loved photography. He took a photograph of me still holding the girl tightly. ‘See me in the office tomorrow’. What happened the following day is a story for another day.
And so I quickly rush back to the house, tell my sister that I am going back to Nairobi and head to Nyanza to collect my results. I break the good news to her. I also call my friend Joy in Nairobi and break the good news. At 6 pm I am at the railway station to catch a train back to Nairobi. I arrive in Nairobi at 8 am the following day – a Saturday - where I find my brother waiting for me. We head to our “Nairobi shags” where after being congratulated by everybody, I sleep until 2 in the afternoon.
‘Boy’, my bother calls. ‘I want to take you for a treat tonight. Your performance was sterling’. ‘No problem’, ‘I tell him. Where are we going?’ ‘Don’t worry; I will take you to a nice place where we will dance all night long’. My brother’s music taste is different from mine. I love to boogie in discotheques and he loves listening to live music bands. My favorite discotheques are
Beat House, Club Tamango, Annabels, Ainsworth Club Boomerang and Florida 1000, Visions, Bubbles. Jam sessions in the afternoon during school holidays were an activity I could not miss. Anyway, I do not mind wherever he was to take me. I was sure it was going to be a lovely night.
At 8 pm we are inside Kenya Bus heading to City Center. We connect another bus that takes us to
1900 Club. I had earlier asked Joy to join me and my brother in the club. Joy comes with another girl, Tracy, whom my bro seems to know. They are dressed to kill. Tracy is in a pair of green bellbottom trousers, a tight shirt and platform shoes. Joy is in a pull neck sweater, a jeans skirt and black shoes and looking very stunning. She 6ft tall, slim – her waist can make wasps think she is part of them! and with a well rounded, well formed bottom. My bro orders drinks for all of us. Tracy is taking Tusker, Joy is taking Tusker export, I and my bro are taking Guinness. I had known Joy for close to two years. We attend the same church and are members of the church choir ‘So, how you are Joy?’ ‘I am fine and congratulations’. She answers in a mellow voice. ‘You are my man. That is how I wanted you to perform’. And I remembered how she used to encourage me to work hard. She told me once, ‘Atalaku, If you attain higher points than I did, I will give you a very big present’. I had insisted on her divulging the details of the present but to no avail. ‘Do you come here often’, I ask. ‘Not very often. I come here when I don’t have a lot of class work’, she tells me. Joy is a first year student at the University of Nairobi pursuing a BA in Literature and Political Science. We talk politics a bit and she expresses dismay at the way their lecturers are being harassed and hassled by the government and how they are not allowed to study some books like the works of Karl Marx, Hagel and other writers who profess Marxism. I tell her about my eagerness and yearning to join the university. Joy also studied literature in her 6th form. We discuss John Steinbeck’s
The Grapes of Wrath and the great American depression, Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s
Petals of Blood and Ngugi impatience with the current government and his subsequent decision to go for exile. Oh, boy, doesn’Joy know the stuff! We seem to be kicking it fine. Time can pass quickly if you meet a beautiful girl who is as intellectually endowed as Joy. ‘Joy, you are joyous to be with’, I tell her. ‘You are intelligent too to be with’, she answers back. I look at my watch. It is already 11 pm. How time passes when you are engaged in a conversation with a smart girl, both literally and metaphorically, and more so if the Jeans skirt is revealing some details that are making me lose my train of thought in the course of our discussions. But who cares! We are already a bit tipsy and enjoying each other’s company.
The disco music is starting to gain momentum and ‘couples’ are on the dance floor doing their thing. Billie Ocean’s Caribbean queen is playing. Life is good. After a few beers my bro suggests we shift base to Starlight Night Club so that he can listen to music by his favorite band, Orchestra Shikashika of Moni mambo. I hold Joy’s hand and head outside where we pick a taxi. As we approach the club we can hear the band playing,
Sisili’ a very popular tune that is almost played 5 times in a day by VOK radio. We find the place crammed with people, all happy and doing their thing. I hold Joy’s hand and we head to the dance floor. I am looking straight into her eyes and she is also doing the same. ‘You are beautiful’, I tell her and she smiles. The band is now playing another of my favorite tune -
Diabanza I hold both her hands and bring her closer to me. She responds and my blood starts rising. She can feel me becoming bigger and bigger down there. The more it becomes bigger, the more she is holding me tightly. The band finishes playing that number and takes a break. I lead Joy to our table and pick my bro to consult on the sleeping arrangement for that night. I explain to him that the way things are I may get a lay, my first lay. The long wait may be over and the promise Joy had made may come to pass. He tells me there is no problem. I can take the girl home since parents had traveled to the real shags. I am bit hesitant because the thought of my parents finding a girl in the house could be a ‘police case’, as we say. But him being my elder brother, I trust him. Anyway after being convinced that all would be well, I accept. He tells me he is not in a hurry to go home and that if she agrees to go with me he could get us a taxi to take us home. It is month end and the fella has loads of cash and looks like he really wants to entertain me. I go back to Joy. ‘It is getting cold’, I say. ‘Yeah, I think I should be going back to the hostel’. I do not know how to respond to that. I tell her we have to take one more beer and she does resist. I pour the beer in her glass and give her a sip. ‘You are such a gentleman’. I do not have any words other than to just smile and squeeze her hand some more. My primary school teacher once told us that it is not a crime to ask for something and be turned down. The crime is not asking when you should have done so.
I gather enough courage and lean on her boobs. She does not seem to mind and so I stretch my hand and touch the left one. They are sharp small boobs, threatening to pierce through the pull neck sweater she is wearing, the kind I have been reading about in The Ebony magazine. She squeezes herself against me. I stretch my hand and touch her thigh. It is so smooth, as smooth as silk. I turn her head and give her a kiss. ‘’My parents are not at home’. I tell her. ‘There is a guest wing where you can spend the night’. ‘Are you sure you will let me spend the night in the guest room’ She asks. ‘It is up to you to choose’. A man has to give some leads some times. She gives me a small slap and I know things will be elephant tonight. The long wait may as well be over. The age of innocence could be a thing of the past.
I collect money from my bro and we hop into a taxi and head to BuruBuru. We get home at 2 in the morning and head straight to the guest room where I had moved to after my 6th form. She does not ask me where she is going to sleep. I remove her shoes and she gets on the bed. I start undressing her. We get between the sheets. I hold her tightly and she slips her hands around my back. Her body is as smooth as silk and velvet combined. Our bodies lock like a mortise and a tenon. I stroke her back. I kiss her and our mouths lock into each other, her tongue exploring and discovering frontiers in my mouth that I never thought a tongue would reach. My hands stroke and grip her body. I touch her nipples and all the other places I had read that a woman loves being touched. And I am getting everything right. I hear her moan and I grunt. I reach between her thighs and feel her hair. It is soft and made softer by the wetness in her. I climb on top of her. Being my first time I am doing things by the book…theory. It is now the time to do the practicals. I tell myself. I know I have to hold myself until she is ready. I have learnt that too in books. I don’t want to let myself down by heating up her engine and not able to cool it down. I pump into her harder, harder, harder, harder. This side, that side, in the middle, sideways… I see her open her mouth wide, pants and utter incomprehensibles. I feel a sensation down there. I am being milked. If you have ever seen somebody milk cows, you know what I am feeling. Yes, I am being milked down there. Then I hear her say, ‘Atalaku, please come with me, please, please’. And so I know I have hit the bull and it is time to travel to the unknown. I release. What I feel is something I cannot explain. I fell like my soul is being pulled from my body. I feel like I am going for a long call. I feel like my intestines are being pulled from my body. I feel like everything is being sucked from me. I kiss her, look into her face and tell her, ‘I love you’. ‘I love you too’. She holds my face and utters, ‘How was the gift I promised you’ I am panting and sweating like I have been lifting blocks at a construction site. ‘The gift is in a class of its own, classic’. I answer her.
My bro wakes me up at 12 noon. I can’t remember how many times I have done it with her. We take a shower together. I scrub her back and she scrubs mine. I find my bro has already prepared lunch and we have to take it fast lest my parents find the girl there. I escort Joy to town. I do not feel like letting her go. I ask her if she minds watching a movie. She tells me there is no problem and we head to The Twentieth century to watch Color Purple…The movie is captivating…issues of race and how the black woman is mistreated in America. The movie ends at 6 pm and I escort her to the university hostel………….
‘Hello Mr Atalaku’. I heard a man pat me at the back. I was startled. It was Kasamu. ‘Man, you seem to be in so much deep thought. Is everything alright’? It was then when I woke up from my deep reverie. I remembered I had called and asked him to meet me at Java Coffee House. Pheeeew… I loved Nairobi in the 80’s.