The Luo Act vs. Ujaluo

Last week I thought about an old acquaintance, T. Ndede. This man is a thoroughbred. His name was mentioned in ICC proceedings, so he is a serious Luo man. Ndede had an ideal he subscribed to a while back, I am not sure if he still holds onto it. He used to believe there is a way Luos do their thing and he called it- tim Luo, the Luo Act. This is what someone later called The Lifestyle. The other day it popped up from a very unlikely place.

The other day I was in a matatu going to Kitengela. If you are not Kenyan, matatu is that necessary evil you have to board to take you around Nairobi if you are not able to own a second hand Toyota from Japan. Kitengela is a dusty suburb of Nairobi Metropolis. In Kitengela everything is dusty, but that is for another day.

I boarded the matatu somewhere on Mombasa Road and got a front seat next to the driver. I looked for the newspaper on the dashboard but I did not see any. I looked at the man next to me and I did not think much about him. Turning round, my eyes scanned the people behind me. That has become my instincts of late, reading people like book covers.

There was a lady right behind me to the right near the window. Like many Nairobi women, I couldn’t guess her age but her eyes were on a newspaper she was reading. I checked the headline, and then turned again to face in front. Yes I am a Luo and Luos don’t do such things as read other peoples’ newspapers. My phone was at hand to keep me company, from Facebook to Twitter and an occasional WhatsApp text just to poke people.

We passed Imara Daima and approached City Cabannas. This is that place where every Kamba in Kenya has a relative. The driver slowed down. Hell broke loose. I heard shouts behind me- wewe wacha kuibia huyu mama. The lady who I could not guess her age was shocked and lost for words. May be it is because this stranger had just called her- mama (mother). The allegations this man next to the door was making against the man sitting between him and the mama must have shocked her. In normal situations, she would have reacted to being called a mother but things were different. I turned and looked the suspect in the eye, he looked innocent.

The matatu stopped, the lady was still lost for words as she checked her handbag that was wide open. I think she couldn’t even know if anything had been stolen. The man next to me had turned and grabbed the suspect’s collar. There was commotion and more passengers alighted and the matau was now almost empty.

A young man came to our window and started hurling insults at the man next to me. I roll the window up halfway. “Wewe wacha ujaluo, sisi tumeshinda hata serikali.” He said as two others came to back him up. They insulted us and walked away like the government could not do a thing.

I looked at the man next to me, and immediately cought his Bantu accent. So he is not a Luo, we Luos have a way of speaking Kiswahili, his Kiswahili was too good for a Luo man of his stature- but that was still an assumption. The young man who has just walked away has admonished him to desist from Luoism.

I started talking to these two people about the incident. I was now more interested than ever on their tribes. I opted to decode their accents. The lady was definitely a Kikuyu; the man next to me came out a Kamba. I could not get the tribe of the man who busted the thief, as he spoke less after the drama settled so definitely he was not a Luo. According to the ‘highway gang’ these two men, who were not Luos had Luoism.  T. Ndede  came to mind and his tim Luo. So what is UJALUO?

Everything is Big and vulgar in Luo Land

Oh my, don’t joke. If Ndede’s quip is taken literally then it lacks juice. Wait until you were with a fine lady and you met Ndede, woe unto you if she is not conversant with dholuo. “Go and give her the Luo Act” Is all you would hear from him as you parted. It hits you that everything in Luo is big, and can turn vulgar any time. In dholuo, every discussion can end up in sex, including discussing fire and cat fish- kamongo.

Kisumu County should be the Texas of Kenya- Where Everything is Big. Someone told me that unlike other towns, Kisumu has no, “Welcome To Kisumu” billboard as you enter. May be if the County Government has put up some but I doubt, they are living large. If you are travelling from Kericho, Vihiga or Busia, and you want to know you have entered Kisumu, just look at the people walking by the road side.

The moment you see ladies endowed with enough volumes behind them. My cheeky Christian brother (name withheld) will say the Lord has blessed their going out. Then you are in Kisumu County, no need for a billboard. It is said that a Luo man must have bulging biceps. Lack of big arms for men is akin to a Luo woman with a flat behind, it leads to low self esteem.

Say it as it is

Luos speak their mind without fear. We are known to be whistle blowers, so Miguna Miguna was just being a typical Luo peeling his former boss Raila Odinga’s mask. This is the ujaluo these thieves meant when they told the man who sat next to me to shut up. Luos are a democratic people. The government is called piny owacho in dholuo which translates to- the people have spoken. It is in our nature to air our opinions.

Luos are known to love academics. This open mind culture of see it as it is and say it as it is promotes learning and the desire for knowledge.

True Artisans

Your typical best tailor, cobbler, carpenter, and mason may be a Luo but we are more than that. In whatever a Luo does, he will be the fundi. Be it Barrack Obama with words, Oginga Odinga with politics or Philip Ochieng’ with his lexical obsession with the Queens English, we are fundis. Perfection is at the core of Luoism. If that is Ujaluo, I am proudly in.

Luos have taste. Dresscode, furniture or name it. We can dress smart at an affordable cost. When you give a Luo and ‘others’ Ksh. 1,000 each and send them to buy second hand clothes in Gikomba Market, you will notice the difference. It is not about the price, an eye for that good stuff is part of the Luo Act.

But do we say

If you thought Luos hard-line stick to the rules is all about being stubborn, you are wrong. It is our pride that makes us to shun anything that may soil the lifestyle. Pride makes us work hard at what we do; it is the same pride that gives us the guts to tell you off on your face. BUT DO WE SAY.

It is only in Luo land where you can be put off with your wealth. In other areas wealth may be a source of influence but not in Luo Nyanza.

Regardless of what the busted thief meant by- Ujaluo, there is more to the Luo Lifestyle than Raila Odinga, benga music and Gor Mahia.

Thanks Heavens, I STAMMER...

I love writing, not because I enjoy it but because I cannot speak as fluently as I would love to, so I write. Novelist Ngugi wa Thiong'o summarized it for me as quoted above. The irony is I am heckler and I love talking even to strangers. My most fulfilling moments are when I interact with people. Discussing and arguing about anything just for the fun of it. 

My good cousin once said, if only I had not been a stammerer, I would have 'destroyed' the world. Oh yes, and to some extent, he is right. Please don’t visualize me as a goat tethered next to a maize plantation with the rope just one metre to the green leaves, it’s better and more fun than that.

Politician Rachel Shebesh is a handful in the Kenyan social but spare her some slack. I will not defend her; unfortunately I have to start with her but she deserves it. This is October, the month when great people are honoured and the lady is great even if it is only for her looks. October 5^th is World Teachers’ Day, World Military Day is on 14^th of October and the Breast Cancer Awareness Day is also in October. Mashujaa Day will extend to Monday 21^st for Kenyans to honour heroes they care little about.

There are heroes among us who share October 20^th celebration with Kenya. These are people who nature has bestowed on a condition that modern medicine is still grappling to find its genesis and cure since the days of Moses. That Levite who was picked as a baby from the bull rashes- the reeds that grows by the river. I dont think the trauma of being dumped made him a stammerer, or I am giving you ideas? Let us leave it at that.  I enjoy reading his arguments with Pharaoh in the book of Exodus, like they say, I feel him.

International Stammering Awareness Day (ISAD) is a day observed worldwide to create awareness of a condition that makes people think faster than they can speak. That is the simplest definition I can give it. In other words, we are always done with a statement before we say it.

Rachel Shebesh is the only member of parliament to ever ask about our plight. She asked the then Minister for Health, Prof. Peter Anyang’ Nyong’o what his ministry was doing to manage stammering especially in children. I can’t tell where She got her facts which found Prof. Nyong’o clueless (to use Miguna’s catch word), but for that my respect for her will always be a grain higher than the public opinion.

One day some years ago, a short nine year old boy stood in front of the whole school to recite a poem, and as they say, the rest is history. He stumped his foot, slapped his thigh, he even squinted but in the end, no word came out. That is a horrific experience for a nine year old. That boy is me, all grown up now but I will do it again if that teacher asks for volunteers to recite poems again. ISAD is a day my colleagues and I look forward to every year to celebrate such moments.

In secondary school after playing truant on the teacher, he asked to stand in front of the class. The usual stuff that happens in school, to be candid I was drawing the caricature of renowned humourist the late Wahome Mutahi (whispers) which I made sure appeared on all my exercise books. I went and stood, as soon as the teacher turned his back on me, the whole class burst into laughter. I am not a comedian, but my struggles to speak have made some people to chuckle but I always forgive them immediately. I was asked to go to the staff room where I could not utter a single word in my defence. The poor teacher felt sorry for me and let me go. I smiled all the way back to class.

        Albert Einstein and his sister- he also had a stutter- we are bright people!

I will not go into the mechanics of stammering because I don’t know what happens physiologically. All I can say is, it is like an iceberg. What you end up seeing is a tip; beneath it is a huge mass of ice that has baffled scientists for many years. I stutter; that’s a new word? Blame the Americans and their obsession with being unique. The British call it stammering, the American chose stuttering, ....you know what am saying?

In the four primary classifications of personalities, stammerers are primarily introverts by default and melancholic to be specific. What do you do if you suffer from social anxiety disorder? This is the condition where one is conscious that inability to communicate properly is a big deal. It leads to shyness and fear of situations that call for an articulate tongue. Everybody is cautious about meeting new people, initiating small talk, and talking to people in authority. These things are hell to a stammerer.

Now imagine all that, and then God creates you an extrovert. You get where I fall, I am the stammerer who chats matatu (public transport) drivers if I find myself in the front seat. I wonder what they think of me, “wacha kujisumbua na story huwezi bonga.”   That is why I call myself- STUTTISTICIAN and my condition is STUTTISTICS.

You see another aspect of stammerers is creativity. Not by design but for survival. Imagine you have a lot to say but you just can’t say it as well as you would like to. In the end one ends up being a ‘punch-line’ guy. Punch lines are like those advert like taglines. Look at Nokia for instance- ‘connecting people’ is the punch-line. We tend to have a way of simplifying stuff just to cut the long story short but pass the message across.

 I set up this blog and called it Otieno Kenyatta, I think I was tired and bored that day or just trying to fill my minutes with something constructive. After some time I changed the name to “Blocks & Stutts” just from the blues. Blocks is my main mode of stammering, as in “K-K-K-K-K- Kenyatta” the other form is prolongation; “Keeeeeeeenyatta.” Stutts is my rendition of stuttering. A few months later it became “STUTTISTICS” my new name to stuttering. And I became @stuttistician. Are we not a creative lot?

I have grown as a writer, if you read my earlier blogs, you find a lot of “punch lines.” Not any more, I have learnt to avoid cutting the long story short by explaining even the stuff I would avoid in speech. It has been an enjoyable journey speaking to myself for you to read.

Then I joined Nairobi Stammering Support Group a few years ago, I went home and laughed. I am not crazy, I did not laugh out of malice, I had never seen more than two stammerers in a room, so I laughed. The other reason is I felt nice, that there is a place I can go and talk without fear of victimization or being misunderstood. I almost (ROTFL) - Rolled On The Floor laughing- like they say on Twitter.

There are more men than ladies in the group as more men than women stammer. This is one indicator that women are genetically stronger than men. On average they speak more words then men, so from an early age they tend to beat this monster. In my search for information on stammering, I got one I always share with people. Stammerers have a high affinity for substance abuse. These drugs especially alcohol and cigarettes tend to ‘cheat’ you that you are fluent by giving you undue confidence. On the contrary, it worsens the condition.

So October twentieth we are celebrating heroes like me. These people go out and spend hours looking for something just because they are afraid of being judged when they ask. We tend to spend more time lost than ask for directions. We still manage to overcome all these hic-ups (sic) and go about our businesses like any other person.

This October, take time to be patient with anyone who is not as eloquent as he would like to be. We make one percent of every society so you will see one of us near you. Take time to listen, and encourage us to speak. Not all of us are as chatty as I am, so go out of your way and ask us how we are doing. May be we will find out why society use words we cant easily pronounce to describe us; KIGUGUMIZI (Kiswahili) or STUTTERING and many more.

As I wind up, if I woke up tomorrow speaking fluently, I will check in for therapy to cope. It has become part of my identity. Apart from Rachel Shebesh, I will appreciate KISS FM host Carol Mutoko – oh my, we attract drama queens for her support. I think we give drama queens a chance to show their good side. Emma Shah is one sweet soul, no drama, this lady has dedicated her life to work with stammerers, and I envy her patience. Thank you ladies, and the men, it is time you stood out.