It was around 5 PM now.
The number of customers, which had peaked just a moment earlier, was starting to reduce. Like a receding tide, the women and men and children and stray dogs and carts which had flocked the dirt road between her kios and the opposite row of kiosks was ebbing.
Darkness was coming. A good number of people typically started closing shop by six in the evening, when the last rays of sunlight were bidding them farewell. Zole’s mother, commonly known as Sakina by the market folk, couldn’t wait for that. She needed to prepare her daughter and son in law a meal.
“Here, help me place those tomatoes inside the wooden crate! No, no, not you Zole, sit down and watch out for the baby, let my son here handle this for me” She declared, while standing up and starting to remove vegetables from the display shelves.
Sambo left the stall and started heaping the green, green-red, reddish and red-red tomatoes into the crate, in that order. He moved fast, trying to match her speed. They were soon done and he carried the crate inside the stall.
They removed what was left on the shelves, onions, coriander, ginger, garlic, and an eclectic mix of ground spices bursting with colors and full of aroma. By this time, Zole had left the kiosk was waiting for them outside. Mama Zole removed the apron as Sambo left.
A minute later, she joined them and the three of them walked towards home.
As they walked, Mama Zole reminisced:
“Toi market is a closely knit circle. Everyone knows everyone. A majority of the traders have been there since its inception almost 30 years ago. I know them by name. We have braved the fights for the land on which it sits. They have braved the police raids, the fires, the bad weathers, the the illnesses, and the deaths- together.
As you know, my dear Zole, land is a thorny issue in Kibra. The traders have felt this pain for years, but still we stand. I know the blood, sweat, and tears that have gone into setting up.
This market, they say, sits on land that does not belong to us traders. In the past, the chief used to say that it belonged to the government. But then, the people are truly the government, aren’t we the rightful owners? And so we fought for what’s ours.
The first eviction notice expired on the same day, you my daughter turned a year old. It was at midnight, on 14th June 1996. I can never forget the heavy police presence here on that cold morning. Our stalls were demolished. We lost property, everything.
But, never forget, Zole, we are a people. This was just another hurdle to be overcome in our pursuit of happiness. We resisted the notice, and defied the chief, who had been colluding with land grabbers. But they built up. As we say here, no one can stop reggae. We kept on with the struggle.
That is how, Sambo, we ended up forming Muungano wa Wanavijiji (Confederation of Slum-dwellers). We have members from all over the city. Disenfranchised people from Mathare and Huruma. Others came from Kingston and Soweto. Others from the two Mukurus- kwa Jenga and kwa Ruben. Still, others came from Korogocho and Maili Saba.
By pulling forces, we approached Kituo Cha Sheria (The Center for Law). Finally, we obtained the legal representation we needed to wage the battle. And fight we did, for years. We still do, Zole, we fight on, the soldiers are strewn all over this market…”
“Sakina! Sakina! Njoo!” A woman’s called out.
Mama Zole stopped her soliloquy. She had not realized how far they had walked this past couple of minutes. She looked at where the voice was coming from, and smiled. She led the two of them towards the ancient woman who had called her name.
Nairo was her name. A Maa name that meant Wife, which was ironic as none knew of her husband. At more than a century old, she was the oldest living member of the federation. She arrived in Nairobi in 1954, just 2 years after the onset Mau Mau Uprising. She had seen it all.
She had also experienced pain, lots of it, and her wrinkled face told some of it. Her only child, a son, was swept away by flooded waters into the Nairobi River. Zole was excited to see her, the sweet old lady who always gave her a fruit whenever she came to her stall.
‘To lose a child is not easy’, she stated calmly, ‘Take good care of the unborn one’.
After a quick chat, they walked on. This time they stopped at Regina’s stall. She was another old woman that Zole had known her entire life. Even in her mid-70s, she was still as jovial as she was back in the old days. Back when she run a Busaa club in the depths of the slum.
“I used to sell this traditional beer. We sold it outside and people came together to drink. There was lots of singing and dancing. Musicians would come and play music, everyone had fun. Men, women, young people, old people, girls, boys, it was very social. It was in the slum, but it was fun. Never fighting! Only fun! Fun!”
They walked on, and met two men.
One of them was an old man almost as tall as Sambo. They, whoever “they” was, called him Mala, for in the distant past he used to sell fermented milk. These days, he run a laundry shop. “It is hard work getting the stench of poverty off these clothes. My secret is hard rubbing with bar soap, Jamaa soap!”, he told them, gesculating wildly while at it.
His companion was the the relatively slender Maina wa Mwangi, but no one called him that. At age 25, he was almost 40 years younger than Mala, and had grown up with Zole. They used to and still, call him ‘Mtoto wa Shida’, for he had a troubled upbringing.
On seeing them, he had jumped up, excited to see his childhood friend once more. He greeted them, respectfully, and Mama Zole asked him about the rumours of his secret wedding to an uptown girl. He laughed her off, and declared: “Am still single but I hope that I will one day meet a beautiful girl from the ghetto”.
By now they were almost near Makina, where Zole’s home was.
They met Margaret, a huge fish monger who was one of the founding members of the Federation. Mama Zole and her were good friends age-mates, having been both born in the early 60s. Zole was familiar with all her 12 children. Her best friend was a daughter of hers, it is though her that she had learnt the language.
“I’m so proud of you Zole, continue working hard and live a better life. The congestion here is a health hazard. When someone gets sick, we all get sick. A fire in one structure gets to all of us. I have always wanted my kids to live in a better environment. I fear for the security of my girls.”
They rounded the corner and stopped in front of Zole’s home. As her mother went in, she asked Sambo to follow her. He obliged. They went behind the house and passed some narrow, muddied paths. They brushed shoulders with smelly drunkards.
They walked for a few minutes before the stench hit him.
It was the sewage Kenyans pretend is still Nairobi River. They stood at a vantage point overlooking it. To their left, there was a silhouette of a man distilling the rivers dark water using an oil barrel.
A little downstream two men were busy tilting a rickshaw. The smelly contents inside the plastic tank it held flowed into the river. Raw sewage it was, Zole had seen it happen countless times.
Further downstream, a solitary man was unloading a another rickshaw. Sambo remembered him from the market. His package was something less sinister, but sinister still. Bang! Splash! Poof! They went. He was pouring rotting and rotten fruits into the river.
It was a river of mangoes and avocados all over again.
“That, Sambo…” Zole said while pointing at the figure, now pushing his cart towards them.
“…Is why that fourth agenda, on value addition, is so important”.
NB: The characters from the market are based on ‘Voices from the slums’, short bios on the members of Muungano wa Wanavijiji. Here’s the original text: https://www.muungano.net/voices-from-the-slums/
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