This
world moves too fast...
The
world has been moving too fast, probably even too fast for some of us
to fully comprehend the reason for it. When I was too small to even
know whether the earth even ever moved at all,a year took too long to
end.. I would write the date ending in the same manner for too long
and when the teacher said I had written the year wrongly, I would not
understand when the year stopped from being 74 to 75.
We
had been ending with 74 all along, for almost what seemed like an
eternity. In hindsight I wonder why the teacher found it unnecessary
to explain why we were all of a sudden changing the date from what we
had always known it to be. In the rare event when I found myself in a
moving vehicle, the telephone posts along the road together with the
vegetation, buildings and any other things alongside them would seem
to be traveling backwards at terrific speeds, making the ride quite
spectacular. It never happens anymore.
The
tractor driver was some sort of celebrity then and all small boys
like me wished to become a tractor driver when we grew up. It seemed
like an impossible dream considering that my father who seemed some
sort of high achiever to me for building stone houses, had not
managed to become a driver of anything apart form a bicycle that he
owned. Now, that was a long time ago because the earth has been
moving quite first and with that movement things have become quite
clear.
That
clarity has not been that comforting and has created a lot more
confusion. In my country we have experienced dramatic events… some
of which I remember include the death of a politician who I had never
heard of before his death -J.M Kariuki who suddenly disappeared as
soon as we had started ending our date with 75. A small boy would
just hear adults talk about the disappearance and I was not sure why
his disappearance was eliciting too much discussion since before the
event there was never any mention of him. He was found dead somewhere
in a far away forest called Ngong which I never knew existed. Now the
evening mention was almost in whispers as it centered around his
death. It appeared that the death was not a normal one if I can it be
put that way. He had been assassinated.
The
second notable event was another death in august 1978 when the
president died. This was even more baffling to a boy. How could a man
who was president even before we were born, a revered president who
had been there all along die? This was a revealing moment in my short
life, almost intimidating. The fact that anyone could die, a
realization of how temporary life was hit me hard. Again the whispers
were even more pronounced: the country had no president and a war was
rumored to be in the offing… there was sadness all round but as
happens always life just continued. Life for others did not stop
because the president had died. Though this event triggered a sort of
new phase in Kenyan politics,its significance was only to emerge as
time moved on, as boys became men and girls became mothers.
Now
three presidents later is when am musing on how time really moves,how
life has to go on despite the events which are happening almost on
daily basis. Many assassinations,many 'normal' deaths of prominent
and not so prominent people, elections which almost always lead to
war, terrorist attacks , protests and mass demonstrations and a new
constitution- time still moves,inducing a kind of forgetfulness that
is baffling.
An
event in my country however monstrous is quickly forgotten when
another one happens or another debate starts and so on. I think the
adage should be or is that life must go on,rending some credence to
the cliché which claims that change is the only thing that remains
constant , because things remain the same no matter how much they
change.
In
Kenya we borrowed and almost copy pasted a constitution from America
hoping it would make our country as great as that country and for the
other reason that citizens were demanding for one, without being
bothered with the the little detail of how it was made or what it
said. Now we are wondering what to do if America elects Donald
Trump…. Do we look for our own ridiculous billionaire to elect or
what ? And what do our little boys think or see of these events,
seeing as most of them never even saw the apprentice and those
who saw it know that Donald Trump was famous for firing his
apprentices on TV? It can only lead to more confusion leading me to
go back to that wish of being a tractor driver…
The
trees and electricity poles never move these days no matter how fast
the car might be moving, it only draws attention to the fact that
that the vehicle is slow or speeding, no one wishes to be a tractor
driver anymore and it is a good thing because there are very few
tractors anyway. Every boy just wants to get rich to get the
attention of the press and be on TV and probably end up like Donald
Trump constructing walls instead of hotels. Speaking of which the
billionaire must have borrowed that idea from our country.. we are
building one on the Somali boarder to keep our country safe from
murderers and rapists. We are the only ones who should murder or rape
our own people…
but
life will go on and many years later the boy who wants to be Donald
Trump will find out that money is not easy to come by if you have no
father like the billionaire had to give you a head start.
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