If it rains in Coast, darkness hits Bungoma

The rainy season will soon be upon us, and while this means that rural areas will be greened and people fed, the expatriate will notice only one thing: the power cuts.

There is one equation that always rings true in Kenya: moisture in the atmosphere equals power cuts. If it rains in Mombasa, there will be a power cut in Bungoma.

If a mere wisp of a cloud breezes over Lokichogio in the north, Loitokitok in the south will be without power for a week.

While in the back of his tiny mind the expatriate patronises sympathetic pity upon those who have no electricity at all, he has himself, in his plump incompetence, become almost totally reliant upon a certain amount of wattage pulsing through his many-bedroomed mansion.

Electricity is as essential to the expatriate as air is to normal human beings. It powers his fridge; it powers his television; it gives him light and hot water.

When it goes, he is invariably watching some foreign series on television and he curses. He usually curses the power company, but is equally happy to curse all manner of others.

In expatriate houses across Nairobi, when the power goes, there is a brief moment of silence, and then the exhalation of one stock word: ‘SH*T!’ Followed by, ‘Bloody KP*L!’

The expatriate righteously refuses to utter the rebranded name, ‘Kenya Power’. Before the remaining battery charge disappears on his phone, he just manages to post a Facebook status update on his wall. It is rarely very polite.

True, many expatriates either own generators or live in rented accommodation that have generators.

But even then, as the generator kicks in with its enthusiastic surge, his television explodes, his electric oven commits suicide and his fridge blows up, ruining the expensive white wine he was chilling with the intention of drinking alone because ‘My sweet wine-drinking Kenyan friends wouldn’t appreciate its fruity crispness.’

He will stand up in the evening darkness, stubbing his weedy, white toe on the coffee table as he shuffles blindly towards the rechargeable lamp he always leaves on the bookcase.

It isn’t there, so he shuffles about some more, face-banging doors around the house until he locates the lamp.

When he flicks the switch, it doesn’t work. It is a well-known truth that nobody remembers to charge their rechargeable lamps until such time as a power cut strikes, at which time it is of course impossible.

He locates an old candle, strikes a match, and attempts to read a novel by its feeble light.

In time, he gives up and goes to bed early to listen to the sound of ravenous mosquitoes outside his net.

At 3am, he is rudely awoken by the sudden return of the electricity, which causes the bedroom lights, that he has forgotten to switch off, to come back on again. Feeling uncharitable, he curses KPLC for this too.

For breakfast, he’ll eat curdled milk and green sausages. His resulting running stomach could run the turbines of a power station for weeks!

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