By Patrick Kariuki
The old farmer, sporting a battered hat and large spectacles, walked confidently into the cyber cafe in a small town and laid his newspaper and a large bag on the counter. From the intensity in his eyes and his businesslike manner, he clearly wasn‘t here to update his Facebook status.
He politely greeted the young man managing the place and announced he needed "a little assistance".
The young man, used to providing all kinds of assistance to his technologically challenged customers, prepared to create yet another new Internet address or send an email to a long lost daughter in America.
"How can I be of assistance?" he asked the visitor. To his surprise, the old man turned out to be bilingual and addressed him in English. He also spoke with the firmness of a man who knew exactly what he wanted.
"I have a document in my Internet I need to send to Shee-kago (Chicago) urgently. Unfortunately, my Internet is from outside. Therefore, I want you to connect my Internet to your Internet, take the document from my Internet, put it in your Internet and then send it to the Internet in Shee-kago," he told the bewildered young attendant.
The surprised young man asked the old man to repeat his request.
But the mzee was not happy to hear this. "Where did you go to school, young man?" he snapped, and switched to Kiswahili. "Ninakwambia…" he began, but then found it impossible to translate ‘Internet’ and ‘document’ to Kiswahili and so reverted to English.
"My internet is not from here. It is from outside. I need to connect my Internet to yours so that we can send the document in my Internet to the Internet in Shee-kago," he added.
"And where is your Internet from?" the young fellow asked. "It is from South Africa but I brought it with me here," he replied with a condescending air before reaching into his bag and pulling out a laptop attached to a modem.
It suddenly dawned on the young man that the old man was telling him his modem would not work in Kenya.
