By Smitta Smitten
I was dead when I somad a smitten fan asking me why I din't menshon Daudi Kabaka last week in my piece "Eleven peeps you'll meet in heaven". Daudski Kabaka is so old – that he muss be in 'Nyumba ya Wazee' in heaven, singing 'Helule Helule' to ole anjels like Gabriel...
But thaz not why I was *dead* (tell me, twits on mukuru wa Dorsey, why do we tweet continuous verbs with asterisk on twirra*? *SMH, taking off my specs and panyes, n hiding ndethe under ma wryting’ desk!*)!
I was *dead* becoz I kumbukad the time my late ole man found Kabaka in a bar in Nairobi West (*Jeans or Johns*) n kujad home with him, the two of ‘em high as kites; n b4 the ole man cud allow Daudi some shut-eye — much needed at the unholy hour of 2:54am, he first amshad all us tois; n made Kabaka play, complit wit his guitar, an entire hour’s repertoire of his wimbos...in our sitting room.
Dat memory I’ll never forget s’long as I live.
(I’ll also ne’er sahau meetin’ dat otha musical genius, Brenda Fassie, at tha Stanley in the early oh-ohs 4 an interview, a day after she’d been booted outta that Afrik-Pan hotel 4 hittin on a lady worker there, allegedly; but BF was unapologetic, n found the whole incident vastly amoosing)...
Fassie fuss
Weirdly nuff, Fassie kuffed on May 9, ma buff-day, two-oh-four. So you can see I anzad this Monday on a high note, celebrating buffday (after cryin over Chelski on Sundae). Ambiaing me "may you live to be old n senile" on my FB wall, BTW, is not a buffday wish. I much prefer Dawg J. Mango’s sendimends. And coz twas my buffday this week, n becoz I was seventeen half a lifetime ago, n becoz me n CEO can no longer fully ‘click’ summa the ‘under18s’, (who can, wen even Cambridge uni under-gradz have become serious hooligans), n coz MTV has a show called "when I was 17" where celebz share their storos about who n what they was up to when they were seventeen. Here goes:
Years ago: when we were 17, the only MTV there was usedta kuja for half an hour jioz on KTN tee-wee, in place of a locally produzed award-winning show, wakina Terro n Ressian’s "Str8 Up".
And for an hour, late on sato nites — 10:45 to eleven forte fae pm, I recall. Wenski evenings n Sato usikus were 4 the rock, n contrary 2 rumours dat da Smitta discovered rock one nait when an imp with a guitar appeared to me in a mission, twas on dat rock show on tee-wee dat we discovered, n fell in dark love, with tha likes of Metallica. Thaz why I always tell the likes of colleague Linus, the jackass (the way I usedta tell Mike Owour), "leave rock to the rocka-fellers, meeenn..."
(Yu gotta say it just so: "leave rock, to the rocka-fellers, meenn..." with cool ATT).
When I was seventeen, we all used 2 have a crush on the esto beauty. Like for real. Every hood would have this one chicka, whom all tha boys wud be into. And give her dumb nicknames 4rm high school set-books, like "Ihuoma". Do tois these days have the hot chiquitta in all the crib crawls, whom they cat-call "Beyonce," n she disses em by insussing they go "to the left x 2"?
If you got too randy for bonoko, yu either spoke to the mkono (here, channel Pink) or else makobostad the neighborhood mboch (here, channel Ala- holla) n hoped she din’t have gono. Playboy was rily a boy’s B.F.F. – until yu got outta high skool.
Old school shizzle
When I was 17, there was no "swagger-daggerlicious" concerts to go to. In fact, when Shabba Ranks showed up for a show in city stady, paroz there almost got sent to hosi strait from the stadia — so sad were tha heard attacks. Still on the zizki when we were 17, tha main shizzle baint rock. Yu tuned the neighbahood’s young uns using cassettes with the like of ‘Boys II Men,’ n otha mo-town high jingles like dat – n all you got in return was a wet peck on tha chick. I bet if I was in Muliro, I’d have gottn more satisfashion snoggin’ beaks of wet chickens.
Old skool shizzle aside, I took real skool pretty seriously, wen I was seventeen — (heh, heh, ION, Ahmed Nassir made me smile *dead* wen he tole Justice Ang’awa on live tee-wee ati she "has the mindset of a kindergarten school teacher"!*, huh). Akademya nuts aside, I luved the school moosicals —– with capos like Pat Kimwere n Jeff Kinyanjui –— like "Alice in Wunderland" (where I first met the nut called Nimrod), the mafya musical "Tin Pan Ali" n "The Hobbit" (where the Smitten was ‘eaten’ by a troll whose musical role was to imba "I am a troll, who’s not particular...about the dwarves that I chew!")....
Those days w/out cool high skool mags like Insyder, we worked on the school rag, SCAN, n all tried to write like Whispers, complit with bogus Latinese (now we got bogus ‘Sminglish’ that we spin out, like Chinese spinnin’ out parks n roads).
Clubbing
When we was seventeen, the only vilabu we usedta go to was "Carni" (The Voo), Dreams n Sahara City – n only thrice a year – in April, August n Dec, via sneaking out.
Our dress code at seventeen was hip-hop, kriss-kross cool, box haircuts, sneakers n long b-ball shorts with long sox. This was real ‘ Fresh Price of Bel Air’n yur there.... Oh, n cartoon ties n hawaii shirts. These had shiznit to do with Barack Obama, who was then coming to Kenya in-cognito, hangin’ out at Garden Square, n smoking ‘sawa sasa’ sportos on his way to see his gran-ma in K’ogalo.
It had everything to do with a smart-ass on tee-wee called Parker Lewis (from ‘Parker Lewis can’t Lose’) who hang loose in Hawaii flowery shirts; n had a synchronized watch that got him into, and outta, sh*t. \more in, that out./
When I was 17, when I grew up, I wanted to be cool like Parker Lewis. Problem was we awas geeks, Parker Lewis was my age-mate, and coz of been such a weirdo, my esto nickname was ‘Steve Urkle" and the nickname in chuo was "The Digital Underground." (Pliz don’t cheka, that trauma still hurts, baaaiibe)...
When we was 17, vodoski was just a rumor I saw in ma old man’s glass – dat inspired him to do weird diesel like bring Daudi Kabaka home at 1:54 am, n keep him up till three am, playing wimbos strummin’ his guitar.
I thot all alkie was eee-vv-ii-l, like finding a ball weevil in yur high schook ‘murram’ (thaz watt we golled githeri). Until, at 17, I discovered kingfisher... and then dat shite dint seem to be such a stinker no mo.
These dayz, I hear the only thing Fisher is nice 4 –wen mixed with mbrack ice – is as a mbra-n-thong chucker. I wudnt know, virgos dat we was, not knowin storos of bonoko . All I know now is dat seventeen is now half a life time away...
So here’s to at least 888 more Furahidays, folks, on Friday the thirteenth. Today, stay away from ladders – n black pakas dat go ‘miaow’ like makobosto in the middle of the night. N try not to have beef it anyone, or to put it like Ndoch, that beef CEO has wit Ray ‘C’ is off the hook... the butcher unhooked it – n sold the custo a kilo!
