A recent, much-publicised and discussed survey showed that young Kenyans today are in the grip of a culture of mindless material accumulation without a care about how they come about the wealth.
This attitude appears diametrically opposed to the practice when I was a youngster in the 1970s and 1980s, when we spent with a mindless abandon as if there was no tomorrow.
On pay day, salaried people seemed to forget the hardships of the previous month and went on spending sprees until their pockets were empty.
Such was the improvidence prevailing at the time that many of us viewed a bank account as a needless inconvenience.
Why go through all that rigmarole of having your salary paid into an account which you could only access in small doses through cumbersome procedures?
Many people I knew preferred to get their pay directly from the cashier and to spend it as they saw fit — which in many cases was all at once.
We even chafed at the business of waiting a whole month to get your salary and spoke wistfully about the practice in places like Britain at the time, where many workers were paid their wages weekly in brown envelopes.
My late friend Brian Tetley was a great supporter and proponent of such a system and to my knowledge never operated a bank account. He liked to be paid promptly and directly, and preferably in advance if it could be manoeuvred.
Of course there were exceptions such as the writer Sam Kahiga, a mutual friend who insisted on maintaining a current account which he operated in an unusual manner.
Besides books, Sam wrote newspaper columns and received his pay through the bank. He therefore boasted a cheque book, which for many of us in those days was a rarity.
His drinking habits however did not permit him to use this facility much.
When I met Sam in the early 1980s, he lived out of town and would come in once a week to drop his column, the well received Norman the Nomad.
Once this duty was accomplished, he would repair to Sans Chique, a bar on Moi Avenue popular with journalists and commence on a “bender” that would last three or more days and take him to a number of bars, drinking non-stop day and night.
Whenever he ran out of cash, he rarely went to the bank for replenishment but would flash out his cheque book and offer any willing lender a cheque in exchange for a cash loan — nothing much, mind you, but something small like a pound or two.
In those days 20 bob could buy you three beers. I liked Sam as a drinking companion because when loaded, he was not stingy with his cash and was always ready to bail out a friend.
There was a memorable incident at Sans Chique when I touched him for a pound but he could not oblige me immediately because he did not have cash.
A couple of beers later however, he was able to wangle some money from the barman — in exchange for a cheque — and magnanimously, he turned to me and inquired if I had asked him for a pound.
I answered in the affirmative and I got the note.
Another couple of beers later, he once again turned to me and asked if I had asked him for a pound. Once again I answered that indeed I had.
When this was repeated the third time and I had 60 bob safely in my pocket, I decided that it was time to stop pushing my luck and quietly made my way out of the bar and into the night, safe in the knowledge that I had enough to see me through the night.
In those days we spent a whole month’s salary in a couple of days with a great show of generosity even to total strangers and the fake gaiety of those who know they are doomed.
The rest of the month was spent on a desperate quest for survival by begging for pounds and thinking up clever excuses for a salary advance.
