In search of renowned Ngugi, Ogot and other short stories

Ngugi wa Thiong'o's book Wizard of the Crow (left) and Grace Ogot's book The Promised Land [Courtesy]

If you detect a meanness of spirit in this week’s reflection, it is because we are entering the month of July, which, to use the words of Alex la Guma, the great South African author, heralds the fog of the season’s end. Only that the chill from our fog is likely to stretch to the month of August, so the end is not in sight.

Besides the July chill, I have had to endure commutes on Mombasa Road—it no longer resembles a construction site; it now looks and feels like the site of a demolition squad by the notorious city askaris.

One of my missions in town was to pick some books and Sarit Centre, in my estimation, was the nearest. Only that I had no idea they had moved a few floors up! I was exasperated to go up and down the stairs before locating their new hood, which looks brighter and swankier!

I announced I was looking for the section holding Kenyan fiction. In tow was a friend from abroad (I am assuming our neighbours from East Africa qualify as international guests).

Then a ping-pong ensued, shoved from one attendant to the next. No one seemed to know where Kenyan fiction could be found. The third attendant, while referring us to yet another attendant, proudly announced: “I don’t know where books by Kenyan authors are; I only know international authors.”

Now, now, that was an interesting line, I thought to myself, returning to face the attendant. Could you just repeat what you just said, I demanded. This was a teachable moment. 

If someone is running the biggest bookstore in the country and the region, and he is asserting his pride in not knowing the nation’s authors, that was going to rile someone, especially if the said authors are shunted to the periphery, in their own land.

One can expect that I stayed in the store longer than necessary. In the end, all ended well. Not only did I find the books I needed, but a diligent attendant called George also took me to the stands where books by Kenyan greats such as Ngugi wa Thiong’o and Grace Ogot are stocked.

I also relished the opportunity to dispel the asinine attitude by the initial attendant claiming ignorance of his own environment, urging him charity begins at home.

Sadly, the shop attendant’s mentality is not isolated. There is quite a lot of upumbavu in our land, and the assumption that mastery of the foreign makes one better. So, I’ll be gentle and explain this as I would to a toddler.

When a baby is born, the first words they learn are: baba, mama, kaka, mimi, tata, cucu, gugu, etc. They are not taught about distant racial groups like the Arawak in the ancient Caribbean, or the Prussians in ancient Germany.

The tot is taught about her immediate relations who inhabit her environment before they can add other aspects of the world to their growing knowledge.

If this toddler’s common-sense approach to acquiring knowledge eludes us, then I don’t know what else will.