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When we are told that the rich also cry, mere mortals wonder what it is wadosi cry about. We wish we were in their position and wipe away the tears in silky hankies bought at Changi Airport, Singapore, enroute to Kenya.
When the broke mouth that ‘money can’t buy happiness’, we are quick to remind them that they don’t know where to shop. Or that they should deposit the money in our account.
But even with money, the rich have problems galore. However, their problems are not Third World ones like ‘mtoto wangu amemeza button ya Jeans’.
Here are 10 problems you will have to solve when you get loaded like a gun...
1. Delays at airports While you get delayed in a matatu with a leaking roof haki na na vile siku hizi kuna nyesha while seated next to a noisy and nosy passenger eating mayai boiro, the rich are delayed at airports during pilot’s strikes.
2. Yaani, hakuna parking The rich talk of which public places do not have safe parking space. They curse at how some places have specified time for parking. How the guards don’t look at their cars properly hence the missing side mirror. The poor worry where they will park their butts kupumzika, and legs encased inside dusty cobbled shoes!
3. Where to buy spare parts While the poor worry about which is the best, cheapest shoe shiners in town, the rich worry about the high cost of spare parts and whether its more prudent to import ‘direct.’ The poor know Njoro wa viatu, the rich know ‘Oketch Mechanic’ and Auto Search Car Alarm Dealers as the poor swear never to leave shoes outside the door.
4. Dealing with public fury The rich, especially if they’re civil servants, worry about public fury after stealing from public coffers. They are corporate thugs specialising in white collar crimes like tax evasion, land grabbing and false mileage claims. They are handled with kid gloves when caught, what with their battery of lawyers and doctors only a phone call away. The holloi polloi are killed for stealing chicken! Or jailed for six years after being caught with lotion from the supermarket!
5. GCE not 8-4-4 surely! The loaded ignore 8-4-4 and instead take their kids to schools offering international curriculum as the financially malnourished contend with children being at home following endless tussles with the government over teacher salaries.
6. Which rehab centre? If a member of a poor family is into drugs then its either “tuombe”or “amerogwa”. For the rich druggie, the issue is where to get the best professional rehab centres. Some poor people only hear of rehab when celebs are mentioned or in movies.
7. South Coast or France... The wretched of the Earth head to shags for holidays. Ngoja tu Christmas uone. They cringe at the high cost of bus flight. But blessed rich are worried at number one above on their way to Mauritius, the beaches of Nungwi (if you know where that is) and when broke they do South Coast which bores them stiff.
8. Deadly enemies The have nots have ordinary enemies. The kind that can harm you with mawe, kugwarwa macho and such. The enemies of the rich have guns and know how to use them. They can also hire professional assassins to get you floating in River Sabaki. Just why the rich live in fortresses...
9. Yoga or the gym While the poor walk long distance to get food, the rich run many miles to digest the food rich in minerals. They have a problem deciding whether to work out at the gym or take the ten day Yoga challenge.
10. What to wear Another First World problem for the rich is deciding what to wear to invite only dinners to where “My stylist insisted on an off the shoulder dress.” Some take their suits abroad for laundry from where they go well with hand-made designer shoes. The hoi polloi just wear anything clean, but ironed.
