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There was the thermos flask reserved for wageni in most Kenyan homes back in the day, and then there was the aluminium birika for the rest of the world.
Electric kettle was not as common as bellybuttons and if your family owned one, it meant your old guy could run for an elective post.
The aluminium birika, now common in rural tea kiosks, was used to prepare tea atop the charcoal jiko.
That meant one had to wake up at cockcrow, collect old newspapers and milk packets, stuff them in the jiko’s small mouth, sprinkle a little paraffin and light the assembly with a matchbox before kupepeta moto with that plastic plate nobody used until the charcoal produced sparks towards your face!
Water, milk and tea leaves were all poured into the birika, which boiled and announced it was ready via spilling on the jiko, producing that unique smell specific to ash contacting milky liquid.
Chai ya birika was thick, tasted so different from today’s gas or kerosene affairs; it’s hard to define its effect on the palate without use of superlatives.
November is the hustle month and we are all about youngins making their money, and we need your help. Do you know of any young person in school/campus who is running a hustle that absolutely deserves to be celebrated? Drop us an email on: [email protected]
