‘Women should never eat chicken gizzards’ and other man-made lies

There is no scarcity of irritants in Kenya. From marauding criminal gangs to a government in the grip of cartels; from pseudo Christians who turn churches into boxing rings to traffic police officers who criminalise vehicle ownership. From elected leaders who believe it’s their time to eat to unscrupulous businesspeople who feed us on chemicals. Then there are traditions and councils of elders stuck in a time warp circa 1900.

Cremation is a fairly new concept to us, but not so new it should baffle us. Kenyans of Asian origin have all along practised it, but it was always ‘their culture’ that many imagined could never supplant our own. But that was a false belief. People who coexist in a shared environment somehow find their cultures and beliefs fused at some point.