BabaJimmy: Let’s watch on our kids this holiday, idlers are preying

By Joseph Maina

Now, someone once said that the difference between school and life is that in school, you are taught a lesson and then given a test. In life, you’re given a test that teaches you a lesson. Now that the first week of the school holidays are here, I’m continually confronted by unspeakable horrors wrought by my kids.  My mboys eat like ants during the holidays, and they seem to have too much time in their hands, which they spend playing with their friends and inventing all manner of mischief. They then return in the evening looking like chokoras, leaving the mboch to launder their filth.

As if that is not enough, chaos abounds in my house every evening. Remember, the stereo is the opium of my mboys. Away from their “radioactive” habits we have Little Tiffany, that sweet angel of mine. On Friday evening I arrived from work to find Tiffany in the compound, playing the cha baba na mama game with a neighborhood boy named Frank. Having saluted the duo, I stepped into the house, tuned in to my favourite Sundowner show and dumped my fossils next to my Deputy Couch potato, Tyson the Cat. Moments later, Tiffany burst into the room blowing some sort of “balloon”.

“Daddy hebu cheki hii balloon!” she proudly announced while displaying the material ‘balloon,’ leaving me thoroughly flabbergasted. Ok, let me be economical with the details of that balloon. For now, all I want you to know is that it was not the kind of balloon that you would let to hang from the side mirrors of your Probox as you drive to your neighbor’s wedding.  The minute Mama Jimmy saw the “balloon,” she let out a scream that could be heard throughout East Africa and the greater Horn region.

“Tupa hiyo kitu haraka!” she screeched at the top of her lungs. At first, Tiffany looked confused, but she held on to her gem.

“Hapana!” she said while stamping her little hoof on the floor.

 “Tupa ama nichukue mwiko,” the comptroller threatened further, but Little Tiff stuck to her guns. Looking completely unperturbed, she slouched leisurely to the door, thinking she was safely out of range. In her royal fury, Mama Jimmy threatened to discipline the girl using her pair of slippers, but Little Tiff remained indignant as ever, so she threatened to cancel her upcoming birthday party. Now that’s what did the trick.

“Hakuna birthday kama hutupi hiyo kitu,” she stated firmly. At the mention of “birthday,” Tiffany let go of the evil balloon, paving the way for a Nyayo House session:

“Where did you get that thing?” I asked calmly, at which she quickly spun a long-winded tale that took us from Times Tower, moved along Mombasa Road, crossed through to Malindi, passed Kinangop via Garrissa before taking us to Baragoi, finally ending at The Kenya Polytechnic. Of course, Mama Jimmy was not convinced, and neither was I.

“Tell the truth!” The comptroller demanded, in a voice that almost melted our sufurias. That’s when my angel realised that we meant business, and upon further interrogation, she revealed that she had acquired the material “balloon” from Frank.

“Frank aliipata kwa handbag ya mamake,” she replied, her innocent little eyes widening like saucers. I wanted to pin this disaster on someone but my mboys, in their usual spirit of “collective irresponsibility”, washed their hands off the hullaballoo, saying they had been listening to “ngoma” at the time.

Mama Frank was out at work and could not be reached for comment, so we turned to our house help Maggy, aka Miss Mboch, alias the deejay who spins our plates and related disks in the kitchen.

 “Ulikuwa wapi Mtoto akiokota takataka?” the comptroller demanded through gritted teeth. Of course, the DJ was not overly keen on assuming responsibility.

“Baba na Mama Jim, haki mimi sikuwa karibu,” she swore. Well, this sounded like nyef nyef to us, but a mboch has to do what a mboch is got to do.  Like any other mboch, Maggy is bound by some sort of “hypocritical oath”, meaning her secrets are safer than the president.  With these few remarks, she promptly stepped out of the room, leaving us with Tiff and the mboys.

“We must do something, dear,” I told the comptroller while disposing the balloon, and she agreed that we must police our kids keenly during the holidays. Now, I’m no “prophet of gloom,” but a little bird tells me that some kids in my neighborhood might hook up with idlers who will teach them a thing or two about drugs.

 Others will walk straight into the waiting arms of child sex predators. Sugar mummies too will not sleep throughout December, and sugar daddies may well enjoy a bumper harvest.