Hugging for… a good cause

By Tony Ngare

With New Year’s resolutions still the in thing, my friend Kim has promised himself to be philanthropic this year.

But the stingy accountant that he is, he has come up with an ingenious way to achieve his goal of philanthropy. He believes that he can hug people (read women) then charge them for the favour to help raise money for charity. Essentially, he is on a ‘hugs-for-sale’ campaign.

I have explained to him that not everyone can be hugged, leave alone getting to charge for it, but the poor soul is obstinate.

Depending on market reaction, bear hugs might be introduced.

He talks of a huge market that remains "untapped". These are the women who can do with a measure of compassion, which is in short supply, he argues. Characteristically Kim wanted to manipulate yours truly and get some mileage from this column, but I have sharply informed him he cannot use it to further his mirage.

Nevertheless, since I don’t want to run the risk of history judging me harshly, I committed to serve as his chief strategist. We reckon that since he is neither a famous celebrity nor does he have the looks, we will initially charge a modest fee of Sh2,000 per hug lasting 30 seconds.

As his product development manager, I have come up with different types of hugs. No, I’m not talking about those ‘take me now’ hugs or ‘sweetie, I can’t wait any longer’ type. Those are hazardous to marriage and we are not homebreakers anyway.

Good business

Ours are solely limited to decent contacts and yes, we only hug women. Should you go for the bonus two-minute hug, this would take you back Sh3,000. Of course, if you are prettier than the others you pay less because we don’t mind meeting pretty girls with a heart for giving.

The not-too-good-looking girls, however, will pay more. (Who says the world is fair?) Depending on market reaction, we may even launch a five-minute bear hug whose value we are yet to determine.

When we first set up shop at a popular entertainment joint in Westlands, the initiative registered astounding success. We had a very busy schedule, which can only suggest two things: The Kenyan ladies are generous (read philanthropic) or that there are fewer men than women.

One of the clients enquired whether we had market samples for our product. As you would expect, I’m the market sample. She reluctantly hugged me and instantly described ‘the product’ as counterfeit. We are considering giving her an offer — buy one, get one free.

As usual Stella has rubbished our initiative saying it’s akin to hanging out the baby to dry instead of going for diapers. Yet the only time Stella gets to meet eligible bachelors is when she is with us. Stella, don’t bite the hand that feeds you!