Life among strangers

By Joseph Maina

Last week, we learned that one of our neighbours is a thief!  Baba Saimo is cooling his heels in remand, having relieved a motorist of his car at gunpoint.

The news took everyone by surprise, as Baba Saimo is a quiet gentleman who generally minds his own business. He attends church every Sunday, and his children occasionally visit my house to watch TV. Following this development, I started wondering just how well I know my neighbours.

It is close to six years since we moved into this neighbourhood, yet I know very little about these folks. You see, life in Nairobi calls for minimal interaction with neighbours, as most of them are busy people who have little time to mingle. They avoid coming face-to-face with you at all costs, and chances are that they will never invite you to their wedding. It is nothing personal.

“We need to know our neighbours a little more,” I told Mama Jimmy on Tuesday evening, moments after we heard the news.

But Mama Jimmy prefers to keep her distance. “Ah, hii ni Nairobi, Baba Jim,” she said with a shrug. “Kila mtu ako na shughuli zake.”

As far as I know, my neighbours are average people who earn average incomes and lead average lives. It is a hustlers’ paradise of sorts, comprising lower-middle class sufferers.

Small-scale hustlers

There is an average of one TV per household, and most of my neighbours are in monogamous marriages — at least on paper. The majority are small-scale hustlers, which explains why we have numerous open-air salons, keg-drinking joints, mutura-eating dens and mama mboga kiosks. The Toyota Probox remains the most prestigious mode of transport, followed closely by one’s own legs.

Happily, I am now making a conscious effort to know my neighbours, one by one. For instance, my next-door neighbours are pretty good people, and it has been a pleasure living next to them. However, they are as secretive as banks, particularly the husband. I once asked him what he does for a living, and I received a meandering answer that took me from the Kenya Polytechnic to Mombasa, then Moyale, past Kisumu via Kismayu, with the final destination being Times Towers.

Two gates away is a family whose parents are always fighting. I rarely see them, and I only know they exist because of the ruckus they create every night. No one knows the source of their wrangling, but local rumour mills have always alleged mpango wa kando issues.

Then there is this single lady named Sarah, who lives two doors away. She loves to attend high-end parties and knows the hottest deejays in town. No one really knows her source of unga, but local wags claim she dates famous fat cats for a living.

Next to Sarah lives a man who behaves like he is allergic to people.  His madam is a type-A snob who completely ignores everyone around her, and the amount of breath they waste saying ‘hello’ to neighbours would hardly save a mosquito’s life.

“Hao watu wana roho chafu sana,” my comptroller keeps lamenting of the couple.

This story would be incomplete without a bachelor, so let me introduce Franco, who lives three doors away. Like most bachelors, Franco is an extremely good player, and I am not talking football. Those of you who know Toni Braxton’s song that goes Play me Like a Spanish Guitar will know what I mean when I say he plays ladies — especially college-going types — like an orutu.

The Playstation

Leo Uncle Franco amekuja na auntie mwingine,” my little angel, Tiffany, keeps saying whenever Franco brings a fresh lady to his house. People have even nicknamed his house the ‘playstation’.

The only person I can claim to know is Soja, aka the watchman who mans our gate. Soja lives on the ground floor with his wife and ten children, and I occasionally hook up with him in the evenings to discuss politics, football and the weather or gossip about our landlord.

Well, that is all I know about my neighbours. Though I feel the need to know them a little more, most of them remain strangers to me. We exchange tight smiles and wave to each other every morning, wiper style, but other than that, I do not even know their names.