Our main character has a protruding forehead. He’s dark. Let’s call him Chocolate Man because some street hooker in Pattaya, Thailand, christened him that. And who are we – mere mortals with aged peeling careers – to disregard the wishes of a hooker? That sunny day she had touched his skin in amazement that a man could be so dark and with glee shrieked, “Chocolate Man!” Her eyes said that she wanted to stir him with a special spoon. But our main character walked away, staggering under the weight of that imagery.
Anyway, when our character picks a Jaguar F-Pace from RMA Motors in Westlands, there are no hookers in sight. It’s a grey overcast morning, what the uppity of Nairobi call “winter.” The showroom smells of success and sex; twins joined at the hip by depravity. We are talking non-penetrative sex. The type that men in advertising sell when they photograph sexy women with ridiculous slits in their dresses against exorbitant luxury cars, fueling the desires of men. The type of abstract and cryptic sex that is founded on hierarchy, acquisition and vanity.
The Head of Corporate Sales, Team Leader George Gatehi received our protagonist wearing a red polo shirt. His weekend wear. If you ask George to spell his last name he will say, “Oh, it’s like Bill Gates without the “s” but with a “hi”. Atta boy. You have to have a winning mindset. George, at first glance, is the type you would probably meet at Mercury on a Friday evening drinking an imported beer. The type that carries a money clip. There are people you can tell love what they do, it just oozes out of their pores. He is one of them. In fact, if he lived in medieval times George would be a snake oil salesman, a silver tongued devil. He’s sleek, dresses well, super confident, is eloquent, courteous, knows a hell lot about his Jaguars and most importantly he listens not to answer but to understand. I bet when he punches out for the day, he runs his hand along the bodywork of that super sleek Rhodium silver, Jaguar XJL 5 litre V8 Supercharged, London Tan interior, Portfolio trim, and whispers, “Until tomorrow, my weakness, may the day break on your legend. Stay sexy.” Then he slaps it gently on the ass. There. There. A man who has surrounded himself with British beauty.
George presses things and points at various knobs and talks about low drag, advanced aerodynamics, aluminium architecture, advanced driving dynamics, continuous adapting, cruise control, torque vectoring, park assist, adaptive cruise control etc…ad nauseam – stuff that only interests petrolheads. I bet he thinks our character is a motoring writer. Ha. Our man is all smoke and mirrors. He doesn’t know about the things George is so eloquently waxing lyrical about. Hell, he can barely spell torque. He loves cars because of how they look, how they drive and the emotions they evoke. The hell with torque. But he’s curious to know if indeed the car does 0-100km/h in 5.5 secs.
When he finally drives out of the showroom, even the sun peeps out from behind the gloom to see the first Jaguar SUV in the land, or what George called “All Purpose Sports Vehicle.” No matter, a Jaguar called by any other name still makes heads turn.
I think it’s important to declare that our protagonist is from Homa Bay County. You might know the good County as the nightrunners’ headquarters and the butt of many jokes. But a man will be forgiven for literally anything if he’s driving a luxury car, as he will soon find out. Besides, he would rather be from a county with supposed nightrunners and be in a Jaguar than be from a county with wheat and be in…what’s that car that looks like simsim bread and sounds like a character in C-beebies? Oh yeah, a Voxy.
Anyway CM (short for Chocolate Man, keep up) eases the Italian Racing red vehicle onto Waiyaki Way. He pushes a button and the panoramic view slides open, flooding the car with the beautiful warmth of the sun and glow of the tropics. Rick Dees is counting down. You see, CM is a sheep in wolf’s clothing. He doesn’t belong in this 13-million bob car. He’s out of his depth, but that’s not what the other motorists think. They think he made it. He sees the look in the eyes of those Subaru chaps when he eases past their bubble of noise pollution. It’s a questioning look. He sees the look in many men, even the ones driving big juggernauts. Looks that seem to ask, “What does that guy do for a living to drive a car like that?”
He first goes to show off the car to his daughter because he is constantly looking for approval and validation from her. She’s the princess with the thousand-yard stare. She is moved by the car, which is surprising because she is the quintessential ice queen; always playing her emotional cards close to her chest. Never showing her hand in any emotional situation. The Princess approves. Now the world can bow at his feet, he decides. He then swings the car out to a chama meeting, one of those boys’ financial investment meetings; first hour chama meeting, the next three hours whisky, jabber and laughter. In Westlands an ageing Asian chap with a white beard, driving a silver Porsche Cayenne, turns in his seat, looks at the car then moves his gaze and it fleetingly settles on our character. They exchange a look. A horse staring at a Jaguar.
The clouds close up and grey descends on Nairobi’s afternoon. CM parks the car at Motorsports Club in South C. Chaps with drinks in their hands wander over and circle the car; staring at it like it’s a spaceship that has just crashed onto earth. Some take pictures. At some point our character drives his cousin to South C’s Nakumatt to grab a whisky. South C should be called Somaliland. Nakumatt doesn’t sell booze there, we are told. The local community said they don’t want it. Fair enough. So they drive out to Capital Center, trailed by an outrider of stares. CM’s cousin at some point runs his hands on the stitching on the upholstery and says, “Powerful, but I don’t like how it picks, my Lexus Hybrid picks soundlessly.” Our character says nothing, he doesn’t need to. A Jaguar doesn’t have to explain its spots. Outside Mr. Price, a lady stands at the entrance, staring at the car, mouth slightly agape.
At the end of the evening, a lady carrying a glass of red wine, breaks away from a party in the banda across from the gentlemen and comes to the window of the Jaguar. He could smell her opening gambit before she uttered it. “Hey! My friends dared me to come say hello to you,” she said with slight bravado. Oh hail ye, the chosen one. The one who steps up to the plate. Our character says, “Hey yourself? What’s going on there, some form of party?” She turns and gestures at the small crowd of ladies with her wine glass and says they are celebrating one of their girlfriend’s 30th birthday. “You are leaving so soon,” she pouts invitingly, staring inside the cockpit of the spaceship. He says it’s late and he’s changing venue. “But please enjoy your party and wish the birthday girl a happy one from me.” Twenty minutes later he’s picking his cousin, Yuanita, for an evening on the tiles.
The insides of the Jag glow red, the colour of passion. The sunroof remains open to allow the sight of the grey cold clouds above, streetlights shining through the car in quick columns as the Jaguar slithers soundlessly through the night.
Over the following days the Jaguar attracted even more attention. At Kasuku Center in Kileleshwa, the ventricles of the middle class , an Asian chap driving a Dodge asked him, “How is its braking system?” as his son lovingly stroked the taillights. At Oloitoktok Road roundabout, a cop pulled him over and after putting his head into the window, asked, “ Na hii si nikienda nayo ushagoo wataniroga?”
There was the female motorist on Riverside Drive. The one who in the midst of all the traffic, puckered her lips in a kiss. She was brazen and flirtatious – a sweeping flood of estrogen concentrate. There was also the brief flash of the mysterious brown girl, head covered with her scarf, face framed by that cloth; long chin, a brow rumbled in concentration, wonder, bewilderment…an emotion that totally disregarded the aloofness and dissociation of her type. It was a brief association from behind two passing windows. Then it was gone. There was the point when he stepped on the brake pedal in traffic and the car went still and silent, off even, the engine cut off from the living. When he eased his foot off the pedal, the animal in the car purred to life, like it was never subdued.
Nairobi is built on materialism. We want more. We want better. Better than the next guy. Better than what we had last year. It’s not even ambition, it’s competition. It’s also fear. Fear that you will be left behind, fear of not being cool enough, of not being noticeable enough, of not being relevant, of not being remembered or celebrated or appreciated. We are all searching for validation, in cars, in clothes, on Facebook, from strangers, in friendships, in titles. It’s a hamster race. Round and round and round we all go.
A luxury car can get you virtually anything. Parking slots suddenly appear. Gates magically swing open, no questions asked. People address you differently. It doesn’t matter if you have the personality of a guava, the temperament of a Dik Dik and the mannerism of a hippo. In Nairobi, we just refuse to get past the surface. We worship at the feet of shiny new things. Society bends towards the man with the appearance of affluence and lauds him. CM learns that money – or the impression of it – is a powerful thing. He learns that all you need to do is sit in your luxury car and not look outside. Why would you? When the whole world is looking inside at you, while only seeing the outside?
Someone emailed our character and asked, “This materialism thing, where we need to buy the latest and biggest, what happens next year when there is a new latest and biggest and what you bought this year becomes outdated?” Our character emailed back and said, “That’s a question that only we peasants struggle with, the men and women who ride these cars don’t have to answer that question. They will simply go and get the latest and biggest.”
Someone said it’s cold at the top. That it’s lonely. I don’t know man, I don’t know. I think such statements are lifelines thrown overboard for those of us who are struggling to climb onto the Titanic.
If sitting in a Jaguar F-Pace is lonely and cold, then please don’t light the bonfire just yet.
Image source: Nairobi Silhouette at Dawn by p.irungu, on Flickr/www.skyscrapercity.com