Meet Gesengei. He’s Samburu. The thing with Samburus is that everybody mistakes them for the Maasai. It pisses them off, and rightfully so. It’s like someone who keeps calling you James when you are Martin and you can’t muster enough nerve to tell them that (cue: shouting) your name is freaking Martin! Or those people who are too lazy to say your name so they shorten it.
Gesengei is particularly irked at ignorant people (like me) assuming that he is Maasai. He is also sick of people asking him “Have you killed a lion before?” or “Is it true that when lions smell you, they take off?” These are people he would love to spear. But he can’t spear anyone because he has a job and his job is to protect these nosy ill-bred miscreants. So he smiles a lot and answers your numbing questions. But come on accept it, it’s tempting to ask a Maasai, er, Samburu such questions? I mean, are you going to squander that chance and instead ask him, “Say, has the infrastructure in Samburu improved over the years?” An opportunity with a Maasai or even a Samburu calls for an idiotic session of Q&A, like the one I regaled this poor guy with.
I met Gesengei at Kigio wildlife camp Lodge over the weekend. Kigio Wildlife camp is one of those posh lodges where tourists pay a leg and an arm to eat breakfast by a river while watching hippos fart. Have you heard a hippo fart? No? Good. But talking of which, hippos are real ugly creatures. When you see a whole gang of them hanging out in water, they look like sausages immersed slightly in a frying pan full of oil. And they stink in the mouth, I hear. I’m not a hippo fan. Maybe a croc.
I digress.
Kigio is an enchanted place built at the shores River Malewa. Every suite is built by a river. All the suites are interconnected by these footpaths. Red-backed acacia trees and thick shrubs mark this lodge. Wild animals wander around this place at night and when you check in the management gives you this rechargeable motor torch with firm instruction. Should you want to leave your suite for the restaurant at night, or go for a ciggie break, all you are required to do is stand at your door and flash this torch in darkness,. Gesengei or one of his cahoots will then pick you up and walk you to the restaurant.
Of course you have the tough (read drunk) city sleekers who have watched a whole lot of 24 series and who will try and walk the 100meters of so through the thicket thinking they are Jack Bauer. These are folk who make such easy dinner for Leopards, or better still get gored by a moody buffaloes. Something, I’m sure, can really cheer Gesengei up.
I don’t believe in action heroes, so I flashed my torch and sure enough this ominous figure in the form of Gesengei showed up at my door to walk me to the main restaurant. I observed that there is something insulting by a full grown man being walked by another man. It’s cowardly. I was glad the moon wasn’t up, that would have been just wrong. Anyway, to break the ice, I chatted up Gesengei, who I shall refer to here as Gee.
“So have you killed any lions?”
I swear I could hear him control his breathing and slowly count back from 100.
“No.” Came the reply eventually.
“Never?”
“Never.” Gee murmured.
“But you have seen a lion, yes?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, how close was it?”
“About two meters.” Gee says.
“No way!” I’m getting excited now. “And it didn’t try to grab you or something?!”
“No, it was on TV.”
Touché.
You see what’s going on here, don’t you? Old boy Gee here is yanking my chains because I’m sure he feels like he should be fielding such airy questions from a white person and not a miro like me. But what he doesn’t know is that I’ve had a few glasses of wine and so I’m shameless and it would take threats of being fed to the hippos to stop me.
“But surely, as a Maasai you have to kill a lion to be called a man.”
“Yes.”
“So you are not a man?”
“I am a man.”
“Er, how and you haven’t killed a lion before?”
“That’s because I’m not a Maasai.”
“You aren’t?”
“No.”
“What are you then because…well, your ears, they are…”
“I’m Samburu.”
“I thought Samburu was a town?”
Gee laughs, or rather it sounds like a laugh. It might have been a small chuckle, or a snort. Something you do when you encounter someone with a smaller IQ than a Dik Dik – that little animal that looked like a shrunk antelope.
“So how can you tell a Maasai from a Samburu?” I push on.
“You can’t.”
Pause.
“Do you fear Maasais?” I ask.
That slow breathing again, he is counting from 50 now.
“No.”
“What about lions?”
“What about them?”
“Do you fear them?”
“No.”
“What about Hyenas, I hear they can crash your Samburu bones with their jaws.”
“No.” he mutters.
“Yes, they can.”
“I mean, no, I don’t fear them.”
“Oh.”
We are at the entrance of the restaurant now. I stop and fish in my pockets for a tip.
“Are you married?” I ask him.
“Yes, sorry.” (Laugh out loud)
(Ok, he didn’t say sorry. I thought I’d add that because it
would have been funny had he said it.)
“How many wives do you have?”
“Three.”
“Three! How old are you man?”
“34?”
“You are a busy man, very busy, if you know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t”
“Right, damn, three wives, all pretty I suppose?”
“Two are.”
I laugh here. I didn’t want to ask why the one wasn’t pretty. I suspect I wouldn’t understand.
“Listen, you are a lucky man Gee. Say, do you know who Tiger Woods is?”
“Who?”
Never mind.