BORN TAO: How my village nemesis became my hero  

The third term of any school year was always special because it meant Christmas was on its way. Third term also meant working extra hard in school to earn presents during Christmas. Growing up, Savco jeans was the best present one could get.

My above average grades guaranteed me space in Class Four having beaten my closest rival and cousin Suzy by five points. And that was a big deal.

You see, Suzy was older than me by four months, and that is important to know because we had sibling rivalry even without being siblings.   

I wish we had family WhatsApp groups back then where we could display our results side by side. That would really have been something. But I hatched a plan that would fall into place during the family get-together on Christmas Day.

The unwritten law in our family demanded that all members congregate to shags (upcountry) for Christmas festivities.

In shags, muratina (traditional wine) would be brewed to quench the thirsts of the city uncles and two he-goats would meet their deaths to please nyama choma cravings as well.  My older cousins would join my uncles to skin the goats and roast the intestines and roast mutura to our amazement.

Uncle Masha was the chairman of the goat-eating festivities. His fame with the knife was a wonder to behold.

He would double-skin a goat, by first removing the outer coat then the inner coat that would skin thin red meat to be cut into small pieces, mixed with hot blood and traditional herbs before being inserted into the intestines and roasted into golden brown mutura.

I had to make sure my shags modo (upcountry residents) relatives had to know Born Tao was there to make a statement.

I flossed a good share of Eastland’s best sheng pretending that I did not understand our mother tongue vernacular language and unfortunately that did not go well with grandpa.

FURIOUS

He was so furious that he called for an abrupt family meeting giving my uncles and aunts a thorough lecture on failure to teach his grandchildren their native language and culture. This lecture also meant that the salvo of sheng words I had specifically I had prepared for Suzy my shag modo cousin would go to waste!

But all was not lost. I decided to channel my inner Chuck Norris (I had watched him in the Walker Texas Ranger show on KBC) and challenge Suzy to a fight. She had won a fighting match between us the last time and I would make sure I won this time round.

This is how the revenge went down.

Shosh Manyaga, our grandmother, sent Suzy to buy salt from the village kiosk and requested me to accompany her. I did not like the idea especially it took me away from the nyama choma festivities.

On our way back, we met Mwesh the village bully, he was our immediate neighbor and he five years older than us.

He asked me, "Unaniweza?" (Can you fight me?)

I nodded hesitantly.

Suzy was silent.

WILD IMAGINATION

My imagination mind went wild. I briefly wondered whether it was a setup by Shosh to finish me off. Mwesh asked again, and this time he placed a stone on the left palm of his hand, daring me to knock it off.

"Angusha tujue wewe ni mwanume.” The battle line was drawn. I was on my own and circumstances forced me to man up.

I threw the first jab with precision, trying to hit fast and hard. I knew it was the only punch I would throw in the whole fight.

He brushed it off his shoulders, I missed terribly.

He attacked me, raining blows and kicks.

I covered my head with my arms and screamed for help.

And then Suzy did the unthinkable. She leapt onto his back and bit his ear so badly that he bled. She had bitten off a chunk of his ear.  

Mwesh screamed so loudly, alerting women selling at village kiosk to come to our direction.

The boy was bleeding profusely and they rushed him to the local dispensary carrying the torn part of the ear with them.

We were frog-matched to the village headmen’s office where spent the rest of the morning before our parents came to get us.

I have never challenged Suzy for a fight since that day.