The Conman

He dressed for other reasons except fashion; everything on him was rated G (G for Gikomba). And like everyone else, he was trying to make it in the big city. But then there was something striking about him. He walked like he had just survived a tornado. There wasn’t a sense of purpose in his strides, he went, wherever it took him. He seemed to be escaping demons, demons that have made it clear that wherever he went they’d be steady on his heels. And so he just walked knowing all too well that the government won’t even save him.

He tried to make an acquaintance with me along Haile Sellassie Avenue. I had just emerged from traffic that was steadily building up. The sun was a little hot. I was carrying a brown envelope. May be that’s was the reason why he approached me. He thought I was a little miserable, that I had fruitlessly tried to woo fate into agreeing a dinner date at Kempinski. You, the envelope was a little worn out from manhandling. Then he saw it fit to pass me a bit of his misery. He should have had the mind to see that tuko ndani ya serikali.

‘Boss habari,’ he greeted me.

‘Poa,’ I replied, trying to sound as repulsive as the price of unga (when the price of unga was plummeting towards the sky).

‘Do you know where I can convert South Sudan currency?’ he asked. I thought him rude. He should have at least commented on the weather, what he thought about the NASA lineup, the price of unga…..you know strike a conversation. You just don’t go about asking strangers where you can convert South Sudanese currency, which I was sure he didn’t have any way. Unlike you, he thought I am bothered by the rising price of unga and milk. He thought I’d he gullible. No, man, I man above that, because we are in government. In case you wondered why we often make pathetic political decisions, collectively, we would like to clarify that we don’t want to give up a special monthly stipend for jobless people whose people are in power and those special discounts that make us immune from hiked prices of important commodities. 

Just to know the extent to which he thought of me, I asked him the currency South Sudan uses. He said pounds. He then went ahead and told me about there being a south Sudan and a north Sudan. He was trying to win me, and subsequently try to ask me to give him Kenyan money, at a terrifically low prices compared to the current market rates.

But then the notes could have been fake and that would have left me with the option of looking for desperate Kenyans hawking the same story as his.