She was a nightmare. I do not know why,
exactly, but she used to send shivers down my young spine. We were in class two.
And every morning we secretly prayed she never showed up to teach. And of course,
our relationship with god was at its infancy, therefore unanswered.
Every morning, whispers ‘she’s coming’
would rent the classroom and we’d all peep through the window to confirm. I
guess seeing is believing. Mrs. Chirchir would be ambling across the field in
pace that made us extra tense as we tried to welcome the impending doom.
The mere act of crossing the field taught
us two things: that whatever is abominable for us was perfectly acceptable for
adults. Taking a detour across the field was akin to insulting the king. I
guess it was an early lesson, which we did not get, that adults can do whatever
they want.
I didn’t like Mrs. Chirchir at all. She had
two children, a boy and a girl. They were two really annoying children. I think
they intentionally chokozad others and if you lay a finger on them or even act
like it, you’d encounter the rath of their mother. We kept our distance,
leaving the kids to annoy themselves. And they often fought, with the boy, being
younger, was more ferocious than an accosted lion.
Mrs. Chirchir did not do me anything to me
of note. Except I lived in mortal fear of her. One day, she came to class
surreptitiously and found me talking with my desk mate Edu. We were doing our
assignments and Edu was apparently copying from me and I was letting him know
about it.
“Ati unanionea hii!!” I said within Mrs.
Chhirchir’s earshot.
“Kumbe unaongeanga ivo?” She asked. At the
time, I knew hell had broken loose. I knew I would be turned into mince meat.
But she didn’t. she let it slide but that simple act did not make me like her
at all.
Fridays were hellish days for us. This was
the day we’d be asked to fetch fresh cow dung from a neighbor to improve the
aesthetics of our classroom floor. It wasn’t’ cemented. It was hellish for us
boys because it was an indignifying chore. It was emasculating and the woman in
Mrs. Chirchir used that opportunity to diminish our manhood – it wasn’t that
advanced but it was manhood nevertheless.
