findme

There must have been 2000 people on the subway that summer evening. Some lost in thought, others chatting while most just incessantly stared at their phone screens.I spotted an old woman struggling to tighten grip on the central bar for support. She was quite tiny and if it were not that the guy in front of her bent to pick up something, where she stood would have just looked like a void that simply would not succumb to the massive crowd.
“???????”(grandma, please come and sit) I groped around and managed to get hold of her hand and slowly led her to where I was sitting before. She looked up at me in awe. She then smiled and in a deep hoarse voice whispered “???”(thank you).The wrinkle under her eye extended and disappeared behind the strand of grey hair that hang down her petite visage. In the gap where her incisors once were I saw someone, a face so familiar, smiling at me with a cavity just as wide in her teeth.
My grandmother loved it when I brought her, her favourite seat . The two baobab sticks tied together with dried creepers and covered with smooth shiny cow hide. She loved to sit on it and watch the sun sink into the hills surrounding Bulesa.
Bulesa, a small town only imaginary on the map in northern Kenya is where I was raised.where the winds always roared with ancestors moaning over the drought and famine that took their wealth. Home to only the pastoralist community of the Borana, I was able to experience my culture in its purity. Every morning, with the sun’s golden rays peeping in from the slits in the grass thatched roof, my 4 brothers and I woke up to the aroma of fresh cow milk tea waffling in the air giving our stomachs a cue to grumble. After the scrumptious breakfast, we would take the cattle to look for pasture.
Mum was always worried about us being out the wild, albeit being well aware that it was part of the apprenticeship in order to be recognized as men by the society. We were more worried for her and our 6 sisters though, since they had to toil all day attending to the myriads of men that flocked to our home to discuss what they called important affairs with my father. They also had to walk to the outskirts of town, near where only the crumbling hut of Asha, the mad woman stood to collect firewood.it was the life of a woman, the curse of the child-bearer.