Thoughtful Feeds

In the journey to break barriers, I haven’t been solo. I am in a long line in my generation. I know because the evidence of the life upon me isn’t what I would wish for my consequent generation.  All of us are in long lines. You are in a long line waiting for that Super Metro to fill up so that you can get home. You patiently sit, listening to a podcast or music that offer an escape because raw dogging life isn't for the weak. On your left is a fellow Kenyan sitting against an open window oblivious of the fact that ownership of his phone is about to be forcefully transferred; you want to warn them, but you're tired and detached from giving a fuck about other people's woes - your own have already become a heavy burden.  He has three girlfriends. He knows or not; about the fact that he is managing a queue while being in one. He is bar ely managing his finances. He queues for loans in banks where he finds others queueing - for car loans, mortgages, weddings etc. He queues to...

Bars on bars like soap on a pub counter. Crack on crack are those drugs hidden in a broken wall? Shade on shade my boy got disrespected under a tree. Dang! "I'm on a roll" that's what chapati would say. Not the intro I was going for but, when the mind decides to cook you let it. Off the line I'll admit it's been a while since I wrote anything creative. Been busy chasing the elusive bag that I failed to take a pause to reflect on life. I recently switched jobs and it's been eight weeks of service at my new job. Two months later, switching from the media industry to the humanitarian world and moving from Nairobi to Northern Kenya, I have been turned  from a wizard to an apprentice. At NMG, I had the work routine memorised. Now, I have to formulate a new routine to make my work easier and also to have and feel a flow that will give me purpose. I have tried a couple of routines; I know the perfect one nears revelation. Moving wasn't the easiest decision be...

Hi, it’s me! Pato! It has been a hot minute, hasn’t it? You must even have forgotten I exist LOL. Well just in case you are wondering. I have been doing fine. “Fine” is an understatement really, I have been doing great actually. Thanks for asking. I'm sharing this with you because you abruptly stopped responding to our conversations, you outrightly ghosted me, or we unexpectedly fell out of contact in some way. I am of course devastated beyond repair, as your attention was all that was sustaining me in these troubled times, but somehow, I find ways to soldier on. I bet you' have missed my writing. Today, prepare to have your mind blown. But I haven’t been practicing. I have suffered writer’s block for sometime so also lower your expectations I'll be a little rough around the edges.  Don’t you just want to catch a break or a hiatus sometimes? To be by the beach, with vast turquoise waters, eating fruit with someone special. Her, wearing little to nothing and you wearing sunn...

We are at a public park, oddly relaxing on a huge couch. Just chatting and enjoying light banter. A bit too cossy for the niche. She says she has an idea of where we could have fun, and all I need to do is trust her. I close my eyes as she places a device on my wrist and turns it on. I feel myself passing out.   Next instance, I am a virtual being, a ghost  and I can see myself lying unconscious. She is too but I can't see her ghost self. I jump back to my body and because I'm panicking and curious with questions.  I shake to wake her. "What's happening?" She explains that the ghost device gives you the opportunity to see the world differently but the only downside is, you cannot meet fellow ghosts because brains individually project how one views the world and it's different with everyone. I question whether it is possible to move things and scare people to which I'm informed with a nay. Only thing I can do is imagine anything or anywhere and ...

In an oversized khaki short exposing dusty, scarred knees, I am sat on the third last desk of the middle row in class 5 West. Waist up I'm in a blue sweater covering a sky-blue shirt. The sweater is holed on the elbows, worn out by contact with my wooden desk, necessitated by the constant need to hold up my head to stay awake for each forty-minute lesson. Madam Irene is in class today but I was  'mtu wa mjengo', busy laying brick and mortar for my golden castle in the air. Every new brick sent me further away from class that I failed to realise my blank gaze had been spotted and Teacher Irene was stealthily walking towards me, armed with a hot slap. Pah! "Come back to class!" I'm not sure which my brain registered first, the pain or the words, but I was instantly brought back to reality.  Lower Primary School felt like being stuck in an unending cycle, I never grasped the necessity to read and understand, cramming was how I passed exams. The cycle begun early ...