Letters to My Son 8

Kenya’s Blockbuster Intrigues: No Guilt, so MuchFreedom 

ByCharlChotto(buddingmind@gmail.com)

Dear son,

It is a pretty tough life these days with the inflation rates ever increasing almost hitting 17% and the value of Kenyan shillings depreciating so fast and the government, like all time, with Baba Jimmy on the steering wheel claiming that life is becoming better. In the twenty first century when the world boasts of technological advances from computers to internet,2G “mulika- mwizi”phones to now 3G smart phones, improvement in Biotechnological advances in food production among others that should offer quality of life better yet, Kenya seems stuck in the world of the days gone. For months emaciated hunger stricken Kenyans had become the new blockbuster in the world box office with the Kenyan name glaring loud in the background as the producer and director. Then the Kenyans-for –Kenyans initiative came along backed by the very government which had been given warnings of the impending hunger and never turned around to take precautions and we clamoured behind the initiative as if this was the first time such human disaster occurred in Kenya. The government did not care because it was busy planning how to sabotage education of the poor Kenyan child by failing to employ more teachers thus sending the teachers on strike.

We are full of shows, from post election violence, Goldenberg and Anglo-Leasing scandals, missing funds for free education, the trials at The Hague to demonstrating teachers in Kenya-name it all-no wonder our intrigues and stunts are almost making us the most popular country in Africa. I have to smile at this point, son, because this might bring in more tourists thus more money which we can use to boost presidential campaigns next year and mega corruption that forms the best of scripts for grand movies with plump ministers and public officials who cannot play the role of convicts of graft.

This is Kenya, a space gone hay-wire. It is a place where freedom reigns that you can do anything and get away with it without guilt or fear of being caught. Today a married person can have extra marital sex and unmarried couple have the same anytime anyplace with any one and feel no guilt at all because it doesn’t matter as long as you use a condom thereafter a big “YES!”Today the fight is no more about HIV/AIDS but it is more about sex and condom: more sex and use condom!-case closed.

Son, from the Old Testament all through the New Testament to Post New Testament, God has changed a lot from the furious no-nonsense God who could smite down a whole nation to the peace loving forgiving God and to the accommodating God that he is today. It is quite amazing! Raised in a conservative Christian background I thought God was one straight being who wouldn’t wait to whip those who disregarded his presence and toyed with his name like a fellow hawking mtura along dingy corridors of Nairobi’s backstreets.

Come to think of it. Listen to Kumbamba show-the music they play. You can call it the Urban Gospel but my mama can never approve of them. They are extravagantly outrageous-she would say-but our “God” seems to like them a lot.

I was made to believe that in the church, a man should remain a man and a woman a woman in their dressing mode,mannerisms,thoughts,words and their general orientation and anything to do with God including songs sang to him should remind everyone we are in a holy place. But nay, a woman wants to be a man, a man a woman and the woman wants the man to know that she is very much in the sanctuary by dressing in tight short minis that when she sits down her thighs glimmer in the light for all the eyes to see and minds imagine of what rests a notch higher. Such are the esteemed guests of the randy pastors who pose as good shepherds but are lost sheep like the pack they lead.

Paul denies men the pleasure of long hair in the church but today men go into the church in long plaited hair, dreadlocks-all kinds and they sing songs that are 95% secular with club banger beats and dance swags “styles) that are meant for the dark dingy shit holes called night clubs. The videos have dances that are too free and not any different from the secular dances and the lyrics are near vulgar and non-distinguishable from the common lyrics of the bogus songs we hear around.

Today, the Bible is read selectively. As long as you have sex,and with a condom, before marriage or out of wedlock, despite the fact that the Bible condemns and warns against it, you can come to church and lead the choir, join the intercession team, ministries and fellowships and even preach without so much ado.

Pastors in taking care of his flock can “take care of” women whose husbands are working away from home and all the maidens in the flock have to be tested and blessed before being released to the “boys” who still value the broken bicycle called marriage. If you are broke and jobless you can compose lousy song and classify it as urban gospel-have never heard of shags gospel- or you can open a church as long as you can read a Bible.

Paul said just take little. But today alcohol is the lifestyle and thanks to Mututho, it is a new legally recognised leisure. It is readily available and you can drink and drive and cause accidents and die and go to hell because it is so easy to do everything and nothing these days.

You can go to church, find a  nice  babe,katia her and get her in the box and get the pastor out of the race and take her home after the service for a special mass.Your pastor wont pray for you before you plant in his hands nig time. When in the church and the sermon is boring because the pastor did not revise his notes well the previous night, you can watch XXX videos on your smart phone and when drunk with it scream loud and everyone around would think that you’re talking in tongues.

Does it matter.No!The twenty first century God must be a face book guy, an internet addict, a Bongo-flava fanatic, a computer genius, a musician or freedom activist who is so loving and accommodating to so much love the world and its deceits as it has turned out to be not to bother about the vector everything is taking.

Son, it is a world gone nut, this world, our Kenya. And don’t sleep, more is always coming.

Yours

Loving-Good Daddy-for-Life