In Daddy's Shadow
I still go to
Hairif Cafe at the Coast Bus junction of Mwembe Tayari in Mombasa. Back in the
day it was Baba's favourite. It was actually his second choice. His favourite
place at Raha Leo behind the old Mwembe Tayari Market was demolished. I never
ate anything there. The place was teeming with flies. It used to be the Raha
Leo Hotel but we just called it Hoteli
ya Mainzi or the ‘Flies’' Hotel. I believe the flies got good
nourishment from the mounds of garbage left to rot in the street. There was
also a butchery next where they hung the meat in the open. There was no refrigeration.
In popular
Kiswahili 'hoteli' generally refers
to restaurant even though the correct term is 'mkahawa'.
Baba loved
the boiled goat soup or ‘supu ya mbuzi'
they served with chapati 'mchicha' or amaranths and an optional
pair of bananas. Now that I am old enough to think, I realize there aren't that
many places in town where they serve African cuisine. The ubiquitous Chicken
and Chips which we so loved is all you find in most places. These days the
Hairif serves that as well but I can tell you it is not what they sell most.
Pilau, biriani and the quintessential Supu
ya Mbuzi rank way up there.
Into the Rabai sunset, Baba walked.
Now I can
hear some say isn't pilaf a Middle Eastern dish? Yes and no- Middle Eastern and
Turkish dishes are so loved here and have been loved for centuries there are
our dishes. The samosa, kebab and mshkak are very much our own dishes they are hawked in the streets.
That is what you will eat at the Hairif. We simply call them Swahili Dishes.
The Hairif is
not where you will take your girl for a date. Mostly it is commuters shuttling
in and out of town you will find there. The waiters shout out your order to the
counter much like an amplified echo as you utter. Just how the cooks note the
orders is a mystery. Each waiter will repeat the current order as they pick up
plates. The cacophony of voices marks the uniqueness of this very Swahili
restaurant. The faces have changed but the style reaching back into the roots
of my childhood remains.
They still
have bright lighting, Formica-topped tables and large mirrors all round the
place. They finally did away with the flowered Formica tables but that was
after they were cracked in many places. Thanks to the holy month of Ramadan,
the place gets a fresh coat of paint annually.
It looks
pretty garish and my son giggles every time I take him there. He too calls it 'Hoteli ya Daddy'. It's a no
frills place where the waiters and one waitress wear none-too-attractive lab
coats for a uniform and in the mornings,
a guest cowpeas vendor sits at a corner dispensing her dish cooked in thick coconut
milk. This particular dish has always been outsourced in Swahili restaurants-
why so is a mystery to me. These days even the chapati and mahamri are
probably prepared elsewhere. I cannot vouch for their quality except trust
Hairif to choose the best for me.
The waitress is a fairly recent addition.
That is after a lady took over counter duties in this largely male
establishment. In the 1980s it was unusual to see an unaccompanied woman here.
Things have changed.
The service
starts with the mandatory glass of water banged on the table as your order is
taken. Yes, the waiter bangs the tub just to catch your attention. It is
actually not a glass tub. Stainless steel tubs have taken the place of glass.
Plastic water jugs too have taken over from their glass predecessors. Baba used
to make a flourish of examining the contents for impurities by opening the
cover to peer at the water before drinking. He was not at all worried about the
flies at the ‘Flies’ Hotel. The food was steaming hot, he said. That did not
detract him from waving them away as he sipped on his soup. I would be sipping
on a soda while clutching the shopping basket. I had to- outside street
gamblers plied their illegal trade. Sometimes they staged mock fights and in
the confusion they pinched a wallet or even carted away a whole bag. They
usually picked on children or women.
Many times I
had to sit in wait at the ‘Flies’ Hotel. My dad had a gambling habit which took
him to Gupta's down Raha Leo street where gruff men hung around. Yet he was
quite amiable. He sang in the bathroom and enthralled us with his deep baritone
during evening prayers. Usually he said he would only be away briefly. I would
watch the happenings in the street for all the hours he was away. I could as
well walk home without him but that was sure to bring Mama to a boil. So I
watched as street cons took advantage of rural folks or greedy first-timers
trying their hand at a game of cards.
Usually, they
let the first-timers win a couple of games. I guess it was to gauge how much
they had on them. Then the rookie would lose all subsequent plays. I saw many
adult men weep on Raha Leo Street. That is contrary to the meaning of the
phrase 'Raha Leo'. It means, Joy Today. If a clever fellow refused to play on
after the first win, the cons started a fist fight. They won either way because
they were all gang members.
For all his
love of Mombasa town, Baba loved MwembeTayari and the zigzagging Raha Leo
Street the most. As the Raha Leo Street wound eastwards towards Digo Road, it
played host to all manner of trades. There were the street-side vegetables
vendors, handy goods salemen peddling anything from mouse traps to 'suta', or street preachers sparring
over which faith was truly God's word. Back in the day religious sparring was a
good-natured affair bringing out guffaws in the crowd.
The 'suta' salesmen hissed out the word from
behind clenched teeth. They were actually backstreet pharmacists peddling
penicillin tablets for the treatment of gonorrhea. I was to find out later that
the law was you had to go to hospital with the person who infected you in order
to get treatment. Little wonder there were so many 'suta' salesmen hissing up and down the street. Of course the cons
took advantage to peddle chalk as medicine.
These were not the only medicine
men in the street. Some men in traditional gear sat under makeshift shelters.
They had an array of roots and herbs for sale. The much loved 'Kungu manga' was on sale here. It's potency was legendary. It was said
the man who took the herb had stamina to last a full night or more. If he
lacked a woman he could even run amok. Of course you had to know who to buy
from because the herbalists were also cons. Not all that was peddled as ‘Kungu Manga’ had aphrodisiac powers.
Shoe shiners
and roast maize sellers made an extra coin on the side peddling marijuana. In
fact, they were not really shoe shiners or maize sellers; they were drug
peddlers. It is not surprising that when heroin entered the market Mwembe
Tayari and the Raha Leo Street became the main market in the town. Things start
from somewhere.
If you ventured
beyond the tarmac and into the slums, fair-skinned ladies lay in wait. In the
most seductive Kiswahili, they enticed men. Well, not all were gifted with fair
skin. Many had only the face bleached white. You could clearly see where the
Ambi Cream reached. It covered as far as the palm could reach living the rest
of the face dark as nature willed. I must confess curiosity drew me to peer at
the happenings in the alleys. On a lucky day you actually got to see a woman
advertise her thighs by letting the wrapper fall off- nothing wanton, just a calculated
act of carelessness. It was not unusual to see a drunk lumber out of those
alleys while buttoning up his trousers. Remember zippers were not that common
in the early 1980s.
Word in the
street held that not all the welcoming voices were female. Some men plied the
same trade under the cover of female dress. Baba pointed out one to me one day.
There was no knowing for sure if he was male. He was draped in a bui bui. It was also said the men often lured unsuspecting clients into the brothels to rob them. I never ventured beyond the tarmac...
A short arc
to the south leads to Blue Room Restaurant. It was not
always at the present site on Haile Selassie Road. It was actually hidden away
in the arc but always had big pretensions. They had slot machines in Blue Room
long before they became famous in the country. My gambling dad never to let
luck slip away, would let me play. Everyone was born with his luck, he said. It
was not illegal for children to play slot machines those days. I cannot
remember winning anything. Of course Baba made sure I kept the matter secret.
Some things were not for women, he said. But Blue Room was the best restaurant
I had ever been to. Here they served chips but Baba never bought me fries. It
was not far too expensive, he said. Indian kids ate fries as I watched. Usually
Baba insisted on coffee and chapati here yet we only took the cheaper tea at home. I kind
of like coffee now.
They pulled
down much of the Old Mwembe Tayari Market and banned street trading along Raha
Leo Street. The place has taken a more
respectable sheen but you cannot miss the attendant chaos resident in the area.
When drug dealers took over the abandoned upper floors of the old Mwembe Tayari
Market, we watched. Government did nothing. Thieves set base up there making
the area a no-go zone after dark for years. But Baba never stopped
going there. He only warned that the key was self-discipline.
He was a good
Christian man, Baba. Prayed morning and night, never raised his hand or voice
at anyone but still gambled. He never drank and was always home by evening news
at Seven. Yet everyday he strolled from work to Guptas to bet on English races.
He loved things English. He was born in the year King George became King of
England. His father named him George. The English, he often intimated were the
most civilized. Were it not for them the
world would be in the Dark Ages, he said. The only problem with colonialism was
the Colour Bar, said Baba. Otherwise
the British were better managers. I gathered that even in the application of
their unjust Pass Laws they were ruthlessly efficient.
He often hummed
‘What a Wonderful World’ and when I asked who sang the tune he said- ‘Don’t you
know Satchmo?’ Then he dozed off. I had to go and find out for myself who
Satchmo was- then I fell in love with jazz…. And the blues.
He read Time
Magazine which I became familiar with very early on. His racing magazines were
not to be touched. He could have won big many times, he said. Only he did not
have the money to place big bets. Once he pointed out a bus conductor who
risked the day’s collection to win big. The fellow won a hundred thousand
shillings. Mama did not understand, he said. Gambling was not bad. It was not
like beer or womanizing- those were the worst things that could happen to a
man.
When, I had a chance to choose- I chose beer
over gambling. Gambling made things hard for us. Baba was always short of cash.
And not just that- Mama was always fearful Baba would gamble his last penny. I
hate gambling. I cannot buy a sweepstake ticket and dread walking into a
casino. Many times I have wanted to walk into a casino but cannot. There could
be some bewitching spirit lying in wait. I could find myself captive. It is
now ten years since Baba died.
Of the many things he taught me I never took
up gambling. I have never tried it consciously unless it is foisted upon me
through product promos. I listened to Mama’s voice on that one but went against
both to become the only one in a religious family of ten to imbibe. I still plan
to go to a casino in Baba’s honour.
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