The Village beyond
She stood in front of a river and felt the urge to teleport to the opposite side. All that dominated the air was the sound of determined waters and a tight flow of mass liquids. Next to it, afar just a few meters stood a valley where kids and villagers placed their vests and hang their clothes as they took a bath from one of the tributaries. Okwamba was a good village. Especially during sunsets when its streaks pinched the horizon good enough to let the atmosphere scream through a beautiful ambience. Sunsets near Okwamba river offered zen on golden plates but it was the river described to be a home of crocodiles that villagers often referred to as monsters. Hens never drunk water from it. Not even the cocks. Cows did. But only the brave ones that hid their coward nature with courageous masks. Crickets near Okwamba river used to begin their rippling rattling noises at around seven. -When the last pot of brown ugali was set out of fire for a family to feast as they basked around it, their bodies giving up relentlessly by how their feet moved. Warmth was & is something always wanted.
She pulled her headgear downwards (it mimicked a woolen benie) as if to suppress her fears of crossing the careless river. She always knew that Okwamba river separated them from the palms of earth and one of her wishes that burned so hot was to palm read nature. Okwamba was used to the comfort of idle Columbus monkeys basking with guavas in their hands. No one disturbed a Columbus monkey because it was considered a little more disciplined and of a tiny chunk of decorum than ants. Or lizards. The beauty with this is that Okwamba looked more attractive and calm as black and white fur would be seen move about everywhere and anywhere. She huffed a sigh as her feet turned about turn, then run back to their home. It was around 6.30. Monsters would be out in minutes to laze around the river’s shores. To wait for a fool who would prod them with a stick as he/she tries to cross the river. The monsters ruled the margins of the palm.
The villagers always knew each other. They knew who loved to eat wheat. They knew the lovers of groundnuts and sugarcane and cassava. That means they celebrated whenever harvest season knocked their doors because they would share. They had hearts blanketed with soft care of goodwill to others. They knew that hearts that love each other grow together and loving a person wasn’t surreal. In times of pandemic they shared. In times of sorrow, they sang songs and stuck feathers around their waist lines because those days instagram wasn’t a social media. Katwelong’ who had admired the opposite side of Okwamba river was a revered heroine. There was a day she decided to start a process of to track the health progress of children aged below 10 years. So she used her primary school exercise book which was only issued once in a term & served a purpose of every subject in the curriculum. This was the day luck and success packed and moved in with her to live in her precious life.
Of course with the little science learnt, she managed to keep track of the children in Okwamba. She loved them and they loved her too. She was as good as a little piece of digestive biscuit dipped in hot tea. She knew what stem of Aloe vera had pulp thick enough to quarter a pot. It was her cure for skin diseases like ring worms and also an ingredient for a killer concoction for cold. She’d spot a child play shirtless in rains and she would spank it so hard, that the scene would now make a good viral video. But there’s something she never knew…
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Twende kazi!