CAGED

Chapter I "Kimani is an i***t. How can he retain us the whole meticulous day in a school shamba? Do our parents pay us school fees to go there to scoop the soil like moles? He needs a slap at his bony cheek, maybe it will help wake his senses". Eric starts concocting his rhetorical questions of which he usually provides 'answers'. He speaks like this only when they are alone with his best ally, Kevin. He is used to coming into longer heads with this teacher on different occasions. In some instances, he is found strolling in the school compound with his shirt flying in the air and collar raised to cover some parts of his skull, he is found in the prefect's list of class noisemakers and many other breaches of school rules. We can't say that Eric is that mischievous because once corrected, he cannot repeat the same oversight for the time being. Other teachers sympathize with him but this particular outmoded geography literate can't let him get away with it. He would press his ear against the tip of his pen or even slap his face when his guts directs him to do so. Today he was 'lucky' he was not alone. Kevin too had not completed the classwork. The whole class was under that punishment. So the whole geography class was working on the school's Miraa shamba the whole of this mysterious day. " It is wrong to term him an i***t though. But I don't fathom how he could expect us to complete making notes of three chapters overnight. That man might be suffering from old age stress-related ailments. I overheard his daughter mumble that he suffers from diabetes." "That might be true. He should request a break from the principal. Furthermore, he is even very old. Don't you think that his years are enough for him to go retire?" " Maybe he has not reached that age. His physical appearance might deceive you. Remember he takes about a bundle of cigarettes a day." Eric nodes, then shift the position of his books, from one hand to the other, wrapped in a nylon paper most probably a takeaway taken from their kitchen after his mother came with it from the shop. He doesn't care about some 'petty' issues such as buying a rucksack. His parents are well off but don't conspire without cohesion. They are the kind of parents who take their children to school just because it is the norm. They take them there to escape the wrath and trolls from the community members. The rest is upon the individual juvenile to decide. Eric chose to do what the community want. He shows some interest by indicating excellent performance on the class attendance list. He would be absent once in a term but under indispensable circumstances. Maybe on the death of a relative or when his parents have delayed clearing the fee arrears. In terms of academic performance, he is an average student. He gets what he gets after exerting a lot of effort. He believes that he warrants the best. Though this verdict was not his original discretion when he joined the school. He made that decision after they made a trip to the nearby University where they had visited a weather station. The whole geography class was there and after a whole day of interaction with meteorologists and students at the university, he made a resolution which he shared with Kevin. It was a coincidence since Kevin told him that he had made the same resolution. He said that all he wanted was to perform the best he can and attain a grade that will propel him to the University and study Euro Nautical Engineering. That's now where their deep friendship emanated. They had a common goal. They hang around together, discussed some difficult concepts together, are together, and even took the same workout during what used to be called P.E or rather a physical exercise. This could be related to the proverb that states that the birds of the same feathers flock together. But, on several occasions, they don't match with it. This is because Eric is slightly careless. He is sometimes found on the wrong side after failing to attend to his duties in the school during cleaning day or being caught chewing Miraa in the school compound. Kevin doesn't like these behaviors and sometimes he could –in the middle of jokes –advise him but his advice fall on deaf ears. Kevin on the contrary tries his best to avoid such trivial mistakes. As a result, teachers like him. The best part of him is his performance in the class. He is among the best mathematicians in the entire school. It is his favorite and booster subject. This is because of his struggles when handling other subjects such as geography which is regarded as the easiest of all by other students. Eric confides in him when facing mathematics whereas Kevin go to Eric when he needs to discuss geography. On matters relating to relationships with girls, they share a common rack. They don't like to hang around with girls like the form three and four boys do. They don't give too much attention to that gender though one could detect a change in behavior as well as the mood when in a discussion with them. They are not ready to enter into relationships or maybe they are buying time. The culture of the school allows them to engage in a relationship with a girl when they are in form three. For now, they are mere form twos. Some of their classmates are already in the latter but that is not a popular norm. "I will use a twenty-liter bucket to carry the water to the bathroom today. Am going to fetch it right now before the tap has been locked, that is why I have decided to leave the school this early. I will do the mathematics assignment tomorrow at four in the morning." Kevin narrates now gazing towards the junction where he usually bids goodbye to his pal on their way home. "Me too, I feel very emaciated. After taking a birth using some warm water, I know my bed will be calling me even before I could think of doing something else". " You did the assignment?" "No!". " What do you think about it?" "I think of ignoring it. Madam will understand..." " Madam will understand what? When did you hear Miriam giving attention to such memoirs as to why you didn't do her homework?" "How am I now going to answer the questions from the lesson I didn't attend?" "Remember what she said before he could cane Mutugi thoroughly." "Who? Oh, yeah. But that boy deserved it. He is very stupid. I normally calm my nerves when my buttocks are on fire after he has written my name on a f*****g noisemakers list..." "You will face the same if you don't do the assignment." "I will wake up very early tomorrow and do it before coming to the class." "Yeah, I know you will," Kevin says, mocking him. It was not the first day he has said so and came to the class late having not done it. Kevin is taking his space on the right side of the road while Eric is on the left as they walk parallel to each other. Now about to part ways to their different homes. Suddenly, behind them, a Land Rover emerges roaring very loudly. They move to one corner of the road and stop there curling themselves. These vehicles are very feared because they are driven by drivers who have successfully graduated from the school of insanity. They are hired to ensure that the perishable Miraa doesn't reach late in the store. Onboard are Miraa pluggers who hung on the vehicle's board like large monkeys, with their shirts flying and some even without them. Miraa is inside the vehicle and the women who were also the pluggers take the space left inside. Others–now young men– are the ones forthwith experiencing the tides of being swayed from one side to the other, up and down, in and out, and any other side that the vehicle may force them to take, but releasing where you are holding is by your own risk. They are also masters of this art because they seem to enjoy it. They compose work songs that involve the use of nasty utterances and even insult anyone who tries to make their vehicle lower the speed like the bodaboda riders who are most commonly the victim of their wrath. Some are younger than Kevin and Eric, who have left the school to join this career. This vehicle passes Kevin and Eric like lightning leaving behind a cloud of dust which the two will wait to clear the air before they continue moving. From a distance, they can hear the vehicle get anchored in the nearby store where now the janitors start giving orders and threats to the vehicle's battalion who they claim are wasting the time getting out of the vehicle, which is not the case according to the with Anders who might be there. The way these people jump out you may think that they are all medal owners in the high jump. Not that Kevin and Eric are new to this. Furthermore, you can't be a true Igembe man if you don't have these skills, whether young or old. It's like basic skills which someone must learn after initiation of the circumcision which according to the modern taboo one must have completed his basic primary education. If you had no privilege of having individual perseverance to finish that course, your parents can organize for the ritual when you are fifteen to twenty years. This ritual itself is not a joke as one is supposed to show a lot of perseverance and courage. You will have to go through a lot of emotional and physical anguish. Some of these that left the school early have stories they share about how they truncated the later journey. They share these stories when in their work as Miraa managers, pluggers, or even owners of the stores. Some of them use these stories to mock those who persist in studying or have studied and graduated but don't secure jobs. Those who mock them are those who don't go places beyond Igembe where Miraa is grown. Others give these while lamenting and wishing that they would have concentrated and studied. These know the value of an educated person in the community. They also ensure that they create groups that ensure that they give support to the community scholars. They believe that a society that doesn't embrace education is a community of bushmen. Chapter ll  Kevin arrives home and finds his uncle is bathing in his house -since his house had multiple uses. He decides to go and fetch some water before he would finish. The water is around two hundred meters away from his uncle’s home. They get the water from his grandfather who has a tap in his home. His grandfather is just a caretaker appointed to oversee the water project of a group of people in the community who came together and contributed money to get water piped to their village on realizing that their women were aging very first, in an artificial manner.  Kevin went and found him seated in his stool outside his was. After exchanging greetings, he clears his throat. “Kebin”, he calls him with his local dialect. “I have a question I would like to ask you”, he said with his thunderous voice that used to be feared by Kevin's father himself. When he had visited them in their home where they lived after getting their share of the shamba away from this man’s home, he work up one day in the middle of the night, took his walking stick. His house was built in the middle of a piece of land he had left for himself after sharing the other with his sons. He started panting so loudly that he wakes many villagers. This is because his panting was accompanied by a whistling sound that was louder than that of a Weaverbird. He made this sound in intervals after taking two steps, maybe after getting exhausted from moving his heavy body. He walked as his steps were being measured by the roused villagers until he reached Kaberia's house. Kevin was not asleep and he could hear his father opening the door for him. He entered the house and got to the sitting room where he selected a seat near the door. He told Kaberia to close the door and match near him. He relinquished. He got hold of the color of his shirt and now what seemed to be a truce visit turned out to be chaotic. He furiously started questioning him. “ I told you to s*******r a he-goat for me. How can you enter this house built on my land and comfortably lock it knowing very well that you haven’t done that?”, he interrogated him, with his eyes wide open. “Mzee am sorry am going to pick my money at dawn for Miraa that I sold today. I assure you that tomorrow morning the he-goat will be slaughtered”, he knew that that would insinuate nothing. Nothing was going to save him from receiving some strokes in his back. A man with a family. Feared by other men including his sons, now under the mercy of his dad. One father is worth more than a hundred schoolmasters, but not the ilk of this particular father. His main problem is going beyond his peripheries.  “Am I a child? You regard me as a child now that you have a family?”, he was saying this fuming with fury. The next step was Kaberia being yanked by his collar behind his neck, violently drugged closer, and heavy strokes on his back from the stick he had as a walking stick. “Am sorry Mzee! Am sorry!”, he squared. No one came to extricate him. Who would endeavor to play with fire? Like Jesus suffering alone–without the people who used to pledge their loyalty – he bore the hostility alone. In this case, now, his children and his wife depend on him to feed and get protection. None of them was asleep. They were hearing how the cane landed on the indigent man's back like a flat surface. It would also prove embarrassing to go and try to beg for his release. On being released, he walked out of his house sobbing like a kid. He was not crying because of the aching back. That was a minor issue. Of course as a man you train yourself to cope with the situations by trying to cover some potholes so that you may not fall a victim to falling in one of them in case you slide. And in case of falling a casualty, you know that is your fault since you didn’t cover it before. But this one is not the kind the problem we are talking about. We are talking about the obstacles out there that emerge as you try to cater to your family’s needs. This thorn is your father. The tremendous torment was knowing that there was nothing he could do to his father. To exterminate him was to guarantee your demise or worst if there is any. To a man with reasoning and no bad omen in him, enduring these strokes was better than thinking otherwise.   His father used to demand this and that from them. Not that he was so much in need. He had his acres of land with Miraa plantation that gave him a lot of money every harvesting season–which was about three weeks. During this period it fetched a lot of money since it was being airlifted to London and the middle east. One would wonder how he would spend all of it and still turn to his sons. He was very extravagant. He had a bell outside his shop at his home which he used to ring every morning. The first villager to come to the compound would receive a lot of goodies from the shop. He told them that the early bird catches the worm. As a result, people thronged his compound every early morning when the bell rang. He had built his strength from the goats he butchered every month. Sometimes he would call other village elders to come and feast with him the resources his sons had amassed through sweat, blood, and tears.  Kaberia knew very well since the day he heard that he was going to see his shamba and would spend a week there, the villagers will feast out of his goat. He had the money the day before but could not go and buy a he-goat when he had students at home who had been sent to pick school fees. He decided to let the buying of the he-goat wait until the following day. Now he has been sent out even before the day would come. He would like to send an elder to go and try to persuade the fellow elder but it would be risky even to the arbitrator. Not even a solitary elder would allow being engaged in such a case involving that ludicrous man. He had to look for someone to lend him the money before the worst could happen. He knew very well that a little fire is a better quickly trolled out before the worst could happen.  He still found no freedom despite moving away from his father's compound and starting his family. That didn’t change anything. He is still his father’s child or so his father believes. He thought of his life since he was born around four decades ago and found that he has never tasted the fruits of freedom. There is a time when his father was very important to him but for now, he has no importance. Haas didn’t push him to follow the right lane and get an education. He is suffering in the village whereas he had an opportunity to study and get a chance to work on offices in Nairobi city. His father had all the resources at his disposal but didn’t use them, and still followed him in his poverty life. He can’t keep a goat in his home like other men in the village. His father didn’t like seeing a goat in the compound. He would demand it to be slaughtered quickly.  He remembered his younger brother who has turned out to be a drunkard after giving up. The last episode was his father chasing away all his family after he refused to buy him a he-goat. His wife returned to his father’s home together with the children. Then his brother joined a group of lazy men in the village who works only for something that can buy a jug of the local brews which the government has vetoed. He pities his brother when he finds him having devoured a lot of alcohol and got blackout on the way to his house. He finds village kids making fun of him and holds him up and leads him to his house. He doesn’t blame him. He puts all the blame on his father. His brother was a very ambitious man and had a lot of respect in the village until his father started demanding one goat per week. It was too much for a young man who had three bellies to feed and provide for. He had once or twice thought of making the sake resolution but he reminds himself that he has a family to feed. Since he married, he vowed to give the best to his family no matter what. And has lived till this age trying to fulfill his promises amid hardships.                                       *** “Between your uncle who is here and your father who is away, who can be called a father?” The old man asks him. Kevin doesn’t understand how he can answer this question. How can Does he compare his father with his uncle? “ I ask you this because I know your father doesn’t know what you eat or drink before you go to school when you are here. It is your uncle who knows”, he illustrates. But still, Kevin doesn’t understand this question. These are two different people with separate kin ties. His father pays for his school fees. It was him who talked with Kevin's uncles so that Kevin could stay there. His father does everything apart from paying for accommodation and daily meals when Kevin is in school. His grand might be out of his mind when asking this kind of a question. But wait. This old lad is known for asking questions with more profound meaning than what one ought to think. He would trap adults with such questions and when responded carelessly, he would swoop his mishap. Kevin had to buy time for this. “Can I come back later and answer that question?”, “ That’s wise of you. Of course, you can come even tomorrow”, he said. Kevin went to fetch his water. That question still ringing his head. He knew very well that it didn’t concern his uncle. He strode carefully with his water can balancing on his head which at the same inside it was trying to get the meaning of every term.   His thoughts carried him further into remembering where he biologically belong. Indeed, he is not a member of this family. His DNA is different. He has grown as a stranger to everybody. He has no identity since he has no defined home to call his home. His biological father is of a different tribe. He spent his entire childhood there until he reached class eight of his eight years of primary education. His father could not take him to a good hospital after falling sick. His mother had to go and pick him and take him to the hospital. It’s only a mother who can understand the pain of the suffering son. Now they count him as a stranger since he is not born into this family. On the other hand, his father could not take him to the hospital because he had no money. He spent a lot of money with his other kids. He just didn’t care. He passed a lot of stigma in that family and it was evident that he was not welcome. He could go to school measuring the temperature using his bare feet on the hash temperatures since his father didn’t mind buying him shoes. He is not welcome here either. That he knows very well. But he had given an appropriate answer to avoid being expelled. In this case, his uncle was the real father. ‘Yes! That’s the answer I was looking for, he tells his conscience. He knows that it takes to his biological father, secondary education with becoming just a forsaken dream. His father will just show him space and tell him to build his house. The next thing without even being directed is to start a family.