Princess Muturi

Muturi sat next to me in class, at my right,and whenever we’d be required to share a text book,he’d shoot to my side like snap.
I wasn’t a big academic then, neither I’m I now.I believe in just getting the concept, then applying the rest.It works, sometimes,but not for calculations.
Muturi was particularly good in Kiswahili.He could chambua a word four times.His misamiati were unlimited.
His stringy handwriting made new teachers look up again,just to make sure-hehe.
On Sundays,when the boys went to play soccer in the rectangular strip of playground , and the girls were washing their clothes,we’d sit in class.Muturi,about two other boys,and herself.spinning stories.
I remember one story Muturi told me and I laughed the entire year. Then, everything was funny.Couldn’t determine if it was true but maybe I’ll find out;sometime.
It was about a very dangerous place where some relatives of his lived.
There,it was a world of reptiles.They were everywhere.If one plastered on a wall paper{magazeti}a family of snakes would set up camp. Not bad at all,since the dwellers have learnt a way to exist with their slim neighbours. Problem was these neighbors had other larger bodied relatives who lived in the bushes.If one was not careful, his sheep or goat would be swallowed whole.If further care wasn’t taken, a person could end up in a reptile’s stomach too.
Muturi ;however, said that a solution had been found and passed on through the generations.Sleeping with one leg folded at an angle.
After almost a decade,I can’t remember Muturi’s full names.What I remember is what he insisted on being called-Princess Kigano.
Princess Kigano, I’m told is a very effective veterinary officer .
A similarly coined story was told by the other boy who sat on my left,The Wag.Told of a place where the spiders were as big as a fist,or as he illustrated,as big as a black toad.Spiders so bad that you died instantly once bitten.
-And how do people go out to work?-
I had wanted to know.
‘Well,they use umbrella’s as shields,and one has to be able to jump,dive and duck out of the spider’s way.Otherwise you are spider’s meat. when I go there I remain indoors until it’s time to go back home,’ he said. Memories in print.16thNov.06