Confessions of ‘playing guitar with kunguni’ at Raha Yangu Lodge

Bar banter occasionally drifts to incriminating experiences when the mouth is motorised by too much onywaji.

And so it was that when Papa English executed the shocking un-odiero move of throwing a helicopter round, talk turned to ‘sinning out’ at Raha Yangu Bar & Lodging.

Raha Yangu, which translates to ‘my happiness,’ it turned out, could provide chapters on ‘debauchery and decadence.’

Even raia you never thought had for a session of kutoshanisha mikonyo like Waka-Knife, our eternal butcher, had slept at Raha Yangu.

Swilling half a bottle of ‘Naps,’ motivated the ‘surgeon’ to slur about how he was shocked by the key to Room 13, which was inconveniently located next to the communal toilet that always reeked of fumes indicative that those who did their ‘long drop’ there had drowned in copious amounts of ‘engine oil’ (Guinness).

The key was the size of a safari bag padlock. But the wooden holder could have passed for an undressed nine-by-nine stone at Gituamba Quarry.

Kot-Kot gulped those long swigs that drew his booze to half the glass, and wondered why Raha Yangu provided mismatched slippers that were sliced with a hack saw such that half the feet dragged towards the slimy bathroom - with a pipe for a shower - that gushed cold water like a waterfall.

Kang’ethe, the ‘old metal’ at the local confessed he stopped ‘bending petticoats’ in lodgings after forgetting that small Flamingo soap in his coat pocket five times, besides wearing his boxers inside out and the long suffering spouse taking the ‘exhibits’ to wazee back in Mweiga in Nyeri County.

Papa English never returned to Raha Yangu after playing guitar with his body due to that small matter of chawa na kunguni being embedded on the wooden bed that resembled a regrettable gift from Manyani Detention Camp.

Diameter, the political analyst, says his only beef with Raha Yangu is the irritating habit of female room attendants shouting: “Toeni mashuka!” just when he was about to beg for a ‘discount’ for poking kichwa tu.

Why Owish ‘Jakom’ once went to Raha Yangu to break ‘a certain commandment’ but ended up reading that Gideon’s Bible found in lodgings - from Genesis to the Book of Luke - is a story for another day.