In Kenya today, one of the ubiquitous words is ‘hotel’. Tin shacks in the most remote parts of the country are emblazoned with the ‘hotel’ sign just as some of the ultra-modern buildings in Kenyan towns and cities do.

Thus, when you come across a tin shack in which a dusty, partly broken bench is the only visible furniture in the haze of drifting smoke, moments after seeing brand names like Hilton Hotel or Kempinski Hotel; the word ‘imposter’ comes to mind. Both cannot possibly be hotels, not in the real sense of the word. However, given that we are so used to seeing the ‘hotel’ sign since childhood, it is hardly surprising that the glaring disparity does not register, much less cause any undue concern.

That tin shack in your village or estate in town is not a hotel, period. The definition of hotel is ‘establishment that provides accommodation, meals and other services for travellers and tourist’s. Emphasis is on ‘accommodation’, ‘meals’ and ‘other services’.

The last takes into consideration things like massages, saunas, salons and outside catering services. Primarily, most of us associate ‘hotel’ with ‘eating’, but that being so, there are categories of establishments that, while not offering ‘accommodation’ and ‘other services’, do offer meals. To distinguish them, names like ‘motel’, ‘inn’, ‘cafe’, ‘restaurant’ and ‘bistro’ are allocated.

Light meals

Since a bistro is defined as ‘a small inexpensive restaurant’, that tin or wooden shack in the village selling buns at Sh5 each fits into this category. A restaurant on the other hand is ‘a place where people pay to sit and eat meals that are cooked and served on the premises.

A cafe is defined as’ a small restaurant selling light meals and drinks’. To urbanites, that joint that you rush to for your lunch when you have an hour break from work is a cafe. Indeed, most of them are appropriately named.

An inn is a pub in the countryside that sometimes provides accommodation. A pub, by itself, is an establishment that sells beer, soft drinks and, sometimes, food. Motels are basically roadside establishments designed specifically for motorists. Most have rooms where tired long distance travellers can spend a day or two before proceeding on their journeys. Motels must have ample parking space on account of the clientele they cater for.

Having established what activities the aforementioned establishments engage in, it must have surprised those who noticed, following the attack on the dusitD2 Hotel in Nairobi last week, that a newspaper headline proclaimed: Inside hotel of terror.

Avowed terrorists

Even with what is called editorial licence within media houses, the headline fits the double entendre description. On closer inspection, however, the preposition ‘of’ removes any ambiguity in what the headline implies; that the hotel mentioned deals in terror; that its business goes by the name terror, whatever business that could be.

The preposition ‘of’ is used to show relationship between a whole and part of that whole. For example, ‘two of his five children are renowned neurologists’. More importantly, the word is used to ‘show association between two entities, typically one of belonging in which the first is the head of the phrase and the second is associated with it’. An example is, ‘the daughter of a colleague’. No such association exists between hotels and terror.

Except when some hotels, from time to time, become victims of circumstances imposed by terror propagated by avowed terrorists; there is no connection between hotels and terror. As explained in an earlier column, space constraints allow newspapers to write headlines that don’t t strictly operate within the confines of grammar. By that I mean, among other things, the use of an apostrophe to denote the possessive or plural of certain nouns, for instance, can be safely overlooked. It does not, however, give room for headlines that carry more than one meaning.

In the live relay of events as they unfolded on ground zero during the short siege on the dusit hotel, members of the media fraternity tried as much as they could to keep those watching the events on television abreast of new developments.

However, in some instances the connection was bad and while some of the journalists in the field could not hear their colleagues in the studio, one of the latter could be heard saying ‘Continue, I am hearing you’. That is bad form, the correct being; ‘I can hear you’.

Mr Chagema is a correspondent at The Standard.achagema@standardmedia.co.ke