Nderitu Maina is not necessarily quiet by nature, but while at work, he must remain silent, for he has no one to talk to. Indeed, his days are spent surrounded by the dead, who fill the deathly silence.
Lately though, Maina has been mourning diminishing customers as clients shift to competitors. In addition, Lang’ata cemetery, where he works is almost full. “The silence in this place is just beautiful. I also love the way those who see themselves as mighty, humble themselves when they come to buy space for their loved ones. Since they are grieving they come with respect,’’ he says.
He adds, “Seeing people burning and turning into ashes has taught me to remain humble. Watching an important person turn to ashes makes me reflect on life a lot.’’
His workmates call him munene, meaning boss. He has worked at the cemetery more than 10 years, having started out as a clerical officer and now the person in charge.
Only dead bodies
We follow the 52-year-old into his office, passing through graveyards, some well-maintained and some abandoned. He tells us Africans have learnt to accept death and nowadays once someone dies most people forget about them. Few people visit the graveyards, compared to back then.
His old office was built during the colonial area and is surrounded by graves; the walls have charts with bar graphs of death patterns.
From the charts, it is easy to deduce that most people especially children die in May, June, July and August. Maina says this is because of the cold season, which is harsh to the young and old. Prices at the cemetery are fixed and cuts across class, age and even height.
Maina’s main duty is to ensure graves are dug on time and bodies buried.
“I never dreamt of working in a cemetery, but I love this job. I am passionate about it as it has helped me improve my life in many ways,” he says. When asked about the dead and their spirits, Maina says: “Only dead bodies are here. When you die your spirit remains where you died from.’’
Maina says he can comfortably walk at night in the cemetery, and has never experienced any unusual happening. He is also not aware of claims of theft and robbery in the cemetery.
“People no longer bury their loved ones with valuables; only foreigners do so but they are rarely buried in Lang’ata,’’ he says.
The father of four says he does not get emotional over death. “I see people crying and I wonder why; when someone close to me dies, I choose to pray and not cry,’’ he says.
He says when his time comes, people should not waste resources transporting his body to his ancestral home. He wants to be buried at the cemetery.
The officer’s job has its shortcomings. Weeds and grass have overgrown, taking away from the beauty of the graves. Maina adds the cemetery is almost full and they get a lot of challenges when it comes to allocation.
“It is a pity that the County Government of Nairobi is not keen on maintaining the cemetery by ensuring it is cleaned, has good roads and proper drainage,’’ he says. Lack of modern facilities especially in the crematorium as they still use diesel instead of electricity has made them lose customers.
The cemetery is also understaffed, and it often becomes difficult to control the crowds when a prominent person is being buried or a lot of burials are going on. Maina says people should prepare for death by buying space before the cemetery fills up. He says it is alright to bury more than one person in one grave as the county allows some graves to be dug 10 feet deeper than the normal 4 feet. The officer says Langata cemetery is special because of its soil type, which cracks easily, and that bodies buried there decompose faster.
Simon Njoroge, who has been working at Murumbi Memorial for six years shares Maina’s sentiments.
Ornament of Queen
The memorial is next to City Park Cemetery, where British soldiers were buried with their medals, politicians including Pio Gama Pinto and Joseph Murumbi.
The area has a rich history and art, a target for robbers, and the graves are surrounded by metal grills that people steal and sell as scrap metal.
Njoroge says the ornament of Queen Elizabeth at the memorial is expensive and there have been attempts to steal it. He says working in the cemetery is a job like any other, and he even sleeps on top of the graves.
“When a person is dead there is no harm they can cause; people assume they are bad spirits but they are the bad ones, and not the dead,” he says. The father of four says his job has enabled him lead a decent life and given him a lot of life lessons.
Njoroge says he does not plan to leave his job anytime soon since it offers him quiet and peace of mind.
