The mighty people of Western Kenya continue to give so much to this country. We regularly help maintain the beauty standards of our great nation by churning out devilishly handsome chaps and ladies whose hips refuse to lie. We are also unmatched for entertainment value. We have provided the country with several lunatics, some of them even politicians, and nobody can dispute their immense meme potential. And this is before we factor in how many media houses would go out of print if we convinced 'Kakamega man' and 'Busia woman' to stop providing Pulizer-worthy content. Let me tell you, that fifth estate would be floundering if we collectively took away those 'woman slaps her husband over undercooked nduma' stories.
Who is smarter?
And yet, people continue to carry us foolish. They tease, and make fun, and they accuse us of such unthinkable crimes as knowing the proper usage of words like 'ndiposa'.
Only last week, they attacked the last bastion of Lunje pride. They made slick, unfriendly comments about Patanisho, the final of our three institutions of power (in addition to Afya Centre and the Posho Mill).
How come, some idiot wondered, only Luhyas seem to have relationship problems? And how come, a different idiot posited, the people of Westie vest such power in the talk show segment known as Patanisho to intervene on the matters afflicting their hearts? First of all, how dare you, sir? Half the marital problems in this town can be traced back to yellow-yellow women with size-three feet and expansive foreheads, and our corner of the country is not known for producing those. The generous servings of character development being dished out everywhere you look would indicate that this is a national problem, not a regional one.
Secondly, it seems we are being asked to apologise for wanting to fix our relationship problems. It is the height of insanity! How can a man crawl back to his wife? Isn't that blasphemy? Won't Jehovah Wanyonyi visit him at night and whip him? How can he, a fella who surrendered his foreskin in a chilly forest somewhere in Bungoma, flap his mouth and apologise to a woman, then ask her to come back to his house? They must have cut off more than foreskin.
Luhya divorces
Our crime, we can only assume, is loving those mad women we marry, regardless of their flaws, and wanting things to work out.
We are smarter than most, you see. We understand that the only way to knock a woman off her self-righteous perch is to shame her publicly. We know they will rush, in the aftermath of a breakup, to pump their friends full of lies so they look like saints. And so we combat this misinformation by calling Kidi and Khost and laying the facts bare.
"Yes, I cheated, but Mama Wafula has fed me rice for three days in a row."
"Okay, I am not saying I was right, but she didn't need to move in with that boda boda guy."
"You know what, fine. Shichenje looks nothing like me, and I have since been threatened by a man he does look like, but let his mother just come home. We will talk."
At least we have the balls to take those witches to the court of public opinion. Other men in this country are just swallowing disrespect, sleeping on couches and drafting PR statements like "God decided to close that door. Wanjiku and I remain the best of friends, and we will now focus on raising Mayden and Nayden as co-parents." Not us, my friend. MayD and NayD will be raised by two parents, no matter how much they want to tear each other to pieces.
Please turn to your neighbour and ask him how many Luhya divorces he has heard of. Now tell him to say hallelujah and leave those people alone. We do not believe in separation. We will call uncles, aunties and even spirits to intervene before we give up on mama watoto. We will eat all the chickens in Shinyalu until negotiation meetings bear fruit. And, when all else fails, we will call a radio station and tell the world that our wife stopped wearing underwear to work, that her ugali tastes like infidelity.
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