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It is back to school! While parents are rejoicing since the tu-brats that hindered them from attending dundas are out of the way, the kids, on the other hand are cursing and wishing Bwana Sossion can call for a strike.
Well, as usual, kids will demand weird stuff from paros without a care that bei ya one kg of sukari has hit the 200 bob mark. And milk that they enjoyed will now be a thing of the past if Kamwana doesn’t intervene.
We sample some of the weird stuff kids demands as they go back to school:
1. Mayonnaise.
Well, for my friends and enemies from Roysambu, mayonnaise is one of those food additives, a mixture of egg yolk, beaten with oil and vinegar. Kids buy this thing to spice up githeri, cabbage and rice-beans served for lunch and supper. Weird, is it? Especially for guys who knew the miracle Royco cubes worked.
2. Sta-Soft or is it So-Soft?
Boarding school is a study in survival and hardship. It is where kids are supposed to take a birth and wash uniforms with sabuni ya Jamaa or any soap-like thing on the taps.
Calamity is when kids add So-Soft or Sta-Soft on their shopping list. Why in hell do they need it? Sta-Soft is for maisha ya TV.
3. Shoe rag!
Those of us who went to serious schools would convert our torn undies into rags that ng’arishad our shoes.
However, technology, the new constitution and Facebook bred kids have found a way of sneaking in this item on the school’s shopping list. A shoe rag? A rag? On a shopping list? These are truly the days of hashtags!
4. Onions
Give them an inch and they will take a mile. Some kids, seeing how sparse viungo vya vyakula are in school meals, will endeavor to sneak in onions and garlic to make their meals worthwhile.
The onions would be diced, mixed with margarine and immersed in the food. The concoction would be edible! Like a Coca-Cola meal!
5. Gillet shaving cream!
Though Mr Khatoti the boarding master decrees that all beard owners within the walls of the boarding section always cut their beards to size, some ‘elite’ students, always from Nairobi and who can’t shave using soap cream and a razor blade, opt to add a shaving cream to ‘lawn-mow’ their chins.
6. Designer perfume
Limara and U-For Men in our days was the perfume of choice. But now, kids are competing with their teachers over who smells better than the other. Perusing through the shopping list, number four is a perfume that costs more than a single malt whisky!
7. Super Bright
Boys in boarding schools will wash their utensils (cups and plates) using water only. Germs are always unaware. But to some school-going kids, Super Bright scotch pad and cleaning paste is essential. It’s a wonder.
8. Tea leaves and a kichungi
Raha jipe mwenyewe... usingojee kupewa. When the cook fails to measure up to the tea leaves content in tea expected by some amateur physics scholars in Form Three, a number of students take matters in their hands by taking with them tea leaves and a kichungi to spice up the tea.
9. Candles
Though the rural electrification programme has snaked its way into villages and backward localities across the nation, kids will insist on adding candles ati ya kusoma when Kenya Power misbehaves. We all know the joy of a blackout in school!
10. Water cans
While Nairobians are cursing the rains that push us into ‘situationships,’ P2-purchasing mornings and cold days in the office, some parts of this nation are dry like the devil’s tongue.
And kids in those areas are mandated to save the little amount of water for use during meal and shower times. Here, a water can must top their shopping list.
