I thank my parents for a rich childhood, something I have felt compelled to recreate for their grandchildren as far as my hands can scratch. Since these kids were born, and until 2019, there has been none, and there shall be no PlayStation in the Jakipash household. These guys will drive those wire cars that I drove; groom their dogs; shoot the catapult or two that I have made sure are lying about; and save for my dainty little pretty angelic gem, these other jambazis know to stick their stubby toes in akalas on weekends.
For some of the nine years I knew her, I picked cotton with my Grandma, Aloo in Ahero, played naughty (much to her chagrin) by seeking out the freak baby chicken from any new set of hatchlings (yes, those ones that that had no hair on their necks… we call them nyang’ute). We’d cover them with those woven baskets for collecting dung (owuoyo) from the kuul (the cow pen), to try and isolate them from their noisy mothers for further alien probing (my younger bro and I missed four Science Nobels by only 4,000 miles). And we sure did get into trouble for our wayward chicken stunts.
Fast-forward to my adult trips to my ancestral home in Kano, or sometimes to south Nyanza where she was married, I inferred, by the way my Dad treated his older sister Salome, that my meetings with her must not be treated casually.
It became an unspoken rule that I must have with me a bag of shopping, a leso and a fistful of paper money…for my Aunt Salome. I knew she was important.
Aunt Salome was as old school and as badass as they came. She visited my home in Nairobi in 2012, smoking her filterless Rooster cigarettes with the lit end in her mouth, castigating me for a having a jet black Dachshund pup that seemed healthier and more obedient than she was, sending me on endless runs to Toi Market, Kibera for Ohangla CDS and wondering why my bike was the size of a cow.
(Flossossians 4:17 No thread shall pass without mention of your mobility)
Aunt Salome died in 2016. God bless her soul.
That was one of the only two times time I’ve seen my Dad cry.
On that Saturday afternoon as we interred her remains, and her Church took over the funeral, amidst the dust kicked up by the frantic dancing (see she was married into a Roho church family), I saw my Dad’s shoulders shudder. This strong, old Engineer wept, and I knew he hurt deeply.
Later I found out why.
See, way back then, when they were growing up, and things were dire, and families made tough choices, my Aunt Salome gave up her chance at school so her little brother could get a shot.
In my book, that’s sacrifice.
Moral?
If you have that Aunt Salome, anyone who sacrificed something for you (even the last toothpick in the tin or the last four squares of tissue on the roll), appreciate them.
If you can be someone’s Aunt Salome, jump at the chance.
I know someone who’s doing it right now…and God bless you for it.
Thank you Aunt Salome, for being immortal.
