MOI UNIVERSITY FASHION WEEK

People care about food, fashion and money. The three basic things you can’t live without fixating on. Trendsetters are spreading like a flu and this varsity couldn’t be kept in the quarantine anymore. Moi University brought the glitz to the glam this past week and to say the least; it was worth the while. The words ‘fashion week’ echo an ambience of class, front row vibe, couture and everything that is six feet above ground.

Well let’s put it like this; Moi University is in the middle of nowhere. Tickets were misprinted, miscounted and fake apparently a signature at the back was the pass. Number of chairs were almost twenty, fifty bouncers at the door and three spotlights. Not exactly an event where you would bump into Rihanna and Giorgio Armani but pretty faces and great concepts were all over.

The kind of event you attend and leave happy that you were part of it. It might not be on the same scale as New York’s fashion week but it’s all a matter of perspective. I simply can’t wait to see what the next one will entail.

MEANWHILE IN SCHOOL..... by Daisy Waitherero Wambua

God created the universe in seven days, a fourteen year old took ten days to get constant water supply for her whole village and Noah built an ark in forty days. Soon after, time started tripling with Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Mau Mau so on so forth. However, who said that it must take me decades to finish one degree?

Being held at one place for longer than expected has a way of fostering lunatics. Every day starts to look the same, time drags along excruciatingly; you can almost identify with the seconds. Monday and Saturday become analogous, the weekend seems longer than the week days put together. So much time is dispensed, with the to-do list exhausted one can only be passively crazy. It’s supposed to be a respite; freedom and zero responsibility. But once it kicks in, it can make you wish to kick the bucket.

Waking up to the morning rays filtering through my sheers, the then bright sun fades away by ten o’ clock. The clouds feud and cover the whole sky, hanging so low you could breathe them in. Light showers quickly escalates to a heavy storm, the sky opens and pours like a woman’s wrath. It resumes calm a little after six in the evening. A whole week of indoor activity, the brave hearted jostle with the aftermath to their destination. A burthen to those with an actual life to lead.

These times are bad. This weather is worse. Two weeks down the line you get accustomed to the schedule. You find yourself waiting for six evening to clock in then you go buy a few amenities for the next day. Tallying the scroll because these kind of days are like shillings and you can’t wait to turn them into notes.
Believe it or not, I have been here one week. But the way my mind is set up, I will have disintegrated by ten o’ clock tomorrow.    

NIMECATCH MAFEELINGZI BY DELA

When I first heard Catchy Mafeelings by Dela, I didn’t know whether I was watching MTV Base or Eburu TV. Albeit I couldn’t stop watching, my eyes were just transfixed. Some sort of trance that I snapped out of when the chorus sneaked up.

The pitch, the harmony, the rhythm and the form so well contorted, to call it a local Kenyan song would be sin. It’s a high energy club banging, roof blowing overly dramatic song. Be sure it will keep your feet stomping like Kirk, fingers pointing like Moi and brow barred at the center with imperious lines like a mad woman. This song has the aptitude to waver every woman’s emotion to that between hatred and loathe.

Nimecatchy Mafeelings oyoyo has a pulled back drop added to it that strips down every emotion carried by the lyrics. The video being high definition pitches in more pros, the clothes and make up, the set and the musician herself are definitely on the correct level. It’s a song every woman can relate to and heck! Even the men can relate whether as perpetrators or victims. Dela is on her way to the top and not even feelings can stop her.

After the glitter, the mud must resurface. The song title is generally not so good; not good enough to say it out loud and not good enough for it to be a chorus in a song. It however represents the Kenyan aspect of queer grammar and phrases. Just in case somebody is thinking of following this similar path, no need to air the country’s deranged way of speech. Normal song titles like Isabella, Nerea, Baadaye and Haree are very much appreciated. They also tend to encourage pride for one’s country. I doubt I will attest to knowing Niko maji by Jalang’o to anyone, my patriotism is tied.

All in all, Dela nailed it on the Adele’s Hello cover and she has done it yet again with her own song. It’s always such an inspiration seeing a woman win.

STAGE IS NO LONGER 'STAGE' AT MOI UNIVERSITY

For security reasons, the place which was referred to as ‘stage’ four months ago is void and blatant as it gets. The cars, the business men and women, and some few entrepreneur-cum-students have been shown the door or should I say the gate.

To create a free and safe environment, you do not kick out the citizens. You make the environment suitable. What happened to putting up streetlights? How many more students shall fall victim to insecurity? Which measure is being taken to ensure nobody walks into the premises armed? Installation of full body scanners? Will we live to see security cameras? Night patrols? I won’t start on tarmacked roads.

The kind of change we ask for and that which we deserve does not involve shifting the place where we board the bus. This relocation is pointless and is a silly move to curb attacks. At what point did the panelist concur on such a strategy? Where did we go wrong? They are stripping the little guilty pleasures that help comrades loathe the school a little less. First accommodation,hygiene, lecture halls, decent dispensary and now stage, they will not stop; not until Chela gets it.

They did not move Westgate after the grave terror attack and therefore you should not move ‘stage’ before a threat is even made.

OUR KDF HEROES by Daisy Waitherero Wambua

The cobra black sky, the ungodly smell of blood, the tangy taste of air, sudden groaning and yowling as the battlefield becomes slick with innards and constant clobbering and clubbing to preserve life. Most soldiers say it’s their calling to stand in the line of fire, others avoid the whys as no one would resonate.

KDF soldiers are more Kenyan than Kenyans are. Personally, I wouldn’t be so forthcoming in suffering martyrdom for my country. Heck! I wouldn’t even kill a fly if it posed a threat to this great nation. The KDF soldiers are the chosen people. They are the muse for this country, those who give us a reason to raise the flag and to do it with pride.

We did not lose heroes, we were taught how to be one. They reminded us that our country is worth more than what we deemed it to be. That we have no excuse but to do that which is noble in honor of them and to always remain united.

LIVING LIKE ITS MY LAST by Daisy Waitherero Wambua

I have short episodes where I crave death. For my body to give in and succumb to the excruciating pain and useless battles. My armor lies popped open on the table written in some gibberish that I try to read every now and then. It’s my source of comfort, the doctors say it’s my Messiah, they are right in their own way. A crucifix stands in my bank account, if anything, there lays my Golgotha. In times like these is when family and friends become indispensable.

My eyes seem bloodshot each time I look in the mirror, “Mirror, mirror on the wall who is the prettiest of them all?” My jet black silky hair covers quarter of my face, my make-up precedes perfection, my eyebrows seem surreal and Mac lipstick should seriously consider hiring me as an ambassador. A mash up of Jennifer Lawrence, Khloe Kardashian and Angelina Jolie, no angel comes close and no devil seems more enticing. If only my doctors would halt the medical marijuana maybe my imaginations would tone down. Cancer stage four, hail the heavens and curse upon the fallen angel.

I could have counted a few things that would have been be my Achilles’s heel. But darn cancer, it has some stealth, a certain creep almost like team mafisi but a little more cunning. I have different wigs lying on my dresser, all bearing names; Shaniqua for my ghetto fabulous days, Juliette for the girl next door feel and Precious for the days that life’s returns are less than my givings. Multiple scarves too, hair can be daunting and a tad too cumbersome. These simpletons make me want to wake up every single day plus other mixed bag of reasons.

My old reserves melt daily if not an hourly basis. They look at me different, like am a weakling of some sort, a child whose daily munch is monitored. Strangers take a couple glances more so to satisfy their curiosity and less to issue pity. Few ask at first by hints then by open pressure, they become uneasy upon disclosure then get overcome by guilt for their inquisition. Michael Jackson sang ‘Human Nature’ so I don’t hold my throat when they start asking why. I am still far from tasting the serenity of my health but I am as young as I can be and my vitality as high as it can rise. I grieve to say that I may not see tomorrow but I rejoice in living today like my last.

“I know that I will live long”. “No, I believe I will live long”. I am not my disease, I am not its ramifications.
                                                                                                        -Survivor Series

PIERCINGS ARE ADDICTIVE ;I HAVE SEVEN by Daisy Waitherero Wambua

Most of my primary school classmates had gone under the needle and the results, simply majestic. I couldn’t really understand why my mother’s favorite chant ‘you’ll do it after high school’ had to apply especially in this situation. I have ears now, I’ll have ears then, I joked to myself. I wanted my ears endorsed and not by hearing alone.

As I proceeded to form one, I encountered more girls with more dark spots in their ears. An abomination, I thought. It didn’t bother me as much- jewelry was not allowed in school and so many of them rendered to find alternatives. Some used fresh stems of grass, others used short broom bristles and other wazimus made use of staple pins. It appealed to me less and less and my vigor diminished as the school had more important plights to address. However, I did not quite abandon my dreams.

Few days to starting my KCSE I got a pimple on my nose. Probably a result of devouring too much junk food at one hunger episode. It soon diminished albeit a mark was etched following close similarity as that of a nose piercing. I took no notice until a discussion of piercings erupted among some of my friends and I idyllically talked of a nose piercing. One of my classmates drew closer to my face and pointed out that I already had one.

Who was I to put cancellations on this befitting absolutely wrong judgment?
I continued with the frenzy and most took it as the Bible truth, others were skeptical as how I got a piercing in the middle of the term. I took pride in vanity and it came to a sad halt as all wounds heal and all scars fade. I still remember how lit my face was when I was told of my ‘piercing’.

Today I have seven existing piercings; one on each lobe, two extensively apart on my left cartilage, another inside my pinna, another on the cartilage attached to my face and one more on my nose. Maybe am also one of those wazimus.

Piercings are easy to get, its keeping them that is hard. The stringent measures! Lord have mercy! Sleeping becomes a nuisance, four to six months of dreariness just to estimate the least. For the ladies hair grooming becomes a hot pan; blow-drying becomes the fire in every sense. There is no wrong in the world and nothing deserves more punishment than someone brushing their hand through a freshly done piercing. These people belong to jail or juvenile prison from that five month old baby to a fully grown up person; zero discrimination.

Piercings are a form of beauty from our ancestral days hitherto and should be treated as such. Nevertheless it should be done in moderation. Don’t do it like you are applying lotion or in the essence of filling all skin pores. We don’t need walking reflectors, especially those that are straining to the eye. Live well and remain porous!