Africa Beckons (Part 7)

Nairobi - big city challenges

(1979) Having established our remote Tana River Delta Camp, we became quite proprietary about our area, and we decided we should try to get a land lease assigned to us, so we could have exclusive use of this wonderful region. One evening, after a few cognacs with Alex and Sally, it was unanimously decided that I should be the one to take our request up to the Ministry of Lands in Nairobi. I do not remember either voting or volunteering for this, so it remains a mystery – except for a surfeit of cognac - as to exactly how I was appointed for this unenviable task. Anyway, we prepared the necessary documents for our request, including a map with our specific area of interest designated on it.

Once I had driven from our Tana Delta Camp down to Malindi, I decided I would leave the vehicle in Malindi and save money by taking a matatu for the journey down to Mombasa. With African-owned cars being few at the Kenya coast in those days, the local people would travel short distances either on foot or on a bicycle. But for longer journeys, they pay to ride in a matatu, a privately-owned vehicle – which can be anything from a minivan to a bus – where the rider pays for a seat.

Before setting off, the driver roams around town, looking for fares until every seat is filled and the journey will turn a profit. Matatu owners compete with each other to have the loudest horns and the most pimped-out vehicles, the idea being that the more eye-catching the design and color scheme – and of course the louder the blasting music – the more likely riders will want to board their vehicle. Hanging out of the open doorway is the conductor, usually some garishly dressed street kid, shouting the destination and cajoling riders to come on board.

Each vehicle has its name emblazoned across the front, back and sides. Sometimes, they are ‘destination’ names, like Nakuru Express, Kisumu Rocket or Mombasa Shuttle. Otherwise, they are bizarre or oddly disturbing names like God Mustard Seed, Allah’s Bomber, The Beast, The Supper Fighter, Texas Flash, Jes Git There and Have Faith! Faith indeed is needed to ride these ramshackle and less-than-roadworthy vehicles, often driven quite recklessly and at breakneck speed. The three-hour drive from Malindi to Mombasa means sitting on poorly upholstered seats with the locals, their kids (both the human and goat variety), chickens and other assorted livestock. The strong smell vies with the intense heat for oppressiveness, but I chuckle at the amused stares of passengers seeing a white man, a mzungu, taking ‘their’ local transport to Mombasa.

After waving goodbye to my fellow passengers in the matatu and being dropped off in Mombasa at the railway station, I buy a ticket for the overnight train to Nairobi. Having time to kill, I wander over to the Spice Market in Old Town to buy my dinner-to-go for the train: Indian samosas, onion bhajis, curry and rice, plus a cup of sweet Indian chai tea. I board the train at dusk and settle into my Standard Class seat for the overnight journey. Called The Iron Snake by the Kikuyu tribe and The Lunatic Express by everyone else, the late 19^th century 600-mile narrow-gauge railway ran through largely unmapped and little-explored bush country, linking Mombasa at the Kenya coast with Lake Victoria in distant Uganda.

Tonight, the train lurches and jolts out of sea-level Mombasa at sunset and chugs through the ten-mile-wide tropical coastal belt, passing huge mango and kapok trees and thatched-roof village huts with children rushing out to wave and shout “Jambo!” at the passing railway carriages. Picking up speed, the sinuous train heads through the red dust of Tsavo, bisecting the national park and constantly climbing to higher altitudes.

The journey is punctuated by stops en-route at dilapidated stations, half-forgotten places that have neither a platform nor a station master. The stifling heat on the unair-conditioned train is almost unbearable. In the morning, as the train continues onward and upward on its way across the Athi Plains, the towers of the capital city of Nairobi at 5,500 feet altitude come into view, shimmering in the distance in the early morning sun. Finally, the train sounds its horn and rolls into Nairobi Railway Station, a fine example of Victorian architecture. In those days in the 1970s, no one rode The Lunatic Express believing it would arrive in Nairobi on time. It never did.

Construction of the railway had begun in 1896, and it included the building of 12,000 bridges. 32,000 Indian laborers toiled on the railroad, being brought to Kenya to work on the project, and 2,500 of them died. Man-eating lions picked off quite a few at Tsavo Station; drought, dysentery and malaria took many more; Kikuyu warriors killed some more with poison-tipped arrows. Over a hundred years later, the line was replaced in 2017 by a standard-gauge railway built with Chinese help, called The Madaraka Express. This turned the old 15-hour journey into a 4.5 hour trip, with the new trains operating at speeds of up to 75 mph.

I disembarked from the train in Nairobi and, following my overnight ordeal, I decided to treat myself to a taxi ride and breakfast at the Thorn Tree Café, an outdoor eatery at the New Stanley Inn which was well-known as a central meeting place in the city. Afterwards, I walked the short distance to the Ministry of Lands building.

I should explain that we already had a license to operate our safari company, although it had been granted only on condition that Alex and I hire and train black Kenyans to completely take over management of the company when they were ready to do so, namely within two years, at which point the government’s intention was that we would all then leave the country! At the time, I had balked at signing any such agreement, but Alex had drawn me aside, saying “Just sign it. All will be good, and I will explain everything later.” So, Alex and I had both signed this government agreement.

Alex had later explained that this was the standard government contract for foreigners. Evidently, Alex had talked to quite a few foreign white business owners in Kenya who had similar agreements with the government. All of them pretty much told Alex the same thing, which was that the agreement called for the handover when the black Kenyans being trained were ready to transition to management. “But you are the boss,” they all said, “and YOU are going to decide when they are ready!” Of course, they never were ready, in practice. Why on earth would we start a business, pour our blood, sweat, tears and money into it - and then just one day hand it over to the locals and go home?

Anyway, I made my way upstairs to the Minister’s office and reminded his secretary of my 10 a.m. appointment with His Excellency. She told me he was busy, and she motioned me to sit on a chair and wait. Which is what I did. Hour after hour. As each hour passed, I again inquired of her regarding the Minister’s availability, also gently reminding her of my 10 a.m. appointment. Each time, she said “The Minister will see you soon.” I was not yet aware, at this relatively early stage in my Kenya Adventure, that the word soon when used in Africa does not have quite the same sense of urgency as it does in Europe and America. Judging by her nonchalant reaction to my questioning, I gleaned that such delays were by no means unusual.

At exactly 1 p.m., the Minister’s office door opened, and His Excellency strode quickly past me without the merest glance in my direction. I immediately got up to follow him, but the secretary bade me sit down, using a commanding tone that seemed – in contrast to her demure appearance - quite out of character. I sat back down. “The Minister…” she said “… has a lunch appointment, and he will return at 2 p.m.” A four-hour wait. I had heard that these things could take all day. Well, I had enjoyed a substantial breakfast, so I settled in to wait him out.

The Minister did return promptly at 2 p.m. and, just like before, he strode purposefully into his office. Looking straight ahead and closing the door smartly behind him. I rose again from my chair, but this time, it only took a stern look from the secretary to sit me back down again. 3 p.m. came and went and then around 3:25 p.m., the secretary had cause to deliver a telephone message in person to His Excellency, so I caught a glimpse of him through the half-open door before it shut again.

Dressed in an expensive suit, His Excellency’s corpulent figure was leaned back in a high-backed leather executive chair. He was reading The Daily Nation newspaper, with his feet propped up on his overly large desk. As the time approached 4 p.m., I began to wonder if the Minister went out for afternoon tea, musing that perhaps he had it delivered? Promptly at 4 p.m., the secretary announced, “The Minister will see you now,” and I went in. Was this possibly the standard ploy of government bureaucrats, to humiliate the punctuality-conscious white mzungus of Kenya by making us all sit and wait an interminably long time before being granted an official interview? Apparently so.

Anyway, I introduced myself and, so as not to waste his time, I got straight to the point (a novice move) as to why I was there, bringing out my map and identifying the Tana River Delta for His Excellency. He took a cursory look, but soon stopped me with a dismissive wave of his hand; a big hand of fat fingers, heavy with flashy gold rings. He said “Yes, I will look into that - later. But first, I want to know… are you Italian?” My jaw must have visibly dropped at this astonishing question, since I have blond hair, and I spoke with a marked English accent. “Yes, Italian,” he repeated, “You are Italian, yes?” “No,” I replied, somewhat indignantly, “I am English!” I pulled out my British Passport and showed him the photo/data page, but he merely shrugged. “Many Italians come to see me,” he continued, ”…and they are my friends!” Since I knew of a prominent Italian in Malindi with whom I felt certain he would be acquainted, I dropped the man’s name. “Do you perhaps know Armando Tanzini in Malindi?” I ventured.

By the way his eyes lit up at the mention of that name, he most certainly did. Now, Armando Tanzini was an Italian sculptor who built a magnificent villa at the Malindi beach. He also operated safaris without a business license, claiming to anyone who might ask that the visiting Italians he was taking on safari were just family. One such group that thundered out of Malindi into the bush one day numbered thirty-four individuals in a convoy of five Land Rovers. Quite a family! Later on, after the pretense of hosting visiting family could no longer be upheld with a straight face, he built the White Elephant Sea Lodge as a proper business venture. ‘White Elephant’ turned out to be the perfect name for it.

Now His Excellency continued his train of thought. “Yes, a lot of important people come to see me. Italians. We sit down, and we make a plan.” Then he said, “That area you showed me on the map, it does not exist. I have never heard of it.” After a pause, he added “Anyway, Kenya does not give out land leases to just anyone.” Reclining back in his chair, he studied me for a moment, apparently waiting for me to say something.

But I said nothing, confused as to what was happening here. Leaning forward again, he beckoned me close and whispered, “What is it worth to you to get this land lease you speak of?” Aha, bribery! Not something my English disposition was familiar with, and I had missed the appropriate cues from His Excellency. In short, it turned out that if I would pay His Excellency several thousand Kenya Shillings in cash under the table, the land lease would be ours. I later found out that Italians in Kenya were notorious for getting what they wanted by offering significant cash bribes.

I should mention that at that time, the powerful ruling class - that emerged after colonial rule gave way to Independence - became pejoratively known as The Wabenzi. ‘Wa’ is a Swahili prefix that comes before a word (in this case, a tribe) to denote plurality. For example, Wakamba are members of the Kamba tribe. The Wabenzi were a figurative tribe, members of the African ruling class who were usually seen as corrupt and having gained their status through nepotism rather than education or merit. Typically, they drove expensive imported cars, Mercedes-Benz cars being especially prestigious: hence Wabenzi, a name that Kenya’s white population had coined for them.

“I am sorry,” I finally said, “But I am not Italian. I am English, and I cannot help you. If there is an annual payment that has to be made to the Government for the land lease, please provide me with a proper invoice and an official land lease.” His Excellency did not bother to hide his disappointment. “I am going to give you a piece of paper,” he said, “and I am going to rubber-stamp your request.” He pulled a sheet from a sheaf of Ministry of Lands letterheaded stationery on his desk, and he scribbled a line on it that I could not see, making a big show of rubber-stamping the page with a large rubber stamp he selected from a rack of rubber stamps.

“This is what you asked for,” he said with a huge grin, handing the sheet to me. He had written ‘Thank you for your request,’ under which he had stamped REQUEST DENIED. (to be continued)