Forget police, the people taking advantage of you are much closer

When I got an unexpected salary rise a year after landing my first job, the first thing I did, and with ill-concealed haste, was move from my one-room “house” in Githurai 44 into a one-bedroom house very far away from Githurai. You see, my memories of that place were not very good, and I couldn’t wait to get away from there.

I once told you about that place, about the culture shock I was treated to when, on my first morning in my new dwelling, as I went to take a bath (the bathrooms and toilets were shared), I bumped into a man around my father’s age wearing nothing but a tiny thin towel wrapped just below his potbelly, bath water dripping from his shoulders down his hairy chest to… I cannot even begin to explain how that image traumatised me – it is akin to seeing one’s father naked. You can therefore understand why I could not wait to leave. And this is just one unfortunate story out of many, mind you.

My first day in my new house was surreal. It felt like a dream, but one I really hoped I would never wake from. It felt strange making my way from the bedroom through the tiny living room, if you could call it that, past the even tinier kitchen, into my own bathroom-cum-toilet. In those few steps, I half expected to wake up from this pleasant dream and bump into a more-than-half-naked elderly man. Thankfully, I remained awake. I was truly in paradise. A congested stuffy house with peeling paint, but paradise all the same.

STAY WAS PERFECT

My stay there was perfect, well, almost perfect, had it not been for the caretaker, who immediately formed a habit of borrowing money from me. He never called it money though, he called it ka-chai. Tea. The conversation would almost always start like this, “Leo si uninunulie ka-chai? (How about buying me some tea today?)”.

If you’re Kenyan, then you know that “tea” does not necessarily mean the one most of us take for breakfast. It is another name for a bribe. This offended me and made me feel taken advantage of because every end of month, I, like every other tenant here, parted with some money which went to pay the caretaker. Besides ensuring that we were not robbed during the day, his other duty included escorting tenants who happened to arrive late from work, from the matatu stop to the flats. It was a short walk, but it was unnerving in the dark, so the burly caretaker offered some much-needed psychological security.

I noticed that whenever I failed to part with kachai he would become cold towards me, and even refuse to pick my calls in case I was late arriving home. I would therefore be forced to brave the pitch-dark walk home alone, hopeful that there was no thug lurking on either side of the dense bushes. His strategy was effective, because I would be compelled to offer him kachai the next day without him even asking, so that he could pick my calls the next time I called. Talk of being held at ransom!

How many people do you know that are like this caretaker? People who take advantage of the “power” they have over you to extort money from you, whether it is 20 shillings or a couple of thousands? Or millions? Forget, for a moment, our police and others in public service who we, the taxpayers, pay to facilitate access to essential services such as water. We have been complaining about the corrupt tendencies of this group for decades, so I would be highlighting nothing new. I am talking about the others in your small circle, say your house help, who fails to return to work on the agreed date, confident that you won’t sack her because you cannot do without her. Or your boss, who keeps pushing work that is his to do to you because he knows that you know that it is only him that can recommend that promotion. Or even that relative who expects you to send her “something” every month because she contributed some money in the harambee that enabled you to join university. Or the school principal you had to bribe so that your son could be enrolled in that school.

Obviously, the high-level corruption involving millions of shillings that we constantly complain and write about started small. It started in our own homes, in our offices, in our institutions of higher learning, … I could go on and on.

[email protected]; Twitter: @cnjerius. The writer is the editor, MyNetwork, in the Daily Nation