BEHIND BARS I; THE ARRIVAL

The cruiser pulls up in front of Juja Police Station. Judging by the position of the moon right above us, am guessing it’s something a little past midnight.

 

“Vile tu mliingia ndio mtoke. Haraka!!” A penal voice booms from within the half a dozen heavily armed officers.

 

We hold hands, each with the person behind and ahead of them, and march inside in a single line, escorted with scorching smacks and innumerable strokes of something far more fatter than a normal cane. Am second. First is a female friend of mine, let’s call her Sharon.

 

See, when someone [just a close PAL guys, easy] crosses multiple borders and bridges from a far off land like Rongai to come say hi to you in an equally remote dusty town like Juja, you’re responsible for them and their safety. Their comfort is your number one priority. So you’d understand why I feel remorseful for Sharon to have to go through this brutality and utter animosity.

 

“Hey, whatever happens tonight, am sorry,” I whisper to her ear.

 

“It’s not your fault,” she replies, trying to conceal the coldness in her voice but I can almost sense it. The regret on her face wears me down. She shouldn’t have come. I had failed her.

 

We’re now being shoved behind the OB desk, as if in an attempt to prevent anyone from escaping. There’s about seven of us; 5 ladies and 2 men. We find another couple of chums being tended to back there; and by ‘tended to’ I mean beaten. Remorselessly, ruthlessly and without the slightest sh*t of care in the world. One of them says he knows his rights, but this only serves to worsen his situation. More whips land on his back as jabs and upper-cuts are pelted up and down his already swollen and slightly bleeding face. It’s not a pleasant sight at all, even from a neutral ground.

 

“Eti you know your rights? Sisi tuko na rights na powers! Unaskia?” One of the men in blue quips, in between the mobocracy.

 

After what looked like a scene straight out of Nairobi Half-Life, the mates’ details are finally recorded in the OB and then, like sheep to a slaughter house, they’re led through some puke-drawing metal door to the cells.

 

The merry on the faces of the men in blue right about now can send a grown ass man with hirsute balls weeping. They’re clearly having a blast. It’s like they just captured, or murdered, an Osama protégé up in this b*tch. What is it with cops and beating people? How in the freaking hell is pounding a fellow human being to bits fun?

 

Saying am scared at this instant would be a gross understatement, if not an insult to the bozos over at Oxford. Am fossilized [eih, hii Ujaluo yawa]. These crooks have clearly proven that they mean business here, whatever that means. And that “Innocent until proven guilty” is all but a bad joke only meant to instill false hope in the general public. Until you’re caught. A weighty whack lands on my bony cheeks, sending me spiraling back to realism.

 

“Nyinyi ndio mnajua kutupia polisi mawe, sindio?” The accoster, an out of this world bald-headed fugly muthaf****r in a K’Ogalo jersey with the words ‘NYAMITA’ [I presume that was his name] inscribed at the back, asks rhetorically.

 

Now, good citizens of our land, help me here, here is a Gor Mahia fanatic, universally known hooligans, reprimanding a neatly-dressed teenager in stripped official shirts for ALLEGEDLY casting stones at opposing law enforcers. [See what I did there? Gor Mahia fanatic? Stones? Opponents? Aargh, forget it!]

 

Nevertheless, let’s assume I did throw the stones and was stupid enough to stay back and get caught; that I had dressed neatly in my one Khaki trouser and two-thousand-five-hundred-shilling shirt bought for me by my mum [forget the old fogeys stopped buying us clothes eons back] to go and participate in catch-me-if-you-can with the cops; that I had tagged along five strikingly gorgeous lasses one dressed in a knee-high white dress and black tights to the parade to, perhaps, help me hold the gravels in their Louie Vuitton purses; that I had passed on an invite to shots of Flirt vodka by my hombre Chacha to protest over matters that held not a hair against my meager existence; that I had stood up a date with a potential soul mate [sshh!] over at Gate C for a date with tear gas and aerial gunshots at Gate A. Really? Are you kidding me? I mean, is it just me or this room stinks of bullsh*tters and their relentless bullsh*t?!

 

Get this, the protests were over a proposed new fee policy [which sought to send students who hadn’t cleared their fee balances by the time of CAT sittings home] and increase in accommodation fee. Here’s the jist, my old man makes sure he clears my semester fees when I report for opening, which means am pretty much always in the clear even when sitting for my CATs. He also sends my house rent every month [as it turns out I don’t even occupy the school hostels either]. That good old man, God bless his hustle, er, soul. And then, am on attachment this semester. Which means no CATs and I don’t even have to pay any fee. So, tell me Sir, yes, you there in a blue uniform, what reason do I have to take to the streets? And what exactly are we being charged for here, again?

 

But after what happened to the previous bloke who yanked open his mouth at these animals, I figure an answer at this point would be just as useless as Prophet Doctor Kanyiri[though I realize this joke is fast getting old] trying to plead his case; useless. So I remain adamant, only nursing my now hurting cheek. He then moves on to the lady behind me, grabs her by the chin, pushes her hard against the wall and blurts out;

 

“Mbona mnasumbua watu?”

 

You know that feeling you get when you want to help someone but you know you’ll just be digging your own grave so you hold back and your conscience condemns you? I just stand there and bad-eye [is that even a word?] the guy in eerie silence, as if waiting for the perfect moment to seize his rash infested neck, but he continues with his oppression of us to his fill.

 

One of the cops now demands for our names as he jots them down while we shout them out, albeit involuntarily. Which reminds me, why must everyone always ask for my third name whenever I introduce myself as “Ian Duncan”? Is it that hard to believe that a black son of a mere high school Principal would share a name with a famous white rally driver? That’s some racist sh*t right there. If big bro was done with Law school I’d have him sue their asses for all they got [which am sure is not much but what the hell!]. And to the next John Doe I meet who wants to know my names, please, Wuod [Son of] Were will do just fine, thank you.

 

The female officer in charge for the night then commands us to each take off a single shoe, our belts, phones, money and any other valuables to which we duly comply. Then our details are hurriedly recorded in the OB, after which we too are led to the cells. The ladies are locked in first before we, the men, are harshly pushed into an almost-full filthy room with the words ‘Cell 1’ roughly scribbled on the door, which is loudly and firmly locked from outside as it hits me that I only know one person in here.

 

My boyz, let’s call him Daniel, with whom we had attended the same high school and goes to K.U, and were with at the time of arrest. So from now till we’re released, it’s us against them other niggaz. Against the world. No homo.

 

Ladies and gentlemen, Son of Were is officially behind bars!

 

 

*to be continued [with events leading to the arrest].

 

***

 

Meanwhile, I wrote this piece almost a two or three weeks back. But a brother been seriously ill and bedridden ever since, which is why am posting it just now. I was held down by a combination of Malaria and some other disease the doctors say is caused primarily by stress [I suspect brought about by these bimbos I’ve been chasing of late]. For half that time, I could neither talk to anyone, not even to my own mother, nor walk past the bathroom three steps away during my numerous trips to do what you absolutely don’t want to know. My only meal became a cuppa uji alongside three unrefined humongous pills. In simple terms, sh*t got real. And depressingly real, at that. As they say, if you want to know who your true friends are, feign your death and see how many really come to your ‘funeral’. Am just saying it’s good to know the kind of friends I keep. I’ll leave that at that!