The Lunatic Express

                                                              

After several weeks of traveling cheaply, of wedging myself into packed matatus and creaky buses, I decided I would allow myself a little luxury, so I booked a berth on a rail line to Nairobi that was once dubbed The Lunatic Express. 

Nairobi, established in 1899 by British colonialists as a railroad depot linking Mombasa to Uganda, quickly grew to become the capital city of British East Africa and of independent Kenya. The construction of the railroad, which spanned nearly 700 miles, took several years and thousands of lives, primarily through malaria, dysentery, cholera, and other diseases. 

The most notorious form of death, however, was by lion attack. For several months in 1898, two male lions, known as the Maneaters of Tsavo, stalked and killed at least twenty-eight workers. The lions dragged their victims out of their tents kicking and screaming into the bush to be ruthlessly devoured. The British East Africa Company hired Lieutenant-colonel John Henry Patterson to dispatch the lions, which he managed after several months and several unsuccessful attempts.

The lions spent twenty-five years as Patterson's floor rugs before being sold, in miserable condition, to the Chicago Field Museum, where they were reconstructed and put on display.

Not long after my train ride to Nairobi, Hollywood released a film version of Patterson's story, starring Michael Douglas and Val Kilmer. Eventually, it made its way to Nairobi cinemas, where Kenyans greeted it with much laughter, primarily because the film was shot in South Africa instead of Kenya, and the South African cast members had mangled the Swahili language. The most memorable moment, though, was watching Michael Douglas chant and dance with Maasai warriors. Kenyans in the audience laughed uproariously, while I groaned in my seat.

The train departed Mombasa shortly after nightfall and arrived in Nairobi fifteen hours later, around 10 a.m. I paid roughly 2,000 shillings for a second-class berth, which I shared with a young Australian man named Pete, who was on his way home after spending several weeks traveling around Kenya. He was baby faced but burly, built like a thumb, and he was easily given to melancholy, especially when I told him I was less than halfway through my stint.

"You're bloody lucky," he said. "I don't want to go home."

I told him he was young, that he had plenty of time to explore the world. 

"That's where you're wrong. This is a one-off thing," he said. "Not unless I win the lottery."

He explained that he was from a working-class family and had only recently come across a little bit of money.

"This is me last hurrah. I'll be settling down," he said. "My holidayin' will be on the Gold Coast with me wife and kiddies."

"You have a wife and kids?"

"Nah, but I expect I'll have 'em soon enough," he said. "Hey, let's have a Guinness!"

I agreed. I'd had a Kenyan Guinness before. For some reason, it was of a stronger variety than could be had in the U.S., with an alcohol content around 8 percent. After the first few rounds, Pete told the steward to bring six beers at once to save him the effort. Three beers in, I was already drunk. And tired. I yawned several times as a hint, but Pete was oblivious.  

"Wagga what?" I said, when he told me where he had grown up.

"Wagga Wagga," he said. "Never heard of it?"

I told him I had not. "What does Wagga Wagga mean?"

"It's an Abo word," he said. "Means crows. One crow is wagga. More than one is wagga wagga."

I don't recall how the conversation turned, but shortly after he told me about Wagga Wagga, he revealed to me that his mother had died recently.

"Sorry," I said. "How did it happen?"

He sighed, twisted his face into a grimace.

"I'm sorry," I said. "That's not my business."

"Nah, it's all right," he said. "She died of cancer back in June."

I apologized again.

"Before she died, she gave me her life's savings. About three thousand dollars." He looked out the window. "She always knew I wanted to go to Africa."

"That's very touching."

He was silent for several seconds. I was about to say something to lighten the mood, but the alcohol must have flooded his frontal lobes and suppressed his inhibitions.

"Me dad's a drunk," he said, suddenly. "Lost his job in Wagga Wagga, so he moved us out to Broken Hill and started working for the mines."

I glanced at the empty bottles and realized he was drinking at almost twice the rate as me. 

"Me mum hated it there," he said. "I think she was saving that money to leave him."

"You think so?"

"Yeah. And she might have," he said. "But I remember something quite clearly. She asked me once if I loved me dad."

He fixed his gaze on me.

"She wasn't asking off hand," he said. "She was looking straight into me. Kind of scared me."

"What did you say?"

"I said yes. And I said it like I bloody well meant it."

"And you think that's why she stayed?"

"Yep."

I don't remember what else we talked about. Pete downed beer after beer, while I nursed one until it was as warm as broth. At some point, I told him I was turning in.

"Oh, yeah, right. I won't keep you up, will I?" he said, pointing at his Guinness.

I shook my head, climbed into my bunk, and rolled to face the wall.

"Sure is dark out there." 

I did not roll over, said not a word. A few minutes of silence. The train was rocking me to sleep.

"We must be in the middle of nowhere. There are no lights to be had."

****

I woke at dawn to find Pete sprawled in his seat, a Guinness sitting precariously between his thighs. I reached over, rescued the half-full bottle, and set it on the washbasin among the numerous empties. I counted at least twelve.

The train jolted, and the clinking of glass must have wakened him. His eyelids fluttered open, and then slowly he leaned forward, like one of those mechanical tipping birds, until his head hung between his knees, his hands covering his face. I asked if he were okay. 

"Me head's splitting," he groaned.

I fished in my backpack for some Tylenol and gave him three capsules.

"Thanks," he said.

He glanced around, and then he reached for the bottle of Guinness on the washbasin. He popped the pills into his mouth and washed them down with a long swig of warm beer. He was mostly quiet the next few hours, perhaps because of his hangover. Perhaps because he was embarrassed by the things he had said the night before.

The train lurched unceremoniously into the Nairobi Railway Station. We poked our heads out of the car and plunged into the stream of humanity flowing out of the station onto Haile Selassie Avenue. Pete said he was going to the Iqbal Hotel to rent a room for the day. He needed a shower, he said, before heading to the airport that evening. 

Against my better judgment, I told him that I got a discount at the Parkside Hotel. I was spending the night in Nairobi, so I suggested he use my shower and park his bag there until it was time for him to leave.

"Thanks, Mate. That's mighty generous."

We trudged up Moi Avenue, weaving our way through the bustle and throng of pedestrians. I paid for a dormitory-like room at the Parkside, overlooking Jevanjee Gardens. Pete tried handing me money, but I waved it away.

I dropped my backpack on the bed and told Pete I was going to the TFA office and that I'd be back to fetch him for lunch.

"I know a good Italian place," I said.

"Sounds good. I'm famished." 

I descended the stairs to Monrovia Street and turned north on Muindi Mbingu Street to the Norfolk Towers, where the office was located. There, I was handed an application for a year-long extension on my contract. Marie Nelson, an administrative assistant, said I would be an excellent candidate. I thanked her and told her I would seriously consider it.

Marie also handed me a $250 reimbursement for “hazard pay.” Recently, a colleague had been robbed of his brief case at Kenyatta University, and the matter might have ended there, but insult was added to injury, and his assailants forced him to strip down to his underwear. He walked across campus clad only in his boxer shorts and took refuge in his department chair’s office. Another colleague woke in the middle of the night to hear voices coming from her ceiling. She fled screaming across the schoolyard to summon security guards, who found two men in her attic trying to cut a hole through her ceiling. Soon after, there were demands for hazard pay.

I was reluctant to accept such compensation. We had been warned of the perils of living in Nairobi, so this seemed to me like changing the rules after the game had begun, but Marie pushed the envelope into my hands.

“Take it,” she insisted. “It’s already in the books. Don’t add to my workload.”

“As long as you put it that way,” I said.

I said my goodbyes, stepped onto Harry Thuku Road and headed south. 

Walking the streets of Nairobi was always an experience. Street boys with glue bottles stuck to their noses. Grubby-clothed children, snot caking their upper lips, being directed by their mothers to tug at your sleeve and beg for shillings. A man with a leg as wide around as a basketball, a result of elephantiasis, panhandling for money on the sidewalk. Another man folded up by polio begging in the middle of an intersection, hoping drivers will toss a few shillings at his feet as they whizz by in their vehicles.

By this time, I had adopted the "Nairobi Walk." My version was to know exactly where I was headed before stepping onto the sidewalk and making a beeline for my destination. No meandering, no dawdling, no daydreaming. 

Pete hovered in the lobby of the Parkside, freshly shaven, his wet hair slicked back. Nairobi still terrified him. He did not brave the streets himself, so he hesitated when I told him we should walk rather than take a taxi.

"It's only a few blocks," I said.

"So, you're not afraid of Nairobbery?"

I smiled. "Not anymore. It's not that dangerous if you know what you're doing."

"I have to admit, I was a little surprised when you took off on foot for the hotel."

"Why didn't you say something?"

"Like I said, you surprised me."

I led Pete to Trattoria, an Italian restaurant in the heart of the business district. We sat at a table on the second-floor balcony, overlooking Kaunda and Wabera streets.

Pete immediately ordered two Tuskers from the waiter. His eyes met mine.

"I got shillings that need spending," he said. 

"This is on me."

He was in no hurry to order. He downed two Tuskers before he even opened the menu. Eventually, he decided on a filet mignon, one of the more expensive dishes. 

"Order whatever you want," he said. "I mean it. I need to spend the last of me shillings."

"You can exchange them at the airport, you know."

"Nah. I want to go out in style."

I settled on tilapia in a white wine caper sauce. Pete ordered two more Tuskers. When our meal came, he ordered another round of Tuskers.

"I'm still drinking this one," I said.

"All right, then. One," he said to the waiter.

As the waiter cleared our plates, he ordered another round. By this time, he'd had six beers to my three. I told him I preferred a coffee.

"Come on. Be a bloke. I'm leaving today."

I gave in. Halfway through the next beer, he began bemoaning his return to Broken Hill. 

"It's a dead end," he said. 

"It can't be that grim"

He said he had quit his job at a gas station in order to make this trip.

"They won't have me back. I'll probably end up in the mines with me old man."

He told me the world's largest mining company owned the town, so the most lucrative jobs were in the mining industry.

"It's like being in the mafia," he said "Once you're in, you're in for life."

"You'll land on your feet," I said, without conviction.

"Yeah, like a cat," he said, feebly.

Pete checked his watch.

"What time's your flight?"

"In three hours."

"You should get going."

"Yeah." 

But he sat there staring down at the pedestrians on Kaunda Street. His eyes followed a Maasai woman, with a shaved head, dressed in red and blue shukas, beaded sandals, beaded wristbands and necklace. The only thing missing was the beaded collar around her neck.

"Look at her," Pete murmured.

"Let me buy you one more round," I said.

He nodded. We spent another half hour on the balcony, mostly in silence, watching street life below.

****

Pete dashed upstairs to retrieve his bag, while I found a taxi and haggled with the driver over the fare. We settled on fifteen hundred shillings, a fair price. After several months in Kenya, I learned that you don’t settle on the first price offered. My first night in Nairobi, I spent 500 shillings on a Tusker, of which 400 shillings were returned to me when my supervisor discovered how much I was overcharged. When Pete emerged from the hotel, he announced he had less than a thousand shillings left.

"Holy cow!" I exclaimed. "That's not enough to get you to the airport. Not by taxi."

"Seriously?"

"How much do you have?"

He pulled the wad of bills from his pocket and counted eight hundred shillings.

"We'll have to put you on a bus."

"How much is a bus ticket?" Pete asked.

"I don't know, but you're going to have to head to the bus stage now."

"Right."

"I will take you to the airport," the driver insisted.

"He has only eight hundred shillings," I said.

The driver eyed me skeptically. All wazungu have money, he was thinking. I explained that Pete was leaving for home and had spent all his shillings.

The driver sighed. "Sawa."

"You'll take him?"

"Yes."

While Pete was climbing into the taxi, I retrieved seven hundred shillings from my wallet and slipped the bills into the driver's hand. He beamed with gratitude.

I leaned through the back window. "Have a safe trip."

Pete smiled. "You're a lucky bastard," he said. "I'd kill to be in your shoes."

We shook hands. I unbent myself and watched the taxi drive off. Pete stuck a hand out the window and waved. I returned the gesture.

I went up to my room and flopped onto the bed, staring at the swaying branches of a Eucalyptus tree outside the window. One day, I, too, would be leaving Kenya, and the thought seized me with panic. I could not imagine returning to the suburbs of Chicago. I imagined Pete returning to Broken Hill, tomorrow or the next day, and the sheer and utter despondency of his countenance was merely a projection, I knew, of how I imagined myself upon my return to the States.

Kenya had transformed me irrevocably. I had walked alone across a game reserve, amid zebra, eland, gazelle, and water buffalo; had witnessed a lion take down a zebra less than fifty yards from my camp tent in Nairobi National Park; had been charged by an elephant in Tsavo West and had never before driven an automobile so fast in reverse. Though I had eight months left on my existing contract, I was determined to prolong my stay. I sat up, retrieved the extension application Marie had given me, and sat at the desk to fill out the paperwork. Only a few of us in the group of sixty-four teachers would receive extensions. I was determined to be one of them.

****

Several days later, while on a Stagecoach bus in Nairobi, I thought I saw Pete walking west on Mama Ngina Street, near Trattoria. I swiveled in my seat to get a better look. I was sure it was him. Immediately, I pulled the chord, but the next stop was a few blocks away, at the Hilton Hotel. 

I hustled down Mama Ngina Street, but Pete was nowhere to be seen. I turned north on Muindi Mbingu Street to Kenyatta Avenue, which was swarming with pedestrians. I backtracked and headed for Trattoria. I searched the restaurant but did not see him. I thought about checking the Iqbal Hotel, but that was in the opposite direction he had been heading.

When I thought about it some more, I realized I might have been mistaken. The hair was a little different, and the backpack was blue, not red. Pete was in Broken Hill. I had been chasing a ghost. 

When I reached the TFA office, I found Marie perched behind her desk, a telephone receiver wedged between her jaw and shoulder, taking notes. Her eyes darted my way, but she quickly returned to her paperwork. She talked loudly, fervently, to some poor Kenyan who did not understand the import of her words.

“Wiki kesho!” she exclaimed. “Kesho! Kesho!”

I flopped into a chair next to her desk.

“Sawa sawa,” she said. “Asante.”

She sighed loudly after hanging up.

When I asked, she told me she had been on the phone with Kenya Airways, trying to book flights for next week. Three of my colleagues, she explained, were giving up and going home. Africa was too much for them.

“They are lonely,” she explained. “They miss their families.”

“I guess it takes a certain kind,” I said.

“Yes,” Marie said, smiling. “The crazy kind.”

I smiled and gave her the paperwork for my extension.

“I must be the crazy kind.”

She took the application and glanced at me.

“Why do you want an extension, Richard?”

I was taken slightly aback. “You told me I would be a good candidate.”

“No,” she said. “Why do you want to stay in Kenya?”

I had no idea how I should answer her. I was thirty years old, and already I could count more than ten places as home--among them Chicago, New Mexico, Montana, and Venezuela. I no longer had a definite sense of what home meant to me. Kenya was different. It wasn’t home, exactly, but I felt I had returned to something essential. Or that Kenya had returned something essential to me.

“I don’t know.”

Marie shook her head. “You look tired,” she said. “You should get some rest.”

I was tired. And filthy. I had just endured six hours on matatus and buses, from Kenegut to Nairobi, over some of the most dangerous roads in the world. The sun would set in about an hour, and Nairobi is no place to be after the sun sets.

It was time to board my final matatu and head...well, home.

(To be continued)