THAT JUNGLE

By Wendo wa Manyondo

It is one of those hot oppressive days. Wuod Ogola has strolled around the town for several hours; enduring the famous stench of Kangemi’s alleys, and the dustiness of its murram roads. He is looking for a job. Any job. But the quest was proving fruitless…

His legs cramped. The toes under his leather shoes were scalded. He had to stop somewhere and rest. Wuod Ogola located a retail shop with a rickety bench outside, and hoped the owner was a kind soul. During times as tough as this, generosity dissipated from the hearts of people. A man could callously deny you a simple non-monetary help.

Fortunately enough, the owner was not bothered by his presence. Not even when Ogola picked the previous day’s issue of the newspaper. He skimmed through the paper. A hodgepodge of dreary political stories, lethargic crimes, and no job advertisements. Ogola swallowed hard. No job adverts. That has been unheard of. The fact that a major daily would lack them only depicted the sorry state the nation had fallen into. Distressed, he put aside the paper and wandered into a thoughtful silence.

“Si kuzuri bana,” the shopkeeper started, hoping to spark a conversation.

“Mmmh…” Ogola in no mood for a talk, mumbled. He had to preserve his energy. He hadn’t eaten since the previous night. Talking would merely exhaust him further.

Ogola’s eyes darted around the shop. His belly rumbled because of the delicious aroma of wheat foods in the shop. And the alluring soft drinks frosted in the transparent refrigerator. But he hadn’t a coin in his pocket. His eyes landed on a pamphlet. A poorly printed one. He instantly picked it up and began reading it. The graphic designer did a shoddy job.

“ARE YOU A YOUNG MAN OR WOMAN IN NEED OF A LUCRETIVE JOB? DO YOU THINK YOU’RE FIESTY ENOUGH, AND SEXUALLY APPEALING? VISIT ‘DEBRIS FLATS- HURLINGHUM’ THIS TUESDAY! PORNHUB AUDITIONS ARE ONGOING NOW. HOT-BLOODED AFRICAN MALES AND ENDOWED FEMALES REQUIRED.” There was a monochrome photo of a Caucasian woman clad in a bikini.

Ogola’s heart pounded in excitement. It did not cross his mind that a reputable firm like Pornhub, with all its vast earnings, would not create such a drivel of a pamphlet. It was not the most respectable job in the planet, but who cares about respectability anyway? He pledged to audition for the job. If lady luck came his way, he would be selected. Probably flown to the US of A. Filmed in a posh hotel in the heart of Miami. And get an opportunity to drive his wedge into the heavenly grottos of some buxom MILFs. No one would need to know what he does. He imagined that he would be paid thousands of dollars. Enough to acquire US citizenship and rent an apartment. Not something classy, he thought. Just a cosy one. With a lifetime supply of expensive booze. A lifestyle he wouldn’t envision in Kenya. It was settled. He would have to audition, even if that meant killing his legs again.

The evening floated slow before his eyes. All days are viscous to a hungry man. Ogola was certainly famished and he was already concocting narratives he could use to borrow more foodstuffs from Wachira’s shop. His tactics were getting exhausted. The previous night, Wachira vehemently rebuffed his ‘erudite’ political conversation.

“Wewe niripe zire pesa za vitu umekopa!” Wachira said. “Sitaki adithi migi!” If Ogola hadn’t persuaded him for almost half an hour, Wachira would not have given him more unpaid-for foodstuff. It would be a mission impossible that evening. Wachira wouldn’t want to see his face. And no other shop would lend anything to him. His debt-ridden reputation was already mounted on the estate’s banner for all to see. He was consigned to starve that night.

Ogola is a lucky chap. A friend, Omar, invited him to a Iftar feast at the local masjid. The biryani was packed in enormous sinias. The men ravaged it all, peaking their indulgence in honeyed dates. Ogola slept like a baby. He had enough energy to walk to Hurlingham the proceeding morning.

There was a light drizzle that morning. Ogola shivered like a chick in the draught as he maneuvered through the light traffic around Adams Arcade. In his mind, he was confident that there would be a few participants in the auditions. Porn acting was unthinkable to most people. Kenyans were intrinsically salacious souls, cocooned in the shell of puritanical conservativism.

When he got to Hurlingham, he surveyed the area trying to locate Debris flats. The place was amalgam of casinos, Chinese restaurants, and dilapidated spas. The drizzle had quelled its gnawing effect at the time, and Ogola felt somewhat relieved. When he arrived at the exact location, Debris flats, there was a warmth seeking to invade the algid atmosphere.

The place was the emblem of disappointment. Vaguely, did he imagine it as it appeared in his sight. A crude edifice four stories high, unplastered. The grey walls, disorganized semblance… something drawn from a Spartan metropolis. It was an abandoned building. Ogola seemed to wonder why Pornhub would have their auditions in a place like this.

But there was a sea of humanity idling around the place. Men and women, young and mildly old, beautiful and amusingly hideous. They were all there… All variations of the human scale. Some were queuing up in a long caravan heading into the building. Ogola mindlessly wandered around, curious to understand what was happening.

“Kwani, why are people here?” He asked a frowning woman seated on a lime block near a heap of ballast. She was tawny in complexion, fleshy lips and a diminutive figure.

“Si wamekuyaa indaviuu!” She replied disinterestingly.

“Interview?” Ogola’s heart skipped a beat. He glowered at the queue again.

“Eeh!” The woman replied. “Sikuexpect kutakuwa na watu wengi namna ii!” Ogola sat on a block beside her. He was dressed in a drab jacket and a corduroy pair of pants that had slightly altered its colour from black to ashen.

“Kwani hii ni interview gani?” Ogola inquired unbelievably.

“Kwani wewe umekuyaa gani?” The woman pitched her voice.

“Si Ile ya…wale watu…Pornhub!” He said embarrassingly. Mumbling the final word as though it was abominable.

“Si ni iyo!” The woman chimed. “Hata Mimi nasangaa.”

Ogola saw their faces. Desperate was the expression casted on them. Some women in headwraps and ankle-length dresses looked as though they were off to a church function. Not a porn audition. Some were undesirable in his opinion. Others were too old and jaded by life, losing every vestige of pulchritude they once had. Like the woman beside him. He assessed her carefully. She was arguably in her mid-twenties. But she was washed out. He didn’t know her, but he could imagine she was one of those rural beauties who were lured by a random blok, got wifed prematurely, and the dude didn’t waste any time inoculating a string of bambinos into her womb, defusing her ‘belle-rural’ status. Yet, she was here with him. Groping for an opportunity to earn something before her will burns out.

“Sasa ata nasikia kurudi nyumbani Mimi!” She cries. “Watoto wangu watalala njaa tena!” Ogola felt a surge of pity. But he was interred in a similar quagmire. The uncertainty of sleeping belly-full.

“Ningerudi nyumbani lakini mbaba yangu alisema nisiwai rundi!” She laments. “Aki nilijialimbia maisha!”

Ogola just gazes at her. Her eyes are welling up. It is apparent that she is losing herself into her grief. The vision of diminishing hope hath manifested itself. His gaze darts to her legs, then to her thighs. Brown thighs. Her orange knee-length skirt drawn up higher. And he is now pinning his glare on her dropping but full bosom. And his manhood simmers in elation. He internally rebukes himself, “Ogola, behave. A melancholic woman here is in need of your pity. Yet the prevailing emotion in your blood is lust!”

“Mimi vile maisha imenipiga hata Mimi!” Ogola said, trying to deflect his sexual thoughts. “Hata sijakula asubuhi. Kazi nilipoteza last year buana! Lakini Mungu yupo!”

“Naamini yupo!” The woman adds. “Labda kuna siku atatuonekania!”

Ogola innately mumbled an ‘amen’. He felt his faith slipping away with each passing day. He was not a firm bible-thumping believer. But he was a believer still. He could attest that the far he had come, it was god that had facilitated it. And he sometimes attributed his detestable condition to being a punishment for his iniquity. Maybe if he became a committed believer, his problems would subside. He had severally thought about visiting a church and rebrand his belief. But no church seemed worthy of that commitment. He had heard people, seen things about different churches. And they all brought a bitter taste in his mouth.

“I am not going to give up though!” Ogola said.

“Mimi hata sinjui!” The woman said. “Watoto nimewapeleka leo kwa auntie yao. Amesema nimezoea vimbaya. Kwa hivo niwakujie jioni. Hata amesema hatawapea chakula!”

The queue was not moving at all. And the ones lined up began grumbling about the unnecessary slowness. Others quit, clicked hard and went their way home. But as one person left, six more came around. It was already eight am. And more would come as the day progressed. Ogola ostensibly wondered how all these people keenly came across the auditioning call. The woman shifted her legs and stretched them, giving him a acreage view of her thighs. Ogola’s manhood simmered again. Even intensely.

The two remained silent for almost half an hour. Observing the queue. It would never dissipate. That was registered in their minds. Ogola had to perish the idea that he would be working as a porn actor in a foreign country. He dismissed the entire thing as a ploy to further devastate young people aimlessly searching for a place in the country. And as he rose up to go home, the woman also rose.

“Acha nirudi tu nyumbani!” Her voice laden with pain. Ogola unthinkingly took her arm in his. It happened so fast. Then he said, “Twende hivi!” The two people walked for long. Not talking to each other. The woman was submerged into her own thoughts. Ogola into his. Both didn’t seem to know the power that led them to walk beside each other. Adams Arcade. Kenya Science, Junction mall. They walked in the sweltering sun. Not talking to each other. And long they walked. Wanyee, Kinyanjui, Forty six terminus. The woman followed him. Ogola knew she was following him. But he did not want to think about what she was thinking about. It did not matter. They simply yanked themselves into the unreasonable power that pervaded them. And they walked long. Naivas, St.John the Baptist, ILRI. Until they came to Kangemi.

And when they both entered into Ogola’s single-room house, a tinned structure at the periphery of a rotten shanty, they did not talk to each other. The woman shed off her clothes. She wasn’t particularly enticing. But for a man who hadn’t dipped his rod in the well for almost an year, Ogola ravaged that Kamba doll to satiate himself. She did not make any sound as he humped above her, perspiration gleaming on his coal skin. And he nutted inside her and collapsed beside her for a small nap.

When Ogola woke up, she was still there. Asleep too. He rose up from the creaky bed, careful not to awaken her. Twilight was here. The collapse of another malevolent day. He went to the nearest kinyozi and picked up his phone. A small contraption draped in a plaster of rubber bands to keep it functional. And as if it was a dream, there was an Mpesa message,

“P0LE5ANAMKUU Confirmed. You’ve received ksh 150 from DESMOND OTIENO OTHUOL…”

He bought two plates of Ugali and bean stew at the local kibandaski and went back to his house. The woman was awake. She was boiling some tea leaves in water on the stove. There were two cups on the table. But there was no sugar. But it didn’t matter any longer. Sugar costed an arm and a leg.

“Nimeona nipike chai!” She said almost defensively. “Najua mafuta taa si rahisi kupata…”

“Usijali. Ni sawa tu. Nimepata pesa kidogo nikanunua chakula kiasi,” Ogola said. The woman nodded and forced a smile. She seived the tea into the cups and instantly blew out the flames of the stove. They sat down to eat.

“Unaitwa?” Ogola finally asked. Petrified that he hadn’t asked her name all along.

“Naitwa Mwikali. Agneta Mwikali,” she said.

“Na Mimi naitwa Ogola. William Ogola!”

And the two did not talk anymore that evening. What mattered was the inexplicable power that defined them henceforth. The innate pull between them. The intertwined urge to figure out this jungle together…