Do you know the hard life we went through?
"Kijana, come here. Sit down.
Again what did you say has brought you back from campus?
Ati to greet us? Who told you we have missed you? This funny attachment of yours with your mother itaisha. OK?
Now, I know you have come to see those girls in the neighbourhood whom you have impregnated. My son is becoming a serial impregnator. Kijana I wish you knew how difficult life is. I'm told that you brag to those girls that 'kwetu tumeosa' so that you get a quick access to their zippers. You don't have the smallest idea of how I, your father, struggled to get this wealth.
You know, young man, me I read in my days. In those days when reading was reading. Yaa, I read books. When university was university.
In our days, we could stay for months without even imagining of girls. Ask your mother here--I only met her in my fourth year. And, true to the gods, I never dreamt of her while I was a student. I only started having feelings when the giver of the powers to read announced that I would receive a First Class. Ask your mother; I had my first erection that day. First erection in 24 years. We were serious with books, not chasing panty-wearers all over campus.
I could go for a whole semester without imagining of touching a girl. Now you here, all you think of is touching every Nyasani, Bochere and Bikeri that crosses your path. I keep telling you kijana: You will die very badly; like a dog. Chinua Achebe says that the thing that kills a man starts as an appetite.
Yaa, do you know how broke we could get those days? Thank your stars your father understands that Helb money is insufficient and does shopping for you. In our days, my father thought that Helb was enough to pay fees, do shopping and survive with throughout the semester. I remember how I ate sukumawiki until they said I would die of sukukumosis, a disease caused by too much sukumawiki in one's bloodstream."
[To be continued . . . ]
