Part V: A Day between Two Mountains

This is the last of five-part reminiscence from my time in Kenya as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the mid-Sixties. See the first four parts in posts from earlier this week.

Ali and I slowly emerged from the desert and its maze. The road straightened. Clusters of sage-like brush appeared along the roadside, then the shade-making, flat-topped acacia “umbrella trees." We passed a pair of camels laden with sticks and guided by an ancient herder. A gazelle clan stared at us from afar before bounding away, their white tails flicking in retreat.

The road turned to tarmac at the crossroad garrison town of Isolo. We passed the armed jeep, which had pulled to the side of the road. We waved good-byes and thanks to its dust-covered driver and machine gunner.

From here it was another hour to Nanyuki and the home of the owner of the Ali’s lorry, Mr Singh, one the thousands of Asians in Kenya’s merchant class.

I would be welcomed, Ali assured me.

We gained elevation again. The coolness of the evening, the forests and the heights enfolded us. Nanyuki is still known to most westerners as the place where the actor William Holden built his resort, the famed Mt. Kenya Safari Club. Even at dusk it was easy to see how he chose it. Nanyuki is safe and pristine, tucked away in a canopy of giant trees and guarded by the mountain slopes.

Mr. Singh and his family lived in an ample rectangular compound of white washed, single-story buildings. The compound’s gates were thrown open, Ali drove the truck into the courtyard, and Singh himself ran out to greet us, knowing full well the dangers of the journey. As a Peace Corps volunteer, I was a welcomed with surprise and made a cause for added celebration.

Singh insisted I stay with the family that night before heading to Nairobi in the morning. He led me to a guest room which had an adjacent, and much welcomed, shower.

“You take your shower and then come out to the courtyard and we’ll get you a scotch and curry. You have had curry, haven’t you?”
As a matter of fact, I had never had curry, I admitted. It wasn’t a dish common to Illinois.
“Well, then, you are in for a treat.”

Indeed I was.

Scotch in hand, I sat with Mr. Singh and his family around the outdoor charcoal burner and gazed into the embers and the curry pot. The pungent amber curry bubbled and steamed into the mountain air. The spicy richness of the exotic flavors melded with the scotch, the celebration, the camaraderie, the distant desert, the day and the danger.
That night, I slept as soundly as I have ever slept.

I have treated myself to hundreds of curries since that first one around the fire in Nanyuki. None has tasted so good, and each has renewed memories of that day between mountains so far away and long ago.

Part IV: A Day Between Two Mountains

The following is the fourth of a five-part reminiscence from my time in Kenya as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the mid-Sixties. See the first three parts in posts from earlier this week.

Once we hit the open road, the convoy began to stretch out as each driver tested the limits of his vehicle. After a half hour or so we were off the mountain and well into the desert maze of canyons and wadis. No one wanted to linger in the desert.

Soon the truck in front of us had disappeared around several curves in a shallow, bone-dry ravine. Not even its tell-tale dust hung above the road. There was no telling how far ahead or behind our armed protectors were.

I was still looking for my opportunity to mention the Shifta when Ali announced that we were approaching a dangerous place.

“You say what?”
“We were attacked here once. It is a good place for attacking.”
“When was that?”
“Last year. See that hole above your head? That’s from the attack.”

I looked at the jagged, finger-sized hole not six inches from my scalp. There were others as well, behind me in the cab and on the driver’s side.
“What about these?” I asked.
“Those are from other times. In other places. I will show you.”

Ali pressed on, pointing to a plateau above a wide place in the wadi. “That’s the place they hide,” he said without looking. But nothing happened, no shots, no new bullet holes.

We sped on.

“Tell me before the next dangerous place, OK?” I said, not sure that I really wanted to know.
“The next place is soon. See that dent?” he said pointing to one on the door frame. “That was caused by the bullet that killed my friend who was sitting where you are. It hit him in the head. The place is around the next bend.”

Again, Ali rocketed past the place, waving vaguely at the fatal ambush perch.

At one point we came up on a truck from our convoy. It was pulled over to the roadside. Ali slowed some distance away and approached cautiously. Only when he was certain it wasn’t a trap, did he pull along side. The driver was tying down cargo that had worked itself loose.

Never had a road so fully engaged me. The dust, the heat, the rugged, lifeless terrain. Most striking, of course, was the fear locking me to the landscape. Yet for Ali and the others whose trips between Moyale and Nanyuki were notched by bullet holes, fear was a mere occupational hazard, part of a way of life.

The Shifta were, and still are, a stateless people. They didn’t take kindly to Kenya’s independence or claim of ownership or military presence. Just as they never had accepted the Europeans or their absurd colonial boundaries. For centuries these desert warriors had raided the Oromo tribal groups—the Rendille, the Boran and the Gabra I had encountered at the clinic. To the Shifta, war and pillaging are manly virtues. The Oroma are considered weak. At best they are regarded as mystical.

But mysticism matters little to the Shifta warrior culture. In the desert, mysticism is no match for the glory of armed victory. As for the Peace Corps, I could only guess how the Shifta would perceive it. Alien certainly, some human anomaly.

The landscape that I experienced as a fearful passage, the Shifta regarded as a proving ground.

To be continued....