My dad had a story for every place we visited. He was big on road trips, first taking us to our grandma’s, where we would take long walks, reliving his childhood. Then the road trips to favorite haunts began and after that, exploring new places. You say you’ve never been to Tanzania? Well, guess who is on the next matatu to Namanga? Crossing the border before heading back counts as being in Tanzania, right? We never took pictures on those trips, not unless you count mental ones, interwoven in the stories that he told. His stories were rich and funny, often repeated for places we visited more than once.
The other day, on a road trip with my brother and friends, we passed by a familiar place. My brother and I looked at each other and recalled a story that our dad loved retelling. For me that is one of the reasons that I think about places more than I used to, they are ties to a father no longer living.
Another thing on place for me is influenced by one of my favorite books, “The Secret Garden”. I love the idea of a garden where these children find magic, friendship, and growth. Thinking back on my childhood, Ruai was that for me, an endless adventure, a magical place. I no longer live there now and maybe the nostalgia is coloring my memories. But just like my father, I have lots of stories of growing up there and all the adventures that we had. Like that one neighbor, running around the house and under tables, holding out his belt so he could punish his children, laughing so much that he forgot why he was mad in the first place. Or the small white pick-up, which like the pied-piper, collected all the neighborhood children and took us on adventures. There are so many stories out of Ruai, so many memories.
I have no ties to the place that I live now, and so I guess place for me has now become my family. My life revolves around them, the things that we do together, something that was said, and the family WhatsApp group that has become our home away from home.
But if I have to write about a physical place, like the setting for the short stories that I have been working on, Ruai is my go-to place. I have tried setting stories in my current address but despite living here for close to a decade now, I have not been able to. It does not really feel like home, not like Ruai did. The closest that I have come to finding a home after Ruai were the four years spent in college. I set a story there and it worked out. But then again, with college, it wasn’t just the place but the friends I made there, friends who became family. Like this one friend, that I had a meet-cute with. I was feeling so alone, my brother who came with me and helped me settle in, had gone back to Nairobi to embark on his own college experience. Then comes the library tour, I’m in a sea of first-year students, all just as lost as I am, and this one girl sidles up to me and says something along the lines of, “this librarian really looks like Dobby.” He’s a character from Harry Potter (for the non-Potterheads). And just like that, I’d found my place.
So I guess place and the ability to write about it is tied to the emotional connection that I have to a place. First Ruai, then the places that I visited with my dad, then Kesses, and now family. And lastly, writing about place is a challenge that I now take up to try and honor my dad.
Knightlessjules 