Living in Lamu. I’ll never forget the first words I learned to say in Swahili mostly because I thought them to be the funniest: Saa ngapi? What time is it?
All the boys walked around the island wearing oversized American-style watches asking each other “saa ngapi?” “what time is it?” when they met. As if it meant anything. Time means nothing in Lamu. When the sun rises, the day begins, when the sun sets, the day ends. And that is how I learned to live.
There was one hotel on the island, Petley’s Inn. I think it was owned by an English couple. There were 11 rooms. Tourists to Lamu stayed at Petley’s Inn when they visited the island. Locals weren’t really welcome nor did they come by except to collect the tips travelers gave them for carrying their bags. When I needed a break from both Swaleh and the Rasta boys I would wander over to see what new tourists were there. They served alcohol but because Lamu was mostly Muslim, it was served discreetly and they frequently ran out. I met Philippe at Petley’s Inn. Philippe helped me escape Lamu after the arrest.
When I wasn’t at Petley’s I was hanging out with the Rasta boys. At night we would all chew khat and walk around the island. If there was an outdoor film being shown (all Bollywood productions that no one understood in Hindi but for the dancing and good love story) then we’d hang out and watch the film played in a field on the island. If there was no film, we’d just walk. Khat was so foul tasting we chewed it with bubblegum. The pink kind with the cartoons. We would chew until the gum lost its flavor. Then we’d spit out the gum, refresh and start all over. We’d chew until our jaws could barley open. Chew and walk, our only light the brightness of the stars and the occasional (very rare) street lamp.
During the day, I’d paint or I’d get high or frequently do both. I’d sit with the Somalian girls and they’d teach me the Swahili words they were leaning and we’d write them on chalk on the stone walls of my house. Lamu was the port for boat loads of Somalians fleeing the war in their own county. Some would stay. Others would move on. You could always tell the Somalian families.
Some part of the day I’d have to go find chapatis since I didn’t cook. Those were harder and harder to come by as news of my firing Norman spread. The German Volunteer Service sent 3 people to Lamu to help the locals learn trades. That’s when I met Barbara, the woman in the featured photo. It was great to have a friend at last and we would stay up late at night and tell each other ghost stories about things we heard happening on the island. To work with the locals, Barbara would travel outside of the village, farther than I would go.
There was another American in Lamu also, Scott. Scott had lived in Lamu for two years learning how to carve dhows when a knife almost cut his foot off. He was back in the States getting surgery on the foot when I first arrived but he returned while I was there. Scott also fell in love with a Muslim girl. During his absence they moved her out of Lamu. Scott crushed, spent time with me before leaving Lamu to find his way some place else on the continent.
Sometimes I’d hitchhike with other travelers and leave the island. I spent three days once with the Masai and once went to Mombasa with Scott before he left.
And then I met Philippe. Philippe was a 38 year-old French movie writer who moved to Shela, the neighboring island, to escape the world of drugs which eventually claimed the life of his french model wife when her heroin habit very sadly evolved into AIDs. However this was not before she tied him up financially with the French government for several hundred thousand francs in unpaid taxes while he was living in Africa. His plan was to open a restaurant in Shela and bring her down to free her of the Parisian chains which tied her. This never happened. She didn’t want to move to Lamu and he ended up getting swindled by the Kenyan government for over $40k in bribes before leaving the country with me.
Things were good with Philippe. Philippe had been on the island for a long time and knew many people. His house was furnished with some European comforts and he made sure I always ate well. We both settled into a cozy little life in his home with our rescued cats and Philippe’s black market ties that made sure we always had alcohol in the house.
And then the gendarmerie arrived. At first I wasn’t home and my neighbors told me. Panicked I flushed all the contraband in my house down the toilet, which settled nicely in the alley by the side of the house. Thankfully, these gendarme weren’t looking for my contraband. They had bigger issues to take up with me. The firing of Norman, my house boy….
Next: Fleeing Lamu: a wanted person (part 4 of 4)
