Kigali part 1: what about?
Kigali- fucking hell!
"I know you are going to start going out the instant you put down your bags" My grandma told me a few minutes after my arrival. I assured her that no, this was going to be a quieter holiday. Yes, I actually believed it.
But to borrow a phrase from one of my colleagues at The New Times, the 'enemies of my development'-i.e my friends- had other plans for me.
A Friday night: I am in a cab from Soleil Luna heading to a party in Kimihurura with the rest of the crew- no one in the car knows exactly where it is or whose party it is, but screw me we are going anyway. More to the point there are FIVE of us in the backseat so Adam is lying across the rest of us. He isn't particularily heavy, but none of us will come out of this with any dignity. And Adam, the bastard actually looks fairly comfortable. This trip follows a fairly bonkers pizza section at soleil Luna where I just had a pizza called- I'm not making this up- flying disco. Oscar and Sunny call it 'reinforced concrete' and they have a point- if you tried to swim with this thing in your stomach you would sink.
The party turns out to be a mostly under-17 affair although you wouldn't know it with the debauchery that is taking place on the dance floor. It looks more like a Roman orgy than a couple of schoolkids getting together. The boys and I grab our beers and retreat outside musing about the fate of the 'MTV' generation.
And much later- after going to intercontinental hotel for their end of month party- we are heading for what we call 'final destination'. The famous-or infamous- KBC. Again there is five of us in the back.
There is a short silence at some point and then Eunice says "My God- I wonder if I still have a uterus"
It is hard not to respect a girl who can come up with a line like that.
The first few days in Kigali are a blur of parties and bars.
Adam our 'operations manager' is on a mission to see how much he can drink without actually having his liver try to physically flee his body. However he is taking us along for the ride so just about every other day I find myself sitting in a bar with the rest of the crew sipping a cold beer. He is taking us along for his little expriment because by God we are a team and he will leave no man behind. It is so noble of him.
It is also at this point that our group name somehow becomes the Ugly Monkeys.
Meanwhile Adam is accusing me of drinking too slowly. It is true I am a very slow drinker but you would think that would be a good thing. Turns out you are not quite a man if you just sip your beer. As for Oscar who has given up alchohol for ten months (till Novermber) just to see if he can do it, he is getting a lot of stick for it. He is sitting there sipping his sprite and smiling patiently. He is probably thinking the next few weeks are going to be the longest of his life. Sunny keeps calling him 'you ugly monkey' something he eventually regrets because like I said this will soon become the group name. However at this point in time none of us can imagine this would happen. And can you blame us? And how did we let that happen anyway?
Adam is raising his glass and toasting to a great holiday infront of us. I raise my bottle. All of us on that table are pawns to some higher social power that relentlessly keeps men from trying to do anything productive.
Then again, what exactly am I supposed to be doing at 10pm on a Saturday night?
"I know you are going to start going out the instant you put down your bags" My grandma told me a few minutes after my arrival. I assured her that no, this was going to be a quieter holiday. Yes, I actually believed it.
But to borrow a phrase from one of my colleagues at The New Times, the 'enemies of my development'-i.e my friends- had other plans for me.
A Friday night: I am in a cab from Soleil Luna heading to a party in Kimihurura with the rest of the crew- no one in the car knows exactly where it is or whose party it is, but screw me we are going anyway. More to the point there are FIVE of us in the backseat so Adam is lying across the rest of us. He isn't particularily heavy, but none of us will come out of this with any dignity. And Adam, the bastard actually looks fairly comfortable. This trip follows a fairly bonkers pizza section at soleil Luna where I just had a pizza called- I'm not making this up- flying disco. Oscar and Sunny call it 'reinforced concrete' and they have a point- if you tried to swim with this thing in your stomach you would sink.
The party turns out to be a mostly under-17 affair although you wouldn't know it with the debauchery that is taking place on the dance floor. It looks more like a Roman orgy than a couple of schoolkids getting together. The boys and I grab our beers and retreat outside musing about the fate of the 'MTV' generation.
And much later- after going to intercontinental hotel for their end of month party- we are heading for what we call 'final destination'. The famous-or infamous- KBC. Again there is five of us in the back.
There is a short silence at some point and then Eunice says "My God- I wonder if I still have a uterus"
It is hard not to respect a girl who can come up with a line like that.
The first few days in Kigali are a blur of parties and bars.
Adam our 'operations manager' is on a mission to see how much he can drink without actually having his liver try to physically flee his body. However he is taking us along for the ride so just about every other day I find myself sitting in a bar with the rest of the crew sipping a cold beer. He is taking us along for his little expriment because by God we are a team and he will leave no man behind. It is so noble of him.
It is also at this point that our group name somehow becomes the Ugly Monkeys.
Meanwhile Adam is accusing me of drinking too slowly. It is true I am a very slow drinker but you would think that would be a good thing. Turns out you are not quite a man if you just sip your beer. As for Oscar who has given up alchohol for ten months (till Novermber) just to see if he can do it, he is getting a lot of stick for it. He is sitting there sipping his sprite and smiling patiently. He is probably thinking the next few weeks are going to be the longest of his life. Sunny keeps calling him 'you ugly monkey' something he eventually regrets because like I said this will soon become the group name. However at this point in time none of us can imagine this would happen. And can you blame us? And how did we let that happen anyway?
Adam is raising his glass and toasting to a great holiday infront of us. I raise my bottle. All of us on that table are pawns to some higher social power that relentlessly keeps men from trying to do anything productive.
Then again, what exactly am I supposed to be doing at 10pm on a Saturday night?
posted by Minzo at 12:08 AM
1 Comments:
Finally you are back, about time! Hey man, whether is my e-mail!! Uzah how and I won't allow!! HAHHAHAHA
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