Dennis Peters

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A Driving Force

by Dennis Peters
Posted on September 24, 2018October 29, 2018

You can almost always tell whether someone is a storyteller or not. Storytellers have this…

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I'm just naturally bad at gifts. I am working on it and there is a promise to improve. My therapist prognosis is that I have an acute sense of doronophobia, which is basically the fear of gifts. This fear has dug its way to my capability to come up with legitimate gifts. I am under rehabilitation and with the help of friends and family I will make a full recovery. Yesterday, my therapist, had me describe the gifts I have ever given loved ones in the past. 1. My elder sister's 15th birthday - a bag of chips. 2. My girlfriend's 19th birthday - a bar of chocolate. 3. My girlfriend's 20th birthday - a huge argument. 4. My small sisters 12th birthday - advice about teenage. 5. My mom for mother's day - a phone call. After careful observation and comparison to gifts I have received, like an entire pool party in a 4 star hotel for my 20th birthday by my elder sister and a complete three piece suit, with a card and a dinner for my 21st birthday by my girlfriend, I have decided to get help. Getting help is first step to getting better. The other day, the one before the other one, I was reading something about the science of gifts where they said the most precious gifts are timeless and priceless. I understood all that but surely, my girlfriend will not show off with a priceless gift. She may be many things but most basic of all she is a girl. Girls like things they can eat or show off, mostly the latter. I have therefore found myself in even more conflict than when I begun this treatment. In a few days, my treatment will be put to test and I will go out looking for a perfect gift for someone very very important. I have a strong feeling that I will fail. Terribly. Mostly, because I have been administering all this therapy to myself. This is actually a cry for help. Anyone? Please?

I have been in Nairobi for four months now, time seriously flies, si it was the other day I was here telling you guys that I had been arrested on my first day to work and you guys thought I was pulling your legs? Nothing has changed, I still talk, and you people still do not believe me. I have struggled to find a cool place I would love in the entire city and for four months, I have found none. Nairobi has just been chaos, noise and unnecessary charades until I went to Karura and fell in love for the second time with someone/something from Nairobi. Karura is a piece of paradise magically placed in the middle of a catastrophe. It is like a part of every place I have gone to and loved all combined together. One thing I find entirely irresistible is that there are more trees than there are people. There are more birds than there are words been spoken, making it the only place you will find silence in the city. You find couples making out on the benches or holding hands on the trails from all kinds of races and you feel right at home. It is amazing that we have to thank Wangari Maathai for all of this, she said that she did not want Karura to be turned into an amusement park, but rather a place for all people to enjoy quietly and contemplate the importance of our environment. I certainly felt that. Thanks Wangari and thanks @MukiriGitiri for a perfect evening. This settles that debt you owed me from my birthday. #dennispetersblog

Women in Nairobi are really beautiful. These are facts. Hear me out. A month ago, I started a monologue on Twitter where I would make fun of stuff that happen in Matatus on the daily in Nairobi. It got old fast because my sense of humor comes in waves plus the crowd on Twitter is very hard to please. Recently, I started another where I would make sure I left a compliment to a lady, mostly the ones seated next to me in Matatus. The line is mostly, "Hi, you're really pretty" and then record their reaction after they have left on my notepad. The shy ones never look me in the eyes, they just say a quick "thank you" and are fast on their way. One really wanted to continue with the conversation but was having a really difficult time going about it so she shifted in her seat until I decided to be kind and commented about the weather. The funny ones never know when they are hurting my feelings. One said, "You too" as she was on her way to the bus exit and I could see her giggling at her joke from the window. She must have felt like Kevin Hart (on a good day). The confident ones are scary. They will look at you directly on your eyes and because most of my confidence is inexperienced, I will turn away. They will have won the confidence battle and it will be my turn to be uncomfortable. The uninterested ones, smile and say "thank you" and put in a crafted line after that to try and sound kind while what they are thinking about is the accumulated paperwork and the unbalanced accounts in their excel sheets. These ones need to learn to relax, life is not that serious. Others we have ended up being serious friends. There is one, after my comment, she was all cool about it. Later, I was on Instagram and she whispered close to me, "do you want to gain one more follower on Instagram?" And I gave her my phone and she typed her account and told me not to stalk while she was there. Later she opened her Twitter app and I extended the olive branch and asked her whether she wanted one more follower on Twitter and she gave me her phone and I typed in my username. Such are the moments I live for. Just because we are stuck in traffic does not mean we have to be grumpy, does it?

There are these sandals that look like sandals but are not really, we call Nyamburas (No relation). We like Nyamburas because they are easy to slide in and comfortable to walk in. They are normally a little paradise for feet. It often feels like walking bare feet along a sunny beach with warm sand caressing your feet. Nyamburas are amongst the greatest achievements in the history footwear. I wear Nyamburas on Sundays when Mukiri Gitiri has to go look for brilliant dresses and unique patterns of linen for her art (rolls eyes). It is usually a tiresome job and I often find myself wishing something could caress my feet and make me feel like I am walking on a sandy beach. Sasa si last Sunday I was all about my business holding first choice linen as Mukiri was busy choosing from sea of them. She usually has first, second, third... all the way to ninety something choices. Its a ridiculous job. The upside of this hustle is that nobody knows me at Mwiki, or Ngara or Gikomba sasa I am usually very comfortable. Everyone is a stranger. Last weekend took a different turn when a couple, a beautiful couple, stood right in front of us and called us out by our real names. We were in Mwiki, we had successfully managed to get the best backdrops Mukiri has been fantasizing about. It was a good day. She was happy. I was not happy but my feet were. So here comes someone who knows us from the blog. It is like we had been caught with our hands in the sugar jar. We froze. Like an antelope in headlights. So they said they knew us from the blog, not because I asked, they offered because we just stood there like the naughty dirty kids we were. The highlight, however, was the look on the lady's face when she saw my dusty feet. It was like she was disappointed. I can't tell whether it was because I look nothing like my stories or it was because of my Nyamburas. Anyway I hope she don't shame me on Twitter. Mukiri calls her current project 'Home not Home'. I have not seen it but it has linen, dresses and stuff. I think. She says that she is writing her story and nobody reads a story before it gets published. I still think we should a get a peek. #HomeNotHome #MukiriGitiri

I have never been a fan of football. There is more chance for me to stab my foot continuously for amusement than to use my 90 minutes watching soccer. I do not have that patience. • I have found myself watching football matches regularly though. Particularly world cups. I remember 2002, I was only 7. I remember cheering Cameroon thinking that Cameroon was abroad. A place for TV mzungus and stuff. I remember skipping Sunday School because of a match and getting my ass thoroughly whipped by mother. • 2006 was a difficult year for me. I remember people screaming world cup while I was crying myself to boarding school. I remember Mr Ngururi's face when he said I was too young to join class 7, so I had to go through class 6 for the second time. I remember my classmates gibbering football this and football that while all I was feeling was like my life was coming to an end. • 2010 was a funny year. We nearly broke windows and uprooted flag posts when our Principal merely suggested that High School was meant for studying and not football watching. It was also the same time puberty waves came through and left me beardless. I am one of those who got beards at 22 years. Laugh all you want. • I had my first girlfriend who was not really my girlfriend at 2010. She was from Naivasha Girls. We met at an English contest at Moi Forces Lanet and she swept me off my feet instead of the other way round. Me I am telling I have seen things. • I do not remember much about 2014 in terms of football. I was in Second Year at Nyeri. Classes were already becoming burdensome and Calculus was weighing me down like the sins at NYS. I actually have no memory of World Cup 2014, ata I don't know what I was doing. Maybe I was teaching myself to write and being a groupie to Mukiri's crazy photography rendezvous that I never noticed nothing. • Shocking revelation, however, was that I was so deep in her friendzone, I could not even see the TV screen even if I tried. I was just staring at her eyes wondering why God had to be this perfect. • Anyway, World cup 2018 might find me married but no pressure... • #dennispetersblog @mukirigitiri Photo by @munyata

There is this cake. It is not like other cakes because it takes time to get prepared. It is orange in colour and feels like Asgard in the mouth. It is cake that bothered to study in the library while the rest were stealing exams at the end of the semester. • I first had this cake at Intercontinental, in 2015 at #BakeAwards. Only one piece and I came back home, told all my friends about it and they thought I was pulling their legs. Cake cannot be that good. So I maintained my peace, wisdom and experience in silence knowing clearly that I knew something none of them did. • Last weekend again at #BakeAwards 2018, after I had lost the Creative Award, I went to the open buffet and can you all imagine who was there, looking at me like a long lost relative? Daisy! Daisy the cake from out of Midgard. • You guys, si I am telling you I ate this cake. I did not even bother much with the rest of the buffet, I camped here going back for seconds that I was scared my table mates would blog about me. I was stress eating. It was a reunion that was well deserved. • Then, we were position three out of five with 768 votes. 768 of you went to that website and cast a vote for us. I am comfortable with this number, it is the number of loyal people who always click on our links. If I had Daisy, I would pass each of you a piece. A generous piece because your loyalty humbles me to my knees. • Writing for me, I would like to believe, has never been about numbers. I just want to tell good stories, publish a book or two or fifteen, eventually, and eat annual cake at #BakeAwards. I hope you kind 768 people can remind this every time I stray from what is important. • #dennispetersblog #BakeAwards @mukirigitiri

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