Biography

Enhance your profile User Name: John Kamau - Male, Producer, Offline
Location: Kikuyu, Central Province (Kenya)

About Me: I am a preacher of Christ and a church elder. I also like helping the weak and educating people about their rights. I openly speak agaist the wrong in the society. I never fear being hated for saying the truth and because of this I have suffered. I am a man of many trades. Iworked with scurity guards for fifteen years, I am currently working in a science laboratory. I like doing phoytography and vedio shooting. I try to understand everything and to do most things for myself. I like pets and I keep a cat and a dogs (puppies). I also keep local chicken and cows.

All my life I have lived in the country side apart from only in 1972 when we went to live in Dar-es-salam, where my dad had a busines. I was six years then and I was the eldest child in our family. The youngest was the fourth born and was crawling. I recall how I used to be left at the duka to keep watch and alart my dad about the presence of customers. It also acted as a security assurance since nobody would dare steal from the duka in my presence and because of this, I never had enough time to interact with children from there and this prevented me from learning Kiswahili. For the one year I stayed in Dar-es salam, I did not communicate in the language. It was made worse when I started school, we were never taught in Kiswahili for the entire period I was in primary school. I only came to lear it at secondery and even then I was not very keen with it. I came to communicate effectively in the language after employment. The weather there was ever hot. I recall how my mother used to take us with her to different destinations in a ferry. It was here in Tz I first saw a big water body ( Indian Ocean). It is even here I first saw a ferry. My mother would take me and other children to the beach and wash us with the sea water. Imagine my mum taking us with her on her own to the sea side and wash us with sea water which I came to realise is salty. I touched the water of the great Indian Ocean when I was only six years and when Idid not know its name. The first day, the sea was not culm and big waves were coming ashore with a bit of force. This even made me think that the ocean was always like that. It was me she was handling at the shallow part of the sea with my other siblings a little distance from the shoreline. The youngest was under the care of those behind me.Then a big wave of water passed us and heanded for the shore. Suddenly my mum started screaming scaring me stiff, for she thought the wave would reach the youngest brother who did not even know the danger which loomed over him. This made me panic every time a wave would pass me for I feared I would drawn. The dilemma was, she would not leave me in the water while she would have to be quick so as to save my brother from being swept by the wave. I was being half dragged as I half waded in water as my mum rushed in panick to the shore to save my youngest brother. She had to overtake the wave which was ahead of us and heading to where my innocent brother was. My other siblings were playing with something further away from the shore than my crawling brother and did not appear to be in any danger. Fortunately, on hiting the shore line, the mass of the wave which had scared my mother stiff disintegrated without reaching where my brother was. But by this time my mumu had been so severely shaken she did not want anything to do with the ocean. She declared to take us back home. As she was preparing to leave, two big boys, who I remember used to come to our shop regularly, appeared from a distance, they must have been arround twelve years. From afar they had heard the screams my mother had made and they even had hurried to our direction to see what was up. On enquiring from my mum about the comotion, they were told about the scare my mum had had and even that we were leaving for home. The boys were not from far from home for they were my father's customers. These boys being native here, they had swimming skils and had experience with the behavior of the sea. They even told mum that at the time it was even calm for there were times when the tide was even more violent. The boys forontered to help mum wash us. They calmed her and even took the initiative to take us to the water to wash. The first to be taken was me, then my younger brother while mum took my only sister then ( we came to have a second one later) and then the youngest.

In 1973 we were back to Muguga this time because mum and dad were not liming. We did not go to dad's family home but to my mum's matanal home. I lived there until November, 1975 when I went to live with my dad's mother (gland mother) who greatly adored me for her hope of my father's broken family being restored lay in my return. She was optimistic that it was only a matter of time and my mum would be back to dad's home. It prooved true since my mum had to come back two years later. I was in stadard two then heading for stadard three. I lived with my grandmother and my cousins (brother and sister). Their mother (my aunt) is my dad's eldest sister and even to her, I was very dear since she so dearly loved and respected her brother. There were other cousins who were my dad's brothers' children.

Living at my dad's home of birth was better to me than living at my mother' home of birth. There I never felt any acceptance for the three years I stayed. I experienced a lot of hostility from my aunt and uncle who were not very older than me. One day, my uncle who was only four years older than me, crafted a catapult. To test if it was working, he aimed a stone at my brother who was only four years. My brother was chasing a hen which he was plying with a little distance of fifteen meters. I did not think it would be so grave as it turned out to be. My uncle placed a stone which he dislodged from the wall of an old mud house. He pulled the catapult aiming at my brother and released the misile which landed on the side of my brother's head. Suddenly my brother, screamed with blood gushing from his head, and headed towards the mian house where my mum and other adults were. In a few steps, my uncle rushed to him and whispered to him that it was Kamau (me) who had hit him. I was surprised to hear my mother mentioning my name and demanding to know why I had injured my brother. I realised that my uncle had betried me since my brother did not even know what had happened. By this time the catapult had bee thrown away some distance. I came out fighting and let everyone know that it was my uncle who actually hit my brother using a catapult he had just made. It took me alot of effort to convince them.Because of the age advantage,my uncle would always advise me to do the wrongs which would benefit him. At other times I would refuse knowing it would be consequential. One time he wanted me to steal my mother's money for him which I refused. He later stole it in a pulse. My mother asked us for the where about of the pulse but nobody would know. She warned us of dire consequences if she came to discover that it was one of us who had stolen. One day I found the pulse in one of the rooms . I wanted to confirm it was the pulse my mum always talked about. As I lifted it from where it was, I happened to look arround because of the awe which griped me to realise that it was me who had discovered the lost pulse and I did not know if my mother would be convinced that I had not hidden it. I did not know whether to report it or keep quite about it. Then suddenly I discovered my uncle who was watching from the open window. I realised that he must have placed it there sothat I would fall into the trap of stealing the few coins he had left in the pulse. I got cold and froze whre I stood. My uncle now had every reason to acuse me as the thief. I just dropped the pulse ther without even openning it and left the room. He then called my sister and told her about the pulse. I never answered for I realise that my every word very much mattered. I decided to wait untill my mum was home and tell my end of the story. And what I said that day saved me what would have been a very severe beating. But I adore mum for how she came to my defence when she saw my innocence and beleived that her brother must have set a trap to clean himself from an image of being a suspect.
My grandmother even made it worse by the hate campaign she conducted against me. I was always the first to be condemed for anything which went wrong. I recall when my aunt, who was yuonger than my mom, and resided in Mombasa, bought a very comfortable bed for our grandmother. The bed's stands were made of wood and decorated with strips of mica. I dont know who must have peeled off the strip of mica from one stand after it had stayed for a while and aunt had gon back to Mombasa. My grandmother did not have anyone else to point her finger at other than me. She even reported the matter to the eldest uncle, who occasionally visited from Kibera, where he had butchery busines. I had to be beaten thoroughly as always happened whenever he visited. My mother was powerless and she never defended me. She feared she would be told to go back to her husband and rid her family the nuisance of indisplined children. She always new that I had not done some other things, but she dared not show her displeasure at my punishment. I got tormented to the point of deciding to go back to my dad's home.

At my dad's home I was very motivated by my uncles' wives who trusted me with everthing. I was the second eldest child among the children there. Without knowing, I became like a donkey. I would be sent to do many chores like shopping, gathering firewood, etc. I missed my mother, but I
Icould never join her at that hostile home.

Shortly after I had left mum, she went to reside in Nyandarwa at the home of one of her uncles. My siblings never enjoyed it there. It was very rough for them. No body seemed to care they were there. I always suspect that mum went to Nyandarwa as a way of keeping far away from dad who by then used to visit while drunk and even threatened take us by force. He would have a quarrell with our grany and sometimes he would have to be chased away. I recall my uncle nganging with aunt and glandmother to chase him away. My aunt once gave me a piece of wood and commandede me to join in the fray but I kept away for it was painful to me to see them driving my dad away.
The year 1977 was a yearI will always remember with gratitude to God for the retun of my mother. Though I did not receive the event with excitement, it is the time my family started living united after four years of separation of mom and dad. For me I continued living with my glandmother while the other family members resided in the Rift-valley on a piece of land my gland mother had given to my dad.
During the time we were at Daresalaam, my father had formed a habit of abusing alcohal to the point of breaking the family. My mum had to take us with her to her matanal home leaving dad behind. He later returned from Daesalaam a wreck of a man who no longer cared whether he had any responcibilities.
Back at Muguga, I and my sister were taken to a nursery school at Kerwa town. We would see our dad at the shopping centre as we went home. I would always encourage my sister so we could talk to him and in return he would be so happy with us. He used to show us to his friends who were his drinking mates. He would take us to hotel and buy us food therer. He would encourage us to eat and he would show his glatitude for seeing us. He was always proud of us and we would be very pleased to see him and the way he showed his love of us. It always defeated me why my mom would not take us back to our dad to live with him. I would go back home very sad and lonely to know that we would not live with our dad. Besides it was also embarassing to narrate to our school mates about our father and mother's separation. I would imagine how my uncles and aunt did not like me together with the hatred campaign my glanmother woul wage against me. Even the mention to them that we had been bought food by dad should never be uttered. I would listen to our school mates narrate about the the unity of their homes. Others would admit that they did not have a father but I did not dare reveal to them that my parents were separated and I felt pain to admit that I did not have a father for O knew I had one whom I was proud of.
When I was 11 years I started thinking seriously about my future. I would worry over along period what would be my fate if I did not have someone to pay for my high school fees. My father was a wreck who would never be entrusted with any responcibility because of his alcoholic behaviour. The year Kenyatta died was the year that my dad received the Lord. He was born again and to me it was like he resurrected from the dead. I did not have much hope of what I had pondered about my life and that of my siblings. But my dad was to resume his responcibilities with a great impact. He imeadately embacked on building the family living house at the Rift-valley. Evern when it came to my high school time he was much ready to shoulder the burdden without asking for assistance from any of his relatives.

I always look back to those days thankfully to God who cared about my worries and presented a rescue by way of revealing Himself to my father. I attende high school and passed.


|  |   |   | 

Story Board

You need to login before you can post a comment on this person's Story Board.