REQUIREMENTS NEEDED TO LIVE IN HOSTEL G

By Timothy Otieno

Now, it’s not good to begin a story with lamenting but it’s no secret…better call a spade a spade and not a big spoon. I was among the many ‘diasporians’ who got evacuated from our hostels at Veecam. The feeling then was that of bitter-sweet. Sweet because we thought we would transcend to Canaan after our long suffering in Egypt, bitter because we had not been moved to a place any more convenient. It was just next door to the Comfort hostels, the proverbial out of the frying pan into the fire can suffice here.

The problems with Veecam were numerous; it had no lights like all the time. The mud was maddening. Mosquitoes were our daily night house guests eating or rather, sucking on us as early as 7pm – the nerve they had! Comfort was no better! The hostels lacked electricity just as much as Veecam. I presume the move was just to temporarily blind us from the bigger problem – that we diasporians are a forgotten lot! I agree with my comrade Kinyua Njeri who wrote an article recently stating that instead of running from the problem, the administration should help us solve it. Thank God I was delivered finally to ‘Canaan’ or a place almost similar to it.
 
I’m a complete stranger to my new hostel. Save for rare minute-to-minute visits to my friends over the years, I have never been to Hostel G as a resident. The janitor there is good, same to her assistant. What perhaps she should have informed me when I arrived was that that hostel has additional requirements other than the usual bank slip, accommodation clearance form etc. 

About two days in the new residence, I received several comments from my classmates of how lately my eyes were becoming more and more red. “Tim kwani umeanza?” they would often ask. What had I started? I would ponder. The strong Christian background I had been raised in would not allow my conscience to realize they had been talking about smoking shisha, weed and those of that caliber. That was until my roommate pointed out to me that the red eyes we had been due to the smell that emanated from our hostel corridor every mid-morning and evenings. Any regular visitor to hostel G can attest to this. I say visitors because the residents seem to have gotten used to the smell. 

We walk around smiling and talking to ourselves like chipped monkeys in a national zoo, all the while we are (as they say) getting high on our own supply! Upon enlightenment on this new predicament I was facing in hostel G, which doesn’t even compare to the hell we went through while at Veecam/Comfort, I sort to sharpen my smelling skills and indeed realized that we had a unique smell emerging from our corridors. 

The strange thing is that my neighbours don’t seem to notice it at all even though their eyes appear ‘redder’ than mine. The pleasantries we exchange occasionally reveal their oblivion of the ‘foreign’ smell in the hostel. They however advise me that it’s due to the fact that I’m new to the hostel that’s why I notice such. “Ni vile we ni freshi huku, with time utazoea budah!!” one of them told me.
Of late I keep seeing the doorknob appearing smaller and smaller and even the ground I step on seems to sink every time. Perhaps I’m running crazy but I feel I need to invest in a gas mask and so should any new individual intending to reside in Hostel G. My friends, the cigarette smoke fumes combined with that stuff they call shisha or is it weed (I don’t even know) is no joke!! One goes to the bathroom and leaves it smelling of smoke! 

I think I’ll start a business of selling gas-masks at the entrance of hostel G. That’s a very good business opportunity that is not being exploited appropriately. Or rather I may start a fragrance spray business. Air fresheners and sprays could perhaps sell like hot cake around that hostel!