Tuesday 10th February 2026
I am meeting Vicky at Congowea, a ginormous, sprawling, open air market which is reminiscent of The Barras in Glasgow in its heyday. There is everything – some old some new. I extricate myself from the matatu – like getting a single anchovy from a tin – and Vicky and I find me a new bumbag (mine has given up the ghost) and we head off to our next funding. By way of a special treat, we get a tuktuk and do a deal. The breeze is glorious. First we visit a wee village where there are several Mama B businesses – and pretty much all of them in expansion mode. The soap business is now a double shop selling a great selection of fruit and veg plus (next door) jeans and t-shirts. There is also a fish business (fried and really rather delicious) and currently supplying an impressive roster of clients. The whole village is so peaceful and friendly – I feel I could relax here, if only there were time..
Now off to the funding – bloody miles away and at the top of a hill with no road. The poor tuktuk (and its driver) is pushed to its limits. But we get there. We are so far from anywhere that getting (as usual) a bottle of anything to drink is impossible. Forward planning, people.
We have another five groups 75 adults and 258 children, As usual the women have themselves been married off around age 12 and are running to escape having their own daughters cut and sold – usually from age 9. It is the fathers who sell the girls for, one woman tells me “very little money”.
There is one group of, what their charming representative describes as “men for men”. This is the first time any gay person has been open with me. I am so impressed. They are going to sell miraa. I am particularly impressed with how hard ( no pun particularly intended) these men work to keep their closet door locked. They marry and this group of 15 men have produced 57 children. Surely bad dress sense and pretending not to know the lyrics to a single show tune would be a les stressful cover … ?
Anyway, we start their miraa business (a mildly stimulating leaf (completely legal) which, eventually turns your teeth green), plus a great landscaping contract, a soap powder hawking group (who will build up to wholesaling), a carrier bag group and a group selling melons whole and by the slice.
The poor tuktuk driver asks if we can just wait till he gets over the roughest terrain here atop the hill, before we get in. Understandable. So we do.
Now, I have noticed that my writing elicits little or no comment, or reaction of any sort when posted here. However, all I need to do is post a couple of photos of some stray cats I have adopted and suddenly everyone is interested.
So I shall post more random animal pix.
