CITY MARKET

The fishy smell is the first thing that hits your nose as you approach the entrance of the market.
AT The centre of Nairobi, Kenya, there is a market called CITY MARKET. I was walking around the fish-smelling market when I came across a shop that sells ornamental mirrors, tea sets, chests and such like things. The owner of the shop, Ecdelis Musyoka, took me round the shop, giving exorbitant prices that he says are for the Mzungu.

When he saw the expression on my face however, he hastily informed me that bei ya mwafrika, of course haiwezi kuwa same na ya mtalii (the price of an African can never be the same with a Tourist's). It did not go down to the levels I expected though.


There was a mirror that was beautifully embeded there and he priced it at 8,000 because he had done the decorations himself and had fitten the rustic frame with great caution. That was the mzungu price. How about the mwafrika price. Believe it or not, he priced it at 7,000. Only 1000 less.

After listening to the differences in pricing that he gave his commodities, I gathered that people like him and his partner, would rather starve or die waiting for a white tourist to buy their stuff "at the right price" than to sell it at a cheaper price to a fellow African.

It seems embeded in our minds that the white man is the only rich man and an African, your brother cannot buy anything at the right price. Sad mentality and one which is destroying our nation slowly and surely.

Behaviours and beliefs such as these degrade us, force us to believe that we are poor, inferior, we then start to thing of ourselves in terms of communities. Some communities are richer than others. Some communities are boastful and like to buy expensive stuff. Silly things like these are what evolve us into tribalists, election hatred and violence. And only one person to blame.

The Damn colonizers. They did it then and they still do it now even without being the masters of our countries. They do it by financing the kinds of leaders they know they can manipulate.

All this from the City Market.