Woman, why won’t you contain your bag, thighs and hair?

Sometime last year, a rumour was spreading, much like Ebola is now, about people stealing hair from people with dreadlocks in matatus, in dark alleys and sometimes right on the street when crossing the road. 

That freaked me out. 

Whenever I took a matatu – because I’d spent all my fuel money on other shit I didn’t need – I’d make sure to cover my head with a scarf. When I went out of the office building in town, I did the same. But the rumours didn’t spread much further or longer and I soon forgot about it.

But now that I think about it, perhaps I should start a rumour that a secret society of necrophiliacs are targeting women with large, weaves and wigs, specifically so that they can cut them off at the scalp, take their handbags of pleather, scrape a little dead skin off their thighs and do whatever it is that necrophiliacs do with such things as they collect. But fake and dead don’t mean the same thing, you say! Well necrophiliacs don’t give a damn! Fake is as good as dead to them, I say.

Why would I do this, you wonder? I’m just so sick and tired of inhaling hair product, carrying half a bag that’s not mine and being squashed by slender people who could fit perfectly in their chairs, but decide to snuggle as close to you as they possibly can. It’s not fair, and I don’t swing that way. Don’t swing at all, might I add J.

I’m not going to seek the necro’s on my fellow women because they look bad, no! In fact, they look pretty good. I wish I had the money to buy and the courage to wear weaves. As we speak, I do not. But I don’t want your plastic tresses in my eye every time you turn your head or every time a cross current passes coughs through an open window. I don’t like it.

Hmm... maybe I’ll just create a legend, a serial hair cutter... and then bring it/him/her to life myself. And when I do get caught, as all serial [people?] do, I’m sure I won’t be stoned to death, or made to wear a rubber doughnut and set alight. There’s no way.

99 problems and ... they’re all matatu related

@njerish

njerimuchai@outlook.com

You know how, when you enter a matatu, you pick the seat of least resistance in the hope that no one will sit on you, step on you, unwittingly – or otherwise – fondle you or pick your pocket? No? Well, most of us do. It doesn't always work. In fact, it rarely does.

Public transport is the cheapest, safest, most comfortable form of transportation in Kenya. Or at least it should be. As it stands, Matatu drivers are ninjas, every single one of them. Notice how they carry on conversations with passengers, their makanga and whoever is on the other end of that mobile phone in their hand, overtake at 120kph in dense traffic, evade arrest and wear their uniforms all at the same time.

One hand is on the steering wheel at all times and the rear-view mirror is all but unnecessary; they prefer to turn their heads and look!

Put on a track with Lewis Hamilton, they might not follow the rules, but they’d beat him every time because, short cuts and flawless multi-tasking, are what it’s all about. Of course, they crush – a lot less than you’d expect – kill and maim thousands every year, themselves included.

The treachery, however, begins before you even enter the matatu.  In many parts of the country, the drivers, intent on catching the fish their competitors are also making eyes at, will drive right onto the curb, forcing pedestrians and clients alike to dive into whatever nearby bush is available. Or worse, straight into oncoming traffic! 

But they don’t stop there! The makanga proceeds to shove you into his vessel having whispered a ridiculously low fare into your ear. And that would be really good too, if he wasn’t taking you 100 kilometres away from your destination. 

They always assume they know where you’re going. On the off chance that you are going where they’re taking you, the driver then proceeds to drive off at full speed, when you only have one foot in the car. He’s a ninja, see?

Once you’re inside a matatu with ninja Kamau at the wheel, you feel instantly safe that he will get you where you need to go. That, or you suddenly get the urge to take up long distance running as a way of life, rather than as a sport.

If you choose the former, you still have the makanga to contend with. And that independence seat just behind the conductor offers no respite. If the dude did not shower that morning or is overly prone to perspiration, you’re getting a whiff of him whether you like it or not. And his manly scent is not the worst of it.

If we ever had the misfortune of entertaining Lady Ebola in Kenya, a makanga would most likely be to blame for your catching it. 

They’re swift, aren’t they? How they wipe the sweat off their brow, pick their nose, scratch their crotch, ‘welcome’ another passenger into the already fully occupied vessel and hand you your change in one fell swoop! Mind boggling. 

New Olympic sport
Makangaring should be an Olympic sport; a test in swiftness. We thank God, don’t we, that Aids is not as easily transmitted as televangelist Pat Robertson seems to think it is. We ordinary, matatu-taking Kenyans would have ceased to exist in the 90s, and an Elysium of sorts, populated by only those with personal cars, resulted. 

You see, aside Nyayo Buses (DAFs, we called them) and Kenya Buses, matatus and sometimes friendly neighbours, were the only other way of getting from one side of the country to the other.

Out of all 99 matatu related problems, death by accident and death by Ebola, are the most obviously frightening.  

Then there’s the cashlessness issue. We were supposed to have gone totally digital by July 2014. Tomorrow is November, and cash is till passing from one sweaty hand to another. This is not only unsanitary, but it also gives conductors and drivers room to play with the fare prices. 

How about the fact that cops do not check if passengers are wearing belts, or if they even exist to begin with? Not only that but, some people just don’t fit. They’re either too minute or too large. Some occupy half a seat; some occupy a lot more. The skinny get squashed and fly out of their belts in an accident. The hefty do the squashing and fly out of the windscreen because the belts were not designed accommodate them. They’re jua kali seatbelts, hastily installed in the fear that not doing so would rattle Michuki’s snakes.

And then there’s the little matter of being touched against your will. Ever notice that, when you’re unfortunate enough to share a seat, the guy next to you always has his money in the pocket that’s in contact with your hip. Why is it never in the breast pocket or even ensconced in someone’s cleavage?

And God forbid that Mr Conductor should take your fare or hand you your change without touching you. He has to grab the tip of the note between your thumb and forefinger, with all five of his phalanges. Sometimes, all ten! Ninja! The rest of that note that you’re not touching is not money. No! It couldn't possibly be worth anything is their logic.

Again, why does the makanga never give you crisp notes or shiny new coins in change? Two parts of a 50bob note are always glued together with tape and the coins always show signs of having been in a fire... or an accident.

Also, when is the Nyayo Bus coming back?

Wyre named Mziiki brand partner

Mziiki, the largest African music-streaming app has just signed Kenyan R&B and reggae/Dance 

Hall star Kevin Wyre (otherwise known as Wyre) to join the movement as Brand Partner. Wyre joins Tanzanian Bongo Flava star Diamond Platnumz whose association was announced recently.

As brand partner for Mziiki Wyre becomes a face of the brand in Kenya. “Mziiki is a cool place for people to find new music and enjoy music from their favourite artists. It’s very exciting to be a part of the Mziiki movement,” says Wyre.

Mziiki offers music-lovers an easy way to access new music anytime, anywhere. Available on Blackberry, iOS and Android mobile devices, it’s as simple as opening the app and selecting or searching for a song. The ease of access, diversity of music and variety of functions on the app offer  artists a great way to expand their fan-base. 

“Because Mziiki is easy to use, and boasts a large array of African and international music, artists get the opportunity to expand their fan base and get their music out there while minimizing piracy. 

Mziiki allows users to explore new genres and artists that they haven’t heard before,” says Arun Nagar, CEO of Spice VAS Digital, the developers of Mziiki. “We’re happy to have Wyre, who is one of Kenya’s top and most renowned artists, join Mziiki as a Brand Partner. We know his fan-base appreciates the partnership – with Mziiki, we have brought Wyre closer to his fans.”

Launched in May 2014, Mziiki has provided artists with a boost in their already-successful careers and continues to grow daily with more artists joining daily.

The 10 hardest things about losing weight

I was reading the other day, a story by a lady called Nadia Darwesh, detailing the benefits and trendiness of going raw. I remembered how, a few years ago, when I was still young and defiant, I went totally raw – against everyone’s advice – for about 3 months, lost a lot of weight (7.5kg to be exact), and a lot of bone mass along with it. It wasn't pretty, but my skin was flawless. And then foolishly went back to my ridiculously cheap diet of fries, the occasional sausage and about a litre of tomato sauce, chilli and vinegar a weak. That... that wasn’t pretty.

Three or four years down the line, I've mastered the art of weight loss, minus the bone loss, for myself and people who like me, who love meat and cheese, hate exercise and would be amazed if they could just get to a size 10. That's considered tiny here (TIA) But that's another story altogether.

In my journey, I've come to realize that not everyone appreciates you're trying to get in shape and hopefully, into some smaller clothes, and preferably ones that don’t look like body curtains. You know the kind... they look like maternity dresses, have gathers and make you look like a cylindrical window – or a spherical one, depending on how ROUND you really are. But even that wasn’t as bad. My goal was always to be like the middle child of the sizes; between the skinny and obese friends. I’m just about there. And it hasn’t been nearly as easy as I’ve let on. Here are my ten worst experiences that came and continue to come with my weight loss.

10. Your mother starts to criticize you for being so thin – as if it's such a bad thing in these times of fast-everything and morbid obesity. She might also bring you food, you know, if you're close - and she'll watch you eat it, just to make sure. She might also send money for food. If none of these things work she might a) try to lose weight with you or b) make fun of your bony frame every time you're together in public.

9. Finding foods that you enjoy eating and can afford... and that won’t kill you... and then sticking to them. I experimented a lot. Some nuts gave me gas, almonds (which are seeds by the way) didn’t. But they’re expensive. Whole wheat chapati gave me some crazy IBS, bananas make me sleepy, so now I only eat them at home when I do not need to concentrate on anything, and very close to bed time. Plus, I have to mix them into food because on their own, they make me nauseas. So now, I’ll go to a different market every week, and I’ll look at all the vegetables and fruits I’ve never eaten or even seen, and buy those in small amounts. Then I’ll consult mother Google on how they’re consumed in different cultures – cooked, raw, roasted, soaked, I’ll try anything once. Eventually, I’ll stick with what is most comfortable.

8. So it’s about 4 months down the line and you start to lose a little weight, and the reason you worked towards losing the weight is so that you’d stop buying body curtains. But guess what, the clothes you already have are so large now, that they do look like body curtains. You have to go shopping now, but you’ve spent all your money on good food, and fuel or fare to where the good food is. So now, you’re down to the only two pairs of jeans that fit, somewhat, and three of the smallest tops, which are still pretty big. Soon enough, you’re getting looks that say “...poor girl, she can’t afford to buy new clothes...” and they’re right. They’re all right. But I’m planning on it, even if it doesn’t look like it right now. It’s all good if you have ‘sponsors’ who like to buy you stuff. It’s even better when you actually like to go shopping. I hate shopping unless food is involved. So, now you see why this is on this list.

7. Nobody sees the training you’ve gone through. They only see the overnight success, the ‘Oscar’, the star. They don’t see you standing outside McFries or KFC battling the demons that are practically levitating you to the counter and mouthing, on your behalf, “give me a double cheese burger, the family-sized pack of fries and chicken nuggets, a half-litre bottle of coke and fudge ice-cream for dessert. Yes, food demons exist and need to be battled. They come in the form of friends, relatives, work mates who somehow always have money to spend, even though you earn the same, and they pay double the amount in rent. Your critics never see habits you’ve had to give up; like that stash of poison – sweets, and salties and more sweets in the corner of your second drawer.

6. Again, TIA, so there’s always this random dude friend of yours who goes like, “you know African men like women with a little meat on them.”

0_o

Well... that’s fine; I like meat on my bones too but, what are we going to do about this fat around my vital organs? Should we close our eyes and pray that it one day magically becomes MEAT?!

If you think your woman really needs a little sum-sum on her bones, Lady Gaga proved to us that beef, and other meats, are good for a lot more than just eating. You can now wear it; make a meat dress; a pork bikini; a fish bra; mango flesh socks; mutton sandals; a polar bear meat coat and boy, I bet those Eskimos knew about blubber and flesh fashion before Noah... of the ark; hey-hey here comes the chicken dress, throw on a few of the chickens’ feathers to make it really flamboyant; and don’t forget the snake meat stockings. But those are just for sinners, because, you know... the snake was cursed at creation. No? Okay bye...

And the best part about having these kinds of meat on your bones ladies and gentlemen is... drumroll please... YOU CAN ACTUALLY TAKE IT OFF AT BEDTIME. Besides, even the skinny ones have plenty of meat in, on, around them... in places. It’s the fat they’ve chosen to NOT let accumulate. Geddit?

5. Once you go black... you can never go... no not really. It’s the trash you can never go back to here. And trust me the trash (fries) will call out to you. The trash (crisps) will beg you to eat it. The trash (sugar, sugar, sugar) will make itself so cheap, that you can buy 10 for the price of 1. But if you can say ‘no’ to the trash once, you can say no every time, even when it’s free and surrounds you like air.

4. If you don’t like the taste of fruits in general, yes such people exist and I am one of them, it can be very challenging. But you know yoghurt is good for. If it’s sugared, it’s less good for you. So... take the plain, bland yoghurt, throw in a few tasty nuts, a banana or orange or apple, you have the good kinds of sugars... nature’s sweets. Mix up your foods in ways that please the taste buds or you’ll be back on your bad foods faster that you can say obese.

3. Giving people advice on how they can lose weight is also pretty hard, because you don’t remember exactly what you did. You heard something here and adopted that, heard something somewhere else and adopted that too. When the results started coming in, you got energized and started really researching ways of expediting the process. Then you realized that no such ways exist without consequences. So you joined groups for support, shared your progress and eventually got to a place where people aren’t making fun of your efforts any more, they’re actually shocked that you accomplished, or are accomplishing, what you set out to do. So they start asking for help.

You offer it. But our bodies differ, one from the next. And your friends cheat and binge on large pack of crisps or a tub of ice cream every once in a while... and they still expect results! And when they don’t see them, they just give up.

2. Skinny friends can be your biggest encouragers. They can also be your biggest hindrance. You see, some of them want to add weight so they think you’re crazy for wanting to be smaller. Others don’t want to give you a complex... well, some do. They’ll say things like, “my, you look stuffed,” when you wear something that’s too small. But the kind ones say something like, “you’re not big, you have BDD, (look that up), your body is wonderful”. In so doing they actually do give you a complex – the kind that makes you think you’re not fat when you’re actually grossly overweight.

1.   The No.1 hardest thing about losing the weight is not actually losing the weight through exercise/starvation/eating a mango a day (I did none of these things because I love food and hate exercise as advertised by gyms, athletes, doctors, and Tae Bo enthusiasts, Yoga fanatics). No. The hardest thing about losing weight is all the people you were once fat with wanting you to remain fat forever even though they have the fat in all the right places and you look like Johnny Bravo, no matter what manner of striped trickery Kenya's Joan Rivers - that's Ian Mbugua - tries to convince you will 'shape' you. That's God's business man, and he already decided that if some people go even one kilo over their 'ideal weight' they look like blocks of meat on stilts. Stripes don't help us. Neither do friends who discourage us from losing weight. But losing weight does, because it allows us to wear belts like normal people.

Those have been my experiences. Do you have any that you’d like to share? Email me: njerimuchai@outlook.com

I let her go

I got home last night and Charlie wasn't in the house. I'd left a window open just so she could move in and out if she felt brave enough to and assumed that she'd gone and gone forever. I assumed wrong.

I found her on the balcony, cowering behind my compost bucket, scared and bloody. Something had happened to her, what? I don't know. I fed her. She slept until about 3am today.

Around 4:30am, she started to act a little crazy, mewing and mewing and driving me crazy. She'd eaten everything I had that was edible to a beast such as she. She wouldn't stop with the vocal practise.

At 5am, I took her downstairs, outside... and left her there.

She wailed a little. And then nothing. I died a little inside but I'm fine. I hope she is too. That or dead. Fine or a ghost.

If it doesn't lay eggs or produce milk and I can't eat it, what good is it?

I have this cat. Technically, she's still a kitten. Her name is Charlie, short for Charlotte which, if you take the time, you'll realise is very closely related to Carlos (Charles, my baby Passo), which is also very close to my English name (Which I loathe).

So, Charlie... I got her at City Market (Muindi Mbingu Street, Nairobi) when she was no more than three weeks old. I'd gone there to eat fruits one day, and having lost the first stray I'd rescued just a few days earlier, I was still very attuned to the mewing of a starving or stranded cat. I heard this high-pitched little squeak and thought, that I must still be missing the lost animal... then...

"This thing..." referring to the little kitten, "... bring it here and I'll kick it until it dies..."

When it 'cried' again, I had to go and look so, I went and found this little grey and white baby 'tiger' of a cat. She was so tiny, could barely see or hear and this guy - one of those that beg you to eat meat at their disgusting stalls - wanted to kill it. I took it in one hand. So small was it that I could wrap its entire body with the fingers of that one hand.

"Don't kill it," I told the lady who'd stashed it in a box. "Keep it until 4pm and I'll come take it. Where's the mother by the way?"

"The mother took all the other kittens and left this one," she explained. See, it was a market cat's baby. If I didn't know any better, I'd say I know now why little Charlie's mother abandoned her when she did.

Anyway, at 4:20pm that day, I returned to the market and carried Charlie in a fruit carton, all the way home. They'd thrown little bits of fish and mutton into the box and, hungry as she must've been, not having fed for four days, she devoured them fast as her little teeth and jaws could allow.

That was June 3rd, 2014.

She's now two weeks away from being a five-month-old kitten except. She's so big, eats all my food and destroys everything I hold dear. She doesn't know how to play gently. She bites or scratches and only to draw blood. No gentle playfulness about this beast. The only time she runs low on energy is when I have no food to give her. I thank God that bananas repulse her or I'd have nothing to eat, EVER!

I've tried a couple of times to let her wander and get lost only to hear her crying helplessly from wherever. Usually, I'll go rescue her and she'll scratch me in the process.

Today, before I left the house, I opened the front door hoping she'd wander away and never return. The one time I hoped she wouldn't show up again, she came right back to the front door, entered and refused to leave. Talk about prayers answered.

You see, when I let her out I'd told myself that if she didn't come back, I could finally let go, but, if she came back, then it meant that God wanted me to keep her and take care of her. I'm stuck with her now. The best I can do is avoid playing with her now so I can let the scratches I already have, heal. I have to have her spayed because I don't want any more kittens with "attitude" filling my house.

It kinda brings to light though the fact that I don't really like animals as much as I thought I did. They were always just there when I was growing up. Now my philosophy is, if it doesn't lay eggs or produce milk and I can't eat it, what good is it?

I want to be a Yesman

Something happens when you realize you're not as young as you used to be. When 25 strikes, you're like dude! I'm old enough to be a mother of about 10 in some cultures, responsible for a company, a household, a life - or ten - what happens if I fail.

When you're in the last year of your 20s... that is 29, and you're still single, don't have a car, a home to call your own, a job you're not quite sure you'll have tomorrow, things really fall into perspective.

You see, just the other day, you were 10 wishing you could turn 18 and leave home. Then you were 18 and had to be responsible for yourself. And now you're almost 30, and wish you could be a kid again, but with all the knowledge you have now, and maybe twice the amount of money.

But it's never that way, is it?

What happens when you accept your age is, you just stop to care so much because, damn! life goes by so fast, before we know what's going on, we're 50 and hoping we'll make 70 without a hip injury, or Alzheimer's. We hope we won't be alone or lonely for the rest of our life (I guess we all do). We hope we'll love our children when we finally have them. Then we begin to wish we'd see our grandchildren, you know, have a sort of surety that our 'awesomeness' won't die with us, that it will continue, for at least a few centuries if not forever.

Religion and God

Another thing that gets awakened, at least for me it did, is the grand awareness of A BEING, A MIGHTY MARVELLOUS ALL POWERFUL BEING THAT CAN DO ANYTHING FOR YOU IF YOU ASK, BUT ONLY IF IT'S GOOD FOR YOU. YOU KNOW?

But see, you haven't been to church in about a decade, or maybe two dozen years and wonder whether, it's not hypocritical to be going back just because you're afraid, hoping to get on good terms with the 'Man' upstairs before you kick the bucket.

You're practically middle-aged because the life expectancy is 55, so you feel like... the end is nigh.

And sure, you feel that you're not afraid of death but, you also feel that perhaps things are not as they should be 'this close to the end,' see?

And church is out of the question, right? So, how about we ask the Mighty Maker a question?

"If you exist, shew yourself."

A random string of awesomeness follows you around after that, only, it's not that random is it?

You realize that you've spent all your life saying No to the right things and Yes to the wrong things. What now?

Unable to get any deeper than that, you decide that you will reverse that yes-no situation, and become the right kind of Yesman! No?

Shaba!!!

Did you know that Shaba Ranks is gay? totally old and useless information. He's not even the Shaba I speak about in the title of this blog. There exists another, in the middle of nowhere... in Isiolo county actually; Shaba Game Lodge... I think. 

Fancy bar where Emma and I charge laptop and phones, blog and send photo to highclass man who live all the way in Los Angeles and is married to Orla Brady. Orla Brady!!! She like famous British actress from series Mistresses, remember that? No? Anyway...

Here we are at Shaba! seated right at the bar with the friendliest barman Ever! Don't want to ask his name because, a brother might get the wrong idea.

About three people have asked us if we've been here. We look that familiar or... it's a tactic they use to strike up a conversation. Well, we're smarter than them because, this place has WiFi faster than the speed of light, and we can stream videos and movies instantly. It's truly amazing. Faster than Safaricom data, faster than any institutional WiFi... this is probably how is like Mrika and other first-world countries, no?

This is the place to be. If you ever save up just a little money, just 7k for a night and about double that amount for fuel, unless of course you're taking Carlos Esteben my trusty 2006 Toyota Passo who was driven from Mombasa, has braved the rocky roads of Olepolos, all of Kajiado County, Namanga, and is now rivalling all manner of 4WDs by making to - and through - the Shaba game lodge. 

Like I said in the last post, it's a little like God Himself, told the designer of the Passo to make this particular car himself, sell it to spoiled Japanese teenager, because one day, at the age of 8, it would be shipped to a far-away land called Kenya, sold to a dealer called Malik, and end up with a struggling 28-year-old called Njeri. Njeri's sister would say:

"Hey! You like this one?"

Njeri would lock eyes with the Car and immediately fall in love. No bargaining. Nothing.

Right there and then, she would christen the car Carlos Esteban and together, they would go on adventures all over the African Continent. 20 years later they would enter car competition and win every time.

In between this, they would meet Emma and Gerald and Famous photographer and wife and they would become famous hollywood people, but they would be very humble and when time came. Njeri would pass on Passo to daughter and daughter would pass on to grand daughter until the time came for Carlos to go to car heaven, where Njeri would go and buy him again, because... well, God is gracious that way, you know?

The end.

P.S.: you will have to wait just a little longer for the photos of our escapades, Carlos, Emma and I. It hath been wonderful, but something tells me, greater things are on the way.

I totally had a Jesus dream...

... but it all began with me in hospital. I was sitting in a waiting room, but not with other patients. I sitting near an arrogant nurse. Don't know where the idea that she was arrogant came from. I was seated so close to her... too close for comfort, hers and mine, that when it was time for her to call out my name, I could see that I was the last one on the list, so obviously, it was time to go. Apparently, I was there to see Dr Bashir... in my dream I knew her full name but I don't remember it now. So up I got to go to the doctor's office. Instead, I was at Villa Rosa Kempinski. It was royal-looking, beautiful, like an idiot's heaven, perfect, shiny, angular, rich people milling around with their noses up... although I couldn't quite see them. 

Before long however, I was running. Where to, I don't know, I was still at Kempinski, being chased by people, all over the place. The landscape was breathtaking, like a Golf-course with marble plaques every few metres. Now that I think about it, they were like grave stones, but beautiful and shiny. I was pulling some ninja moves, jumping here, running a little, slipping out of the grasp of a security guard just by a whisker, and then I saw a familiar face, and with an unfamiliar head of white hair. A black man, with a white, old man's hair. Samuel L. Jackson was on my tail, he was trying to get me, but I kept skipping and jumping so that neither he, nor his goons could catch me. 

Somehow, I made it out. Now I was running up a bridge. A bridge. Not really. It was that overpass that straddles university way. I was running up the ramp shouting. Took me a while to realize what I was shouting. And I only remember shouting it just twice. Once in my head, when I realized that he was standing there, at the centre of the 'bridge' looking towards the Globe roundabout. He was looking at the sunset. Impossible. It was evening, and there's no way the sun sets in the east. Right. So maybe it was a fire he was looking at. He was tall. So tall. Slender. In white. But the light, or fire, or sun that was rising at the wrong time, made his face and gown look the softest, lightest brown. His hair was long, his beard was just right, but I only saw the side of his face.

He wasn't happy. When I realized who I was looking at, I cried out his name; twice, like I said. Once in my head, the second time, I heard myself say, in a very loud an desperate voice: 

"JESUS!" and I had my hand stretched out, like I was saying, "take me with you now!". And just then. Just as I was about to reach him, he either snapped his fingers or waved his hand and everything turned black and white... like a 1920s comic book... and he was gone. I remember thinking in my dream that I was going to remember this dream, no matter what happened. I knew I was dreaming. That was Thursday night or Friday morning. Not quite sure. And I woke up with my hand stretched out, so it's likely that I woke up a few neighbours as well.

I was right. I'm probably never going to forget that. It's only my second Jesus dream. When the first one happened, I was a child, maybe 5 or 6, maybe 8... I don't know. But he wasn't happy then either. He was seated among ruins, historical ruins, it looked like, and was surrounded by broken clay pots. Just seated there, alone as I watched from a few feet away.

Intense dreams.

LOST IN CYBERSPACE and other found poems: Oulipost Interview

LOST IN CYBERSPACE and other found poems: Oulipost Interview: 1. What excites you about Oulipost? Creating poems from a newspaper. I rarely read newspapers. 2. What, if anything, scares you about Ouli...