Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.
— Oscar Wilde.
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Less money for beautiful hair: Tips for saving
Hair they say gives a woman an untold beauty. Beauty that one who doesnt have hair will go at a loss when a bride or when a woman who is ripe for marriage is being sort. This does not mean that a woman who does not have hair isnt beautiful.. nope but one with good hair will be more attractive.
But do you know how much it costs to keep your hair looking beautiful? Unless you go natural, hair, braids,washing,shampoo name it.. will always be expensive.
In the past, ladies used to recycle the use of braids. But after a few years, the practice stopped. I dont know why but it could be that people begun being rich.. the essence of recycling braids was to ensure that you minimise your expense.
Lets cut to the chase. If you were to plait braids on your head, you would use a whooping Sh1000. This money alone is enough to buy electricity tokens, a good dress.. name it.
I say this amount because right now.. one braid is 65 shillings. If you have too much hair, you would require six to seven long braids to plait your hair. You would need to wash and blowdry your hair and pay the saloonist some money for her work.
You might find that this money is more than 1000 shillings depending on where you do your hair.
Way forward?
Lets go back to recycling braids. We can do this ladies. Just wash it and dry clean it. Apply some hair food and Vuala, you’ve got this.
Buy a wig. Note that this can be recycled. Ensure that it is clean everytime you wear it
Maintain natural hair. You can as well undo your hair and style it without adding secondary hair to it.
Shave. This is the last option if you are going into bankruptcy.
Paying high for less? How touts con Kenyans
“The van was moving at a high speed on the higway, pedestrians were paving way for the vehicle that was fitted with bomb. The threat was real, the alarm had been raised, all security apparatus were put on standby.. as time went by, the driver kept his eyes on the road as he targeted a church near the road.”
Madam… songa kando..madam, i heard someone calling me from a distance…as i recollected my thoughts , i realised that i was seated in a matatu plying njogoo road as it headed to Buru buru, my house.
Ni nini? Mbona unataka nisonge na nimekalia kiti changu? These were the words that came out of my wide open mouth.
Songa tu, the conductor Retorted..
But i refused.I had paid Sh80 for my seat,why then did this guy insist that i needed to move. After being adamant, i asked the tout to return 10bob to allow me share a seat with a passenger.
But this never happened.. in my mind, the bus with the bomb was about to explode at anytime…
BOOM! I heard the earth shaking sound, hundreds had been killed, sirens could be heard everywhere .. women and children were crying as bibles were scattered all over the floor..
Madam unalia nini? Unalia juu ya kiti!.. I looked at him furiously with teary eyes making him shift focus on the extra passenger.
The short plum woman had to alight from the matatu. There is no way i was going to pay Sh80 and sit down on half a seat! No way!..Even as I dried my tears, i continued to look at the tout angrily all through the journey.
This is not only common on our route but in many cases, touts want quick money real fast. If you are a passenger, know your place. Fight for your rights!!
Have you ever been to such a situation? If yes, here is the solution:
Tie your seatbelts ..
You would ask how this works.. well, ones you tie your seatbelt correctly then it will not allow anyone to sit on your seat. Which means you will also not be able to move unless you untie it. Try it out !
Stand your ground
Don’t let the tout intimidate you. You have paid for that space for crying out what else does he want? Let everybody pay for their seat. This is not being fair to the other person without a seat but it is fair enough that you paid the seat at a higher price.
Sit on a single seat
This could be another solution. With a matatu, its easy if you sit on a single seat. Nobody would disturb you but when you sit behind the driver, the hustle will always be there.
Sit directly opposite the driver
This will guarantee your ‘safety’ on your seat. Though getting this space is rare, its a good idea to give it a shot.
Street food a cause for alarm
As the hot windy weather takes precedence in Nairobi county, the orange dust that sweeps across murram and unfinished roads continue to dry up wells leading to the use of contaminated water by vendors across the streets.
Vendors selling by the roadside without having stalls are not spared as the dust covers their foods and the water that they use on a daily basis.
As I walk down the Nairobi streets from work, I decide to buy vegetables to prepare for my supper before retiring to bed.
But as I go to the mama Sukuma stalls, I notice a vendor commonly known, as ‘ Mtu wa Mutura’ busy making the sausage-like food delicacy.
Mutura is Kenya’s traditional blood sausage, made with fresh blood and a blend of ginger, garlic, scallions, cilantro, and fistfuls of lethal piri-piri chilies.
Salty, fatty, and addictive, this is street food at its finest, the fuel behind many a barbecue and late-night party.
As I wait for my vegetables to be finely chopped, I take a glance at the man making the delicacy.
He roles the mutura with a lot of love and peace with a surety that he will get customers from all walks of Nairobi.
Minutes later, a man dressed in a suit walks by, and asks the businessman to chop ‘Mutura ya 10bob’. As the man does that, the customer is seen preparing kachumbari by putting salt and preparing a space where he will be savouring the sumptuous meal. As he munches on the meal, many more customers throng the place from students, executives, locals to young children..
“I enjoy eating Mutura because it’s much more delicious than the mutura that is sold at the supermarket,” Santa a student at the University of Nairobi tells me.
Santa notes that she eats the street food on a daily basis when she leaves school in the evening.
“I spare Sh10 every day to eat mutura because there is just a way, it makes me feel,” she says amid laughter.
Then I decide to ask her if she is not afraid of food poisoning since, most of the delicacies are made with not so clean water and the dust that sweeps around the streets go straight to the food.
“You know most of the street foods are the best. In fact, if I was to choose between this mutura here and the one that maybe is made at home or at parties, i would go for this one ,” she gestures at her almost finished mutura.
A study done from University of Nairobi on October 23, 2018 indicated that deadly germs are found on the popular mutura sold on the road sides.
The food experts said more than half of cooked or uncooked ‘mutura’ sold in Nairobi were highly contaminated with disease-causing germs.
James Wahome 35, who has sold Mutura for three years, says he receives customers in the evening at around 6pm.
“I get like Sh2,000 but when business is down i get Sh1,500. I use it for my house, I save some and it really helps me as an individual,” he said.
He said that he started the business on a small scale and urged other youths who were looking desperately for jobs to venture into the business.
“I started the business and by then not so many people were coming. You have to earn people’s trust for you to get here. This business can be done by all,” he added.
But Mutura is not the only delicacy that can cause stomach diseases. I decide to walk towards the Central Business District, just to survey what else the middle class feast on in the evenings and in the night.
I take a step further as I spot many students and middle class eating and enjoying smokies at a corner in the CBD.
I get closer and realise that most people feast on smokie when its cut almost into two horizontally and ‘kachumbari’ put into it with a bit of tomato sauce and chilli sauce with a pinch of salt.
“When its cut open, the smokie is really sweet and sweeter than the one you buy and cook at home,” Samuel Owino tells the Star.
He says that he eats at the stall everyday after leaving school.
“It’s not like I am hungry, there is just something with these street foods,” he adds amidst laughter from his friends.
Then I decide to ask her if he has ever been to a hospital due to food poisoning or food contamination.
“Yes I have not only once but twice. The doctor tells me I need to stop eating unhygienic foods that cause these diseases,” he said.
Then why can’t you stop? I prompt him.
“This is a craving that I can’t stop. I remember one day after eating the smokies and combining it with some Mabuyu, the next day i felt sick. It first started with bloating, then diarrhea, later on, i was vomiting,” Owino says.
He adds that he was warned not to eat on the streets but still could not afford to miss the smokies being sold in town.
Globally, a World Health Organization study found that contaminated food was the cause of 600 million illnesses in 2010. Out of these, 420,000 cases resulted in death.
The study also found that food-borne illnesses were disproportionately more common in developing countries, noting that “people in developing countries often have difficulty coping with food-borne disease”.
So in short, mind what you eat. When you feel like craving on something unhealthy think twice!!!
Introduce Yourself (Example Post)
This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.
You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.
Why do this?
- Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
- Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.
The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.
To help you get started, here are a few questions:
- Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
- What topics do you think you’ll write about?
- Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
- If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?
You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.
Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.
When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.
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