At any given moment, there’s always a fad sweeping across this Jamhuri, some new miracle promising to cure everything from heartbreaks to hangovers. And when Kenyans catch wind of a fad, we carry it to our villages, remix it, and use it with more zeal than the very people who invented it. We have a PhD in exaggeration.
It started with chia seeds a while back. Those shiny little things were famed to be the ultimate elixir, the perfect cure all. Then came the dragon fruit-that bloody red fruit which was said to be packed with nutrients that could last one a whole week. The myth didn’t last-and progressive farmers who had invested in it are now left with acres of fruit no one wants.
At the moment, the latest fad in murima is castor oil. This one is actually making a comeback. I have written a story about a snake-oil salesman who appeared in our village two decades back and told women that swallowing castor seeds was the organic way of family planning. In three months’ time, all the women who had swallowed the idea (pun intended) were pregnant. The castor oil generation from this con job is now in college.
The other fad is ‘tumbaku’-as in snuff. Its potency is being shared in great secrecy in WhatsApp like coup plot plans. Silver-haired snuff pinching grandmothers who have been in touch with their culture must be wondering what this craze is all about.
There’s a reason the ancient esoteric wisdom of castor,tobacco and other potent natural medicines was entrusted to a few. And there’s a reason modern medicine demands years of rigorous training: knowledge without discipline and control is poison.