On the other side James and the other schoolboys say: ‘You know you just can't talk to these people because they know nothing about the world. All they know is the bush and how to survive with their animals. They have no idea what's going on in the world outside.’
Sometimes I used to think they hardly knew each other at all. Even so I had assumed that in a situation like this, Lketinga would have trusted his brother and helped him out.
I'm so angered by reading the letter that I decide to do something about it straight away. I get the Indian's telephone number from international directory inquiries and get in touch with him. He's very surprised by my news and the fact that I'm not coming back. lust a few days ago Lketinga told him I was on holiday and would be back shortly. He's sorry to hear of my decision but agrees to talk to Lketinga about taking the shop back as he can't see it surviving if I'm not there. I thank him, relieved that at last the shop won't be a problem for Lketinga much longer. I have no idea what he'll do with the money. I can only hope that he doesn't spend it all on beer and miraa. I immediately write to James to tell him what's been agreed.
At least one good thing has come out of all this fuss. Here in Switzerland I'm just sitting around doing nothing waiting to hear from the immigration authorities. But when it comes to Kenya I'm astonished at how quickly and efficiently I can act to get things done. It's good for my self-confidence and makes me keen to get back into work again. My new surroundings no longer seem as alien as they initially did and I'm gradually putting on weight again. I'm trying to eat normal food more often rather than stick to my special diet and I'm delighted to find that as the weeks pass I'm having fewer stomach problems.
Shortly before Christmas, Napirai and I are delighted by her first sight of snow. It really is incredibly cold but it doesn't bother me any more. On the contrary in fact, I find the weather here suddenly far more interesting than a clear blue sky day after day and an unforgiving sun shriveling up the vegetation. And then when it does rain after months of endless sunshine, there are floods everywhere and people and animals run the risk of getting swept away to their deaths. I'm happy again just to see rain, snow and even fog.
A few days before Christmas we go shopping with my mother down in Rapperswil. I find all the excess in the shops just incredible, and decide that from now on I will make do with the bare minimum. This overabundance is really unnecessary. Purely by chance I bump into my first boss from way back when I had my first job selling insurance. After two years working for that firm I'd saved enough to open up my own bridal wear shop. I had been so taken with the idea of buying and selling new and second-hand clothes that I'd taken the risk of setting up my own business. He on the other hand had been sorry to see me go. Now here he is standing opposite me listening in astonishment to all my stories. By the end he gives me his card and says he'd be glad to give me a job again whenever I want; all I have to do is give him a call. We say goodbye and I beam at my mother and say: ‘You see, it's going to be easy for me to find a job again.’
Even though I don't really want to go back into the insurance business, the chance meeting has cheered me up enormously. It's been a big boost for my self-confidence. Apart from anything else it was the first conversation I've had with another man, and one who knew me back in the days when I positively oozed self-confidence. And straight away he makes me a job offer! Whether it was a serious offer or not, I feel like I'm in seventh heaven just because he showed belief in me. I tell my mother that as soon as the holidays are over I'm going to get on to the immigration authorities to find out what's happening to our case, especially as my three-month residence permit will be about to run out. She says I might be better to just wait quietly for them to get back to me.
I'm really excited about having a proper Christmas once again, with cold weather and snow and all that goes with it. It never really felt like Christmas in Kenya as it was almost always unbearably hot. The only thing back there that made me realise it was Christmas was all the old people in Barsaloi making their pilgrimage up to the mission to get some maize meal and new woolen blankets. All those who regularly attended the ‘bush church’ were entitled to these presents at the end of the year and Mama obviously wasn't going to be left out. I would watch each year, smiling inwardly to myself, as she got ready for her calculating little trip to the mission.
On Christmas Eve we have nearly my whole family together as it's my mother's birthday the next day. Only Eric, my younger brother, and his wife Jelly are turning up two days later as they want to spend Christmas itself in their own home with their two sons. Already there are piles of presents under the tree for my little girl. Everyone wants to give her something and Napirai just sits there in amazement.
Then she starts ripping the paper off one after another and doesn't know which to start playing with first. Two or three parcels would have been more than enough for her. Where are we going to put all this stuff? In any case Napirai is happiest of all when I take her out to the playground to play with other children.
But I really do enjoy sitting down with my family at a beautifully laid table for our traditional fondue bourguignonne. Then all of a sudden, looking at the plate piled high with an enormous amount of meat I burst out laughing. When everyone stares at me curiously I have to tell them what it is that amused me so much: ‘If Lketinga was here he simply wouldn't comprehend that this little pile of meat is going to be enough for all of us. He and another warrior could easily polish off an entire medium-sized goat in a single night.’
‘Well he couldn't do it here, not least because of the price of meat,’ says Hanspeter with a smile. But my thoughts are back with Lketinga and I can't help wondering what he's doing now.
Some days now simply drag on and on while others flash by in a trice. New Year's Eve is one of those days that just doesn't seem to end. We don't make a big thing of it as we're all locked in our own little worlds. The one thing I want more than anything from the immediate future is for us to get Swiss residency. I'm not worried about anything else.
Early in the new year, the Indian shop owner rings me up and says he was ready to take it back again but Lketinga has changed his mind and wants to keep working in it. So now he's expecting rental in advance for the next three months. I tell him he'll have to deal with Lketinga; I've paid until the end of the year and if Lketinga wants to keep on the shop he'll have to take responsibility for it. I tell him I've left all my money in Kenya with my husband and have no influence over him any more.
Nonetheless I'm worried at the idea of Lketinga trying to keep on with the shop and can only hope he's found someone good to help him.
It's exactly three months since my arrival back in Switzerland when a letter arrives from the immigration authorities. My heart is pounding as I open it — this could decide the whole future course of my life, or at least which country I spend it in. But after reading the first two sentences, I'm both relieved and disappointed: all it says is that they require more information about all the members of my family.
I fill in all the details as precisely as possible and stress in a letter that I am not expecting any sort of income support as I have my family to support me in any conceivable financial difficulties. Apart from that I mention that I have already had a concrete offer of work. Confidently, I send off the documents again. My mother however comes over all sad saying she's got so used to having Napirai and me around she couldn't bear it if we had to move abroad again. I do my best to console her: ‘Everything's going to be fine. Otherwise they'd already have deported me in the last three months.’