By Markson Omagor
(Author)
This Friday the 20th April must surely portend something bad. First we woke up to a heavy downpour that kept us in blanket wraps till about 8:00am. Knowing that the morning had gone, I covered myself even more and allowed sleep to take me over only to be woken up unceremoniously that we were to go for labour party. An inconvenience!
Then I report to our workplace and find our Afande already there and the place opened by himself. This was an unusual occurrence, but on the other hand I was elated. Elated because I had sent the same Afande to communicate to my wives and I was eagerly awaiting a feedback. I inquired of the same and he told me both lines were off and yet he had bought Airtime of One Thousand Shillings (1,000) and engaged Kika. In other words not only was the 1,000/= lost but the eagerly awarded feedback was not to be.
While still nursing my disappointment, my workmate accuses me of losing a knife. I told him he was the last person to use the knife.
“……I used the knife for what?”
He nearly snarled at me. Unable to control my fury, I answered back in the same currency reminding him that he pealed sweat potatoes when I was literally done with everything to do with cooking. He continued searching for the knife and when he failed to locate it, still suggested that I could have accidently carried it to my room. At the mention of this, I started thinking the guy was mad and I told him so in a tone suggestive of disinterest in his stupidity.
Later he told me he was to deliver printed uniforms to the office before 10:00am. I had an appointment with the in-charge prison library to sign for two Novels immediately after morning lock up. Boiling inside, I left the work place immediately after lock up without informing my colleague.
I found the in-charge library in his room. The man however, could have been nursing his own wounds as I found him in a foul mood such a mood as I have never known him to be in. He still dragged himself and we moved together towards administration. At the gate, this short and brutish R.P harshly stopped us. The librarian told him, he was with me and the purpose was to sign for books. Not satisfied, he accused the other of smuggling me to welfare office to make calls. Off course this was outlandishly false. Still he allowed us through promising hell should he find out, that I was actually being smuggled into the Welfare Office!
On arrival there, the library office was locked. The librarian then was telling me that I should go back to the wards and look out for him later when the officer in-charge had come and opened. It was at this time that the brutish gate R.P burst in and in a victorious voice says;
“….Didn’t I tell you I would find you in the welfare office?” He barked. “What are you doing here?”
Now the librarian in rather a soft voice asked him if he had found me inside the welfare office. The R.P simply continued accusing us and at the same time the chairman prisoners came by. This was a good moment for the R.P as he immediately reported us wanting us to be taken to the OC for punishment.
I think unknown to this R.P was the fact that the library was just next to the welfare office. When we explained ourselves to the chairman, he understood and advised us to do what we were already in the process of doing. I was now nearly exploding. Needless to mention that I came back to the work place to find Ezra fuming and wondering where I could have been yet he was supposed to be delivering uniforms. I simply told him, I had an appointment too and kept quiet.
When I went back to in-charge library the man ignored me as if I was a still wind. Frustrated, I quietly went back without a word consoling myself that I was after all a prisoner and that the monitor Newspaper I had sent for could keep me busy for two days in the least. Back in the work place, Afande finally tells me he got Sarah but after using the Warid line I had later given him. She was fine. That livened me a bit. I started cooking and thought of eating.
In the evening, I impatiently waited for the Newspaper I had sent for only for the ‘Karadio’ to tell me the officer in-charge of purchase did not bring my order, none of the things I sent for was brought including the Newspaper. I painfully resigned to the bitterness of the day and I asked myself “what is wrong with this day?” Recall that it was a 20th of a Friday that I was convincted and sentenced!!
