HashTag: I Have Never Used the SGR

Posted on 16th October 2019, 19:00 Hours East African Standard Time

The train arrived at around noon for the Nairobi-Mombasa trip. I was booked on that trip for a meeting.

In my country, Kenya, we call the train line just SGR, which stands for Standard Gauge Railway.

We are fully capable of naming the train line something like Coast Bound Express or just call it a baby name like Ngina and please our women. But we didn’t nickname the train.

The name SGR stuck with us because the name was hyped as the government borrowed 3.6 Billion dollars for the project. The train I was sitting in was nowhere close to what they had promised.

It was a shame. Other African countries had built electric railway lines with a lesser budget. Ours was a laughing stock.

Luckily, the old automaton opened its ugly doors and let us in.

For another hour, we just gazed at each other. There was no communication at all from the management.

There was no official email sent through the booking protocols to notify us that the trip would be late. AND; there was no Food.

I felt cheated. How could a train service worth 3.6 billion dollars not afford tea?

I am no guru in programming, but it would take our guys less than fifteen hours to develop a working communication management system for the entire SGR.

A Kenyan hosted service that would never have a low time.

I felt angry and hungry as I sat in that empty train. The train was not exactly empty; it had people, just empty people.

Lonely betrayed strained and bored Kenyans. Kenyans who had wasted an hour they don’t have.

Mortgages, hospital bills, unemployment, uncertainty, poverty, and shame hung on their shoulders. In Africa, we call these people the middle-class.

More than ten million Kenyans work their entire lives to rise to middle-middle class. The rest thirty million Kenyans hope just not to die; to see another day, and maybe win a Jackpot.

After a staggering and painful one hour of waiting, the Chinese inspected us. They were checking the package.

After the Chinese loaned my beloved country 3.6 Billion dollars, they took the contract to build and run the entire project.

They are currently making losses, they can’t give us tea, and we still owe them 3.6 Billion in dollars.

For a moment, I understood how my ancestors felt in a ship when transported to be sold in Virginia. It is degrading and inhumane.

With Kenya’s unemployment rates being the highest in East Africa, someone should have let the Kenyan Graduates take the receipts - not these Chinese fellas.

I was startled by the slight shudder of the train and realized we were about to leave the station. I looked around the economy class and my heart shrunk in pity.

Little children cried for food. Their mothers could not afford dishes soled on the train, and it was illegal to carry food on the train.

I remembered a sad story of a woman who could not take anything to her daughter who lay sick in Mombasa.

As a culture, we carry home-cooked food when visiting our sick.

It was easy to understand why poor people eat huge quantities of Ugali when the rich only eats tiny leaves and onions.

It is because poor people know not when they will eat next. These people were tired, hungry, and getting sick if not already sick.

I could not enjoy the ride since I was already bored before we left the station.

I placed my briefcase on my laps, pulled down my hood and tried to get some sleep.

Before I could drift away, I replayed the expected meeting in my mind just to be sure.

Indeed, being a Kenyan is a death trap.