Boarding School Part 1

I have been thinking about this post for a long time. Almost all of my teenage years were spent in boarding schools. I have loads of memories, some sad, some good and some ridiculous. It was a mixture of the good, the bad and the ugly.

My dad never wanted me to go to boarding school, I could not understand why since my elder sister was already there. I pleaded with him every single Sunday morning. Why Sunday you ask? Every Sunday morning we had to go wake him up and ask for sadaka 'church offering'. Looking back, it must have been annoying ☺. I love my Sunday mornings since they are the only days I get to sleep in....so here I was, tiny little fingers shaking him awake to ask for church offering and asking, 'Daddy when are you taking me to boarding school??' I was stubborn and nagging.

He finally threw in the towel and away I went to boarding school. I was ten years old, young and naive. I thought boarding school was cool, I thought my sister was so sophisticated. I loved how neat and obedient she was and I thought it was a result of being in boarding school. Turns out I was WRONG....because she is still very annoyingly neat and myself....well, I never caught up with her 🤣

I don't remember the first days there. My sister stood by me and made sure I was well fed and therefore I did not feel the full effects of being away from home. There are things however she could not protect me from. Firstly, the weather. My school was located in a very cold area. The early mornings and night preps were a nightmare. We were not allowed to have jackets in the classrooms because they said the warmth would make us fall asleep 🙄. I don't know who in their right mind came up with these rules. Every morning we had breakfast at 6.30AM. A cup of porridge. ONLY. Nothing more. From there we had a cup of cocoa without milk at 10.00AM. Lunchtime was githeri (a boiled mixture of beans and maize) every single day but for Thursdays and Sundays. Supper was Ugali, every single day but for Thursdays and Sundays, we had githeri for supper and rice for lunch on those two days.

I lived for Sundays and Thursdays. Those rice lunches were accompanied by pork....PORK people. It was delicious!! I still miss it since I have never had pork cooked quite the same way again. The problem was that we were served only one small piece. If you were lucky you got two pieces but if you were even luckier, you got a bone. That was a jackpot hands-down. When you got a bone, you cherished it the whole day long. You carried it to class and hid it in your locker and ate tiny bits while everyone looked your way in envy. You were luckiest if you were serving the meal, Let me explain.

We had tables in the dining room (which was used for serving but not eating). It was too small therefore we ate outside. So, every table had 10-12 members. Everyone had their day of serving. If it was your day, you served from breakfast to supper. That means you had to be in the dining room 10 means before meals so that when everyone came the food was already in plates. If you were serving meat, you served yourself more, but better still, you ate while serving. Listen, when you are in standard 4 or 5, you did not have the luxury of serving yourself more food. The senior girls would find it and take your plate. To avoid that inconvenience, we ate while serving, then served our plates same potions of meat as everyone else. 🤣🤣 Win-win.

The senior girls were bullies. There was no question about that. They would be-friend a junior girl known as 'kidosho'. Loosely translated to a beautiful girl. When you became a 'kidosho' you washed your senior's clothes (because they were too busy reading) how ridiculous does that sound?? You fetched water for them and basically became their maid. In return they made sure you never lacked food. They could also sneak in snacks. Did I tell you we were not allowed foods in the dormitories?? No juice, not sweets, no chocolates....nothing. These senior girls knew how to get these goodies and the juniors were there for it. It was a treat they always looked towards to. I think the juniors adored the seniors so much. They were their protectors in a way.

The school was run by nuns. We recited the rosary every single day and went to mass every Sunday and Wednesday? I can't remember. The best part of Sundays was eating freshly baked scones. The smell wafted through the air and we could not wait to get our hands on them. Problem was, it was only one piece per person, and in the worst case scenarios, someone would miss. I can't explain how heartbreaking that would have been. I never missed a scone, I have always been a fighter 🤣. After eating scones we went to class till lunchtime. After lunch juniors would take a nap and the seniors would go back to class.

The best day was closing date the second best day was visiting day. Again, I am not sure who came up with these rules, but visiting day was once per term. A term was three months long. We only saw our parents only once in three months.....ONCE!!! Unless you were lucky enough to fall sick and go home. Once every three months we got to see our parents. The day was precious. We lived for that one day when we got to see our families and EAT. We ate until we started to produce sulfur burps. You know, that nasty smell that comes out after overeating. Some people threw up just to eat some more. It was short lived but sweet. Families came with so much food at the end of the day the school would look like there had been a food festival. After the parents left we were subjected to a search, to make sure we hadn't sneaked any snacks into the classrooms or dormitories....or gumboots 🤣

Then came closing date. You would think we were going home for good and never coming back. We parked and oiled our hair. We wanted to go back to our parents looking great even though we were always skinny. We had a special dress and socks for going home with. Our shoes shone and we barely slept that night. In the morning we cleaned the dormitories and stood outside eagerly waiting for our parents to come in through the gate and pick us. Leaving school was ecstatic. All we looked forward to when we went home was eating and eating and more eating. A whole month of pure uninterrupted bliss before opening school again.  :"(