Nostalgic Thoughts of Mafaranga Menshi

A sunset on Lake Kivu

          Less than a month since yours sometimes took to much needed rest in the Mavoko Municipality of Athi River, there are still aspects of my country of refuge that I miss dearly.  Except for the dust, which is just that, and the heat, which we’ve learned to adapt to, Athi River is great; so great you can describe it by paraphrasing a Mr Matthews who, when explaining to a National Geographic writer why Karen is so great, said: “From here, you can see Nairobi; but you can’t hear or smell it.”

Most peaceful too: During the 2007/8 post election violence, when chaos took over Nairobi, life here went on as if nothing had happened and Nairobians would come to shop in our supermarkets after theirs were barred against or destroyed by marauding looters. Here, donkeys, camels, cows, goats, sheep, zebra, kudu and part-time human beings are not just picture book illustrations for kids, but everyday realities that one actually shares a municipality with.

            Still, I miss the place that became my post-post-election-violence economic refuge. Most of all, I miss my friends from Kigali – both the +254 variety and the beautiful, gentle people of Rwandan extraction, whose graciousness is only equalled by their inscrutability.  I miss the sound of people addressing each and all in Chinyarwanda – with neither a sense of arrogance nor embarrassment – as if it were Swahili or some other regionally recognisable language (like, say, Kikuyu or Dholuo?); I miss the smooth, newly tarred roads; the jam-free vehicular traffic snaking its nevertheless slow way around the hilly city of Kigali; the unique architecture that seamlessly blends the traditional and the modern; the feeling of always sitting on one hill contemplating another; the gorillas; sunsets on Lake Kivu; the Canopy Walk in Nyungwe; the temperate climate that makes you want to burst into spontaneous applause as rainbows arch dramatically between one distant hill and another … But top of my miss-list is the word Mafaranga, which tends to become part of the background noise wherever there are people talking. True story: every few words in a Kinyarwanda conversation, radio or tv broadcast, political or motivational speech, are more often than not punctuated with the word.

            Now I am no gambling man, but I am willing to bet the hut that mafaranga (francs), Kinyarwanda for cash, is clearly the most commonly uttered word in the language. The casual observer quickly catches on that most of the time you hear the word, it is accompanied by the word “yange”(mine). Hence “Mafaranga yange” are the last words you’ll hear from an irate Rwandan before he/she calls the police or the Mudugudu leader on you for not coughing up what belongs to him/her cash-wise.

The word also regularly appears as mfaranga menshi (lots of money) which aptly describes the cost of items on sale that are more expensive because they come from Kenya – or the kind of money you are expected to command if you come from Kenya. Incidentally, mafaranga menshi is what you pay in fines if you are caught speeding (over 40 kph within city limits), or parked in a no parking zone. It is certainly not what you are expected to pay as entry fee for your car when you drive into the country; but it could easily refer to what you are likely to pay in fines if you don’t renew your foreign registered car’s entry permit once it expires, as I once learned the hard way.

            “You have not renewed your entry permit,” said the policeman who had waved me down. He was scowling at the temporary importation papers I had obtained at the border slightly over a month before, even though the permits used to be valid for only two weeks then. (The new EAC rules later made the entry permit free and valid for at least 3 months but were vague about thereafter)

            “But why,” I had asked, feigning confusion, “do I need an entry permit when I am already inside? I paid at the border. Entry…,” I demonstrated with my hands. “Please let me go. I am late for an appointment.”

            “It is expired,” explained the second policeman patiently like he thought I was retarded, “you are supposed to get the car out of the country. If you wish, you can drive it back in again.”

            “You mean pretend to leave?”

            Needless to say, I never made it to that appointment. The policemen, both from the Revenue Protection Unit, had boarded my little white car like two officially sanctioned pirates and ordered me to drive to a yard from which I couldn’t get the car until I had paid the mafaranga menshi fine and signed a note that came with it. Written in Kinyarwanda, the note simply stated that this offending car was to be driven back to its home (Kenya) within 24 hours. It did not go on to say “or else”, but you could be sure that the consequences of disobeying such a note would be even more mafaranga.  

By an unfortunate coincidence, mafaranga menshi also refers to the price of almost anything good that you would like to buy at the grocery shops or supermarkets or hardware shops or restaurants, in Kigali. When news from reached us from Kenya that riots were about to start because a bag of maize flour had hit the 120 bob mark, us Kigalians were quietly paying the mafaranga equivalent of 186.50 Kenya shillings for the very same bag of flour.

 Sadly however, the salaries of most people in the country do not even remotely resemble mafaranga menshi. But you won’t hear an Atwoli threatening uncle Paul with mass action; never. In fact I bet there are no Atwolis there. What you will occasionally overhear are the hushed tones of shrewd investors referring to the “low cost of local labour” as they sample delicate meats in exotic hotels with names like “Heaven” or “Republika” or Shokola. And as they chase the said meats down with expensive wines and tap their expensively shod feet to the piped jazz oozing out of hidden speakers, they explain to you how easy it is to make mafaranga menshi in Rwanda. In fact, many are the Kenyans who have done just that in the fast growing, hilly little country, whose capital city is characterised by an armed soldier/policeman every few hundred metres.

Yes, in the country of mafaranga, just like in Athi River, you can walk around unmolested any time of day or night as long as your intentions are good and you are not (in the case of Rwanda) within 100 metres of the President’s office – but that’s another story for another day (hopefully someone will pay mafaranga menshi for it.)

© Lloyd Igane, Nairobi 03/04/2011

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