The Big House

-Wandering Bessie or Naughty Ng'ombe-

[From 25 July]

The pastor’s cow took itself for a walk this morning.

Jumping out of its pen, the dairy cow [from which the milk for my daily chai comes] went for a stroll about town. Nobody seemed to notice or care much until it began rubbing up on some mud-brick homes to scratch an itch that its ill-equipped hooves couldn’t quite reach. With a clanging of pots and shouting voices it headed back home – leaving time for a brief stop in the parish office and a visit with the doctor’s goats along the way.

Then there is the chicken.

This black-feathered beauty thinks she rules the roost. Where the other chicks in Alfred’s flock are content pecking at the grains of rice overflowing from this year’s harvest in the courtyard, she repeatedly tries to stake her claim on the family’s quarters. She stalks the doorway, strutting back and forth on the stoop. Clucking confidently she hops across the threshold for the relative safety found under the couch. Like the artful dodger, she moves silently and is soon seated on the edge of an armchair. “Don’t worry. She is only trying to lay her eggs,” says the pastor’s wife. With a flick of wrist and a ‘shoo’-ing noise, the chicken is sent back outside.

What with the cow, the chicken, and four children – Gersham, Adoration, Atu, and the rambunctious Mika – life in the Kikoti house has been anything but dull.