CANDID TALK : Ceiling-less shacks treat Uswahilinites to drama

I swear by all the fish in Lake Victoria that am moving out of Mama Mwakilambo’s shack in these godforsaken Uswaz tenements soonest possible.

Although the leaky roof in these rains that have incessantly been pounding Uswaz might as well be good reason why I should be packing my couches (and in the process transfer some rats in them) but it isn’t – there is more than meets the eye.

It is the ceiling-less house that allows no privacy that is sending me packing. You see, in Uswaz you can almost “hear” what the last door neighbour is thinking let alone what he or she is saying.

What with my growing daughter, Jenny and housemaid Koku who are in their teens listening to what would make the devil cry blush with shame?

As I said, while the walls might give one a sense of privacy in that one might not be let into secrets whatever is happening inside those shacks, the ear-splitting and unsavoury noises that emanate from them are enough to send Shaitan himself to repentance.

A man and woman quarrelling at highest decibels, the farthest end of the tenements comes into our ears “live” as if we are witnessing it. Many are times I am tempted to close my ears and of the tribe around me. My one-and-only woman, Bisho Ntongo, the woman from Katerero, thinks that we should have moved out that house like yesterday.

On a typical evening we would be “treated” to screams and insults coming from Hussein the Uswaz wag’s, shack. Hussein is a “professional” wife beater who is always seeking for something for which to bash his mouthy woman. On the other hand, Asha, who happens to be nth wife among wives and concubines shoots with her mouth like a candidate for Mirembe madhouse. She says the most heinous things unsuitable for children’s ears.

Now, the worst culprit is Tatu, the barmaid. This woman should be hanged at a public place – a stadium with brass band playing for while she does what she best can, she has been corrupting Jenny’s morals.

Whenever she extends her illicit intimacies to her “customers” in the bar to her room that happens to be next to mine, the outcome is she gives the entire block sleepless nights. She sneaks a man in the room after the bar closes and what ensues cannot me written in this column.

This would not bother me had she been discreet about it. What she does inside that accursed room can only be left to the imaginations – the moans, screeches and coos can turn a porn star green with envy.

Nice and tidy.