“And now for the speeches.” If you’re ever in Kenya and you hear these words, you’d better hope you’re not sitting on a white plastic chair in a small marquee in a field somewhere. If you are, hopefully you’ll have some snacks to hand, because your next meal could be a long way off.
Even the most unlikely of scenarios can suddenly turn into mammoth pouring forths. Like the day a few weeks ago when we headed out early in the morning to watch a local half marathon that was passing through the town.
It was a fairly low-key race and there were very few spectators around when we arrived. The original plan had been to run the race from the bottom of the valley all the way up to Iten at the top. Twenty-one kilometres uphill. But at the last moment the organisers realised they didn’t have enough buses to get the athletes to the start, so they changed the course, beginning the race instead just a few minutes walk from the town.
As we arrived, the runners were already in sight. We clapped as they ran by, pushing hard up the hill. And then they were gone.
“They’ll be back in an hour,” I said, standing by the empty road, wondering what we should do until then. We decided to amble up the street to see if anything was happening by the finish, which was in the big field in the centre of Iten.
A few cows were grazing on a football pitch. Someone was wheeling a bike across the grass. Nothing indicated the end of a race.
We decided to stay and wait. It was a nice morning. After almost an hour, a car came speeding on to the field. It screeched to a halt and two men in tracksuits jumped out. They quickly held up a finishing tape between them, just in time as the lead runner came sprinting across the field. A few passers-by clapped as the man crossed the line and collapsed in a heap on the floor.
As all the other runners began to come through, a truck drove on to the field and pulled up beside the finish. Two men got out and began unloading a marquee and stacks of white plastic chairs. It seemed a bit late to be setting up a viewing area, I thought, but the men worked without haste, lining the chairs up in neat rows.
After all the runners had finished, I met the organiser whose brainchild this event was, and I asked him why the chairs were only being put out after the race had ended.
“This is a special day for Iten,” he said. “It’s all about promoting tourism through sport.” What he meant, I later realised, was that the main event had yet to begin.
When the organiser heard that I was writing a book, he told me he wanted me to hand out some of the prizes to the runners, and to make a speech. I could tell it was a non-declinable offer. However, before anything else could happen, we had to wait for the guest of honour to arrive. The word going around the field was that it was the deputy prime minister of Kenya, Musalia Mudavadi.
It was now 11am. Having been told I was needed to hand out a prize, I had to stick around, though my wife took the children home.
While we waited, the organisers played some Kalenjin music on the PA. Then I heard the announcer telling the sparse crowd slowly gathering in the field that he wanted them to “give some appreciation to a special guest from England, Mr Adharanand Finn”.
“He’s a famous sports writer and he is here to market this area for tourism,” he told them. He looked around to see if I was there. I stood up and about two disinterested people glanced my way. I spotted the event organiser grinning at me.
We waited and waited, shaking hands with various people, slouching further and further down on the plastic chairs, the music skipping on, until finally, at about 3pm, 15 shiny 4x4s zoomed from nowhere on to the field. One by one the cars stopped, the doors swung open and large, important men in suits stepped out.
It was instantly clear which one was Mr Mudavadi. He had a big, self-satisfied smile across his ample face. He had people crowding around him, and he was waving cordially in all directions.
The announcer was suddenly excited and started trying to organise various troops of schoolchildren into lines so they could perform for the guests. As well as the deputy PM, there were about 30 civic officers and local politicians in tow. Once they were all seated and had finished guffawing with each other, the children began their well-rehearsed repertoire of songs.
During each song, one of the honoured guests got up and started dancing along with the children. Then another one joined in. Sometimes the deputy PM himself would get up and shimmy around happily to the music.
Someone was handing out sheets of paper. It was a schedule of the day’s events. According to the timetable, the “entertainment”, which was all the singing and dancing, was due to start at 10am. Followed by the speeches. The whole thing was due to end at 2pm. It was already 3.30pm.
The announcer was hurrying the singers on. “We have a lot of speeches,” he said. “So, please, just one song each.”
By now a few thousand people had gathered to watch the proceedings. It was almost 4pm. Time for the speeches to begin.
And on and on they went, one politician after another, talking in grand gestures about corruption, the coalition government, the political parties, and many things in Kiswahili I couldn’t understand.
By 6pm they were still talking. I was getting saddle-sore, so I moved seat and found myself next to the legendary athlete Daniel Komen. “Still talking,” I said.
“This is Kenya,” he replied. “It’s 25 laps. Two more to go.”
It was a beautiful evening. A golden sun lit up the painted corrugated iron shacks lining the road at the far end of the field. The large crowd sat patiently, still listening. Children played quietly on the grass. Occasionally the faint sound of a tractor could be heard struggling along up a hill somewhere.
At 6.30pm, midway through the deputy PM’s speech, the final bow, the last act, the endless ending, a soldier marched on to the field, saluted, and started lowering the flag. Everyone stood up and the deputy PM stopped talking.
Everyone waited in silence as the soldier got the flag tangled around the post trying to get it down. The poor man struggled with the ropes, the silence tangling him up more, before he eventually hauled it down, folded it up, saluted again, and walked off.
The deputy PM started up again, as though nothing had happened. As though I had just imagined the whole flag thing. I had been sitting there so long, perhaps I had imagined it. The only thing that could save us now, I prayed, was the impending nightfall.
Sometime before 7pm, he said “Asante sana” and it was over. The crowd clapped politely. The prizes for the runners, who had finished running over nine hours before, were finally handed out. I wasn’t asked to present any, or to give a speech. I looked around for the organiser, but he had long gone. Someone handed me a piece of paper. It was an invitation to lunch at the local hotel. The invite said 2pm.
• The book Running with the Kenyans by Adharanand Finn will be published in 2012
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