A Violent Event When I Was in Kenya - Essay Example

A Violent Event when I Was in Kenya In September last year, 2013, my parents and I went to Kenya for a tourist tour. Our main focus in this tour was to visit the major tourist centres in Kenya, and also to have an experience of the Kenyan culture. When my dad broke the news that we would be visiting Kenya in four months time, I was really excited about it and I was looking forward to the day when we would go for the tourist tour in Kenya. We left Kenya for the USA on the 17th of September and we arrived in Nairobi the following day, on 18th September. The journey was quite exciting, although tiring, by the time we arrived in Nairobi, I was really quite tired. At the Jomo Kenyatta Airport, we were received by my father’s friend, Mr. Robert Rickaby, who works in the central part of Kenya. Mr. Rickaby is the director of USAID programs in the central part of Kenya, i.e. in Meru. From the Jomo Kenyatta Airport, we went directly to Meru, where Mr. Rickaby works. In Meru, Mr. Rickaby works at a village called Chiakariga, so we stayed at the Chiakariga village for a week before we started visiting the major tourist centres in Kenya. It was while I was at the Chiakariga village that I witnessed a bizarre incident of violence. In the central part of Kenya, as I came to learn later, the predominant religions are Christianity and the traditional African Religions (Religions of Kenya, web). Christianity and the traditional African religions, however, coexist peacefully in Kenya, although in some instances the worldview of the two religions crash. My witness of the bizarre act of violence took place on Monday, 22nd September 2013. On this day, Mr. Rickaby had taken us to Chiakariga Market to visit the people there and to have an experience of the culture of the people. In the trip to Chiakariga market, we had two tour guides, Mr. Mutegi and Mr. Mwenda, both friends of Mr. Rickaby. Shortly after arriving at the Chiakariga market, we saw a crowd of people curiously gathering somewhere. The gathering was rapidly enlarging. Out of curiosity, I asked our tour guides to take us there so that we could have a glimpse of what was happening. Our tour guides agreed to take us there but cautioned us to be wary because violence could easily erupt from the gathering. When we finally got there, I saw two men and two women; all in white robes. When we inquired from our tour guides whom the people in white robes were, our tour guides told us that the people in the white robes were pastors. The pastors were so charismatic and they were charging the crowd with good music; the pastors also were preaching about prosperity and success. The crowd was now had become so big that one could be forgiven for thinking that there was a drama taking place there. The four pastors claimed to prophets and they had come to the market to pray for the residents of the market and other business people there. The pastors talked at length about evil spirits that had invaded the area and that had caused many problems to the people in the area. The pastors claimed that evil spirits had made many marriages in the area to break; the white robed pastors also claimed that the evil spirits had made the businesses in the area to record great loses. As a remedy for these problems brought about by the evil spirits, the pastors offered to pray for the people so as to exorcise the evil spirits. The crowd seemed to believe in what the pastors were saying, and they started shouting Halleluiah! After preaching and singing, the pastors embarked on exorcising the evil spirits from the people so as to make marriages to work, business thrive, students do well school and so on. Since these issues seemed to affect people or people feared them, a large crowd of people gathered in the inner tier of the circle where the pastors invited anyone who wished to be prayed for. The people seemed to hope for instant solutions to their problems. For instance, when we inquired from one of the business people there, Miss Ann, a lady who sells boiled eggs at the market entrance, why she wanted to be prayed for, Ann told us that she wanted to be prayed for because she wanted her business to thrive. As the pastors were praying and wailing in prayers, hell broke loose when a snake jumped out from a handbag of one of the women who were being prayed for. At the beginning, everyone ran helter-skelter for his or her safety. We also ran for safety because the whole scene had really became so chaotic. But the pastors prevailed upon the people not to run away, but to come back and kill the serpent. There is a common belief among the people of central Kenya, that the devil is a snake and the devil worshipers use snakes. This may have prompted the people to violently attack the woman, from whom the snake had jumped from her handbag. I was keen too to follow them and get every fine details of the whole scenario. The people picked up stones, which are so many in every part of the semi-arid place, and they started hurling the stones to the woman. Among the crowd, there were, however, a group of people who supported the woman who was being stoned. So, the people who supported the woman started defending the woman by hurling stones back to the people who were stoning her. So, the whole market became a war zone- stones were being thrown from all directions. We immediately ran to our van for safety because the place had come so dangerous. We, however, did not drive far because we wanted to see how the whole scenario would unfold and end. The people who were stoning the woman lastly overpowered those who were defending the woman, and the woman, together with many of her supporters were beaten senseless before the police men arrived. I was very terrified. When the policemen arrived, they dispersed the crowd with teargas canisters and they took the people who had been beaten senseless, and they took them to hospital. I had never thought that people can be so violent. In this incident, I saw people hurl all sorts of brows, kicks, insults, shouts and curses at other people. Some people were chanting, “kill them”. There was a lot of shouting and yelling among the people. It was so bad. This was a very hostile experience for me. I had never seen people I knew to be calm, gentle, and peaceful become so brutal and brutish within a very short time. The market was all in squabbles. Nobody was in peace. People were unruly. I was in great confusion; great fear and had nobody to hold on to. People in the market were packing their belongings and merchandise to leave, vehicles and motorbikes were hooting and crisscrossing the market alleys so quickly. In general, people were in real state of absurdity. This is a day so clear in my memory, especially because I thought that the people were always calm and accommodating, but I was shocked to see such animosity. The bodies of the dead were taken to Marimanti district mortuary, which is twenty kilometers away from Chiakariga. The others who went for treatment stayed in the health centre for a couple of days before the police took them to the police station. The police then launched an investigation into the whole matter. This incident taught that the cultures of the world are indeed quite different. According to my culture, I could not expect people to arise against another person or group of people, on spurious claims of witchcraft or evil spirits. To me, the lynching of the suspected is unacceptable and wrong. However, for the people of Central Kenya, although they are prohibited by the Kenyan law to lynch anybody without the due process of the law, the snake that came from the handbag of the woman was an enough proof that the woman was evil and therefore deserved to die. This fact shows that the culture of the people of Kenya is indeed quite different from our culture. Although I did not agree with their cultural conviction, I however respect their cultural believes. In conclusion, this incident therefore taught me to appreciate and to respect the culture of Kenya. Work Cited Religions of Kenya. Web. Read More