restaurant, he would see classmates of his who were now ministers or businessmen, and in front of everybody he would
tell them their ideas were silly. He would say to them, “Oy, I remember that I had to teach you arithmetic, so how can
you be such a big man now?” Then he would laugh and buy these men beers, for he was also fond of them. But these
fellows would remember their school days, and know what Barack had said was true, and although they might not
show it, his words made them angry.
By the time your father was a teenager, things were changing rapidly in Kenya. Many Africans had fought in the
Second World War. They had carried arms and distinguished themselves as great warriors in Burma and Palestine.
They had seen the white man fight his own people, and had died beside white men, and had killed many white men
themselves. They had learned that an African could work the white man’s machines and had met blacks from America
who flew airplanes and performed surgery. When they returned to Kenya, they were eager to share this new knowledge
and were no longer satisfied with the white man’s rule.
People began to talk about independence. Meetings and demonstrations were held, and petitions were presented to the
administration complaining about land confiscation and the power of chiefs to commission free labor for government
projects. Even Africans who had been educated in mission schools now rebelled against their home churches and
accused whites of distorting Christianity to demean everything African. As before, most of this activity centered in
Kikuyuland, for that tribe bore the white man’s yoke most heavily. But the Luo, too, were oppressed, a main source of
forced labor. Men in our area began to join the Kikuyu in demonstrations. And later, when the British declared their
Emergency, many men were detained, some never to be seen again.
Like other boys, your father would be influenced by the early talk of independence, and he would come home from
school talking about the meetings he had seen. Your grandfather agreed with many of the demands of the early parties
like KANU, but he remained skeptical that the independence movement would lead to anything, because he thought
Africans could never win against the white man’s army. “How can the African defeat the white man,” he would tell
Barack, “when he cannot even make his own bicycle?” And he would say that the African could never win against the
white man because the black man only wanted to work with his own family or clan, while all white men worked to
increase their power. “The white man alone is like an ant,” Onyango would say. “He can be easily crushed. But like an
ant, the white man works together. His nation, his business-these things are more important to him than himself. He
will follow his leaders and not question orders. Black men are not like this. Even the most foolish black man thinks he
knows better than the wise man. That is why the black man will always lose.”
Despite his attitude, your grandfather would once find himself detained. An African who worked for the district
commissioner was jealous of your grandfather’s lands. This man had once been rebuked by your grandfather because
he would collect excessive taxes and pocket the money for himself. During the Emergency, this man placed Onyango’s
name on a list of KANU supporters and told the white man that Onyango was a subversive. One day, the white man’s
askaris came to take Onyango away, and he was placed in a detention camp. Eventually he received a hearing, and he
was found innocent. But he had been in the camp for over six months, and when he returned to Alego he was very thin
and dirty. He had difficulty walking, and his head was full of lice. He was so ashamed, he refused to enter his house or
tell us what had happened. Instead, he called me to boil him water and bring him one of his razors. He shaved off his
barré
(Barré)
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