Kenyan negotiations

We are sitting in a bright pink room which I suspect has been freshly painted for the occasion, a feast laid out before us and the room filled with chairs.

A relative of one of our friends has started a relationship with a guy she met in town. He is the son of a high ranking government official and this meeting has been called to negotiate the relationship…however the situation is somewhat complicated by her heavily pregnant state.

According to the culture of this tribe there is not allowed to be any discussions of dowry until after a pregnant girl has given birth, but instead this is a meeting to determine if marriage is a good idea or not and for the parents of the groom to offer a welcome ‘gift’ (in cash). For some reason myself and Abi's transport arrangements have resulted in two witless muzungus crashing the party.

After taking our seat and a myriad of introductions, the young couple are required to leave the room as culture doesn’t permit them to eat with their in-laws if they are indeed to be married and of course, events such as this begin with an enormous feast.

I take a large mouthful of my food and instantly choke on the strong chilli, both me and Abi find this funny, but our laughing and coughing is soon cut down by a sharp reminder to ‘behave ourselves!’  I look up and notice the guy next to me has a pistol down his pants… it turns out the security of the government official is not something to be taken lightly. I decide to focus on my food and not making any more of a scene than possible being a random white girl sitting in on a personal and touchy meeting such as I am (why am I here again?).

An elderly lady enters the room and all rise to greet her, I whisper to Abi next to me the appropriate mother tongue greeting ('aaa mwaitu', in response to 'wakya'), Abi is so worried she’ll forget it she grabs the ladies hand and blurts out the response before the grandma has a chance to say a word… looking somewhat startled the lady takes her seat and I try to disguise my hilarity.

After the food the conversation begins in earnest. Discussion flows back and forth, the two parties leave the room separately and re-enter several times. We watch as the bride-and-groom- to-be are questioned as to whether or not they truly love each other. The groom squirms awkwardly and looks at the ground. The bride is sweating profusely, and uncomfortably mops her brow with her hanky, her heavily pregnant state not enjoying the heat of the room or apparently the intensity of the situation, I have to admit I wouldn't want to be in her shoes, all the in-

laws and family members, police official and then a couple of clueless random muzungus all listening in to her confessions of love.

Finally after a couple of hours we all stand up, the negotiations appear to be over and there are smiles all round- except for the aforementioned grandma who refuses to stand and looks less than impressed. The-groom-to-be clearly wants everyone to be happy and pulls a 1000 ksh note out his wallet and hands it to granny. There are hugs between all the family members and ‘new family’ photos. We all walk out of the room to the resounding belch of granny, who despite the cash remains seated and glowering at her new son-in-law.

Despite the randomness of the entire situation it was a very interesting occasion to be involved in and such a very Kenyan experience!