Football madness is in our villages too!

I’m on the hillsides of the section of Bongo Republic where I was born and brought up, the very place that saw me, some decades ago, walk barefoot 5 km-plus to where I acquired basic education, that is, Ka-Vazungu Primary School.

Yeah, the school located on a hill that—legend has it—provided a vantage point for European (Wazungu or Vadhungu in Chathu pronunciation) tourists to enjoy a panoramic view of most of our district, including the faraway Lake Jipe that separates Bongo from Kenya.

Having thus digressed, let me now share with my experiences at our shopping zone that stretches from the Mombasa Store area to Lomwe, the location and name of the school in which I finished Standard 7 and proceeded to secondary school elsewhere.

I’m home to attend to crucial family matters whose details aren’t stuff for this space.

Now, just before sunset on this special Friday, October 25, I phoned my favourite bodaboda, Kiure, to come and pick me up from my family homestead.

He drove me all the way to Kwa Temu Bar, which is full to the brim.

A big TV screen is showing a football match pitting Simba SC against Namungo FC.

Football fanaticism is rife here, the way it is in urban areas, a sign that our villages are moving on. Tunaendelea!

Both teams are being cheered. Does it mean Namungo is commanding a following in this remote area of ours?

The answer is no! Those cheering Namungo are actually Young Africans SC, aka Yanga fans, who want the “Southern Killers” to humiliate Simba, their club’s arch-rivals.

That’s Bongo for you, a country that, when it comes to football, gets split in two, right in the middle: Yanga camp and Simba camp.

It’s widely said a Yanga fan will cheer the Devil playing against Simba, and so will Simba do the same in regard to Yanga. Ubaya, ubwela! Badness is back, so goes Simba’s current war cry.

Namungo, who, once in the past, whacked Simba, failed to score even a single goal this time around, conceding 3-0 instead!

The match over, I pay my bill, which includes one-on-one for two fellows I hardly know but who have humbly requested that I buy them something in sympathy for their loss.

“What loss?” I remark, "Do you mean you’re Namungo fans?”

“No; we both belong to Yanga... and we wanted Namungo to beat Simba on our behalf!” said the shorter of the two crestfallen Yanga fans.

His fellow fanatic agreed, nodding vigorously.

Well, I live in the "diaspora,” and I’m hardly ever here amongst my people, coming only for special family matters.

Fellows such as these two Yanga fans are what make our villages in Mwanga District tick, so I ask myself, What are two beers to these two fellows, even though I don’t share their sentiments against Simba SC?

I step out of Kwa Temu to find Kiure—my bodaboda, whom I had earlier called to say I’m ready for a ride to my part of the hillsides—waiting for me.