Khalid just turned 23. He's tall, light-skinned and lean. He has a fisherman's athletic physique. If he were dark, he would easily fit in that "tall, dark and handsome" description, often fancied by girls.
There's a lot of things Khalid hasn't done in his lifetime. He has never taken alcohol. He has never smoked a cigarette. He has never had a woman beside him for the night. Khalid was a virgin. These ranked high on his bucket list.
There's one thing Khalid had never done - and, didn't think himself capable of doing. Yet, he'd done it. On impulse, as they settled for dinner, Khalid had slapped Tasha.
Not a light, fond tap that most siblings often share. His hand had taken a violent life of its own, reached out across the table with a stinging slap that almost knocked her off the bamboo chair. PTSD is real.
Weirdly, at that moment, he'd thought of the bamboo chair. If it broke, his mother's heart would stop.
Tasha was dazed for a moment. She stormed out. Then his mother, too, stormed out. Khaled was left alone at the table. It was laden with steaming Biriani, in sparkling aluminum pots. This was a celebration of his homecoming.
He raised his hands like a man in prayer and looked hard at them. Why? Why? His younger sister had always teased his receding hairline, and gotten away with it.
Well, Khalid is a soldier. He was on a break; after a year in the boot camp, training.
At this point, memories start flooding his mind. He slips out the backdoor into the backyard. There's a dirt road beyond. Unconsciously, he squeezes between strands of barbed wire and starts walking to the market.
The slides of his life start flashing behind his eyes. From the beginning. The gate to the Recruit Training School (RTS) is situated at the end of a long, tree-lined driveway branching off the Eldoret-Turbo Road.
In his mind, Khalid had thought such an institute would have a huge, imposing iron gate swinging on reinforced concrete pillars.
He was wrong. It was a simple, iron grill gate. A few sentries. Quite friendly, checking papers.
Khalid, with a few hundred other recruits spent a relaxed week at the camp, doing paperwork. He was really proud to enlist in the military. Only a few members of his Bajuni tribe had achieved this feat.
The official training started the following week. Khalid uncovered a second false impression - the RTS isn't in an institute. Or, anything close.
It was hell, complete with yelling reincarnations of Satan - camouflaged in military fatigues - the instructors. One instructor, particularly, haunted Khalid's nightmares.
A short but stocky, barrel-chested seemingly jovial guy who kept recruits in a trance with glorious stories of war. He'd introduce himself as Njoro. He'd seen action in Sierra Leone and Burundi, while deployed on UN missions.
Now, this instructor had an impenetrable mask - brandishing a whip - and not hesitating to use it.
His whip was the kind forged from old tyres. The kind hawked to motorists on busy road intersections. The business end of that whip had painfully found Khalid's back with a frequency that made him think he was paying tribal sins.
You had to crawl on rough gravel like a snake. Not like a Gecko. On day one, Khalid had knees and elbows bleeding by midday.
Recruits do not wear military fatigues. A recruit's entire wardrobe is limited to two pairs of blue shorts and white T-shirts. A nylon track suit - hardly ever fitting sizes.
The day's program would end around midnight - Khalid and co' had to literally fight for water at the few functional taps. It'd often roll way past 3 am - no sleep yet. Eldoret, where RTS is based is known for its cold. An all-year wet weather pattern.
The recruit dons wet clothing, at 4am - for the day's program.
The first few weeks of training, the recruits transform into zombies. Literally, the Walking Dead.
Khalid would take naps anywhere. Standing. Walking. Eating. In water-logged trenches.
The few sit-in classes in the training program that covered necessities like first-aid, fire fighting - were an entirely new trauma. The instructor would be rapping heads with his cane at every instance.
After a few weeks pass - in a blur, Khalid didn't think of home, or anyone at home. Not even Tasha. He'd be at pains to recall the face of his girlfriend.
He'd only remember the first four digits of his mother's cell: 0722. He no longer missed his closet. Designer T-shirts and jeans. His prized sneakers. Jordans.
Khalid had always kept a kinky, frilly afro - Bajuni hair grows silky, and wild. The resident barber would scrap his scalp for the tiniest hair every week. The only constant in training is hunger.
Khalid wasn't generally a 'foodie'. But two weeks in, Khalid was wolfing down 3 premium loaves of bread, daily. And 2 packets of milk. Sometimes, they'd be forced to eat in hiding - underneath the metal bed. Recruit! Find the shine on your (soaked) boot! No eating!
The parade drills on the asphalt square transforms grown men into weeping boys. The rimrod-straight-backed, hawk-eyed, drill instructors were, well, without an iota of humanity. They'd take refuge under shades, and watch the recruits grill in the hot sun.
The sun would boil brains from above, and the hot tarmac would fry them upwards. Perhaps, out of coincidence or sheer malice, parade sessions would always be scheduled around noon.
A recruit would pee, standing in line. The piss would find its way into his boots. Khalid was appalled the first time it happened. With time no one cared. It was hell.
By luck or providence, neither Khalid nor his squad mates went insane. With time they'd harden. Around the 6th month, they'd start 'sprouting seeds' - aptly captured in instructor's jargon as 'Kuiva'.
Things kinda relaxed when the bush experience comes round. Recruits are now almost soldiers. Or, so they are made to believe.
In the bush camping experience, there are lots of exercises planned up. This is easy for by-now well-toned recruits. Most are in tip top physical conditions.
To tip the scales, everything is rationed. Food. Sleep. The worst? The water deprivation experience. After a long hike over plains, valleys and ravines - a recruit's water ration is finished - the instructors pull a trick.
At camp, they'll pull up a full water bowser - then open the taps and let the water run. No one fetches. The mental fortitude required by a recruit to absorb this, is what makes a soldier.
If Jesus wept in John 11:35, so will the recruits weep on that day.
Seemingly on the brink of starvation, a lot of recruits would attempt meditation and self-examination. Why am I here? Is this what happens in a soldier's world?
If Khalid had a phone that day, he'd call home and give them a verbal Will. His cousin Abdi would be the luckiest. Abdi would get the prized Jordan sneakers.
They had survived. And had a colorful pass out parade. Khalid had been posted to Manda Military Camp - the Kenyan forward base for front operations. The Somali war was at its peak.
Khalid's team arrived at Manda Base in a spectacular convoy, on a cool evening. As kids, they'd stand on the roadside waving at soldiers in speeding convoys. That evening had ended in an anti-climax.
As the team formed up at the square for briefing by the Camp's CO, a pair of choppers came in to land - lights flashing. They were from the frontline. They were bringing in casualties.
Khalid and his team were ordered to assist place injured soldiers into a waiting ambulance. They were a few bodybags as well.
He'd never seen so much blood before. He was trembling.
The following day, Khalid and his mates were granted 14 days leave by the CO, to see their families. On the bus home, he could still smell blood on his hands.
Khalid had come home to a table laden with steaming Biriani, and Tasha. As she's teasing him, his mind flashes an image of a soldier writhing in pain on a stretcher, a tibia blown into pieces..
