Kigali has grown of age; and so have we, the city is teeming with all sorts of people and all sorts of joints.  This weekend was one in a hundred; I hadn’t gone out for several weeks, not because the "chain-keeper” had locked me up and not because the joints had closed down, far from that!   As the saying goes, what you "sow is what you reap”, several years ago, some of us did get entangled in some affairs that led to us getting "imprisoned for life” under the wardress of none other than the "chain-keepers” because we had sworn to stick to their control "till d-de-de-death does us apart” (sorry, that word leaves a bitter test in one’s mouth)!  As I was saying, with the commitments came the new members of the family and as these grow up, their demands treble by the day, month and year!

With the "créasse économique”, we are not spared the "AIDS” (Acquiring Income Difficulties Syndrome), our sources of income have shrunk and in some cases disappeared altogether and yet, the prices of beers have refused to adjust accordingly! With the children demanding for the ever increasing "minerval n’ibijyanye nayo” (school fees etc.), some of us had to cut and run for it!  My daughters demand for the latest hair styles, the latest skin tights etc.!  I have to either invest in them (for the future) or enjoy beers, I have chosen the former and that is why I frequent drinking joints less often.

This weekend was so special, it was the end of the month and hence, most people had smiled all the way to their banks and out to their favourite joints.  There is this guy called Agure (as the old folks call him), which sounds like "he buys”, a very close friend of the Diaspoman, though Diaspoman always wanted us to believe that Agure was his relative, as the Kinyarwanda saying goes, "umukecuru ufite imineke ntabura abuzukuru” (the old woman with ripe bananas cannot fail to have grandchildren). Thanks to my column and the friendship with the Diaspoman, Agure invited me for a drink to a pub of my naming and time of choice!  On consulting the Diaspoman, he suggested that, I tell Agure to take us to "FoEyes Hotel” but that, I should not spill the beans (that he is the one who chose it).  Why would I? I wasn’t born yesterday, you cannot bite that hand that is about to feed you, would you?

Contrary to what people used to say (that Kigali is a very small place), Kigali is really a very big city! Inspite of having driven past Giporoso and seen the sign for the FoEyes Hotel, it had never crossed my mind that, at one point in time, I would visit the place and not only that, that, I would have more fun than anyone would have bargained for!
Normally, people expect fun at the likes of SERENA, Milles Collines, Car wash, e.t.c but here was a jewel neatly tucked away in the sleeping suburb of Remera Bibare!

(To be cont’d)
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