I think I have finally cracked the code on situationships. Kalamba down! I have way too much experience na after having this conversation with my friend enyewe nimekapitia, all in the name of pursuit of human connection, ptho! What a lie we’ve been fed.

I do not want to come off as bitter heartbroken woman who hasn’t gotten over my exes—should I even call them exes? Lakini this is the playbook.

STEP 1:BEING SCOUTED.

There’s this person umekuwa ukiona around, they look good lakini you guys don’t talk like that. Ama they are a friend of a friend they’ve been plotting on you lakini you had no idea—wewe you’re just minding your business the spark in your eyes bado iko. Mnapatana mara moja you have a conversation (inakuanga a group setting) and you realize you have the same takes on a lot of things. Hiyo siku when you walk home unarealize how you were glancing at each other mkicheka jokes za watu wengine. (Congratulations! You have a crush)

STEP 2: SETTING THE TRAP

Now, we both know you don’t want a relationship, you’re just a little bit bored and its been a minute since you got some, unaskia ni kama itafungana sindio? Rafiki yako atakuambia we are going out for drinks si ukuje, na utafika umpate huko. Hiyo siku fortunately you have your lip combo done, a short skirt na thigh high boots, unakaa fiti and you know it na you see him checking you out.

Na a few shots in, atatoa a cigarette, ofc he knows you like to smoke(he did his homework).

“Uko na lighter?”

“Unaenda kuwasha? Acha nikupeleke sitaki kupoteza lighter.”

Na you’ll go outside and have a conversation and one of you will make the first move and after hapo you guys will just vibe on cloud nine.

STEP 3 : SETTING THE TONE.

The weekend imepita hivo na you both know mtatafutana tena adi mnaongea kila siku good morning texts on whatsapp, you have a streak on tiktok, you’re liking each other’s reposts. The first two weeks, bliss, lakini bado hauko ready kusema those tuwords; unakumbuka how bad the last one was lakini bado you don’t want to let this thing go. So you decide to vibe. Let’s just go with the flow.

FAMOUS. LAST. WORDS.

STEP 4: KUPANGWA SASA

If this person you’re talking to is the devil incarnate(they mostly are) hapa ndo the love bombing huanza. Hapa if you are vulnerable tutakupoteza.

You’ll get promises; empty ones! You’ll be getting fore head kisses when you wake up, breakfast in bed(let’s be honest, there’s no other place you could have taken the breakfast from it’s a bedsitter for crying out loud lakini uko kwa ile phase ya kuromanticize everything), morning cuddles, wanting to spend their Sundays with you , they’ll give you their favourite tshirts, kama yeye ni mtu wa sports he’ll ask you to go watch him play. You’ll meet the homeboys adi.

‘niko na mamaah”

“I like whatever we have going on”

“I feel like im falling in love with you”

They’ll even drunk call you once in a while ‘akiconfess’ his feelings and then pretend they said nothing the next day.

They’ll bread crumb you vibaya sana na after a few weeks ukiwaona your cortisol levels ziko very elevated your mind inaanza kukuambia maybe I should give them a chance. (tumekupoteza)

Hapa they are on a mission lakini you don’t know it. If you did you’d probably leave ama detach mbio mbio(lakini we both know hiyo haiezi).

STEP5: ONE STEP FROM CHIROMO

Right now, you’re very sure you like him, you’ve even told your friends about it—makosaa(in dj afro’s voice). All of a sudden, the goodmorning texts zimepotea, he does not want to spend the Sundays with you anymore. Adi unaanza kurepost videos in hopes he’ll see them and do something, wapi. The minute you start to move on kidogo, he’s back again and since you like him unarudi tu. Unajiaambia you’ll tell him what you want si you are a big girl, hapo ndo unaskia dangerous words like,

“You know I just want to go with the flow”

“Aki this semester niko na a lot of units I have to lock in”

“I don’t think I’m ready for a relationship”

“I have a lot going on at home.”

And maybe he’ll not say any of that atakuambia tu “kam kejani’ I feel like this is a conversation we shouldn’t be having over the phone” and when you get there you’ll talk about everything else except what you went there to talk about. You’ll feel like you’re tweaking ama you’re going crazy.

STEP 6

Hapa sasa most of the time unafaa kuwa umetake your L, na ukablock na ukago no contact. Lakini we ni mgeni town, so you block them, and then ‘coincidentally’ mnapatana hapo locals, unarudi na yeye home, unaunblock, anakuonyesha why you blocked them in the first place, you block again. Your playlist ni SZA pekee, your reposts ni kama tuletters to him, na yeye ako hapo tu.

Hii cycle varies on every individual depending on how attached you are and how bored your life after him has been. It could even go on for a year.

The minute you wake up from that trance, you look back and realize how mediocre this person was. Unashangaa ni nini hiyo ilikuwa inakukalisha huko. And you vow to never do that again and maybe you do, maybe you don’t. And when you finally get over it, unajipata ukiandika articles kama hizi on substack hoping no one makes the same mistakes you did, lakini deep down you know it’s a canon they have to na adi umwambie aje they just have to experience it themselves.

ive just remembered my primary school days, kwanza lower primary. i was a very weird child aki; i would pull out my teeth when the teacher was teaching, i also did this for other kids and in exchange id get sweets and chocolates from their parents and older siblings( i guess thats why i have this obsession of doing people’s piercings as a grown up). i was mosfully quiet, i didnt talk alot but i was a yapper around my deskmates, i was that kid that almost never finished her assignments according to my class teacher i was smart but lazy, i think she hated my guts though.

anyway nikiwa class one, ill never forget this day, but i dont remember how this whole thing came up. i had a deskmate, collins(not his actual name), and he was one of the most quiet guys in class. he never talked adi during breaktime, he would take his tea pekee yake, i remember cause he had this habit of dipping his bread in tea before taking it and i found that weird. the both of us combined, we were just people who minded our business, the quiet kids yk.

so you’d imagine my shock when this classmate of ours comes up to me and tells me ati “najua kenye we na collins mlifanya masaa ya kuenda home.”

first of all that classmate, mike(not his actual name lakini najua akisoma hii atajua ni yeye naongelelea—i still hate you btw) was not my favourite kid in class. alikuwa wale watu mushene quick to be in peoples’ business trying so hard to be the teachers’ pet lakini inakataa. when he said that to me, my first thought was kwani nilifanya nini na wapi? that time he was talking about nilikuwa class pekee yangu, i was always the last one to go home cause i had to go home with my older neighbours na walikwa wanareleasiwa late. so i just asked mike “tulifanya?”

this guy looks at me dead in the eyes and says “mlikiss”.

ushai sweat haga?

acha niseme ukweli collins and i have never even touched hands let alone kiss. na who even knows how to kiss in class one, my mum alikuwa anakataa adi niwatch storm over paradise ndo unaekelea nimekiss mtu. so i just put on a brave face and tell the guy “ni uongo unaniekelea.” he then proceeds to threaten venye atanisema kwa teacher, ati ooh utachapwa and i thought he was bluffing.

boy was i wrong. by the end of the day the whole class ilikuwa inajua, tuliimbiwa ile chant ya “haiya marakacho, i must say you” na the whole class(one of the most embarassing moments of my life). next thing naskia tumeambiwa tusiende home our class teacher wants to see us.

aki ghai that was one of the worst beatings i’ve ever received, adi mama yangu hajawai nichapa hivo to this day. na it was all a lie. mike wewe! heh! nikiwai patana na wewe just know i know karate right now. nimekuwa nikishikilia this thing for like 17 years now. i will never forgive you omba mungu nisipatane na wewe aki.

I wake up in the morning, and the first thing I do is open TikTok.

I don’t even bother checking the class WhatsApp group. I’ll deal with whatever happened there once I’m fully awake.

(I should’ve stuck to WhatsApp.)

Instead, my For You Page feels like I’ve accidentally walked into an overachievers’ convention, and I’m the only person who forgot to achieve anything.

“Get ready with me as a 19-year-old intern at the United Nations who also runs her own business.”

“Get ready with me as a 21-year-old buying my first car.”

“A day in my life as a 20-year-old entrepreneur working a 9-to-5 while building multiple streams of income.”

By 8 a.m., my day is already ruined.

I know I’m not supposed to compare myself to people on social media. I know half of it is curated. I know everyone’s timeline is different.

But come on.

I’m human.

So I close TikTok and immediately open Reddit.

“Easy ways to make money from home.”

“Trading for beginners.”

“Best side hustles for students.”

This time it’ll be different, I tell myself. I even imagine my life after all this.

For the next month, I lock in. I watch YouTube tutorials, download free courses, create accounts on websites I’ve never heard of, convince myself that this is the opportunity that’s finally going to change my life.

Then... nothing.

Not even a thousand bob.

By the end of it, I’m not richer. I’m just burnt out, disappointed, and somehow convinced I’ve fallen even further behind.

People love saying, “You’re only 22. You don’t need to have your life figured out.”

I disagree.

Not because I think life should be perfect by now, but because nobody told my parents that.

This is the age where you start hearing things like, “Umekuwa mtu mkubwa. Unafaa kuanza kujipanga.”

You’re old enough to be responsible, but not financially independent enough to actually do anything about it.

So now, on top of clinical rotations, assignments, and trying to finish a research proposal, you’re also expected to figure out how you’re going to replace your dying phone.

Every conversation with your parents somehow ends with:

“Na sisi hatuna pesa.”

And they’re not lying and that makes everything worse.

But they’re also your only source of income.

Then your laptop crashes.

Of course it does.

You sit there staring at the blank screen, wondering whether this is what people meant when they said, “Your twenties are the best years of your life.”

If these are the best years, I’d like to speak to management.

The funny thing is, nothing dramatic is actually happening.

You wake up.

You go for clinicals.

You try to study.

You stress about money.

You pretend you’re okay.

You sleep.

Then you wake up and do it all again. The mantra in your head is ‘masiku ziende mbio nikufe.’

Sometimes it feels like everyone else is building empires while you’re just trying to keep your phone charged and your bank balance above zero. And everyday when your hopes are up for a minute something worse happens and your hopes plummets to zero.

Where are the better days I was promised? Where’s my vienna?

A while ago on Tiktok a girl was talking about how Fiona from Shrek settled, I don’t know if any of you guys saw the discourse. These were her exact words,

“shrek is not a fairy tale, it’s a cautionary tale an example of how a woman cannot turn a man into an ogre but a man can turn a woman into an ogre.”

She basically talks about how Fiona, a princess could have gotten a pet dragon, a castle, everything in the world but she chose to love Shrek, an ogre and in her eyes, she settled.

Now I will not be talking about Fiona and Shrek, that deserves a whole new article but im just going to highlight somethings.

It is very clear she did not watch the movie cause Fiona herself was an ogre, shed been an ogre way before she met Shrek. Her ogre form was there way before she met him and that made her ‘unlovable’ by society and she was cast away because of her appearance. Shrek then came along and showed her what love is took her to his home and they lived happily ever after (Fiona chose to be an ogre from then on).

What bothered me more was not the misunderstanding of the movie, it was how she tated Fiona “could have had everything” and then she proceeds to mention material things(a pet dragon, a prince, a castle)

I read this amazing article by Scottie, (ill link it here), and she was talking about how we should decenter money. Reading this article reminded me of this exact conversation. Somewhere along theway we lost the plot, we started treating genuine love as one that has been packaged in expensive gifts, trips luxury cars; if it isn’t that it doesn’t count.

Now before the “pick me” comments start rolling in, hear me out.

Having a rich partner isn’t bad, wanting financial stability isn’t a crime. Wanting a person with ambition and the drive to grow is the goal actually. But at what point do we start measuring a person’s worth directly to how much they can provide? Why are we directly tying our worth to how much we can attract a successful/rich partner.

We keep forgetting that the real fairy tale in Fiona’s and Shrek’s story is that she found someone she was willing to show parts he hid her whole life, parts she was conditioned to believe were ugly and unlovable, and the person loved every part of her.

Maybe the greatest love story is not finding someone who makes you look perfect to the world.

Maybe it is finding someone who makes you feel safe enough to finally be yourself.

from what I know there are five love languages — gift giving, words of affirmation (whatever that means), physical touch(apparently what all boys have), acts of service and quality time.

im going to use platonic love as our case study here…cause that's the love I'm more familiar with. you have your best friend that you love deeply with your whole heart and her love language is let's say quality time. This means that you try to hang out with them, go on dates, sleep overs etc etc, but then she's going through something and you need need to reassure her, will you not do it just because it's not her love language?

ok I understand that is a very crude illustration of what im trying to point out, but I think you understand what I'm trying to say.

anyone who's experienced true love, any kind of love really, you know for sure the word ‘love language’ is an oversimplification of something so nuanced. I know that cause i have loved. I have been loved. I've seen people that love me stretch themselves thin to make me happy. I've done all the five languages simultaneously to show love.

the biggest problem I have with love languages though is how it's just a lazy way of lying to someone that you care. love requires you to do everything, pay attention, be willing to learn and understand someone, doing things that you do not naturally do to express your love for them. a simple question like “what's your love language?” won't give you those answers and if you feel like it will, then I'm sorry to break it to you but you don't know what love is yet.

I thought of this as I watched About Time it's my favourite movie of all time I highly recommend watching it or re-watching it if you already have 😚

ok you've probably figured out that complete contentment is impossible right?…..personally, I think the pursuit of the said happiness is what makes life life..the pursuit of happiness is what leads us to making new connections, trying out new things, making new inventions, cause we are chasing something that we can never really get enough of and in the process we live.

there's a time in my life I would not enjoy the things I had…and the moments I'm in all because I thought I'd enjoy them better if I had the specific things I was chasing, but after I watched the movie I realised that this is a never ending cycle…and it's the ‘chasing’ that actually matters..cause I can never be content and that's okay cause that's the human way to live. I cant spend so much time waiting to become happy enough to live forgetting that Im missing the living part entirely.