#behindcloseddoors

When I lived in the village a few years ago, there was a man, a mupakasi, who earned his living digging in people’s shambas, killing snakes lounging near chicken coops, rescuing piglets that had fallen in old, unused pit-latrines, and felling ancient trees.
Zidolo had no house, but one of his clients had been kind enough to offer him a place to lay his head- a small tool-shed, a “ka-sitoowa” (store). Because the space was so small, it meant that he slept on his back, raised his legs and rested them against the wall. He lived in this shed for close to ten years until he was killed by a snake, that had been hiding among the hoes. The irony.
Nobody knew if he had sheets, or if he covered himself with a blanket, but there was definitely no mattress among his belongings.
And this is what I wonder about when I come home late at night, or when I leave very early in the morning. What the sleeping arrangement is behind our closed doors.
How does a family of seven, plus the maid, fit inside a 10’x12’ room with a set of Johnson chairs and one bed? Do the children sleep under the bed that is shared by Mum and Dad and the two youngest? Do they lie In a row, with their heads under the bed and their legs sticking out? What about the sufurias, buckets of water, and dirty jerrycans that cannot be left outside for the thieves?
Do some of them rest in the chairs?
Are there bedbugs, fleas, rats, the vermin that wake up when the humans go to sleep?
Does the bodaboda motorcycle lie on the bed, while the owner curls up on a raffia mat on the cold hard floor, so that the treasured possession that is his livelihood, can have some rest.
Does a wife who is so fed up of her drunken husband sleep at the edge of the bed, willing him not to touch her?
Does a husband who is so fed up with his wife’s nagging opt for the sofa just so he can have a quiet night? Then creep back to the bedroom in the morning, so the children do not see him.
There are wives who are not getting a wink of sleep because their husband snores endlessly. 
What about the shopkeepers who sleep among the sacks of flour in their small grocery stores?
I know of another man who spent his nights in the outside kitchen, sleeping on the kibanyi among the bananas and avocado that had been put there to ripen.
And then when it rains, some say goodbye to sleep because the corrugated iron roof has so many holes and they put buckets and saucepans everywhere so that the house doesn't get wet.
Or if your house is in a swamp and the water comes in, then those who usually sleep on the floor, do they hang by the rafters?
And that someone who spends the night in a huge six by six mazongoto, lying between black silk sheets and a warm fluffy blanket in a spacious grand room?

Only you know what happens when you close your doors at night.