#yougandibetthi!

Yougandibetthi!

That’s the indication that Ma Lihanna has a new maid.

I ponder for a while, then understand her statement to mean, “You go and bathe!”. But the way she joins the words together makes it sound like a completely foreign language. Lihanna and her older sister are being ultra-obstinate this evening.
I guess that’s how they treat all their new maids (two so far, since this year started) making them yell and beg them to do everything. From waking up, to eating their breakfast or supper, to ‘betthingi', sleeping. Then there are the tantrums! Tebaagala kugambwaako. They do not want to be chided for anything. And it might not even be chiding- even telling someone to “gandibeethi” can elicit loud howls, fits, rolling on the ground. How these kids get so spoiled when their mother is never around beats my understanding.

The new maid’s voice is baby-like. Very girlish. I have no idea what she looks like, but the tone strikes me as young. I wonder if the girls will respect her.

I also wonder what the LCs will say in case she’s underage… Y’know I have this other neighbor who loves to mind other people’s business- she could, just might, go to the LCs (y’know her and Ma Lihanna don’t kulima kambugu - they don’t see eye to eye). And she has told me before about how Ma Lihanna’s children have big tummies. Mbu their stomachs are African-elastic, and that they devour everything in sight- like locusts- mangoes, bananas, ffene, they could even do grass, when the going gets tough. And mbu they like crying over nothing. That they can wail and whimper and bawl  for no reason. Of course I never believe her, because she says anything and everything about anybody and everybody.

I mean, she said the old man in the third house from the gate had syphillis. How did she know? Did she give it to him? Then she said that my immediate neighbor was a kidnapper. Oh God, I didn't sleep that night. And her husband endorsed the lie.

Anyway, I’m digressing. We’re talking about the new maid at Ma Lihanna’s. I know she had another one before this one- after the one who brought the chinless Sudan boy into the house. I hear something bad happened to that maid and she had to leave immediately.

Oh, why doesn't this woman have any luck with maids?