‘Uncomfortable’ : Gikuni Trek Experience

I just peed on myself. Finally! That almost peeing moment in Nachu caves – that people would compare with today’s until guys who weren’t there were demanding for it – happened in the shower with my clothes on. I was tired but happy. Great feeling but can’t be compared to peeing in the bushes. I did that for the first time today in the Gikuni Trek. Everybody should try expose their butts in cold jungle/caves/forest/waterfall air. I would have said fucking awesome but it doesn’t perfectly fit. I need more.

Every Trek has the good and the bad. Something annoyed me in the middle of the trek today and I wanted to have this ‘uncomfortable’ conversation.

As I give you time to …uhm…you know…exit, Lets talk about

Life lessons I learnt from the Trek

Don’t compare yourself to others. There are people who have Stamina more than others in this treks. If you have that self-love that allows you walk in your pace and not feel like failing, then _ (Fill in the blanks).

Be open to and aware of life challenges. Challenge. That’s what the guide used when we got place where it was either too steep, too rocky, too (Insert opposite of steep).

Start small. If you are going to face a big task, prepare using something else that will help you appreciate how far you can go. I want to finally hike and climb more rocks like J, If you know you know. So I started climbing rocks I didn’t necessarily need to. My fall and soaking my shoes was annoying but…checking…I don’t feel discouraged. Nani anauza hiking shoes hapa? Need a pair, size 6, 38, 39 Bei mzuri! Waterproof would be nice

Always have good shoes. I know… (shrugs) but its true. I think I meant have the right tools and people around you. I had a raw conversation earlier on with myself about the men I met today and how supportive they can be to help some women…uhm…climb up, down ,cross rivers and all. Yeah, it’s going to remain there, in the drafts. Seriously though, through our lives journey, its important to have positive people around who are going to cheer you on, hold your hand if it gets crazy, care about your wellbeing without expecting anything in return, know you well enough to recognise when its going to be or getting tough just to be around incase you a push.

To get greater things, go the extra mile and do it smartly. Apart from getting good views, better wind, better experience just from that challenging trek that should be termed Hard instead of ‘easy-moderate’, I sat my ass non-thoroughly washed trousers onto wet leaves at the caves below/behind the First Waterfall. Despite having two trousers, my panty was wet. The sound of water from high up, falling on the stones was amazing. I didn’t want us to leave that place. It was better when everybody left for the caves. I mean, what! I sang high keys after a very long time, No one could hear me anyway. If you had it, I’m Sorry. I didn’t mean to but I am getting my voice back.

Someone asked me today in the middle of the trek if I was okay and I outright said “I was bored”. Anyone who listened would have thought I was annoyed of the easy to moderate lie. I mean it was before 3km. 5Km in I was cursing within me.

It’s funny how when you are done, you still want more. These things dont make sense. How is it that when news that Trekking is ending makes you want to do more of it? Siget!

As much I am in my best moods and happiness and all the good stuff after that today’s adventure (wierd result today…usually feel fresh and nice not particularly elated), I want to un-bottle this annoying encounter.

Before that, why do we hold in hydrogen sulphide, Carbon dioxide and whatever else is package into a fart just because, It has an ‘Uncomfortable’ Aftermath? I mean, 99% of us fart.

Just as I was writing this, someone who hates when I openly fart just had a loud one. God performs miracles in mysterious ways. Don’t let you’re fart kill you, embrace it. It’s as natural as it gets. If your innerware goes to the crack, just remove it. Don’t hide it.

I had the best experience last week seeing a middle-aged man dig into his jeans just to scratch that thing out. I don’t have the name but we get it once in a while. I thought, finally someone has allowed themselves to thrive without the care in the world of who is seeing them. It lasted like 10 seconds and when that feel-good moment had passed, He did the thinkable. Why would he care who saw that?????? I am getting invested already.
How I reacted?

Anyway.

I was going on and on about ‘when I roll..sth’. Can’t remember what the conversation was about. These grown men had no idea what I was talking about. Their faces… Jesus Christ!

I go, “Rolling?, Kunyesha?” …Scanning…pe…periods..Monthly periods. Oooo. “Kwani you guys don’t have sisters, female friends, Girlfriends, a human being with a vagina”. That’s the first time I didn’t stop even after realising I was making someone uncomfortable. I think their “Cheza chini” faces made my voice raise. It was 6 pm. I had stood the whole day in the lab and I was dead tired! But…

‘Poor’ men! I shouldn’t have blamed them and gave a whole lecture on

How:

Disgusting the blood can be especially if you stain your favourite panty. Woi! You have to wash that dirty sometimes thick blood off.
PAINFUL your whole body can just be. The back, the front Weak legs. Light head or heavy head. People faint.
Disgusting it is to remove a filled pad and unluckily be met with a full bin with overflowing unfolded pads.
Disgusting it is to carry a used pad in ur bag if u change in the bush like in hikes/treks or in places women are not recognised.
Annoying it is to see free condoms and not free high-quality pads.
Hot that genital area can be and worse when you sit on a filled pad. Ngai Mwathani!
Annoying it is to see thrown spinach in Today’s Gikuni Trek. Waah. Why did they throw that spinach I saw in the trail. Was it an attack that made the thing fall? Some girls in some high would have used it. In high school, badly cooked greens were cleared and meat found in the bin. Never saw anyone throwing away iron. Now you know why I was bored about it. Everything about how periods are regarded as ‘uncomfortable’ came hitting hard.
~~And as if it’s not enough. How~~ frightening and worrying it can be to have a heavy flow (like u change ur pad a lot, too many days, lots of unending blood)
And the funny thing about it all is how worrying it can be to miss your period. The irony, Right? Nkt!
Tensed you can be to be in the woods, feel like ur flow is coming (good radiance for the ones who feel, the rest of us don’t. Dates don’t necessarily always help) and No one has a pad.

If there is something women bond over is pads. Like it is never uncomfortable to ask ‘Uko na pad?’. What annoys me is the hush-hush and the folding away of the pad in a tissue and the …argh…why? It’s a pad for God’s sake. It’s not – I cannot think of anything embarrassing. By now you know why – Whatever you find embarrassing. It’s not. It happens every month, some 1.5. 3-7 days every single month.

Oh wait, Seeing other people get embarrassed is embarrassing. The empathy! Like that ‘Fingers in jeans’ guy turning to meet my smiling face. Alafu uongeze dimples, Gatho! Or the kids squatting to hide their ~~tiny penises~~ butts at the river today.

Why is it uncomfortable? No. I did not apologise to the poor men. They should pay for the free lesson.

I can imagine that when men want to learn “I love you”, “Hi” or “Please” in a new language, A woman thinks about ‘Do you have a pad?’. I made a conscious decision to stop using rolling , kunyesha and all those codes names that should mean periods. Its Periods. Monthly… peri..ods. Why does it still sound like a code name? What’s the original name? Blood is coming out of my vagina?