UNIVERSITY STUDENTS TO USE TIME CONSTRUCTIVELY OVER THIS TIME.

Following the university lecturers strike, there has been a lot of free time at the disposal of students in the universities that have still remained open. Out of the seven public universities and many constituent colleges, only two have told their students to go home and the rest have students in their premises. This means that there is a lot of free time at the disposal of students with some having even the libraries closed. What it means is that basically these graduates are just eating and sleeping.

I would urge the graduates to put their free time into use because an idle mind is a devils workshop. It is upon such seemingly free times that one normally finds themselves indulging in drugs and other forms of substance abuse. The allure of random sexual escapades is almost irresistible and many unplanned pregnancies occur leading to dangerous abortions. In a bid to earn extra money to fuel their bad habits some may be tempted to indulge in crimes that may lead to prosecutions or careless loss of lives.

I therefore encourage the students to take it upon themselves to be responsible and try to put their free time into constructive use by continuing with their studies because at the end of the day, it’s neither the government nor the lecturers that will get hurt or get to lose. Those into sports and other talents like drama should practice hard for them to excel and also to keep temptations at bay. They can also form discussion groups and also be active in their clubs and movements by doing community service in their area of influence.

For those at home, instead of chasing around the form four leavers who have a profound desire to explore the world, they can volunteer to teach in the secondary schools around and also help parents in the farm or in the running of the family business. One can also use his or her skills acquired so far to engage in an income generating project to top up the parents efforts to pay their fees.

Meanwhile, the government should move swiftly and put the condition under control else students will continue suffering in a fight that they never initiated.

A PEEK INTO THE BIG BREAK FROM THE PITCH TO THE BUSH BY THE NUC MORANS,WHAT A DAY!!

Normally, Saturday mornings find me basking behind  Serengeti hostel with other professional idlers led by Chacha,Mogire and the number one “basker!”Obadiah,I swear this guy loves to bask so much that he will be found lying down like a giant monitor lizard even when its raining. as usual, we discuss politics of the week,football,campus politics, complain about the little HELB money  and concessionary who is getting laid by who or who is laying who  in campus or watch those taking what is known the walk of shame,ie those from sleep-overs. It was during our usual hang at the jobless corner that I got a call from my one good friend Dansoh the most cheeky computer  geek asking if I could urgently go to a new joint called THE GREENLAND CONSERVANCY, just a few hundred meters from campus and could I please go with my camera?

I thought its some news he wanted me to cover and with the lecturers strike on and fellas so idle, we are never short of news. Unfortunately, my camera was away taking photos of bikini clad bi*ches at Mombasa beaches with the tourism class so I informed him it was not possible until I heard him mention something like the rugby team bash! It was not a chance to be wasted on a Sarto that seemed to have been determined to take 34hrs to reach evening. On a record breaking 20 minutes I was good to go. Kenyan men and goat-roasting bashes! On my way to the place, there was this kind of excitement on the road from Runda to Total and I could see the skinniest of fellas(I can swear they don’t know the shape of a rugby ball) walking towards the party area pocketing and whistling happily to tunes that  they themselves couldn’t recognize! And I can swear that I’m not by any means trying to imply that my joker friend Colloh was among them!

The situation on the ground was equally interesting. As usual,rugde players are huge wild guys who if they bend down and goes on fours could easily be mistaken for rogue rhinos and I’m not referring to Jude, pronounced as “Chut” or Bensoh.So u can imagine a group of huge guys lying low on the wooden benches inside the park talking in deep baritone voices on the bush that Greenland Conservancy is.For once I though im embedded deep in Somalian Puntland with the Kenya army guys out to beat the Shabaab into a pulp. The one factor that kept reminding me that I was amongst some of the most intelligent brains in the country was that unlike the army who they resembled save the uniforms, they talked about things academia.see?the army talk about wars of conquest, their travels around the globe and of course their different encounters with various women of the world.So,it was during one such talk that Johnnie the rugby captain got to give us a lecture on the reason why boys tend to love their mothers more than their dads who they see as competitors and also how a guy named Odipus killed his father just to have his mother all to himself! And to prove Johnnie right Colloh,not the skinny one,colloh wa drama,said that such a though once crossed his (silly!)mind.

All the while, the natural law of the beauty and the beast was applying. You know how it goes between rudge guys and beautiful girls, they are like magnets! Darwin in his evolution theory claimed that male animals fight and the strongest ones survive to mate with the healthiest females for the continuity of the species and the law seems no exception to human beings!Alas,were it not for the side factors like money and social status, some fellas would sadly leave the world without passing their genes! Beauties were in plenty and the best thing is that campus guys go for galz with not only good stuff between their but also between their ears! So that is how I found myself into a debate on various cameras and scene setting mode in photojournalism with one cute Esther, a Nairobi based journalist who I can only contact through  colloh as he hindered all the efforts our exchanging the number saying that if we need to consult in anything we do it through him, but never mind, like in investigative journalism, we exchanged numbers right under his very(nosy)nose!Brayoh Omondi my very good friend and fellow blogger was in company of his queen Laurie and Epho was  accompanied by his sweetheart too and Jude and his coastal beauty.Danso the rogue bachelor seemed to have a new sweet catch but I’m not in a mode to make quick conclusion on the guy who is married to his number one love, Computers!!

Nico of the eating competition fame was in attendance as noisy and hungry as usual. On a casual chat  with Dansoh Ito while away time as we waited for the meal, I got to find out a short history of this group of great young men.

      INSIDE LIFE OF THE NUC RUGBY PLAYERS(THE MORANS),LIFE IN AND OUT OF THE PITCH.

The team was founded by Danson Gichui,John mugi and Alexie mwangi on their first week in campus as freshmen in 2009.They encouraged the rest to join. They had several challenges as it was the first time that majority of the players were playing the game and only about 3 knew about the game. Rugby is not a game of the weak minded or weak bodied and so they had to embark on a military-style of training to harden and toughen up the players. Stuff that turns mamas boys into commandos in the pitch. Due to the hard and tough training procedure that saw them running for around 10kms on daily basis, majority dropped out and the tough got going on.

The fist ever game they were beaten a shameful 43 to 0 by a local team of some idlers from Narok town so u can see the distance they had to go before being men in terms of rugby players.Sadly,they had no coach or a field and they had to contribute their own money to buy balls. A trend that goes on up to today as the school only provided  them with two very old balls which saw them contributing money almost on daily basis to have them sewn due to puntures.But on their persistence they have really moved on to the point of almost beating the national champions in the Maseno open tournament.

Life in the pitch is run with military precision with the captain calling the shots backed up by the disciplinian.Rugby being a very emotional game due to  the numerous push and shoves involved, requires strict code of discipline else the pitch would turn into  another battle field. Its not uncommon to see players exchange blows. The unwritten rule that everyone has to follow irrespective of their position in the team is that whatever time that one arrives later than the said time on the pitch either by 30 or one second, you have to take 5laps around the field.

The players, due to the hardships involved or what they undergo together has made them to stick together as brothers and even out of the pitch you will find that they are drinking buddies and often you find them passing time together and woe unto you if you decide to fight any one of them outside in the  clubs for you will never know where the rest will come from.

They are also a generous lot with not only big bodies but also big hearts take for instance yesterdays bash were the number of those that were invited and are not rugby players was almost double the team members.They contributed all the money and invited people just to feast on the goat.

Here is the list of the players in detail.

NAME	DESIGNATION	POSITION
John mugi(jonie)	captain	Winger/center
Danson gichuhi (dansoh/head)	Organizing sec	fly half
Brian kiprop(brayo)		prop
Cyrus rotich(cyroh)	Ass captain	Scrum half
Paul nthiwa(kamuma)		hooker
Kelvin kipruto(small)		Winger/center
Alex mwangi(alekie)	Team manager	Winger/center
Benson githui(head.master)		second rows
Livingstone lugaka(kuku)		fullback
Kevin magiri(big)	disciplinarian	Eighth man
Collins kamau(head.gear)		prop
Nickodemus matara(niko)		winger
Kennedy kibata(kennie)		hooker
Jude barasa(chut)		center
Wallela tulienge		Winger/center
Brian omari(omar)		scrumhalf
Augustine mukhwana		center
Kevin akoko(bush)		secondrows
Brian omondi(maGUYZ)		flanker
Emmanuel ochieng(unfit)		flanker
Robert wafula(chonjo)		Flanker/winger
Michael kidiori(mike)		Flanker/secondrows

Many are the times one’s life has been changed by their participation in what they love doing. Take for example many national players who are making fortune in the game and they are already enrolled in the universities and it’s not the degrees that is giving them millions.

Back to the bash, meal time saw a mountain of ugali and copious amounts of various flavor of juice served by Johnie the capie and meal time saw Sailoh,Brian Kiprop Johnie and Esther take to the serving box and overfill our plates with sembe,mbuzi fry,veges and kachumbari.There was plenty in store with the bold and shameless going for the second helping like kina Chacha  and Kelvo big going for several helpings which is not a crime anyway.

Lugaka,Kennie and Mwas proved to have diplomas and higher diplomas in roasting goat legs and heads to create soup out of them and just like in the traditional dowry negotiations ceremonies where one never got to finally know the destination of such parts of meat, nobody got to know the exact final destination of the head meat meant for the elders.

All along, Morris mwenda,my companion got everything  covered in video and I promise you that everything from those quick pecks and kisses in the bush were also captured and the video will soon be  available in this court and the newly created rugby players fan page in the Facebook.

Until the next issue I remain yours faithful,

“Team editor”

GOVERNMENT LETTING STUDENTS DOWN.

Following the shocking revelation of the underground drug deals by a ruthless group of individuals named “untouchables”, by two dedicated Kenyan investigative journalists Mohamed Ali  and Dennis Onsarigo,everyone has been left questioning the integrity of Kenyan politicians and the meaning of the police slogan “utumishi kwa wote”.

We all watched in awe and even greater  shock  as the events that followed the intercepting of the largest haul of cocaine in Africa unfolded. There was well orchestrated serial killings to the  police officers and individuals who seemed to oppose the move to enrich themselves  from the drug money. The greatest shame was that those murdering them was their colleagues who they worked with on daily basis .Its a shame that love for money and wealth has superseded the respect and dignity with which we should always hold human life with as it is priceless.

The most disturbing part was the execution of an innocent man in front of his young family and worse still ask his neighbor to eat his brains. The man is up tp now mentally disturbed and I believe he will die with that horrifying picture in his mind. It hurt so much to see a seven year old boy crying on the national television passing a message to the killers of his father and saying he was sure they were enjoying life with their children. Is it possible for such a child to easily say what Alfred Mutua coined for us all to be saying, that “najivunia kuwa mkenya”?i believe no, not until justice has been served and the killers of his dad brought to book.

Being a journalism student I watched with great admiration for the two Kenyan journalists. I hoped and still hope to do the same kind of citizen journalism once im through with my studies.To expose the rot in the society, I hoped the government would soon be announcing a top reward and state security to the two journalists until I saw the police commissioner, Mathew  Iteere  announcing it that the two were to  were to be sued together with their media house. What a shame! They were to be sued for proving that the politicians were into drugs trade and did not really care about the future of the youth. They were to be sued for using almost a full year of their time doing what the government together with the police failed to do; to name and shame those that think they are above the law and that Kenya is just their playing field. I felt discouraged to be pursuing journalism because I felt that the government views them as their enemies and not their extra eyes.

Many students who work hard to get  earn a good and modest  and responsible life after  school felt that  at the end of the day, what mattered is not your hard work but the money, no matter how dirty you will have acquired it that mattered. For example, I wonder whether the young boys narrating how their fathers were killed by the police would ever think of joining the police force if they had earlier decided to follow in their dads footsteps bearing in mind a child always want to be like their fathers. If they sue the two journalists or execute them in cold blooded murders which have almost become a ritual in our society, how many journalism students ambition will thy have killed?

I urge the two principles to say something on this case and to protect journalists in the course of their work and to provide justice to the aggrieved parties so that they can bring back confidence and ambition to Kenyan students who are following this sad case with a lot of interest.

MORRIS MUNENE MUGO,

NAROK UNIVERSITY COLLEGE,

SECOND YEAR JOURNALISM STUDENT.