THE MAN AT THE BUS STOP

Walking down the streets of Nairobi, many a time I have wished to have stayed home and left whatever I had to do in town for someone to do it on my behalf. The large numbers of human traffic on every street and beggars on every corner always put me off. I used to think all beggars just want to make fast money out of unsuspecting Kenyans and that everyone who walks very close to me has an agenda. Nairobi you see is a very crowded place and many weird things happen whether day or night. I board a bus home at the ever crowded Kencom where they say is the hub of conmen and pick pockets. It is here that I met this man; I don’t know his name so I will just call him the man at the bus stop. I saw him every day after that as I boarded my bus home.

            Today I saw him, the man at the bus stop. He was as happy as usual.  He always seemed so contented, so at peace with his world. I wouldn’t really know what or where his world is but I can always tell that he was at peace. His clothes were dirty and greasy as if they had been worn for months without washing. His legs were swollen and he seemed to be suffering from some sort of disease. He kept scratching himself and anyone who saw him could tell that he was a beggar but the only thing that was different between him and the beggar you meet every day was that he does not beg. You are probably wondering, how could a man with dirty clothes and some sort of disease possibly be happy and at peace. I asked myself that too when I first saw him. I was troubled and I wondered why there are so many people with good health, clothes and a roof over their heads that are never happy yet they have what anyone would want just to say that they are well off.

Anyway, my heart went out to this man and I wished I could talk to him and get to know his story. All he does is smile at people who are boarding buses and give them a thumbs up which is usually a sign that everything’s fine. How could everything be fine, how could he be so happy yet in my eyes he was in a state that I knew I wouldn’t want to be in?Today he was trying to play with a child, the child was holding a lollipop in one hand and started crying as the man at the bus stop held his hand and tried to play with him. The child’s parents seemed to be happy as if they knew this man but then again I am not sure if they were the child’s parents or if they were just taking care of him.

As the man held the child’s hand and walked a distance from where the parents were, the child kept crying and I saw two women look concerned and start to approach the man. They must have thought that the child was being kidnapped or that the man wanted to do something bad to him. Just then, he turned still smiling and started walking back to the parents of the child. The women saw him give the child’s hand to his father and only then did they walk away. At this point I asked myself, how many times do I bring a smile to someone’s face even when my own world is crumbling down? How many times do I judge people just by their appearance? If I had a chance I would like to get this man’s story because I know that many would like to hear it and many would learn a great deal from it. The man at the bus stop gave me a new focus point for life. Would you smile back at him if you met him and he just wanted to say hi?