Here where
he stood, Gor clasped his buffalo-hide shield;
There
where he dashed, he wielded a spear and danced for war
And there
where he danced, he waged war.
~ Adrian
Onyando, The Epic of Gor Mahia, p.76
The
story is told of an astonishing and at once extraordinary and numinous child from
Kanyamwa in Luoland, Kenya—in the wildernesses of yesterday where magicians dwelled
and humans met beasts and ghosts—contained in a locale designated Ramba in antiquity, then later Milambo and, not desiring to be left out
of this primordial exercise in nomenclature altogether, the British pejoratively
renamed it District of South Kavirondo, but we now know it as South Nyanza; born
Gor Okumu, the Mysterious One was son of Ogada and grandson to the esteemed Ogalo;
the only begotten son of his mother Atoka, daughter of Jema, the great magician
of Kanyada, he descended from a long line of mystical but on the whole momentous
gentlemen stretching back to the foundations of time: Chwanya Ragwar, the Fork,
to Onyango Rabala, the Rebel; then to Obunga Osewe and Ologi, the great
brothers, and finally to the Great Chief Ogalo Ng’injo, the Crumbs; although Gor’s
birth is shrouded in the mists of time, it is believed to be inside the first
half of the 19th century.
But
Gor Mahia—Gor the Wonder Maker—was no humdrum infant. Steeped in awe and
amazement, the child displayed gobsmacking otherworldly abilities and impossible
feats of miracle and wit and great wonder from a tender age, thereby seamlessly
growing into the responsibility of Ruoth,
Paramount Chief of the South; greater even in stature and deed and accomplishment
and marvel than was his all-towering grandfather, Ogalo the Hero, son of Obunga
Osewe. It is variously whispered that Gor was blessed with magic and cunning and
wit by way of both his paternal and maternal grandparents who were famous
magicians in ancient Luoland. Plenty of my insights into the life and primacy of
the almighty Gor Mahia are gleaned from Adrian Onyando’s The Epic of Gor Mahia (Pangolin, 2005) and from it I will attempt
to reconstruct, as best as I can recall, just one of a myriad of exploits of
this eminent Luo protagonist in verbatim and ode:
The Contest of Two Babies
Omoro of Kanyadoto came to Chief Ogada feigning respect.
‘Son of Ogalo,’ he said, ‘for long,
Our people have lived together,
But now is not the time to live together anymore
For we shall soon begin to contempt each other.
Let my people also own land.’
‘Which land, fellow elder?’ asked Ogada quietly.
‘This land!’ replied Omoro loudly.
‘This land we occupy is ours!’
‘Fellow elder,’ said Ogada, ‘let’s not quarrel.
The land you occupy is right at the heart of Kanyamwa.
Let it not be said by the ancestors and the future generation
That Ogada allowed tenants to grab the ancestral shrines.
However, if you can go far and occupy land elsewhere,
I shall not pursue you.
The land is vast
Go and occupy it like the others have done.’
But Omoro creased his face, tensed his muscles
And stamped his feet on the ground vowing,
‘I shall not move!’
The Kanyamwa land was fertile,
The Luos call it ‘the female soil’.
‘This land we occupy is ours!’ cried Omoro.
‘Fellow elder,’ said Ogada coolly, ‘let us not fight.
Let the ancestors decide for us who owns this land you want.
Bring your child Onduru
And I too shall bring my child, Okumu.
We shall tie ropes around them
And whichever child breaks the rope
Shall win land for his people.’
Omoro happily consented to the contest and went away.
Truly, he thought, anticipating victory,
My four-year-old son is exceptionally strong
And can even break a rope made of metal!
Truly, he thought again, that child Gor,
Even though he is Onduru’s age-mate,
Is too weak to even break a rope made of cobwebs!
Two ropes were made and their strength tested
By having ten strong men at both ends pull at them.
The ropes were long like rivers—
The stalwarts at one end
Could hardly see those at the other end.
Then they were tied to the kang’o
tree.
People of our homestead, the kang’o
tree is hard
And well rooted in the earth.
It does shake in the wind, but does it break?
Does it break with the blows of axes
Or yield to the persistent million mouths of termites?
People of our homestead, the kang’o
tree is strong.
Drums beat, whistles and horns blew
And praises showered on the contestants.
Monkeys shrieked in trees;
The omoro Rhone antelope
bellowed.
Spectators moved to the arena.
‘The Contest of Two Babies’ was underway.
Omoro’s child was a giant,
But Ogada’s child was only clever.
Oh Gor was clever!
The rope was tied to Omoro’s son’s waist
And the referee shouted, ‘Pu-u-u-ll!’
Onduru ran and ran and ran
And when the rope finally tautened, he failed to break it.
He collapsed and was carried away to drink potfuls of milk
And to eat all the grains from his father’s granaries.
Oh, what a shame to eat after defeat!
But when Gor was brought to the arena,
The Black One turned wild.
Even when they were tying the rope to his waist
They could hardly hold him down.
The child had the strength of a hundred well-fed bulls.
When the referee said, ‘P-U-U-U-LL!’ Gor dashed forward
Like lightening, like the flash flood!
The eyes of the spectators could hardly trace him
As he licked the length of the rope in an instant.
Before the eye could adjust to the speed
The rope sounded ‘NDING’!’ and was broken.
And the kang’o tree also
broke, ae Gor!
A song broke out,
Gor is the tornado that breaks the kang’o
tree,
Ae the Tornado!
Gor is the Earth Shaker that turns the earth,
Ae the Shaker!
With the roots of the kang’o tree,
He uprooted the plants,
Ae the Uprooter!
Omoro gathered his belongings and his people
And migrated far away to Nduru.
There they put up shelters and claimed it for their own.
Ogada said: ‘Let them exist too.’
But Ochieng’ Ratego’s stomach rumbled and he burst out,
‘War is in my stomach!’
‘Let it remain in your stomach!’ people replied.
‘For us, the child Gor has won a war.’
It was as though Gor had won,
Not against an enemy, but against Ratego.
Jealousy ate Ratego’s stomach
Like hunger eats up our intestines in famine.
Yet, if it were not for the wisdom of our forefather
This land would have gone.
If it were not for the wisdom of Gor
We would be having no land.
For there are dangerous vultures
Waiting for you to make the kill
And then when you settle to eat it,
They grab and make away with it
Leaving
you exhausted, hungry and poor.
The
anecdote concerning my acquisition of this book is as intriguing as the treasures
I found buried in its pages. I was deep into a lengthy chat with mother during a
visit to Kendu Bay as I often times do on such occasions—if only to tap into
the long oral tradition of my people, folklore that captivated me ever since I can
remember (and mother is particularly adept at these things)—when the conversation
veered to Gor Mahia; I don’t quite recall the circumstances of that detour in banter
but I was riveted, more so when she made it plain that I was maternally descended
from this celebrated progenitor—this mysterious man who, as a child, would blink
both eyes and confuse his playmates and the whole land; who danced with his fingers
instead of his legs; who, when jokingly challenged by his father Ogada to a
duel in a bid to assess his strength, disappeared into thin air and in his
stead stood a bull elephant presaged by a whirlwind; who, when heaving a sigh,
trees and grasses would shake and dust would rise by force of his breath,
forming a tornado, the stamp of his presence; this man who would wake up early
in the morning and lie down at midnight but refuse to sleep and even if he did
sleep, his eyes would remain wide open like a rabbit’s—Gor Mahia, the
Mysterious One, the Miraculous One, the Cunning One.
Piny’ dung’ buru / Piny’ dhi aywaya / Piny’ dhi ariwa
/ Yamo oloko / Jo K’Ogalo kalo k’uneno!
 |
Gor Mahia at the 1987 Africa Cup. From right: Bassanga,
Breakdance, Hezbon Omollo, Pierre, Magongo, Fundi,
Sollo, Dawo, Mwidau, Nyangi, Jua Kali, Maira, Janabi,
Ndolo, Kamoga. (Photo courtesy of gormahia.net) |
Onyando
elucidates in the introduction to his pièce
de résistance: “Gor has at various times become the symbol of the Luo
nation within the republic of Kenya. Consequently, in 1969, when the Luo’s
political fortunes were on the wane, they formed a football club and named it
Gor Mahia Football Club. As Professor Atieno-Odhiambo argues, the myth of a
heroic past represented by Gor became the means of the community’s political
and social assertion in a state where they felt increasingly marginalised and
oppressed.” My familiarity and obsession with the legend of Gor Mahia is
primarily rooted in a longstanding association with the eponymous football club.
I recall my father—who himself played for Luo Union in the 60s, a precursor to
Gor Mahia Football Club—and uncle, zealots for the club, planning long trips to
Mombasa and everywhere else around the country in support of the team in the early
80s, and records in praise of both prodigy and prodigious team playing on loop
in both homes. It is from these songs that I started to get a glimpse into the
enigmatic man after whom the famous club was named and my curiosity was flamed.
When Gor died on May 9, 1920, the Luo nation mourned heavily, wondering whether
there would again be such a hero. And now here was mother presenting me with
the book that would ultimately unlock the riddle and answer all my questions,
with a bird’s-eye view into the annals of this my supernatural ancestor. I was bedazzled.
And
then it suddenly came together.
Now anyone
who knows me knows that I’m a thousand choices from being a Believer: I’m not at
all spiritual—not on any level or by any definition—and I’m certainly not a
purveyor of fairy tales or kingdoms come; as a matter of fact I abandoned all
imaginary friends by the time I hit class one, save for the constant trio who hung
about the household longer than I contemplated or dared anticipate—I singularly
and sorely rely on facts and the facts are these:
- I have worked at more than a
few agencies in my career as a Creative.
- Among those, the ones that chose
to fall foul of my favour found themselves on the back foot, confined to the
pungent compost heap of history, lost in distant memory and eternal
irrelevance. (See me in camera for a definitive list).
- Only two are left.
- Among these, one is now
disbursing bouncing cheques and has fired the entire Accounts Department in
consequence; the other, as of Friday 24th of February or
thereabouts, dropped a record 8 employees like hot potatoes, including an
unprecedented 3 senior managers. Obviously a reckoning is afoot.
Go
figure.
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