My Journey in Writing

By James Kemoli Amata

My Journey in Writing
I cannot remember when and where I start writing.
However, I remember writing notes in secondary school.
To kill the boredom, I choose to write a book.
After some other years, I complete typing my manuscript of Zahara Mage.
Every page of the book has countless mistakes.
The book drops from glamour to embarrassment.
I quickly list the mistakes in the book indicating page, paragraph, line, and word. I send the list to the publisher with a request they withdraw the book from market and make the corrections. The publisher withdraws the book but ignores my request to make corrections.
This forces me to take a useless legal step.
Every day, after school I write my Uandishi wa Insha and finally submit the manually typed manuscript to Heinemann Educational Publishers.
I submit once more to East African Educational Publishers (formerly Heinemann Educational Publishers) the manuscript for this great book together with another one for children, Elijah Isaac Mayukuba Shiyonga of African Kenya Sabcrynnsk of Soi Praying and Healing Church.
For years silence rules. In the year 2007 I inquire about the manuscripts. In less than two days I get a phone call asking me to collect my parcel at National Finance Housing Company office in Eldoret.
One day, I bump into a new dance. I am in a bookshop at Kakamega...I quickly and angrily realise that a university male lecturer and a secondary school female teacher have plagiarized my work!
I choose to publish the two online.
People who steal other people’s ideas are parasites.
I sincerely thank Dr. Gibbe of Moi University. He gives me a key to selling books.
I quickly work to turn my A4 four-page Makosa katika Insha hand-out into a handy A6 pocket guide Makosa katika Insha book.
After teaching poetry (ushairi) in Swahili in secondary schools and participating as a facilitator in workshops for teachers of Kiswahili for over twenty years, since September 1976, I choose to write a Swahili poetry teaching textbook.
I get in touch with publisher Jimmi Makostsi of Acacia Stantex Publishers.
I am unaware I am hugging a hyena.
In the meantime, writing and my journey in writing continue.
I set out on a hunt for a publisher who can see my Mashairi Rahisi (Simple Poems) in print, to at least enable me earn some money, having lost all fat from Taaluma ya Ushairi to Jimmi Makotsi of Acacia Stantex Publishers.
Getting ideas from anything, I write a study guide to Swahili literature syllabus. I call it Mtaala wa Fasihi (literature syllabus).
Who knew there would come online publishing to save us from traditional publishers?
Writing letters is part of writing. My earliest letters go back to 1967.
I travel from Likuyani to Mukunga. It is a hard rough road to travel. I leave copies of my book. To get payment is no easy task.
I have a wild imagination that I should sell my books to home schools as a humble way of giving back to the community.
I write to Barack Muluka to get me some books so that I do serious business of hawking books. He sends me copies of Fasihi Simulizi kwa Shule za Sekondari (Oral Literature for Secondary Schools), a teaching text book and Kisa cha Zahara, a novel in Swahili, in two large cartons.
I arrange to visit a school every other day. In all the schools I leave a copy of each of my two books and my contact mobile phone number because narrow bottlenecks clog purchase process. None of the schools contacts me and none orders any book.
I exhaust my stock. I have not earned any money. I cannot pay Barack Muluka for the books he published. I cannot ask for more books. The business collapses into a commercial coma.
In spite of all these, I am still writing.
My first work to be plagiarized is Makosa katika Insha.
Otherwise, how did I lose my Uandishi wa Insha na Tungo Nzuri?
Right now I am ready to re-issue Taaluma ya Ushairi.
I am peeping at pr

• Language: English
• Publisher: James Kemoli Amata
• Release date: Dec 23, 2022
• ISBN: 9780463657379

James Kemoli Amata

I am a retired secondary school teacher of Kiswahili (and Christian Religious Education) and an excited preventive healthcare marketer with Green World Health Products Company.I am a 1976 University of Nairobi Bachelor of Education [Arts (Hons)] graduate and a freelance content writer with a passion for writing and indeed I am a farmer-like author with many titles.I published my first book in 1985, by traditional publishing. I have tried self-publishing and now I am in great heat to explore E-publishing.However, I will never forget my Taaluma ya Ushairi (with Kitula King’ei) from which the publisher ate fat alone, and happens to be an E-book without my knowledge.As I do my business, I worship God in African Kenya Sabcrynnsk of Soi (Prayer and Healing) Church.

Book preview

My Journey in SABCRYNNSK

James Kemoli Amata

Smashwords.com Edition

© James Kemoli Amata, Saturday, July 24, 2021

Uploaded on Smashwords.com on Tuesday, 22.11.2022

By James Kemoli Amata

Appreciation

The following is a list of the Living Springs of the Word of Elijah, aka the Covenant of Elijah or the Covenant, the Source being Baba Mtume Elijah Isaac Maikuva wa Shiyonga: Archbishop Ronald Ambulwa, Jane Ayuko Ambulwa, Rose Irene Mukavane Kalamu, Risper Mukavane, Jane Meda, Josphat Shigali Mugongoi and Ezekiel Jamen Serenge Navodera.

Word of Thanks

Without LUNATECH CYBER, Chavakali, I would have failed to prepare the manuscript for this little book. To Kenneth Anusu, with his team comprising of Christopher Lunare, Dominic Musungu, Kelly Musodzi and Silas Indire, I have no words with which to thank you sufficiently.

The Scriptures

Job 12:4 I have become a laughing stock to my friends, though I called on God and He answered – a mere laughingstock, though righteous and blameless!

12:16 To him belong strength and insight; both deceived and deceiver are His.

12:22 He reveals the deep things of darkness and brings utter darkness into light.

Isaiah 33:1 Woe to you, destroyer, you who have not been destroyed! Woe to you, betrayer, you who have not been betrayed! When you stop destroying, you will be destroyed; when you stop betraying, you will be betrayed.

My Journey in SABCRYNNSK

By James Kemoli Amata

Chapter 1

September 1976

I Start Teaching at Highlands Girls High School, Eldoret. It is Tuesday, September 09, 1976, that I arrive while the school is on the morning parade. I have long Afro black hair and beard and dressed in a tie, light grey shirt, brown flare trouser with black and blue lines and a large belt, with feet in black Duke Socks and elastic half boot shoes.

I wait at the veranda in full view of the school. Most teachers are young adult men and women. Out of a total of twenty-eight staff members, almost half, if not half, are Europeans. I am a young almost mature boy seeing big girls in their beautiful grey short skirts, white blouses, maroon ties and pullovers, black shoes, and white socks.

The parade ends. One male teacher, Mr Paul Ng’etich, comes to meet me. We greet, know one another then he takes me to Headmistress Miss Jane Kidiga.

She is excited to have me. She walks me to the school timetable in the staff room, looks for my name, and announces, In fact you are late, and you are supposed to be in Form 5A1 teaching Kiswahili!

Mr Ng’etich brings me a copy of my timetable. I am supposed to be in class but I choose to relax and study my timetable.

For a start, I shall be revising with Forms 6A1 and 6A2 Kenya Advanced Certificate of Education candidates, nine lessons each of Divinity and teaching Form 5A1, nine lessons of Kiswahili. These make a total of twenty-seven lessons, with a free Wednesday afternoon in a week.

In my training as a teacher, Religious Education is my minor teaching subject while Kiswahili is my major. However, as I start teaching, Kiswahili becomes my minor teaching subject while Religious Education becomes my major.

I meet and teach almost all adult women, many of whom are my age mates. The school head girl and I are 1952 born.

As I teach, I am unmarried, and ever with a brown bottle and a burning stick on my mouth.

I praise and thank the Living LORD God of Elijah for the life he has given me and the experiences He keeps passing me through from one day to another. Indeed, it is a miracle that today I am alive and a gracefully retired high school teacher.

Chapter 2

Almost Ten Years Later On

To be a drunkard is a sad tale.

With my bottle and stick on my mouth, my grandmother’s brother, an employee of Eldoret Municipal Council, has been begging me to change. He has always wanted me to teach by example. He laments, My son, a very good teacher of religion, you teach the Word of God, why can’t you do what you teach?

In all honesty, although under the control of the bottle’s contents, I answer him, I teach for money, and not for saving souls.

All this time, I have been teaching more Christian Religious Education than Kiswahili lessons, mostly Forms Five and Six Arts classes.

Education officers, Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT), parents, and local politicians tag me as a very good teacher, while the late Hon Ambuka, Councillor of Kidiwa Ward, specifically brands me, A very good teacher of CRE!

The Late Mrs. Limo, a devout saved Christian of the Tukutenderesa level, always desires I become not just a Christian, but a saved child of God and not just a preacher, but a preacher like my both late grandfather Musa Idah and grandmother Raheli Savane.

The year is 1985. The late Catherine Kariuki is in Form 6. She and I are sitting on a short wall in front of the assembly hall facing the clock tower and having a chat. Catherine is seriously concerned with my life and future. She sincerely warns me, Mr. Kemoli, if you do not stop drinking you will surely die. You will die because of either drinking or an accident due to drinking too much. Stop drinking, Sir.

I am sad. In 2021, I trace Catherine. Thanks to Facebook. Unfortunately, she soon passes on. I remember her so much for the many United Nations booklets she gifted me. It is like she knew I would retire and need the information for my new life in a rural village. The Living LORD God of Elijah rests her soul in eternal peace.

I lack what to say. However, I remember the night of December 31, 1976/January 1, 1977.

I have been drinking at Stand Bar since afternoon. I want to stagger home at 5:00 but the late Dr Alfayo Kihusa convinces me otherwise: What is the hurry for? You know we have just come. Let us have something first, after which we shall go home together. All of us are going to Wangulu and you know very well that I have my Ford Zephyr car.

Ford Zephyr was a big car in the class of Zodiac. Those were the cars of those days. They were for people with money, not ordinary workers. Things change. Those cars get out of the way in favour of the Mercedes Benz, which squeezes them out of the President’s escort fleet.

I sit and continue as if I am just starting afresh.

Soon, there is a downpour. It is about 9:00 in the night and too dark for anybody to see, let alone to see well. In a conversation, I disagree with elder Dr Kihusa. He bursts out the truth from the bottom of his heart, Did we come together? We came separately, didn’t we? You can go the way that you came – we will not go together. I won’t take you in my car!

I stand up and stagger out of the bar into darkness. I cross the road and attempt in faith to take the road home through Chavakali High School. (Today you can only pass by the school by taking either the left or right feeder road.) I go too far to the right, miss the calvet, and plunge into gushing