Landing in December? Read This Before You Ask If Nairobi Has Uber

My aunt in Minneapolis called me on Monday. Called. In my family, an actual phone call means one of two things: somebody died, or somebody is landing in December.

It was December. She lands on the 14th, two weeks, full itinerary pending. And her very first question — before hello, before how is mama — was, "Do they have the car app there?"

Wueh.

Mama. We have Uber. We have Bolt. We have Little. AND a train. The train, manze. There are days I can't roast the diaspora properly because the roast keeps coming true on its own.

And mind you, these are the same people who don't pick up when I call. Every call from Nairobi is assumed to be a loan application. I am not borrowing. I have never been the one borrowing. But December flips the whole script. Suddenly my phone rings. Suddenly I'm popular. Suddenly everybody remembers the girl in Kilimani with the apartment they've decided is a hotel.

So let me make it easy for all of you. After two weeks of field research in October (see: the Mutua Series, parts one through five, may it rest in peace), I present the official December visitors' guide. Study it. There will be a test at JKIA.

One. Do not perform amazement. If you left in 2024, you do not get to say "Nairobi looks so different!" You left in 2024, brother. You took a Bolt down Mombasa Road last year. The shocked-safari act is reserved for the aunties who left fifteen years ago and still think we queue at a cyber café to check email. And even they are wrong. There are three Korean restaurants in my neighborhood alone. My eggs cost $15. I'm not saying that's a flex. I'm saying it's a fact on a menu.

Two. The accent stays on the plane. Do not land with "sorry, English only" energy at the coffee shop. You grew up speaking your mother tongue. Your own mother does not speak English. In October, one msee ordered a "ca-fay latte" in full CNN anchor, then got on a video call with his mother and switched into fluent, unhesitating Kamba. The accent is a costume. We can see the tag sticking out. When we took him to Matungulu, our grandmother sat in her judge seat and he spoke to her in Kamba the whole afternoon. He passed. That's the entire test. It has always been the entire test.

Three. Fix your money behavior. Dollars are not legal tender here. Do not hand a rooftop bartender a physical twenty and watch him hold it up to the light like customs. Do not tip a barista — she will look at you like you offered her a goat. And do not play confused about tap-to-pay when you tapped your phone for three mzingas without blinking and announced them like a State of the Nation address. The same msee who converts my eggs into shillings on a calculator app bought drinks for strangers that night. Selective tech literacy. Clocked it.

Four. Know your species. US Kenyans land with Costco-sized confidence and opinions about everything. UK Kenyans land humble, Primark bags, apologizing for the weather in two countries. Our Middle East wasee land quiet, with new phones for everybody and no press conference. I document all of you. You are a whole genre on my page.

Five. Do not flex fake designer at me. I run my mother's Gikomba Instagram. I can clock a counterfeit logo from the gate. If your "Gucci" belt came from a mall kiosk in Minneapolis, I will know. Worse, mama will know, she tells her stall neighbors, and you become folklore by New Year.

Six. Bring your wallet. I keep mental tabs on the hosting season like a court docket. Somebody "forgot" their wallet at a fish spot last December. You know yourselves. The docket never closes.

Seven. Eat everything. By day three you'll be having $15 eggs and pretending it's normal. By 2 AM you'll be at a mutura joint, remembering how to stand. Both are correct. And when Wamlambez comes on, you will know every single word. That one's not a performance. That one's muscle memory. Honestly, it's the realest part of you.

(This guide is dedicated to everyone coming home except one specific gentleman in America, who is not coming home, because we don't do that anymore. Dodged a bullet. Anyway.)

My father asked if the hosting season means I'm now a tour guide. Close enough, baba. The tips are better and the tourists lie to me in two languages.

Karibu home, everybody. The rooftop opens at golden hour. Gikomba opens at dawn. I open at "five minutes away," which means twenty.

The city survived without you. Come home anyway. That's the whole guide.