“You know how, when you have been married a long time, you no longer ask where your spouse is going to spend the day?”
A Call from 14 Riverside Drive
Lucas Maranga’s heart nearly stopped when he received a call from his wife Nyawera. He could barely understand what she was saying. She was repeating something about an explosion, over and over – but none of it made sense. One thing that was clear was the fear in her voice. Eventually, he made out that she was at her client’s site at 14 Riverside; the word ‘shooting’ popped up again and again. Dazed, Lucas changed his route and headed towards Westlands, zooming down Waiyaki Way. The road was mostly clear, but by the time he got to the Westlands roundabout, things had changed. Throngs of people were on the road! It didn’t make sense. He saw men he knew. One was a bank MD directing traffic, another a senior exec standing on the roadside looking flustered. A traffic snarl-up had begun, so he ditched his car at Galileos and ran across the highway to the ICEA/Riverside Park complex where he met a stream of panicked people, many crying, heading the opposite way.
He was intent on getting through to the back of the complex because he knew there was a gate connecting to 14 Riverside where Nyawera was. He almost made it. But people kept telling him it wasn’t safe. He looked at them in disbelief telling them he knew, which is why he was going to get his wife out. Fortunately, for him, two men Lucas came across were strong enough to stop him from reaching his destination. This deeply upset him. In truth, his mind could only process the need to get Nyawera out, not the danger he was leading himself into.
Frustrated, he headed back to his car to find another route. The ongoing explosions and gunfire he could hear were singularly processed as a threat to the safety of his wife.
Nail-biting minutes in Nairobi traffic near Museum Hill were only good for Lucas to call Nyawera’s best friend. He shared what he knew, hoping that they could brainstorm a way to get his wife out. His trials to get into the complex were pure folly, and in retrospect he understands that, but in that moment, getting to her seemed like the only rational thing to do… and so he went, eventually making his way down Arboretum Drive and up to the Riverside Drive junction where he abandoned his car and ran towards the scene.
By the time he got there, people were streaming out of the complex, running past the gate. Many collapsed, adrenaline spent as they could not believe they had made it out alive. Reverberating sounds of gunfire confirmed he had entered a war zone, a scene he was ill-equipped to handle.
Nevertheless, logic was not the driver of the day, love was. Luckily for him Nyawera’s friend, Ciru, was on the scene before him; and once again there was someone speaking logic, trying to impart to him the senselessness of trying to make it in, begging him to wait and keep hope alive. But Ciru couldn’t understand what was going through Lucas’s mind, he had heard his wife’s voice, fraught with distress, the mother of his children had called him and he needed to help her. He says that in his mind he considered getting hold of an army-type jacket, and pretending to be a cop – assuming he could easily get away with it because of his slim frame. Looking around though, he slowly realized he wasn’t alone: other people had gathered trying to get news of their loved ones. The security forces on the scene held all of them back.
Turning to his phone, he half-resigned himself to only talking to his wife, trying to understand where she and the people she was with were. “How much battery to do you have?” He asked. “Twenty five percent,” she responded. “Then send me the numbers of the people you are with in case your phone dies.”
Seeing the arrival of the Recce squad and the changing nature of the response elevated Lucas’s hope – maybe this will soon be over, he thought. By then his phone was literally a PABX, with family, friends and colleagues calling him because, sadly, scary news travels fast. After a few calls, frustration lingering within him, he stopped taking calls and switched to text and WhatsApp, keeping the line open for the one person he knew he had to be there for.
Family members came to support the vigil. A friend on site took his keys to go find his car and take it home. Another person gave him a power bank. Various Nairobi food outlets donated coffee stations serving those waiting as the minutes turned to hours. An Indian family from neighbouring apartments was handing out bottles of water to servicemen and families of those still trapped. Church members were calling. Text messaging became the only way to keep hundreds of anxious people updated. He tried hard not to think about his children at home and what he would tell them about mummy. He saw the first responders stand down and begin to head out once the Reece team was on site. A part of him wanted to scream at them – why are you going? His exasperation was understandable. He had seen them do the impossible – shepherding over a hundred people out of harm’s way before the site was secured. He wanted them to do that for his wife too. She remained trapped.
Night fell.
Gunfire continued.
Hours passed as Lucas tried to stay in touch with Nyawera, giving her comfort through the phones of the colleagues she was trapped with after her battery ran out. All this while trying to remain sensitive to the fact that they too had loved ones who wanted to talk to them, even if it was in hushed whispers as they all tried hard to rally hope through the lines.
3:00am
Nyawera and her colleagues were finally rescued in the wee hours of the morning. To say that their reunion was emotional would be an understatement.
