I wish I had been brave enough…
It was exactly 10 years ago, on a cold November evening, when I received the news. He was barely through his early 20s…he was no more; he had crossed over to the other side. The news came down like an avalanche, crushing any semblance of strength that I could have mastered at the time. It was piercing, I could not believe it. My once close friend; my Mortal Kombat and Contra playing buddy and my “deskie” was gone. He was just starting to come of age, a young man…so much potential, so many dreams. I was crushed, but I could only imagine what pain he was harboring, that had led him to this untimely...
It had been almost a year or two at the time of the news. I could vividly remember our last interaction, which unknowingly was to be, the last time I was ever to see him alive. It was a typical Thursday afternoon, at the University of Nairobi. Marked with the normal hustle and bustle of student life and comradery amongst mates. I was standing outside our AIESEC office, which was next to Gate D I think leading towards the central police station. In a typical sense, we were engaged in one of our, we are gonna turn the world upside down conversations.
Suddenly, I saw Mario walking by. It took me a few sections to confirm the visuals, given my struggles with myopia and my refusal to get prescription glasses. “Mario, I called out…”. In his usual calm demeanor, he smiled back and stopped to give me a high five. It wasn’t a planned meeting, Mario was on his way to see a friend. We had a brief conversation and cut short the random meetup as he was running late. As usual, we had planned to catch up sometime in the neighborhood. You know, what we all normally say when you run into a friend who you had kind of not seen for a while…yes, let's catch up over beers.
At this point in our lives, we had unfortunately grown a bit distant. It wasn’t like our time in primary school when we practically hang out almost every passing day. Having gone to different high schools and now in separate universities and pursuing different career disciplines, we had less in common than in our junior years. He was pursuing a degree in engineering, being the smart kid that he was, and I was in business school at the time. We had lost contact somewhere along the way. I guess we had different goals in life. As they say, life happened. Unfortunately, little did I know, that this rare meet up was going to be our last “real” conversation.
I had met Mario during our time in primary school. It must have been in our 5th grade that we actually got acquainted with one another. We were initially rivals, plowing our footballing skills for different classes. He was clearly the more talented of the two of us. He would handle the ball so well and as if that was not good enough, he was also one of these annoying ambidextrous kids. He could swing you to the left, then drop the ball to his right, like a cross-over in basketball. Leaving defenders flat-footed. I was clearly no match for his footballing prowess. He was in a league of his own.
Lucky for me, our school had this discriminatory principle of grouping the classes based on academic performance. So shortly after we were done with 5th grade, Mario and I would end up being classmates and desk mates. He would end up being my “deskie” for the entire bit of 6th grade.
Mario was very likable. He was a gentle spirit who never argued much with anyone. His football skills on the playground, earned him the name “Zagallo”, after the famed Brazillian coach of the 90s Mário Zagallo. Everyone liked playing with him. Even though he had a frail frame, his footballing IQ and footwork made him untouchable. He was our Ronaldo, the real Ronaldo Nazario, who was back then the biggest star one could emulate.
Mario was as well, very gifted academically. He had received admission into one of the top boys' high school. We would occasionally meet during the school holidays, to exchanged exam papers and to compare notes on our boarding school life. We would sit and laugh about all the near-misses we had had from running's with more senior students. Bullying was rampant in both our schools and one has to just survive until closing day (end of the semester). Besides school, we would normally exchange movies and music DVDs and just kick back and hangout from time to time. I remember vividly that it was Mario who had introduced me to some American Pop music in general. His brother had been playing in a band and they always had records and tapes back then.
I cannot exactly remember when we had drifted apart. It must have been somewhere just after high school. As we had now kind of forged separate paths to follow. I remember getting the news that he had lost his mum. Could have only imagined how shuttered he was. His mum was his everything... Growing up in a single-parent family, they were like best friends. This was a dark time for him and I think we just never really saw that jovial ever smiley character away. I feel like when she passed away, a part of him also left.
Things were never the same again after this. Our friendships changed. We grow apart and he just kind of shut down. The Mario that we were interacting with was a faint image of his old self. Man, I really look back and sometimes wish we had the right words to say or knew how to actually speak about some things. We could all clearly see he was hurting, but none of us took the time to really be brave and have that heart to heart session. Until today, I don’t know how we could have had that conversation…we just couldn’t. We were not raised with that type of courage to be “vulnerable” enough for us to have a moment of truth.
As I write this, I am still shuttered to know 10 years on there are more and more Mario's out there. Dealing with a lot and going through an emotional rollercoaster. People who have to endure such pain and have no outlet. In the past few years, we have seen an increase in the number of suicides across the nation. More and more cases of folks taking this painful path and a society that is alarmingly becoming more and more toxic in its expectations.
In Kenya, 75% of suicides over the last decade have been from men. This is not news to any of us, we know the expectations in our society. We are brought up being fed this mantra of “Mwanaume ni kujikaza”. Such rhetorics like “boys don’t cry” are every day pumped in our heads from our infancy. A culture that is built around toxic masculinity. Men are simply not allowed to show any emotions, besides being happy your football team is winning and other empty feel-good emotions.
Earlier this year, I completed the 25 push-ups challenge. This is a challenge designed to raise awareness of mental health issues. The challenge in itself is very straight forward, if you are nominated, you get to do 25 push-ups a day for 25 days and subsequently nominate another 25 people. It's a simple way to reach out to men, through something that is “manly” and have them talk about a conversation that is sensitive and almost taboo — Mental Health. It's a very subtle way to engage men in a conversation that we should be having more often.
I saw a few celebrities engage in this challenge. It’s a rather easy way to draw people's attention to the subject that is mental health awareness. It's one of those topics we don’t get to openly speak about as a society. It is almost frowned upon and society would look at you as being “weak”. Folks just don’t get it. We ignore people in our society who are struggling with one form or another of mental health-related issues. A topic like depression is not even considered a “Kenyan” or “African” thing.
When you tell someone in Kenya you are seeing a shrink, the looks you will receive will be heartbreaking. There is a general stigma towards mental health and people having open conversations on things that are troubling them. It's an uncomfortable topic, that we as a society need to be more open towards engaging in. A lot of stuff can be prevented, if we create safe spaces for people to engage and have an open conversation. Stemming from the family as a unit, we need to be better to have these conversations starting from home. People need to know that it's ok, not to be ok. We should take away the judgmental view we have on mental health and promote it as folks being courageous enough to seek help. Which we should be more than willing to offer and support.
Coming back to Mario. I like many people around him, was not brave to engage or have a conversation with him. When he was going through his struggle and battling with the pain within, we simply didn’t know how to engage with him. When we saw him walking or being in the streets, when he was battling through this pain within him, we simply couldn’t relate. We had no words and no courage to fight through with him. Maybe he just needed a shoulder to lean on, or a listening ear to hear him out. Maybe we could have just simply hangout with him…like we used to back in the days. 10 years on and I still wish I had been brave enough to help in one way or another. Maybe, just maybe…we would still be having his jovial self in our lives.
“We’re gathered here today…
To remember the lives of Mario and others…
A tragedy, another tragedy in the community
We got to do better, people
24 years old, this boy was too young
Our condolences go to his family, our prayers
We know he’s in a better place
We know he’s in a better place
But this has got to end, ladies and gentleman
We’ve got to come together, this is — this is beyond words
He was only 24….we gotta do better.” paraphrased from Change by J. Cole
© Untitled’s Cut
