It's almost a week that Peppino Onassis is living in the populous district of Majengo.
It went well that the owner dell'Upeponi Café has taken a liking to and in exchange for three Italian shirts and a pair of shoes with leather soles, granted him a plate of beans and polenta fist for ten days.
In the evening, if you are still hungry, unable to scrounge a few potatoes from mama crouched among the tin shacks of the muddy alleys of the slum. On top of the lane less muddy, in front of a concrete hut not yet finished with a tin roof collapsing, there Dahabu, a plump and pleasant woman half Arab and half Chilosa.
Maybe the woman started to give him credit sniffing the deal by selling its unbeatable samosas and crispy bajia at double the usual price.
"Me to pay when you have them, Peppino. Sooner or later the rain Mzungu money in his pocket somewhere. "
"Meanwhile, I'll give you that. It 'a painting of the Madonna with child "
"But I'm Muslim, Peppino"
"But it's nice! Look, if you move, you change color and the baby Jesus raises her head and looks at her mother "
"It's true! Too strong!"
Basically you can not want to hurt Peppino.
With his English patched with which struggles to make himself understood but at least still not understand when they speak, with the yellow smile sportsman cigarettes and bright eyes that are placed inevitably on all large breasts that pass under the nose, it is well-liked by everyone, including children who improvise girotondi of joy in his presence, when they see him coming.
This Italian skinny and a bit 'hunchback, that when he arrived in Malindi called Onassis because it was full of money to be disgusting and had bought a boat and several girlfriends, has been without a shilling.
Or rather, it would still have enough Onassis, but all that does is sealed in the safes of a bank closed indefinitely.
There was enough to live on, withdrawing up to 2,000 shillings a day.
And to think that when he landed in Malindi, will retire at least ten times as much.
Since the boat was sunk and one of the girlfriends if was no run off with his SUV and a nice nest egg, Peppino had decided to downsize without drama.
"These things happen, not is anyone's death. Here you live so well, that some mange can happen to you as well. "
He had left the house with a pool rented in Malindina area and had moved into an apartment behind Lamu Road and not far from Majengo, with a girlfriend less comely previous but, in his opinion, more reliable. No more bets in the casino, a pizza a week to the People and the rest in medicine to the pressure.
Moreover, at sixty-two it is just to wait for another three (or maybe five?) For the minimum pension that will make the leap.
No one cared that much even when the second girlfriend reported him to the police for non-existent and beatings for having shouted "come back here, bitch" when he saw her go out with the TV shoulder.
After paying three thousand euro, the agent had also become his friend and told him that in future he would not have such problems, if he had turned to him.
Eventually, in short, he had learned to move in that paradise where he lived the life he had always dreamed of and where you could only learn from mistakes.
But now he did not take the damn bank.
That story of the possible failure is ruining your health.
Since last Tuesday, he found it closed, he has done nothing but run far and wide to Malindi. Ask, inquire, clench your fists and crying, expire and be offering coffee.
Every morning, at nine o'clock, show up in vain at the gate of the bank.
"It will take two or three months, before getting back the money. And who knows if we will review them all "said a compatriot after a few days.
A Peppino collapsed upon the world.
He that since the third girlfriend had discovered the hiding place of the euro sewn in the mattress, put it all in one bank and it was done deliver the credit card with which he slept and, protected by a plastic bag, also he bores in the shower, it was unexpectedly poor.
But poor poor, as one of them, those who every day begged him: "Peppe, Peppe give me something pe 'eat", and he recalled the teenage years and the efforts made by his father, chain workers in the North, scuciva always at least ten shillings.
"One day to you, tomorrow to him ... more I can not boys."
Yesterday one of them, Occhiostorto, asked him if he wanted to split a bag of cookies she'd just given a German.
"But you can not do anything? We write to the Embassy, ​​the Ministry, Rai Italy! "
"You can not do anything, Peppino. Banks fail all over the world "
"But here it is not the world, otherwise we do not really I was!"
On Friday, the former Onassis ended at home to think.
First gathered valuables: gold chain with pendant of Our Lady of Pompeii donated by Nunzia grandmother, his silver watch Girard Perregaux with perfect mechanics, the twins of first marriage (the poor gifted, how I do not feel it) and the special issue of a postage stamp depicting the Armstrong landing on the moon.
On seeing him gather his things, Confidence, the ugly girlfriend, he did the same thing: a bundle of his most precious possessions: Android smartphone 5s, two kilos of hair extensions real Arabs, three pairs of thong intimissimi, two pearl gray bras, a silver photo frame with a picture of two children who are in Machakos from her mother and suddenly decided that it should go visit.
On leaving, while he was, he also took the surround sound of the television, the Peppino ipad and microwave, although we did not fit in my suitcase.
Peppino was too caught up in the other room to score the other things, and crunch.
When he heard "Hello, love," he replied with a guttural sound and automatic kiss snap.
After a good half hour was also released him, before going to eat two samosas from Mama Dahabu, then to go to the Alvaro cravattaro.
Alvaro also has the account in that bank, but it has another seven in as many Malindi agencies.
And then if things went wrong, could always sell one of the nine villas which, including that which was before him, the Pajero, Land Cruiser, the sedan, the Kawasaki, the two quads, five tuk-tuk and the boat very similar to his that had sunk and was not seen again.
"Peppe, this stuff will also be of value, but does not want it anymore. What am I doing with a clock of the eighteen hundred? Here mo 'to look forward all use the i-phone "
"You give them a pledge ... then I am coming to take them"
"Just because it's you ... I give you 5000 shillings, but if I do not bring them in three months, I keep everything"
"Thanks Alva, you are a friend"
"Do you want a coffee?"
"And 'it included in the price?"
"And vabbuò ... this time"
First, with three thousand shillings went on foot to save fifty of boda-boda, to pay the month's rent to the home owner, Sheikh Bin Abdulraman Bayusuf.
"At least I'm quiet for two weeks"
"From next month, the rent increases by two thousand shillings," she said Ahmed Ali Mohamed bin Abdulraman the son of Sheikh Abdulraman.
"But you have already increased six months ago! Have mercy ... "
"So many people want that house"
So Peppino decided that it will look for another apartment cheaper.
Before evening back from Mama Dahabu and sits beside her.
Around the smoke of frying pans it mingles with the dust that rises to the sky seeking the last sun rays.
The trees do not get tired of watching their leaves dancing in the wind and emit gentle hiss.
The children have stopped their uniforms to school and play half-naked, armed with pieces of tin and plastic bottles.
Someone has built a truck with a cardboard box and Peppino led by a wire house and has equipped with wheels and fenders. Children laugh and call that truck "Mzungu lorry".
"The last girlfriend was also taken away the stereo and computer, mama. But today I have sold the table with four chairs. So that's what you had to, now we start from scratch "
"You're too good, Peppino. But now where are you going to stay? "
"I do not know, tomorrow I sell the TV first and then look for accommodation".
"I have a proposition for you, Mzungu"
"I've got one to do to you, mama"
The next morning Peppino gets up very early.
For the first time does not pass by the bank at nine, but he went right away from Hamid machines charterer, who is interested to your TV.
"Twenty thousand"
"But I paid seventy, a few months ago ..."
"Twenty-two thousand, maximum bid"
"Ah, then everything changes ..."
"I have to go?"
"OK I accept"
Fortunately there are those two thousand shillings more, think Peppino.
Fifteen hundred are invested in the rental of a pick-up with three strong ones.
They loaded up the bed and the refrigerator, the only two things left in the house.
"It 's wonderful, partner!" Cries Mama Dahabu seeing him appear in the muddy alley.
"There is also the freezer, so we will do what I have told you"
"When we bring the bed?" Asks one of the strong ones.
"Down the hall is a small room with orange curtains" explains Dahabu.
And 'the new home of Peppino Onassis.
Two meters by three meters of tranquility, a beautiful fan and a picture of the Madonna with child in a wall.
In the other the Prophet Mohammed.
Mama Dahabu lives in the front room and rented her son Sammy.
Peppino in two days he learned to make the samosas.
Stretches the dough, prepare the filling of meat mince, carrots, onions, turmeric and pili pili and then closes them into triangles with a paste of flour and water.
"How they come, mama?"
"Peppino All right, you look like a chef in Lamu"
And they laugh.
Peppino in the freezer there are two hundred at a time.
So they do not ever miss, and with the help of the Mzungu, Mama Dahabu can devote to those of potato and bajia. the Upeponi Café also started to buy the samosas Dahabu and markets them is a pleasure.
Fifteen shillings each, and sells them at 50.
"If they go ahead, Peppino, you will not have to even pay the rent"
"Sooner or later the bank will reopen, mama. Or liquidate savers and then ... "
"Well?" He asked the woman with a look of serene resignation.
"Then we can buy a bigger freezer for our business!"
As the sun colors the concrete and corrugated iron shack, and it draws the outlines of a palace, two figures embracing each other in the gloom.
One is large and round, the other is tiny and stortignaccola.
"What are you doing Peppino, touches?"
"Er ... mama ... habit ..."
"Oh well, at least if I take away something, it remains in the family!"
The last laugh of the day is accompanied by a toast to the tamarind juice.
"Banks around the world, and those who do not know that in here there is not even a bit of happiness."