PHAT

PHAT 

Being in high school and in university, Khadija was a pretty common name, so a lot of people in their talks or gossips would try to differentiate personalities through their physical appearance and for me it was always "yule ako na rasa kubwa ama yule mnono" the former I preferred but this one for "mnono" not soo much, i'd be like YEAH, I'm PHAT with a P and someone would most definitely ask why with a P? I'd be like yeah as I roll my eyes, PHAT stands for Pretty Hot and Tempting...But also who were my friends? How can you allow me to utter such NONSENSE...You were all EP's 😁😁😁, but thank you for standing by your WEIRD friend,

Sooo its 2006, I join university in Malaysia and let's just say it was a BLAST, a country that I love almost as much as Kenya is Malaysia but its also the country where I gained most of my weight. Fast forward a year later, i'm back in Kenya after surgery for Endometriosis(That's a story for another day), my mum is like it's time for you to come home Chica...which I did and immediately joined USIU. I remember my mum and sisters came to meet me at the airport and as I walked out still feeling like a million bucks, I couldn't seem to get their attention, they were looking past me until my small sister was loud enough for me to hear her say "Ghaii you guys the FAT lady IS IMAN"as I write this i'm dying of laughter because I didn't find it too funny then.....I swear to you weight is a silent visitor to the carrier because at no point did I feel overweight or see any change. 

So here I am, a fresher in USIU, minding my own business trying to lay low but NOOOO that wasn't what was in store for me. First of all I would just like to say that, USIU was a BLAST and some of my fondest memories and friendships were made in that place. USIU at that time had a really cool mix of people and vibes were right, FIFI's was life and people actually wanted to hang out with each other after school plus the SPONSOR bug hadn't bit yet.

So one morning i'm seated at the cafeteria having breakfast and my friend Chemie comes up to me and hands me a certificate and explains that it was a unanimous decision to present the certificate to me by most of the guys in Uni, the certificate read and I kid you not "To the Biggest Behind" with an explanation for the certification, at that moment I was soo embarrassed and all I could do was laugh. You have to understand that even though I knew I was blessed, it wasn't the center of my existence, it wasn't what I wanted to define me, that's just not how I was brought up, you'd like to be known for other things such as your accomplishments, your future plans and everything else plus when growing up it was considered UGLY, its only recently that people have actually benefited from carrying around extra FAT on their bottoms. It was a struggle to embrace the personality it forced me to have or just to block it all out. Let's just say, I had to and FORCEFULLY. 

In USIU we had campus night awards and it was one of the coolest events in Uni and before it happened people were nominated for various categories, ranging from sports personalities, community involved people, academics, SLAY QUEENS and all. I remember I was coming from class and my friend Nana comes up to me and tells me I've been nominated for the African Queen category and I was surprised to the point of being petrified, what is an African Queen, what are the requirements? I mean there were many questions but I played the role and when the awards night reached I was crowned African Queen, TBH,  I was in shock, you should've seen the other nominees, beauties from Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania. So after that let's just say a certain part of my body was a celebrity 😉😉😉 unfortunately the unwarranted attention didn't make it easy for me in Uni but it still was a BLAST. Struggles of a bigger woman are so real in everything we do, I swear you'd think i'm a teachers pet because I would rush to class early so that I can pick the biggest chair and mark my territory because my friend, if you don't get the right chair, you can easily sit one one thigh the whole class and limp the rest of the day because of lack of blood supply to the other, also pins and needles are not your friend. 

To be honest, the list is endless, I guess you can say I've been making this decision for the longest time. I knew I had to do something quick fast about my weight when one time, I was feeling like a million bucks and I was chilling outside the school cafeteria, this cool Casanova guy I had known for a while and I had always considered harmless (naivety) says hello to me and explains to his friend how he knows me..so he goes to say in swahili "I have known her since she was slimmer"...also let this ground open up and swallow me now na muniokotee Wajir tafadhali. You have to understand this was the guy that was supposed to like you whether you were 140kgs or 50kgs but noo he had noticed meaning others did as well PLUS he was the cool guy he wasn't supposed to say such stuff...what did I do you ask? I just smiled..Umuhimu ni uhai is what would've been the perfect answer but it hadn't hit by then 😂😂😂😂. 

Also another incident in Switzerland, I think this is the one that struck a cord home, I had gone on a tour of the city and there was a group of all female Chinese tourists who were following their tour guide into some narrow street that I was coming out of. I remember them gasping and sounding like they had just seen a ghost, some of them were shrieking as though they were about to unleash some Kung Fu moves(pun intended)....also dramatic much because the whole street was now just watching me..UNNECESSARY...so I signaled to one of them WHAT? She signals to my lower part of the body and asks if I can take a picture with them??? What now? Are you mad? So that you can go back to China and say you met a human being who looks like this? At least they were honest, everywhere I would walk in Switzerland all I kept hearing was this word "GROSSEE"..OKAY say it with me, sounds a lot like "EWW GROSS"... So I asked my sister what that meant and she was like Girl, they are saying you IS FAT, YOU IS BIG, YOU IS ROUND. Aki humans can be funny, as they say Nyani haoni kundule, mind you the people saying it have no shape or form, also their fat is mostly on the front and that's okay because they're known to drink BEER but no this African woman has her fat in all the wrong places...Lord delivereth us from this nonsense..but now i understand the standards of beauty vary in various parts of the world.  My experiences as a fat woman have definitely given me various blessings and strengths, which I am sure I would never have or developed if I was a much smaller person, there's more to looks, there's personality and intelligence and kindness which make you a better human being.
Here's to loving ourselves in all shapes and forms, to matching the inside with the outside, to being happy and as always to spreading that kindness everywhere and anytime.