Postcard from Kisumu: A beer cocktail, extreme heat, and newfound love for Reggae

Whenever I feel like getting away from the city, I usually travel down to Kisumu to just switch off my brain and relax, possibly even catch the sunset with a beer in hand. Which means Kisumu, like home, has always presented a safe space for me. It’s a nice and calmly chaotic and fun city because my tribesmen are boisterous and eccentric and it always amuses me the levels they can push the limits to, every single time. I’ve only ever had two complaints about Kisumu all these years.

First, Kisumu is scorching hot; like three-cold-showers-but-still-sweaty hot. But there’s nothing we can do about the heat, so I’ll cut Kisumu some slack on that. My second problem, and which I am often embarrassed about, is that Kisumu sleeps too early. It is not logical that Kenya’s third most populous city, and arguably her cleanest, goes to bed at 8pm!

You will drive through the Kisumu Central Business District (CBD) at 9pm and the only things you will find open are nightclubs and petrol stations. You will not find a mall open, a hotel/restaurant, even a bloody KFC! Everything shuts down, and the only people that remain roaming the streets are ghosts, and maybe a few ladies practicing the oldest profession in the world. I have studied and lived in Central Kenya for nearly a decade of my life, and not one time will you ever alight from a matatu at 3am and miss a small hotel to serve you hot coffee and donuts or someone with mutura breath trying to sell you shoes.

Anyway, I digress. In case it wasn’t clear by now, for the slow learners at the back, I was in Kisumu again this past weekend. The good people at Tusker lager put myself and three other journalists on a Jambojet and sent us down to the Lakeside city to attend this year’s edition of the Oktobafest. I have an almost incomprehensible phobia for heights, so it goes without saying that I hate airplanes. But it was a quick 45-minute flight, and I’m happy to report that I maintained my calm both at take-off and landing, so no seats or pants were soiled in the process.

We were received at the Kisumu International Airport (Yes, you have to say it in full like that) by a very calm Luo driver called James, who spoke very little, played music on low volume, and kept his eyes purely on the road. I rode shotgun and tried to engage him in scattered conversations every so often, because the only way to truly unearth a city’s secrets is to talk to people like James, who traverse every single underbelly of the beast on a daily basis, interacting with people from both sides of the horizon. That first day, as he was navigating a roundabout in the CBD on his way to drop us off at the Sarova Imperial Hotel where we were staying, I asked him: “Jatelo, so who’s taking over from Professor as Governor in 2022?” He smiled shyly and said: “It’s still too early to tell bwana, saa bado!”

We had lunch at the hotel at about 2pm, then I climbed one flight of stairs up to my room where I had a long nap till about 6.30pm when I woke up to take two very cold showers in between catching glimpses of the Man City vs Southampton match on the small screen hoisted on the wall in my room. Afterwards, I switched out t-shirts and climbed back down where I found James already waiting to take us to Club Da Place, the venue of the Tusker Oktobafest, in Mamboleo.

Tusker has always held one major edition of the Oktobafest towards the end of October every year at the Ngong Racecourse in Nairobi. It is not written anywhere, but the month of October has always belonged to the Tusker Oktobafest – there may be small small events here and there, but everyone always knows there is but one major plot in that month, every year. They usually set up different stages for different acts, from upcoming all the way up to established (100 musicians performed last year), and curate activities that attendees can engage in. The Oktobafest has never been a festival where you just go to drink beer, it is always a space where you go to drink beer while experiencing different cultures. It is where all of Nairobi congregates, for just one weekend in the entire year, to unwind and be loud.

This year, however, Tusker decided to do things differently. I imagine one person, in their boardroom meeting, lifting her (it’s always a lady) hand up and saying: “I know we’ve done this major event in Nairobi all these years, but how about we take it out there this year? I mean, people out of Nairobi drink beer too!” I can almost see another board member (a man, of course, because men are allergic to change) from the other end of the table seething with rage, banging the table and saying; “No, we do things the way we have always done them. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!” And the I see the back and forth going on for a while before the brass finally puts the matter to the vote and Mr. If-It-Ain’t-Broke-Don’t-Fix-It loses the count and now he has to pack a bag to fly to Eldoret to source for a venue.

And just like that, this year’s Tusker Oktobafest is being held across different regions, for a change. Five, regions, to be precise: Nairobi, Rift Valley, Central Kenya, Nyanza, and the Coast. It began on Saturday, October 19th, with two simultaneous mini shows; one at Club Enkare in Kitengela, and the other at Club Timba XO in Eldoret. Our trip to Kisumu marked the second weekend of the mini shows, which were being held at four different locations at the same time: Burudani Address (Juja), Quiver Lounge (Thika Road), Moran Lounge (Nanyuki), and our chosen venue Club Da Place.

This coming weekend, November 2nd, will see the last five of the mini shows being held at New Sarvid Gardens (Kiambu Road), Orchid Lounge (Ngong Road), Bar XO (Ruaka), Derby Place (Karatina), and New Big Tree (Mombasa).

“The decision to deconstruct the main festival to mini festivals was to open up access to the festival to more of our consumers across the country. We recognize that Oktobafest is an important calendar event for our consumers in Nairobi we have made sure that even as we open up the festival to the rest of the country, Nairobi still gets Oktobafest each weekend spread across the city,” Christine Kariuki, Marketing Manager of the Tusker brand, told journalists when we queried about this new format.

“Tusker Oktobafest has grown over the years, and we believe now is the right time to open it up to even more people across the country and explore how we do beer and culture across our different regions. That said, we will still be treating our consumers across the country to the Oktobafest experience. We’re reimagining Oktobafest from one big moment in time to many moments where people can share their favourite beers and artists.”

We rocked up at Club Da Place a few minutes to 8pm to a very organized entrance structure, were ushered in and led to a beer quiz screen where I scored 67%, and thereafter to a rotating wheel where I unfairly won zilch. Then we were taken to a Tusker Lite booth where we were convinced to try out a cocktail named Sunrise that, quite frankly, wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I’m not a cocktail person, but a cocktail made out of beer? C’mon.

We were then taken to a Manyatta booth, where I tried out the Lemon & Ginger as well as the Pineapple & Mint cider flavours and decided there and then that that was what I was going to drink the entire night. Tusker Lager, my all time favourite drink, may have to make some room in my heart because the Manyatta – as Gen Zs say – is coming in hot!

DJ Ves and Hype Kish were already on stage working up the crowd that was forming slowly, by the time we sat down. Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna walked into the club about an hour after us and took a table at the Regular section with the rest of us simple earthlings; snubbing the VIP area where anybody would’ve assumed he would sit. Citizen TV’s ’10 over 10’ show host Azeezah Hashim took up the mic at about 9:40pm and performed some of the most impressive crowd work I have ever seen from an event MC in recent times.

She was dressed in a red top and cowboy-ish jeans with these sort of like feathery things on them that flapped around whenever she moved. A lot of things have been said about Azeezah’s marvelous voice, but not much is said about her general ability to study a crowd and get them to do whatever she wants. She did this thing where she stepped off the stage and came down to the audience, going table to table while the DJ played a tune and just dancing with them and interacting with them and hyping them up. At some point, she passed by our table and winked at another journalist seated next to me but I thought she was winking at me and my heart stopped beating for just a second there. I’ve always told God to give me a sign at the first sight of true love, and I don’t know any bigger sign than my heart stopping. Somebody tell my tribesmen to start the necessary arrangements, safari tunayo!

DJ Pskratch took over from 10:30pm and played a HipHop set for a bit before switching to Ohangla (because we were in Kisumu, after all) and anybody who knows me will tell you I do not sit when Ajawa (as we call Ohangla music) is playing because that is sacrilege. He did his thing for close to an hour, then Ndovu Kuu came on with his own personal DJ, and brought out Ajay of Buruklyn Boyz a little later on. Fun fact: Ndovu Kuu came into the industry calling himself Krispah, but his ‘Ndovu ni Kuu’ song was such a big hit that he decided to change his stage name altogether. I always feel like that was a brilliant move because Tusker lager, since its inception, has always been identified by the Elephant (‘Ndovu’ in Swahili) on its logo. Do you get where I’m going with this?

The showstopper, Bensoul took to the stage at 1:15am to an already excited and almost impatient crowd and opened with ‘Favorite song,' a clear favorite song of many going by the cheers and screams that rented the air. Here's the thing though, Bensoul sings mostly for lovers and people who smoke a tonne of weed; and I fall in neither category. So, if you ask anybody who attended that Oktobafest edition their favorite performer, they’ll most likely tell you Bensoul.

But, if you ask me, that crown belongs to DJ Double Trouble – who wrapped up the event with the most banger of a Reggae set I have ever heard in my life, and I don’t even listen to Reggae!