Beverly Hills Maasai (8 page)

“I really appreciate your coming along today,” I told Olivia.

“I wouldn’t want to miss this.”

“Well, it’s not going to be that interesting. We’re just bringing the guys down to register for the race.”

She laughed. “Something tells me that walking in with these three is going to be pretty interesting, no matter what.”

“I guess you’re right. Still, you know … thanks.”

“Hey, that’s what friends do.”

Olivia
was
my friend. A
real
friend. Not just somebody who was in my class or went to my school or who I shopped with or went to the same parties with—although she was all of those. She was more.

Before I went to Africa I would have told you that I had dozens and dozens of friends. And Olivia certainly wouldn’t have ranked very high on that food chain. But when I came back I saw things through new eyes. All that stupid shopping, the desperate need for
just the right thing to wear, the cars, the parties, the pettiness, the gossip—everybody talking but nobody actually saying anything—the fascination over such meaningless nonsense, the … the … everything.

I think—no, I
know
—that I felt disgusted by it all. After seeing people who survived on so little—and seemed so happy despite it all—I had no time for people who had everything but didn’t seem to be happy.

For the first month I was back I didn’t even shop. I didn’t set foot in a mall or even go down to Rodeo Drive, once known to me as the happiest place in the world, forget Disneyland. I hardly wore any makeup, stopped watching reality TV and reading the celebrity mags. I went to parties, but I didn’t really enjoy myself. I had absolutely
nothing
in common with the people I was hanging out with. And I told them.

I told them about the poverty and problems in Africa. I told them about what they could do about it. I told them about the things they were doing that were wrong, or shallow, or silly—and that was pretty well everything. But nobody wanted to hear about starving children when they were eating their sushi. Nobody wanted to be told about people who didn’t have fresh drinking water while they were sipping on a double-shot latte with cinnamon sprinkles. Nobody wanted to be told about people who didn’t have shoes when they were so delighted that they’d finally got their hands on the new Birkin bag. I knew all that because I was the one telling them those things. Time and time again.

Looking back with the insight of a few passing months, I realized that the post-Africa version of me was, without a doubt, the most annoying, pretentious, obnoxious person imaginable. And believe me, I could have been accused of those same faults before I went away, only in a different way.

In those first four weeks I lost a lot of friends. Well, really, I didn’t lose
any
friends. What I lost were a lot of people who I’d thought were my friends but really only occupied the same physical space as me. And through it all, no matter what a pain I was, regardless of how preachy I became, Olivia was still there standing by me.

So she was right; I did care about her. She was a good person—sometimes a good person hidden beneath a layer of designer clothes, expensive makeup, and a shield of the most pretentious accessories money could buy—but still, a good person, and my best friend.

And I think through her I sort of found my balance. I would never forget what I had seen and experienced—the people I’d met in Africa and the way they lived their lives—but there was no point in telling everybody about it … well,
lecturing
them about it, all the time.

Even worse, I couldn’t tell anyone about my family’s donation to build the medical clinic near Ruth’s village. It was important for her village, and really, what was that kind of money to my father? For
most
of the people who lived in my neighbourhood, it might have been the cost of their
fifth
car, or the gardening service, or their monthly clothing allowance, or the personal
chef. But I’d quickly discovered that telling people what we’d done only made them feel uncomfortable. Maybe they realized that it was something they could do quite easily if they really wanted to. It wasn’t the means they were lacking but the will to help. Why couldn’t these people see or understand how even a little would mean so much to people who—No, I couldn’t let myself get wound up. No point.

I pulled into the parking lot and searched for a spot. I knew I was in the right place because the people around us walked like runners, looked like runners, and worst of all,
dressed
like runners—and by that I mean
horribly.
Sure, I’d come to understand that fashion isn’t
everything
, but surely it had to be
something.

When we climbed out of the car, I was suddenly, along with Olivia, a little island of style adrift in a sea of fashion disasters. What was it about runners that made them want—no,
need
—to dress so totally repulsively? I understood that when they were running they couldn’t very well dress in Gucci and Miu Miu shoes. But today they weren’t running; they were simply registering to run. Did they think the organizers wouldn’t let them participate unless they dressed the part? Did they think that if they looked halfway fashionable they would be sent home?

People passed by dressed in skimpy little shorts, mesh shirts—I couldn’t even
think
of an occasion when mesh might be considered clothing—and lots of tight spandex bodysuits. Goodness, put on little whiskers and ears and they would have looked like they were wearing cat costumes—and I’m not talking
a sort of Halle Berry Catwoman. More like a cat costume that would have been turned down by a six-year-old at Hallowe’en. And the colours! Did running make you colour-blind? Really, who decided that lime green and orange were a good combination? Come to think of it, if I dressed like that I’d run too—run away where nobody could see me!

Not that I would ever be a runner. It’s a completely impractical mode of transportation. If you want to enjoy the view, you walk. If you want to get somewhere, you drive. If you want to catch the eye of the opposite sex, you work on your strut. I know runners who talk about the peace and tranquility of running, but I just tell them about the peace and tranquility of a full body wrap and shiatsu massage. For me, running has to have some purpose—a sale at the mall, perhaps, and rushing in when the doors first open. Of course, having been in Africa, I can now say from first-hand experience that being chased by a four-thousand-pound elephant is sufficient motivation to make anyone run like an Olympic sprinter.

Then there was their choice of footwear—totally clunky and totally unattractive, and apparently made with all sorts of space-age materials and adorned with garish little swooshy symbols and stripes. Couldn’t they replace the swooshy symbol with some sort of animal? Perhaps a cheetah? No, cheetahs are fast but have no endurance, and the marathon is all about endurance—twenty-six miles of it.

I looked at Nebala and it came to me—running shoes should have a little Maasai on the side!

Not that Nebala and Samuel and Koyati were wearing running shoes. They wore simple sandals that were actually crafted from pieces of recycled tires. Yes, they wore tire tread for footwear. I wasn’t sure if that was completely inappropriate or completely and utterly correct. Of course I didn’t think anybody was noticing their tire-tread shoes because the brilliant red blankets and dress pretty well captured everybody’s attention.

My plan had been to simply fall in with the flow of people to find our way, but as usual, everyone was just standing and staring at the guys in their Maasai wardrobe.

“Excuse me,” I asked a man, obviously a runner. “Can you tell me where we can find the registration desk?”

“For the marathon?” he asked.

“No, for the fashion show!” Olivia snapped.

“Yes, the marathon,” I said before his confused look took hold.

“For all of you?” he asked.

“Just three of us.”

I noticed that the crowd of fashion rejects around us was growing quickly. Then I looked at Nebala. I knew that attached to his belt, hidden underneath his blanket, he had his
konga
with him. In a fight between three Maasai warriors and three hundred runners, I’d bet on the Maasai.

Then again, it wasn’t going to be that sort of fight. It was going to be three Maasai running against three thousand other runners … No, not three thousand—there might be ten times that many. I’d seen marathons
on TV, and they were just masses of people. I remembered something about there being forty thousand people in the New York City Marathon.
Forty thousand.
There couldn’t be that many running in Beverly Hills…. It wasn’t a big city like New York or … well, really, it
was
L.A. The richest part of L.A. Could there be that many people who were going to be part of this run? Serious runners, people who, with their crew of personal coaches, trained for years and years? People from around the world? Could Nebala and his friends outrun people like that who devoted their lives to running?

I got a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Nebala and his friends had come here to win
—certain
that they could win. But what if they couldn’t? I didn’t want to think about that. After all, they did spend their entire lives walking and running. They trained not just hours every day, but
every
hour,
every
day. Nebala had told me about how Samuel had once tracked a wounded lion for three days, covering hundreds of miles, before he finally killed it. Anybody who could do that could do this, no problem.

“Just come with me,” the man said. “I’m on my way to register right now.”

“Thank you.”

We fell in behind him. The crowd opened up at one end and allowed us through. Then everybody fell in behind us. I felt like a celebrity followed by a horde of paparazzi. It did have that quality. Everybody was watching us, and there were a lot of phones being pulled out and pictures taken. Of course I was only in
the shots because I was standing beside the celebrities. I guess that made me part of the posse. No, not the posse—more like the Maasai’s entourage!

As we walked, the crowd moved aside for us, snapped pictures, and then followed along behind. It was a combination of Moses parting the Red Sea, a celebrity reality show, and the Pied Piper leading the rat parade—except a whole bunch of these runners seemed to weigh
less
than a rat. Forget supermodels being too thin, these runners all looked downright scrawny. I guess the difference between them and the models was that these people were all incredibly fit—they just looked like they really needed a couple of good meals.

Up ahead there were big signs that said “REGISTRATION”—no more question where we were headed.

“Are these guys, like, real Maasai?” our escort asked.

“As opposed to fake Maasai?” I questioned.

“I mean, like, they’re really from Africa?”

“From Africa, from Kenya.”

“Kenyans! They are the best marathon runners in the world,” he said, clearly in awe.

“Cheruiyot!” said Nebala proudly.

“Tanui!” cheered Samuel. “Cherigat!”

Our runner friend seemed to recognize what they were saying—runners’ names, I guessed?

“Yeah,” he said. “Kenyan runners won the Boston Marathon ten years in a row! Maybe I shouldn’t bother even entering,” he added.

“No harm in entering,” Olivia said. “Unless you were hoping to win, of course.”

He looked both disappointed and amused by her remark. I just hoped she was right.

We entered the building. There were tables arranged around the room, and above each were letters of the alphabet.

“Have your friends pre-registered?” our guide asked.

I looked at Nebala. He looked as though he didn’t understand the question.

“Have you already filled out papers?” I asked.

“We have papers.”

“Oh, good. Can I have them?”

He reached inside his garment and pulled out a sheaf of papers. He started sorting through them. Some of them were worn and torn and tattered. He could have really used something like a cool leather messenger bag in a colour that would be complementary to the red of his clothes … maybe a tan, or—What was I talking about? As if he was going to carry something
like an oversized man-purse. A spear, a shield, a bow and arrow—yes. A trendy bag—no.

He finally found a page and handed it to me. It was the information sheet about the marathon, the one he’d already shown me back at the house.

“No, not this,” I explained. “Did you send in any registration papers before you came? If you did, we can probably skip at least some of this craziness.”

He shook his head. “Is this a problem?”

“No—that’s what we’re here for.” I eyed the crowds up ahead. Maybe we wouldn’t have to wait after all. “Just come with me.”

I took Nebala by the hand and dragged him toward the registration desk. Samuel and Koyati fell in behind … followed by our giant fan club.

“Excuse me!” I called out, and again the crowds parted, all the way to the desk. “These three need to register for the marathon.”

The man behind the desk had his head down; he was filling out some papers. “Just hold on until I finish with—” He looked up and his mouth dropped open.

“We need to register these three for the marathon,” I said.

“Register?”

“Yes, this
is
the registration desk, isn’t it?”

“Um … well, uh, yes,” he sputtered.

“And that is what you do, isn’t it? That’s why you’re sitting here, correct?”

“Yes, of course.”

He scrambled for some papers and handed me one set, then a second and a third. “Have them fill out these
forms … over there.” He gestured to some tables where other people were sitting down with their paperwork.

I took the papers, and Olivia and the guys followed me over to the tables. I looked for a pen … none. I almost asked Nebala if he had one, but I didn’t want to risk embarrassing him. A
konga
he had—a pen, probably not.

“Does anybody have a pen we can use?” I called out.