The sun is out early and bright. What a special day!
It’s a Friday to others in the world, but in Nairobi, it is Furahi Day, which means a day of furaha, or joy in Swahili. It is the day we adorn unique, stylish clothes to the office, when we all dress down.
Our bosses do not mind us wearing traditional shirts and collared tees. They do not rebuke us for our floral and skimpy dresses. Neither do husbands mind their wive’s little exposure of cleavage and legs. It is a day of conscious compromise in many households.
Today we will commute in comfort.
We will not squeeze in loud and recklessly driven matatus – our public service vehicles that break all traffic rules without a care. Our cars will have a trip to town, taking a break from the week-long slumber on the parking lot. So our roads will be busier than any other day of the week.
Our club hosts will be a happy lot in the evening, because we will not hurry to get home. We will keep them long and lucrative company, drinking and dancing, until the Covid curfew disrupts our merrymaking.
This is the Friday I have always known.
Until the day I listened to one wise former dealer. He said, “The worst trade ever known in the history of mankind is trading a Friday evening for a couple of drinks and a Saturday morning for nursing a hangover.”
How will you trade your Friday?