The Mighty Mchele

After high school, my fifth job was as a mchele seller at a local construction site.

If you don't know what mchele is, I honestly don't know how to explain it to Gen-Z's. Back then, mchele wasn't just food. It was currency. It was power. It was the difference between a worker finishing his day strong or collapsing like a sack of potatoes. We sold it in plastic bags, wrapped in old newspapers, tied with rubber bands that had seen better days.

The profit was fifty bob per plate.

One Thursday, everything changed.

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That Thursday started like any other Thursday.

I woke up at 4 AM. Cooked the rice. Packed the stew. Packed the cabbage. Everything was ready by 5:30 AM.

I carried my big sufuria on my head and walked to the construction site.

The site was massive. A new building going up in town. Workers everywhere. Carrying cement. Hammering things. Shouting at each other in languages I couldn't understand.

I set up my station under a tree.

"MCHELE! MCHELE MOTOR!" I shouted.

The workers started coming.

"Mimi plate moja."

"Mimi mbili."

"Weka extra stew."

"Extra stew ni ten bob."

"Ni sawa."

I was making good money.

Then the foreman walked over.

He was a huge man. The kind of man whose stomach arrived five minutes before the rest of his body.

"Wewe!"

"Ndio, Boss?"

"Unaeza toa mchele nyingi?"

"Nyingi kiasi gani?"

"Kwa wote."

I looked at the site. There must have been thirty workers.

"Boss, I don't have enough for everyone."

"Then go and get more."

"I don't have money for more."

He looked at me.

I looked at him.

Then he said something that changed my life.

"Unaeza cook hapa?"

"Cook?"

"Ndio. Hapa. Mwisho wa siku, I'll pay you for everyone."

---

Have you ever tried cooking mchele at a construction site?

I have.

Suddenly, I wasn't just a mchele seller. I was a mchele chef. A...