Dear Kenya haijin,

Thanks to Silvia, who has raised another interesting Kenya haiku
topic : mtumba (singular) / mitumba (plural) :

I rest under
a curtain shade --
mtumba smell

~ SILVIA MUKUHI

Unless I am very much mistaken, this cannot be a kigo (season word),
as we have them all year round, but it can be a very useful Kenya
haiku topic.

Gabi sensei, mitumba are second-hand items (mostly clothes and shoes)
imported from abroad and sold in Kenyan markets. Many of them come
from charitable organisations who collect the clothes in Europe --
they sell them in huge bales to Kenyan importers, who sell them to
Kenyan wholesalers, who sell them to Kenyan stallholders, who often
break up the bales and sell smaller quanitities on to smaller
stallholders -- and finally, they are sold to the public.

Mitumba come ready sorted -- a bale will contain all trousers, or all
T-shirts, shirts and blouses, or all stockings and socks, or all
shoes, and they are graded according to quality, so that the higher
quality bales will fetch a higher price.

The income helps the foreign charity with its charitable work, and the
mitumba help the Kenyan vendors and customers, as they provide them
with fashionable, good quality and cheap clothing. Most of Kenya
dresses in mitumba. The import of mitumba underwear has meanwhile been
prohibited.

It is a moot point whether mitumba have destroyed the Kenyan textile
and clothing sector, as well as the production of wool and cotton.
These sectors have indeed very largely disappeared (except for the top-
quality segment), but it could be that mitumba imports are not the
only factors that hastened their demise.

Could I ask all of you to watch out for mitumba-related haiku, and to
post them here, so that we can create a page for them in Kenya Saijiki?

Have a wonderful Sunday,

Isabelle.