Madaraka Life: Every other man has a leather wallet, and a belt they’ve used for years. It’s been closer to their person, than any soul mate ever could. That insufferable list has been joined by the beloved mobile phone. It’s become akin to an appendage.
Spare a thought, then – for generations that had to hack it in a world without phones.
Chances are, at this moment, you’ve probably ignored, nay, blue-ticked an admirer on Whatsapp. There’s a couple of day-old messages pending in your Messenger, right?
Dating, back in the days, was an extreme sport.
While the objective hasn’t changed for generations, dating was a different ball game.
What would you do without a ‘blush‘, or, ‘love‘ emoji on your prospective’s status that’s cunningly used to test the waters? What, pray tell – would you use to break the ice? The funny clips are godsent. As she breaks into laughter, so does the walls tumble down!
This is what used to happen, before mobile phones.
You’d meet a beautiful lass tending her mother’s grocery stall, on market day. You’d have to start somewhere. What with these tomatoes? Kwani where do you get your cabbages? They are so, well, round.
All this while, your peripheral vision is scouring the area – lest her fiery-tongued mother bursts you red-handed.
Luckily, and may the Good Lord bless the girls of that time, the beauty would pick the cue. Pray that she’s in a good mood. They were often obstinate, and would have no qualms blasting your dreams to oblivion. She’d give your her home’s location pin, and ‘probable‘ times she can meet.
By ‘probable’ times, it was never cast in cement.
The times, generally – also favored love birds.
Only ‘Dynasty’ family had piped water. This meant girls (and younger boys) would spend lots of hours fetching water from streams. The trick? Befriend the younger brother with sweets and condiments – create allies – to act as emissaries.
You’d have to spend hours waiting hidden in bushes hoping the girl comes along.
Same script, with fetching wood.
The harder task, was netting a girl from a well-to-do family. They usually had walls, locked gates, and almost always – very stern parents. For these families, image was everything – and often, match making would be a thing. It’s a little disconcerting nowadays, chatting to such a girl, over a stone wall – that was pretty common!
It used to break hearts, seeing the love of your life getting married off to a wealthier dude – just because you hail from peasant family. In rare cases, some rebel girl from a welathy family would elope – and it’d talked about or years!
Oh, the things we take for granted!
What’s overwhelming right now, is the variety of options available today – in terms of communication.
Social media. There’s Whatsapp, Facebook, LinkedIn, Reddit, Telegram, Instagram……all these are great meeting avenues. Mobile phone services providers have awesome offers in terms of data and voice calls.
Of all these, though, Telkom Kenya is non-arguarbly the friendliest of them all – with the Madaraka Life package – now a certified permanent tariff.
The tariff will have Telkom’s existing customers opting-in upon a one-off payment of KSh 100 and get 1GB, 100 on-net minutes, and access to a preferential rate of KSh 2 per minute* to make calls to other networks.
A 1GB and 100 minutes monthly starter pack will be credited to the customer’s account at the start of the next 30 day cycle, from the date they opted into the tariff.
Telkom customers get more call minutes in revamped prepaid plans
One also has three monthly Data booster packs, set at the rates: 1GB at KSh 75, 4GB at KSh 240, and 8GB at KSh 410 – available for purchase.
Plus, one need not exhaust the resources on the starter pack for them to purchase a booster pack.
New customers need only register onto the Telkom network, make a one-off payment of KSh 100 onto their line. They then enjoy 1GB, 100 on-net minutes, and access to a preferential rate of KSh 2 per minute* to make calls to other networks, monthly.
Telkom customers (New & Existing) can access the tariff via the USSD code: *544*0#
