The Mattress

Weary from many nights of feeling bed slats under a thin mattress, I asked Rose, the matron at SMMUCo, for a new mattress. Rose jumped on the request and informed me that I would be getting a new mattress in two days. Two or three days later she said I’d be getting the mattress in a couple more days. The next week she told me that she was waiting for money from the assistant bursar to buy the mattress. Finally a few days later, she told me she had the money, and I’d be getting the mattress the next day.

She was right the last time. At about 5:00 in the evening, she and the college driver Haji arrived with a 6 foot by 6 foot mattress. I had hauled off the old foam mattress by the time Rose entered with the new one still sheathed in plastic. We quickly slid off the plastic, plopped the new one onto the wooden slats, and saw that the mattress hung over one side by about six inches. By then Haji had entered the room, and we three stared at the too-big mattress in silence. I tried to squish the mattress down into the frame, but it was impossible. It was then that Rose decided the frame was not 6-by-6 but 6-by-5.

After some Kiswahili words were exchanged between Rose and Haji, the three of us put the mattress back into the plastic, Rose said they’d be coming back with a smaller mattress, and I made sure she repeated the word for “today” - leo.

It was well after dark and I was fighting bed-time yawns when they arrived again. We did not take the plastic off the mattress but plopped it onto the slats. Now there was more silence as we stared at the extra 3 inches of slats exposed on either side of the mattress. Rose and Haji exchanged more words. Haji and I repeated that the mattress seemed to be 6-by-5 ½. I said it wouldn’t be a problem and repeated that several times to Rose who stared and stewed at the exposed slats. Then Haji had the idea of cutting off foam from another mattress and sewing it onto the new one.

Haji, master of jerry rigging, would know. The college Land Cruiser has received much of Haji’s creative solutions that hold the thing together. The hand brake is kept in place by an oil can secured under it. There are always at least two bottles of water lodged under the hood, possibly to cool down a radiator. Above the driver’s seat, a stick is secured between parts of the ceiling frame to hold up I-don’t-know-what. The back door of the Cruiser has been an endless source of creativity for Haji. It never stays closed. After a month of almost losing the back passengers closest to the door, Haji used a strap of rubber to secure the door like a hinge. Then it only banged open and shut on the large boulders along Kibosho road. Eventually, someonepossibly Hajisoldered a latch onto the door. Now the only one who can successfully close the door is Haji.

So it was no surprise that Haji arrived at the idea to cut off foam from another mattress and sew it on. I was informed that the foam strip would arrive the next day.

And that was two weeks ago.