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headFIRST

He wore his name the way a toad carries its coat; his folks had named him ‘Kagwa’.
In the laughter of that language, the name would have meant a ‘weak, little sugarcane’.
In fact, on second thoughts, Kagwa was actually a frail young boy, had toothpick legs with knees protruding like door knobs and a mug that looked foreign on his face.
But Kagwa for all i knew, was my best friend in my whole wide world punctuated by hills, valleys and a forest.
A good friendship we had, many games we played, including his favorite when the rains pounded the red dry earth and the ground was slippery.
Kagwa would skid like he was skiing, bare foot, continuously for about ten meters.
As the other stragglers hastened to catch up with his zest, he would hog all daylight by skidding on his knees, hands held high much to the chagrin of the kiddie crowd.
I tried to share and outshine his prowess once, by skidding on my heels, but ended up with a very bad headache – landed on the murky ground with the back of my head.
Soon, the rains, common in the slopes on Mt. Kenya, would subside and a healthy green carpet covered the landscape, stretching into the horizon.
Then, a long pit would be dug, filled with grass and a used tyre positioned at one end of it (pit).
From about 12 meters or so away, boys, lost in their boyhood, would pick momentum like in long jump, sprint, hop onto the tyre, fling their bodies in the air then flipped over, landing on their feet, on the grass.
Some landed on their butts in the acrobatic quest, others had their backs badly bruised, yet some, like Kagwa, broke the record, by landing head first.