Nairobi, 100 kilometres. I barely see the road signs in the breakneck speed, as I break every record and law of the land, or at least I think I do.

Morbid thoughts are running through my head, what if those horror movies are actually true and that my macabre package next to the tool box in the boot could morph into Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and either gouge my eyes out or worse. The smell grows increasingly unbearable as the morning sun gives way to a blazing hot and humid midmorning. The road shimmers in the heat.

“Wewe simama”, I sight a cop beckoning me. My reverie is broken as I screech to a halt on the side of the road nearly knocking down the cop who had flagged me down. ”Gichana, unachesa na polisi ya Ghenya” (young man, you are messing with the Kenyan Police), the cop mutters in barely unintelligible Swahili. “Wabhi license?” (where is your drivers license?) All I can think of is, where do they train these guys. I mumble something incoherent and he looks at me like ive just dropped in from a yet to be discovered planet. The cop’s fat face beams and he licks his big lips as if by some good fortune he has just nabbed the most wanted man in Kenya. He circles my car, and approaches my window again then stops short and starts sniffing like a hound. “Hiyo ni nini? Umeua mtu” By now the odour is so strong I think Ill pass out if this idiot doesn’t let me go. I end the charade when I inform him am a police officer too and that am carrying some sensitive matter to the gorvenment chemist. I see his face deflate as hopes of a big payday go up in flames. “Harakisha uende” (hurry up and go).

I engage the gear and rush off, but this time ive opened all the car windows just to let fresh air waft in. I chuckle to myself as I settle down to doing 150 kilometres per hour. The hundred or so kilometers from Kinangop to Nairobi seem like an eternity. I want to come home and rest, see my brothers, cousins, and old friends but I have Frankenstein’s progeny in the boot and that’s a pressing issue.