Jimmy Karda: JIMMY DIARIES SERIES, #1

By Jorges P. Lopez

Growing up has its myriad of problem which few tend to notice apart from the child growing up. Or maybe this is because of the child's point of view? Anyhow, all of us have fond memories of what was and what might have been - life with brothers, sisters, parents, neighbors (and often, with grandparents). Children have little understanding of what is happening around them and we get entertained as they tell us from their own point of view. Many of the stories make us flash back to our own growing up and all the adventures we had - though we keep telling our own children to beware and to look out for accidents and strangers and what have you. To make a long story short, we all love children stories.

The JIMMY DIARIES SERIES forms a collection of stories from Jimmy's memories of his growing up. We are entertained by adventure after adventure as Jimmy goes about his business, sometimes in the suburb of the city in which he lives - but majorly in the rural countryside where he spends school holidays with his grandparents - and later begins schooling. The narratives are humorous enough to pull kids away from the TV and to reinvent the age old tradition of reading. The stories are also good especially for English language learners because they incorporate simple idioms so the reader learns them in context. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jorges P. Lopez
• Release date: Nov 17, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223172123

Jorges P. Lopez

Jorges P. Lopez has been teaching Literature in high schools in Kenya and Communication at The Cooperative University in Nairobi. He has been writing Literary Criticism for more than fifteen years and fiction for just over ten years. He has contributed significantly to the perspective of teaching English as a Second Language in high school and to Communication Skills at the college level. He has developed humorous novellas in the Jimmy Karda Diaries Series for ages 9 to 13 which make it easier for learners of English to learn the language and the St. Maryan Seven Series for ages 13 to 16 which challenge them to improve spoken and written language. His interests in writing also spill into Poetry, Drama and Literary Fiction. He has written literary criticism books on Henrik Ibsen, Margaret Ogola, Bertolt Brecht, John Steinbeck, John Lara, Adipo Sidang' and many others.

Book preview

First Printed in Kenya

Jimmy Karda

Illustrated by J Mdukaki Tel: [phone]

Jorges P. Lopez

What a luckless

Thing a little boy turns

In a world that is tuneless

With all a little boy needs!

Sometimes it seems

Such a curse!

For Joel

1

Hi. I’m jimmy. Jimmy Karda. Excuse my rude interruption, my skipping the usual niceties I mean but...ah...maybe I should do this my way. Alright! All I’m trying to say is that my name is Jimmy and I’m a lonesome kid. I could do with a friend...that’s why I spoke up if you are okay with it. Not many people would confess to loneliness so openly these days but there it is. I guess to a diary you could say anything – or to the guy looking at you in the mirror.

I live in Jericho...yes that suburb on the outskirts of the city where you have to sweat it out to get there...not the older town in the bible where that dumb guy was going when those thugs pounced upon him and gave it to him good. That place where pretenders were as thick as thieves! I hear the dumb guy had to do with the help of the Good Samaritan – at least that’s what Grammy says. No, I’m not talking about that Jericho, though there are as many hoodlums in our Jericho too. I guess that guy in the bible was indeed lucky he wasn’t living in our Jericho. There aren’t any good Samaritans or Jews or Africans or Europeans or whatever where I come from. In fact, decent people are hard to come by. They are as rare as a sunflower in the desert. Come to think of it, even decent dogs are as scarce as hen’s teeth. Had that bible guy been roaming around in our Jericho, I’m quite sure he would have ended up in hot soup. The hottest there is. The best he might have got away with is a smashed up face - or a broken nose - and a limp. At worst, he would have ended up swimming with the fishes. Life here is a race against time. If you still have no clue what I mean, jump aboard and I’ll give you a free ride through my diaries.  

You see where they have the National Archives in the big city in the sun that is the capital of this country? That’s where we need to start. If you look across Thomas Kambona Street from the National Archives, you’ll surely see some matatus as old as dirt that normally laze there facing the Railway Station. You can’t miss the cursed crowd or where they sulk away. The place is normally crowded with hawkers selling fake

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chewing gum - the bitter flavor kind which sticks to the back of your palate and you have to keep unsticking it with a finger and this makes you wretch - because your tongue can’t reach that far. The kind that sends your taste buds on holiday for a month or so. In a minute I’ll tell you why those hawkers come here. You can’t miss the vehicles either; they are the oldest of the pack left around, the kind that the driver still tries to hide his shame from the passengers by doing his trick from a separate cabin. And if you are in the cabin with him, he cringes at the far corner like a scalded cat, looks straight ahead and avoids your eyes you’d mistake him for one of those wax statues they use in Indian suit shops. One time I had to prod one with my index finger – then my Grandpop’s walking stick - to satisfy myself we wouldn’t be driven home by a Zombie. He turned