Every morning at exactly 6:40, the same man stood at the same bus stop.
Not sitting. Not leaning. Just standing.
If you passed by enough times, you started to notice him. Mid-fifties, maybe older. Always in the same faded brown jacket, always holding a small black bag that looked like it had seen more years than it should have.
People came and went. Matatus stopped, engines roaring, conductors shouting destinations. Nairobi mornings are never quiet. But somehow, the man looked untouched by the chaos.
He simply waited.
At first, I assumed he was like everyone else—another commuter trying to beat the morning rush. But there was something different about him.
He never boarded a matatu.
Not once.
Every day he arrived at the bus stop. Every day he waited. And every day, after about twenty minutes, he walked away slowly down the same street.
One morning curiosity finally won.
I walked over.
“Boss, hauchukui gari?” I asked. Don’t you take a ride?
He smiled slightly, like someone who had been asked that question before.
“My son used to pass here every morning,” he said calmly.
Used to.
The word sat heavily in the air.
“He worked in town. Every day at this time he would stop here and we would talk for a few minutes before he left. Nothing big… just small things.”
Weather. Work. Football.
Life.
The man looked down the road for a moment before continuing.
“Three years ago he passed away.”
There was no drama in his voice. No tears. Just quiet acceptance.
“I still come,” he said.
“Not because he will come back… but because those mornings were the happiest moments of my day.”
For a few minutes we both stood there, watching the city move like it always does—loud, fast, impatient.
Cars passed. Conductors shouted. People rushed to work.
And in the middle of all that noise, a man kept a promise to a moment that no longer existed.
Eventually he checked his watch.
“Time to go,” he said softly.
Then he walked away down the same street.
The next morning at 6:40, he was there again.
Waiting.