I delivered evening talks right from my first year at Starehe till my last. And thanks to those talks, I discovered I had a talent for public speaking given the way some schoolmates used to compliment me. The morning after I gave my first evening talk in Starehe when I was in Form 1, a prefect commended me for it when I reported to his study for duty.
Then another schoolmate could't believe I was the one who had written that evening talk I delivered when I was in Form 1. He thought my senior brother Paddy, who was also in the school, had penned it. What I didn't disclose to the schoolmate was that I had intelligently plagiarized the contents of the speech from a Social Education and Ethics textbook.
Though I surmise most Starehians of my time can't remember what I said during my talks, I know of a few who do. One of them is Dennis Makhandia, a housemate of mine at Starehe who was a year behind me. When we were at the university in JKUAT in 2008, Makhandia once asked me whether I had a written copy of a talk I gave when I was in Form 3 about the dangers of taking carbonated drinks. I didn't have a copy of the speech but I remember that I plagiarized it from a passage in a KCPE English paper exam.
As I have said, I only remember three other evening talks we had at Starehe besides the ones I delivered. The first was by a senior student who told us why being a lawyer is a noble profession. Even though I can't recall the contents of that talk, I think that was a good initiative.
The second was by a schoolmate called Abdikadir Hussein who tried to convince us that Islam is an honourable religion. He spoke of what Islam is and what it is not, and how it is misinterpreted by those who don't understand it. I also think that talk on Islam was a good initiative, but the problem was that Abdikadir delivered it incoherently. If only he had been eloquent! (By the way, I learnt yesterday while doing research for this story that Abdikadir Hussein is now a doctor.)
The third evening talk I recollect from my Starehe years was one by Mr. Kinyajui, our Agriculture teacher in junior high school. Mr. Kinyajui gave us a nice homily about the benefits of drinking water. He outlined several of those benefits but the only one I remember is that drinking water makes us look more handsome. The talk inspired me to take water on a regular basis, a habit I have kept to this day which explains why I usually look as radiant as a Hollywood movie star.
Because I forgot almost all the benefits of drinking water that Mr. Kinyajui propounded, I googled them up some time in 2017. And to my delight, Google directed me to a website called Top 10 Home Remedies which lucidly explained that drinking water:
- relieves fatigue,
- improves mood,
- treats headaches and migraines,
- helps in digestion and constipation,
- aids weight loss,
- flushes out toxins,
- regulates body temperature,
- promotes healthy skin,
- relieves hangover,
- beats bad breath.
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RECOMMENDATION: If you've enjoyed this story about the benefits of drinking water, you might also enjoy another one I wrote sometime back on "Lessons From My Storytelling Journey". Just click on that link in blue to dive straight into the story.
