This piece, “Mzee Privilege", appeared on page 32 of the Spring 2024 issue of Chicago Life Magazine.
Marc’s trip to Kenya this winter had a huge impact on him. “Mzee,” the piece published in this issue of Chicago Life, touches on one bit of it. The copy went to press before Marc had back surgery, yet another procedure made possible by his status as a privileged American. He is still recovering but expects one day before too long to do the equivalent of the hike down to the Ewaso Ng'iro River and back. He just doesn’t know where yet. Check out on his travel journal and Flickr for pictures from the trip.
It can be viewed using this link: Chicago Life Magazine - Mzee Privilege
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I’m sitting at the Forodhani Restaurant in Old Town Mombasa, 280 miles north of the equator and about 1000 yards west of the Indian Ocean, eating lunch with my driver, Sebastian, and tour guide, Bernard, both Kenyans. Somehow our conversation comes around to dentistry. Sebastian has beautiful, perfect teeth. Bernard not so much. They are both in their late thirties. Each has five children. Neither has ever seen a dentist.
They want to know first of all, of course, if dental treatment hurts. I explain about anesthesia. Sebastian and Bernard have a hard time imagining how it wouldn’t be just plain horrible to have a dentist drilling and yanking on their teeth. This dialog, which occurred near the end of the amazing three weeks I spent in Kenya last winter, reminded me once more of the level of privilege I enjoy.
Typical for an American my age, I’ve had lots of dental work--fillings, crowns and implants--with no end in sight. And it all works as well as my native teeth did. I chew, smile, brush and floss today just like always. Needless to say, in Kenya I saw many, many people a lot younger than I with just a few remaining teeth or with none at all.
At the restaurant I asked the guys if they knew where the restroom was. Sebastian, who spoke English less well than our waiter, collared him and inquired in Swahili about the location of the men’s room. Rather than let the waiter answer me in English, Sebastian insisted on taking me to the loo (note the British colonial influence in my choice of euphemism), up some stairs and down a hallway.
I put my foot down, literally, insisting back to my driver that I was perfectly capable of making my own way to and from the bathroom. Sebastian and many other Kenyans whom I encountered tried to treat me like an old man, an mzee in Swahili. That’s not a bad thing. “Mzee” is an honorific. With age comes wisdom and respect, attitudes I do not expect to encounter much in America. These well-meaning Kenyans were striving to take care of me; saying, “Pole, pole,” (slow, slow--pronounced poe-lay, poe-lay) it seemed every time I took a step, while pointing to where each foot was supposed to go.
Well-meaning or not, being treated like a semi-invalid drove me kind of nuts. I pride myself on the physical abilities I’ve maintained well into my eighth decade. (Aside: I know my pride is irrational. Years of medical practice have taught me that good lifestyle choices are far from a guarantee of physical wellbeing. So much depends on a fortunate shuffle of the gene deck and on being lucky enough to get through life without some random bad stuff happening.)
To set Sebastian straight about how much I didn’t need assistance, I bragged of my 240 foot descent and climb back up a couple of weeks before to the bank of the Ewaso Ng'iro River, next to Thompson Falls, over a steep, slippery, rocky path, in my sandals. (Note: if there were a video of me on this course I would in no way remind you of a gazelle.) Though I did nothing more heroic in Kenya than the Thompson Falls hike, I think I held up pretty darn well during the whole trip.
Almost as soon as I got back home to the States the hip pain that had bothered me right before I left struck again, severely. I’d put it off over the duration of my trip with a short intensive course of prednisone, an anti-inflammatory that will make most anything feel better for a short while. I was pretty certain I was going to need a new hip. It turns out the pain was coming from my spine.
I’ve gotten to thinking about the medical care that has kept me on my feet. Between 2007 and 2014 I had four total joint replacements, a hip, both knees and an ankle. Every one of them has worked superbly. (Unlike teeth however, artificial joints will never be exactly as good as the structure they’re replacing. But they still are darn good. I have been able to bicycle and walk about as far as I want, and even hike down to the bank of the Ewaso Ng’iro River and back.) Thanks to recent minimally invasive spine surgery, I am now well along the way to walking, biking and hiking as well as I used to.
As a result of the time in Africa, my thinking about my own healthcare has broadened to appreciate how incredibly privileged I am. If I’d lost most or all of my teeth and didn’t have the resources to repair and replace them I would not starve in Kenya. (To be sure, I would probably have to cut my goat stew into tiny pieces that I could swallow after some gumming. They eat a lot of goat meat there.) But how would I be doing if I had four joints that, without benefit of replacement, hurt excruciatingly when I tried to do anything much more than sit still or lie down or unremitting back pain whenever I stood, due to a pinched nerve in my back? I’d be crippled. Physically I really would be that mzee who would have needed a lot of help just to traverse those few steps to the bathroom at the Forodhani Restaurant, let alone to make the trip to Kenya. I see more clearly now than ever just how fortunate I am. And I admire how resilient are those millions of Kenyans who motor on without the benefit of prosthetic teeth or joints or neurosurgery. Perhaps I’m even a little wiser, a little bit more deserving of the title mzee.
