Chips Funga v. Friends: With or Without Benefits?

Much as 'clande' and 'chips funga' have taken over as the preferred Kenyan promiscuity jargon in the recent past, it is hard to deny that sleeping with friends is still as popular now as it was when it emerged; if not in concept, then certainly in practice. Casual sex has become the norm, and who better to help you out than someone you already know and have a harmonious relation with?

I realize that marrying theory to reality on the issue of cross-gender friendships is a feat I should not claim to have any authority or vested capacity to plausibly produce.Especially since I've had my sizeable share of Mwax myself - yaani Mpango Wa Kayndow'z. Anywho. Supposés have never stopped me ranting before, so no reason why they should start now. Let me state that I do not subscribe to the academy of thought that considers boys and girls being bffs as loving for free.

Nonetheless, allow me to posit that at least to my underdeveloped intuitive panorama, while it is not impossible as an actuality for such pure relations to exist and indeed succeed, it is tantamount to treading across a croc-infested river on dental-floss - of course some Guinness World Record-bent daredevil may have tried it, but woe unto him WHEN the floss decides to flaunt its weaknesses.

Such a statement is bound to discommode a few of my fellow Wajivuniao [1], whose theory it is that man and woman can be buddies and roll together like boys - or whatever other popular youth colloquialism befits such dreams. Pause and ask yourself, you who are at odds with my presumptive assertion, why it is that the affair of certain installments of benefits exist on the cross-gender hand of friendship while not at all featuring on the other. Unless of course you tip to the bisexual scale of relations, in which case your participation in this monologue defeats the premises of my purpose. You, my friend, can stop reading right about here.

Assuming we are now within the limits of male-female relations, I will further put it to you that we all have some experience or other - however inconsequential - of the other man or woman. One cannot take exception to cold hard fact, and in point of fact, the notion of friendship with benefits has become one of the 21st century's neologisms in the great dynamics that entail this relatively new rapport with the opposite sex.

Even whence effort has been invested to dot the i's and cross the t's on a friendship between Kimberly and Kimani, the triumph of such an arrangement is not at any rate exclusively dependent on the two parties. You see, had they a nuptial kind of agreement to declare theirs a 'strictly friendly' association, then, dare I say it might work. Might, and even then, only on the bedrock of a rather shaky premise, and the unreasonable fact that noone decided to spoil the party when the Rev unleashed the "speak now or forever hold your peace" clause. Like that will deter any go-getting mamacita from later on holding your man's 'piece'. Story for another day that.

Of course Kimani will have an environment with some sort of put-in on the progress of the liaison, aka my boys. And the boys will always have a world of influence on said liaison's success. Nothing breaks the mirror of lies a guy looks at a woman through than a mate going, "Waah, si ako down!?" Kimberly also has her own resident advisors, as part of whom she makes up the so-called 3 musketeers, aka the 300, for these women always come in 3s. It is amusing - indeed infuriatingly so - just how demanding it is to bank on these other mamaz to ignore the alluring urge to ~~tag on the guy's balls~~ interfere all the time. They will be sceptical, always trying to steer the rally car, even when their navigations clearly head straight into a sea of murk.

This is especially so when Kimberly and Kimani have recently relegated their Facebook relationship status from the throes of 'deeply in love' or whatever, yet decided to retain some level of cordiality. No offense, but exes trying to be friends is a painful and abject thing to witness; one I do not really know how to describe other than to say that it very much reminds me of this brain-damaged puppy I saw on YouTube trying to pick up a bone in its barely functioning mouth. Eventually he got it, but it was a troublingly sad sight.

In such a scenario, only fiction can conspire to assure your otherwise very alert acumen that both the involved parties are complementary in assessing their break-up and any prospects of a future together, albeit without being really together, if you catch my drift. I do not claim to be any sort of specialist on Psychology, but it is so mind-numbingly difficult to expect any two people to draw an exact same conclusive perspective on any situation, given that the set of experiences the dumper and the dumpee draw from are different. While Mohammed the Prophet and bin Laden the Bad Boy of Islam drew from the same Qu'ran, which in basic principle and virtue is a meticulous guide to proper living, that is as far as any comparison of their essentials can constructively go.

Does there exist any kind of contingency in such a bond? Because mattter-of-factly, situations are bound to change, and survival thus depends on a certain degree of readiness, an open affinity to adaptability that most of us are either unwilling to or incapable of developing. Soon Kimani has a Missus, Makini, and she will have her insecurities. Couple this with Kim's boyfriend - we shall call him Roy - exhibiting distrustful resentment of the chemistry shared by the Kims, and you have an eternal clouding ingredient of this boy-girlness shared by them, louring the horizons with not a soupçon of archetypal silver linigns in range. Like it or not, that is one reality check I am not simply dictating, but if you let me, would prefer to impose upon you.

Conclusion? Well there is no obligation for one dogmatically true and explicitly solid grand finale on this phenomenon. As previously stated, it is not only too dynamic but also intensely situational, and to have one general truth in forceful summary of the idea would be a relegation of personal principle and mutual commitment the likes of which amounts to no more than folly. One easy deduction does however bob into mind: it takes a lot of work to coin a relationship of sustainable development between any Kim and Kimani, without falling back onto the excesses of affectionate intimacy.

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Disclaimers ‽ ‽

1. While it may seem like I am pro completely ignoring friends' advice on 'matters relationship', soon enough you will realize that every rally car driver needs a trustee mate riding shotgun, occasionally yapping 'left!'...'right!' and so on. Absolute ignorance of friends' perspectives amounts to driving with your mind resolute on not steering left. The straight stretch of road clears within a pre-determined amount of time, and you find yourself stuck in a ditch, or caught up in a realm between hell and Shangri-la.

And trust me, by the time this eventuality comes to pass, there'll be no matey riding shotgun. Like Iyaz - how the hell do you pronounce this guy's name? - you'll find yoself solo in purgatory; that's a euphemism for death [for a certain Miss Bree's comprehension purposes :)] The sage way forward dictates that you listen and sift; garbage-in garbage-out leaves your system with some experience worth holding on to.

2. My significant other has no clue that I run this blog. It would be detrimental to my health if she were to stumble upon some of the 'aforestated' views, especially - as you might imagine - as concerns my mwax; your sustained lipsealerie would therefore be highly adviseable, if not possibly appreciated.

[1]

Wajivuniao kuwa Wakenya. Adapted from a popular Kenyan slogan "Najivunia kuwa Mkenya" i.e. "Proud to be Kenyan".