I was most curious to meet the legendary figure called Galaydh, our own Somali Dr  Pickup! Dr Kissinger! 

I had the chance of a lifetime to take the proper measure of Galaydh: 

Is he Sheikh or Sharmoot? 

Is he politician or mortician? 

Is he a man or a mouse? 

Is he really an eager eagle or gier-eagle or a vulture pretending to be an eagle? 

Is he really a Harvard man or a Dhulbahante Hustler from Las Anod? 

Is he a Somali patriot or a clannish coon of con artist? 

Is he really a Grad or gûn or a goon? 

Is he really a prince or another Dhulbahante Damean Dafle dullard Daba-Dhilif? 

Is he a man for all seasons or a fucking timeserver & opportunist like that number one Faqash factotum called Dr Hussein Tanzania? 

Is Dr Abdi Samatar right-on in his accusations of Galaydh’s greed & graft and malfeasance or is Dr Abdi Samatar activated and actuated and motivated and galvanized by clannish Gudibirsie envy and professional jealousy? 

I had questions galore.

Galaydh is a very impressive figure blessed by the good Lord with cunning, gravitas, 

and a baraka called charisma. 

We met at Dr Sa-eed Sheikh Samatar’s family home in South Orange, New Jersey. 

I was advised by my then good Darod friend Sa-eed Samatar not to be tough, not to be rough, not to ruffle the feathers of Galaydh. 

To be as wise as a serpent & as a harmless as a dove! Sa-eed said to me: 

“Tickle him with a feather; 

put him in high feather; 

don’t ask him how come he is in full feather instead comment on his grand and grad and good feathers! 

And whatever you do, 

don’t ever ask him or remind him how he had feathered his own nest at the expense of the poor people of Somalia. 

Don’t ever bring up that subject: 

that is the broken feather in his wing. 

Tell him instead how fine his feathers are. 

Flatter him like the Barawanie, 

his crony, 

his flunky, 

Bur-i Hamza flatters him. 

Remember, 

when flatterers meet, 

the devil goes to dinner! 

You need the assistance of the devil to get Galaydh to drop his many masks. 

Smooth the easily ruffled feathers of Dr Galaydh by doctoring him to death! 

Then I promise you; 

I guarantee the eagle will be yours; 

he will fall into your Togane trap!” 

I took Dr Sa-eed Samatar’s advice; 

who am I to dispute with a Darod about another Darod! 

After all, 

it takes one Darod to know another Darod! 

And I am not most definitely a Darod. 

After all, 

to break the bone of an elephant, 

you need another bone from the same elephant! 

I am a simple Abgal Donkey Driver who was almost eaten alive by a lion and almost trampled to death by a rouge elephant, 

in 1973, 

as he was fleeing from Afwayneland by foot, 

by sneaking illegally, 

in fear & trembling, 

into Kenya whereas Galaydh escaped from Afwayneland by flying, 

by piloting his own Cessna into the Wilson Airport of Nairobi àla 007, 

àla James Bond from Las Anod and with millions of Yankee dollars stuffed in his briefcase! 

No doubt about it: 

Galaydh is an eagle & I am an Abgal turtle! 

That is the difference between a Hutu Hawiye & a daring dashing Darod with many a feather in his cap like our Galaydh! 

That is the difference between Shit & Shinola. 

As we all know, 

the Darod like his brother, the Hawiye, 

is born naked without feathers, 

without a disguise; 

but soon the Darod dons a new disguise; 

the Darod dare not live without a disguise, 

without dissembling! 

So, 

first I had to disarm the Darod eagle by putting him at ease; 

by reminding him that although I was persecuted mercilessly by his agnates Dafle & Farah Hussein alias Farax Badow alias Farah Damean Bilash Bedouin, 

I forgave them all. 

I also reminded him that we were affines now since one of my favourite sisters, 

Fathuma Keen, 

was now married to his cousin, Abdi Maolim, 

a Dhulbahante born & brought up in NFD.

Galaydh began like a peacock by parading his intimate knowledge of Abgal inside politics. 

I was smitten; 

Galaydh is the most charming Somali I have ever met. 

If I were a woman, 

I would have dropped my panties before you could say Jack Robinson! 

When it comes to seduction & shmoozing, 

there is no one like Galaydh; 

he is a Professional; 

the rest of us are amateurs. 

No wonder Sa-eed adamantly insisted that we kick Galaydh out of the Ergo on the sound reasoning that if we let him stay on, 

he would upstage us by always grandstanding! 

By always stealing the show, 

by showboating, 

because Galaydh is a showstopper! 

Sa-eed said, 

“Galaydh is as large as life and twice as natural! Galaydh is such a formidable phenomenon who speaks English with a Harvard accent whereas you Togane butcher the English language with your funny Abgal accent & I lull & bore everybody with my lackadaisical Laylkasse accent which is just as damning & as unbecoming. 

Galaydh will always be the center of attention; 

with Galaydh around, 

we have as much chance as snow in hell to attract the attention of anyone, 

Moslem or Gaal! 

No! 

Let us get rid of Galaydh; 

let us boot him out of the Ergo or we will be condemned to live in his shadow forever & carry his shoes like Bur-i Hamza, 

the Brawaan brownnoser!

Sa-eed & I kicked the poor Las Anod eagle’s rear end out of the Ergo in a Jiffy!

Galaydh is the only Somali I know who can drink whisky with impunity, 

without pissing & shitting his pants! 

I had to give up drinking alcohol reluctantly some twenty-one years ago because I simply could not handle it with class, 

with nonchalance, 

with aplomb, 

with the quiet confidence of a Christian holding an ace & a shotgun like Galaydh can! 

Give the devil his due even if he happens to be a Darod devious Dhulbahante like Galaydh!

In Sa-eed Samatar & Lydia’s living room in South Orange, 

New Jersy, 

sat Galaydh like an owl, 

nursing his drink of aged whisky while I stuck to my lowly Abgal Adam’s ale. 

Galaydh began our interview by discoursing on the nature of power. 

By way of an illustration, 

he told me an anecdote I heard before concerning my late uncle, 

Ali Ghedi Shadore. 

Someone said to Ali Ghedi Shadore in Mog in 1969,

—“I have good news and bad news from El Dhayr…”

Ghaydi Shadore interrupted:

—“Cut the baloney & the blarney & the bullshit! Forget about the good news & the bad news bit, 

all I want to know; 

all I am interested in, 

is, 

have I won the seat in parliament or not?

—Yes, you won the seat in parliament but your only son, 

Mohamed, 

a captain in the Somali National Army, 

was shot dead by your aggrieved & outraged opponents from whom you & he had stolen the election. 

—That is ok. It is worth it. 

I know how to make another son; 

I know where to get another son! 

Power is all that matters! 

A son is born; 

a son is dead; 

and so it goes!

We both laughed uproariously at the hilarity & at the tragedy & at the futility & at the vanity of it all! 

To clinch the point of this famous Somali anecdote, 

I handed Galaydh the book I happened to be reading then, 

Jesus Rediscovered by Malcolm Muggeridge, 

and asked him to recite the relevant passage as Sa-eed, Lydia, Safia, Dalmar & I listened:

“I, serving as a captain of a legion of Rome in the Libyan desert, have learnt and pondered this thought—in life there are two pursuits, love and power, and no man can have both.” 

I broke the poignant pregnant silence of pathos that ensued by asking Galaydh:

—Ali, please give us an idea of how Afwayne wielded such ultimate power over the lives of all of us Somalis; 

how he ran our Somali democratic Republic. 

What was Afwayne’s philosophical grasp of the nature of power & its uses & misuses & abuses & disuses. 

You were Goab-Joag: present on the Somali stage with Goolwadow Siyaad. 

Next to your cousin, Dafle, 

in the Darod MOD Nomenclature! 

You were in the inner circle, 

in the inner sanctum, 

in the holy of the hollies; 

you were member of the rer Koshin family! 

You were closer to Afwayne than Shire, 

his own son, 

his own flesh & blood! 

Because poor Shire’s Mom was from the Macavity Majerten clan! 

You were a full-fledged member of the Darod Mod Squad! You were the D in MOD! 

You were playing, as usual, 

the Dhulbahante hyena to the Marehan lion; 

you know where Afwayne buried the bodies; 

you were present at the creation of Afwayneland; 

you were privy to the private thoughts of Papa Doc Afwayne; you were one of the Druids of Afwayne’s Darod! 

Galaydh, I know you can fly & soar like an eagle over the Somali seas into Nairobi; 

the question now is, 

can you dare to sing like a Darod canary! 

Galaydh, give us the lowdown on Afwayne & on how he had ruined Somalia. 

As I said, 

you were goab-joag; 

you had the front row seat to Afwayne’s show to end all shows! 

Galaydh, go to it & spill the beans; 

start singing like the nightingale.

—Togane, 

I will give you the perfect example, 

the most telling example of how Afwayne exercised power. Afwayne was not interested in wealth or health or love; 

his only interest in life was how to acquire power; 

how to keep power; 

how to wield power; 

how to stay in power forever. 

I am the aptest pupil of our teacher, Afwayne; 

I am the man after his own heart. 

Afwayne & I hold the same view on life. 

Malcolm Muggeridge is right-on: 

in life there is love & power & no man can have both. 

I don’t love Somalis & Somalia; 

I just love to have power over them! 

I have devoted my life to the pursuit of power NOT pussy! Remember, it was the most reckless pursuit of pussy that nearly derailed the presidency of Bill Clinton! 

That made the oval office more like the oral office! 

I share the same views of Madame Mao on the bootless pointless pursuit of pussy who opined: 

“Sex is engaging in the first rounds, 

but what sustains interest in the long run is power.” 

For example, 

the only sort of marriage I believe in is political marriage, 

not the Hollywood romantic syrupy balderdash of how marriages are made in heaven. 

I only love one thing: 

Power. 

I marry only for one reason: 

to gain power. 

I married that Marehan woman, 

Afwayne’s niece, 

Fadimo Isaq Beehi, 

not because I loved the bitch but because I wanted to insinuate myself into the inner circles & graces of Afwayne& his powerful Marehan clan. 

That is how I was able to abscond with millions of American dollars in my trust with which I was supposed to build sugar factories for the Somali nation! 

Suppose I had built the goddamn sugar factories, what then? I am sure they would have been looted & sacked & gutted by Osman Atto & his Habarkintir Huns! 

Thank God that I had the foresight to beat them to it! 

Better the millions in my pocket than in the pockets of Bantu Hutu Hawiye hooligans who are so dumb that they prefer bililiqsie to mighty Power! 

That is how mindless & Myopic the Hutu Hawiye are! 

They are dogs in the manger! 

They are like kids who can’t fuck their mother & who won’t let you fuck her for them! 

It is power that makes the world go around; 

Not love; 

it is for power I live & breathe. 

I admired Afwayne; 

he was my God; 

I enjoyed watching him exercise power like Allah over life & death in Somalia. 

One example will suffice to illustrate my point. 

One day Afwayne swaggered in late into the cabinet meeting that he had convened & pointed with his scepter to one of his ministers, 

to one of his minions, 

I should say, whose name I shall not reveal. 

Afwayne barked this command at the miskeen minion:

—You! You dare not divorce your lovely wife with the undulating lovely Majerten fat fanny! 

Just because I love fucking her, 

you are pissed off at me & to get even with me now you are going to foolishly get rid of your beautiful wife who still loves you! 

I command you to keep your good wife! 

Let me set you straight by sharing this insightful experience with you: 

when I was a poor penniless soldier, 

I found out that my wife was being banged behind my back by a powerful Macavity Majerten Lord! 

There was nothing I could do: 

he had Power, 

power to fuck my wife & cuckold me. 

And I had no Power. 

Like you I went ape & threatened to divorce the whore who kept a cozy corner in her cunt for the use of the Majerten! Someone wiser advised me to be patient & wait until my wife, Qadeeja, birthed the child she was carrying which I strongly suspected was the Macavity Majerten’s. 

I was so relieved when she delivered a son with an ugly mug like mine, with a hyena’s mouth like mine! 

The son looked so much like me that I had named him “Maslah!” Meaning the son that made peace between me & my wife! 

So, don’t divorce your wife: wait till she delivers the baby & then we will be able to determine whether I impregnated her or you!

 —Togane, that is the kind of Power I crave! 

I want to wield that same kind of power over Somalis & Somalia like Afwayne had done! 

Look at this institution where I am teaching now. 

It is named after a man I don’t admire at all! 

Hubert Humphrey who had no penis; 

who had no balls, 

no cojones, 

no power; 

whose pecker was always in LBJ’s pocket! 

I want to wield power over Somalis & Somalia; 

the kind of power that my favourite American president, 

LBJ, had wielded over America & Americans. 

I want Somalis to be so loyal to me that they will kiss my Dhulbahante dirty Darod derriere in Macy’s window for the whole world to see & watch & hear Somalis say & sing that my ass truly smells like all the roses of Sharon & all the perfumes of Arabia put together!

 

  ----Mahamud Siad Togane