If it looks like food, fills the stomach and help keeps hunger, maybe even anger, at bay, then it is food.
For residents of Korogocho, it is the waste or rejected bread from bakeries in Industrial Area they have nicknamed anyona, repackaged and sold to the residents, that keeps the pangs of hunger away.
A few minutes after 4pm, residents, both young and old, emerge from the dingy alleyways in the corrugated iron sheet shackles that dominate Grogan B village of Korogocho.
They quickly mill around a vendor standing across the street, a huge sack in front of him. Before he can open the sack, countless hands holding mostly coins are stretched to his face.
The elderly are more advantaged since their hands are more visible to the seller. However, this is not the case for the younger ones, mostly barefoot, elbowing their way to the front, making certain not to miss this valued commodity.
For Sh10, one gets a huge chunk of bread: white, brown or a mix of both. You are lucky if you get a fresh piece.
The vendor is reluctant to talk to the Star, but his neighbour, Esther Wairimu, who sells anyona cake, agrees to tell us about the thriving business.
Wairimu was not lucky today. She had spent the entire day in Industrial area looking for the waste bread, but only managed to get the rejects. Rejects is an almost expired mixture of hard cake, mandazis and cupcakes.
“With the increase in the price of baking flour, the waste and rejects are very rare. I walked from bakery to bakery since morning and only got these,” Wairimu said, pointing at her stock.
“This anyona doesn’t move like the bread does. Bread fills the stomach longer and is easy to share,” she says.
We buy a pack and take a bite. The cake is too tough to chew and the mandazi is almost stale. Wairimu, however, assures us that if we stayed there for a month, we would appreciate the delicacy.
Wairimu has been selling anyona in Korogocho for more than five years. The name, she tells us, is a Sheng’ word borrowed from Luo which means ‘it has been stepped on’.
She said before the shortage of wheat flour which resulted in a decrease in waste, the vendors would step on the bread packed inside a gunny bag till it was flat.
Stepping on it, Wairimu said, makes it easier for them to "break it into pieces and repackage it in small plastic bags.”
“We don’t weigh it while repacking. We just use our eyes. After doing it for a while, you know how to portion it easily.”
She, however, informs us that the portion has since reduced due to the scarcity. Increasing the price would be a fatal business move, she says.
The waste bread is bought from industries with the intention to feed livestock, but once it is brought home, it is sold to people for consumption.
At the bakeries in Industrial Area, a sack of waste bread is sold at Sh30. The vendors then buy repackaging bags and transport the sacks to Korogocho where they sell it at Sh10.
“I would get approximately Sh100 to Sh200 in profits when the business was thriving. Today however, luck determines your profit,” she said.
Anyona is very popular for breakfast and lasts many families a whole day in Korogocho.
Janet Maina, a residents, tells us that growing up, her family depended on 'anyona' for dinner and breakfast. Lunch was a word they only heard except on very rare occasions.
“We would buy anyona in the evenings and take that with strong tea for supper and what was left, we ate for breakfast. That was very common practice even among our neighbours,” she said.
Anyona has always been valued among the residents of Korogocho, and with the rise in the cost of living, its popularity has skyrocketed.
A 400 grammes bread that has for long retailed at Sh50, now sells at between Sh55 and Sh60 in the area, a huge margin for residents in the informal settlements.
A research by African Health and Population Research five years ago in Korocho said children and adolescents in the area are faced by various nutrition vulnerabilities which can be attributed poverty.
Although there are several programmes and interventions addressing these vulnerabilities, the focus is only on children under five years, the report said.
Linet Atieno, an ECD teacher in the slum, told the Star most parents normally give their children Sh10 to buy anyona, which they take together with the porridge provided in school.
"Anyona fills the stomach for long. Considerations for nutritional value when buying food is an illusion for the many low-income residents," she said.
There are other healthier street foods in Korogocho, like Mushogi, but it costs more.
Mushogi is chicken head with the neck stuffed with potatoes. It is then deep fried and retails at Sh30 per head in most places.
"They buy the chicken parts which are waste from factories that supply the chicken to restaurants at a throw away price," Janet, a resident, said.
(edited by Amol Awuor)
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