The Antelope Carving

For many years this was one of my most treasured possessions. The antelope is typical of the stylised carvings of animals that one could buy from the WaKamba carvers who for many years have displayed their wares in the central reservations along Kilindini and Salim roads in Mombasa. I can't recall when I bought it, or perhaps it was bought for me, but it travelled back and forth to England through my school years, wrapped in a kikoi in my small brown overnight suitcase.

This carving was finished by being polished with boot polish. Many of the 'ebony' carvings were the same wood, finished with black boot polish. Compared to some WaKamba carvings, it's crudely done, and over the years it has sustained some damage - for example, the tip of its left horn was broken off. Other than this, the little antelope is as good as the day it was carved some sixty years ago.

Buying these carvings was always fun. We would ask the price of an object and then gasp with horror when it was given - perhaps, even, walk away shaking our heads. The vendor would then suggest a slight reduction, which was greeted with more head shaking and expressions of disgust, but, perhaps, a suggestion of a price - ridiculously low. Finally, the bartering would end at a price somewhere in the middle which was acceptable to both sides.