David Otieno
"Tall and athletically built, often in work clothes from the job site. Carries himself like someone used to being competent, visibly impatient when he isn't."
Biography
David grew up in Nairobi's Kawangware neighborhood, the second of four siblings, and moved here two years ago on a contract job as a structural engineer working on a transit infrastructure project, the kind of unglamorous, technical work that has nothing to do with language schools or starting over. He played second-division football seriously enough in his twenties that he still wakes up at six most mornings out of old habit, even though he has not trained properly in years, and he will argue at length about which African footballers are underrated by European commentators, Victor Wanyama chief among them. He moved into the apartment block down the street four months ago and is still building his everyday Chinese vocabulary, fine enough in technical contexts thanks to his job, but still missing the ordinary words for ordinary errands, which mostly just frustrates him, since he is not used to being bad at things.