When I got into a number 48 public transport “matatu” near Odeon Cinema in Nairobi today, I sat next to a guy with Indian features. He seemed a bit agitated and was preoccupied with tinkering with a fat expensive looking Nokia phone and didn’t look up until the conductor began collecting fare from the passengers. The guy put his hand in his pocket and came out with several bank notes from which he selected an old and battered 100 shillings. In the meantime, I had reached into my wallet and fished out a crisp, very clean 100 shillings note. When we handed over our fare, the conductor looked at each of the notes briefly before folding them horizontally into half and wrapping them around his middle finger as is common in the “matatu”.

As the “matatu” moved towards Kileleshwa, I began thinking about the two bank notes lying next to each other. What were they thinking about one another? Perhaps the crisp new looking note was looking down at the dirty old note and wondering how on earth it ever allowed itself to become that way. And perhaps the old note was looking at the new one and envying it for looking so clean and fresh. But what if the two bank notes were to tell their stories to each other?

The crisp note would most certainly talk about exciting escapades. It would talk about being handled by soft, carefully manicured hands and sleeping in an alligator skin wallet, surrounded by the waft of ethereal fragrance inside a lady’s handbag. It would talk about gracing exclusive clubs and what the thrills are inside of an international Casino. It would talk about how important it feels to be part of a bundle of a million, and about the rude awakening of being ejected from an ATM. If the bank note was to sum up its existence in one sentence, it would say; “What a life!”

The old worn out bank note would talk about the feel of the rough hands of the peasant woman who got her pay for laboring in the countryside farms. It would explain how it was folded many many times in order to be tied into a tight knot on the edge of the woman’s headscarf. It would talk about being exchanged for flour and cooking fat and beans at a local shop, and riding in ramshackle rural “matatu”. It would describe the smells of fish, cow hide, and spices on a market day and how stuffy it is to be hidden inside a brassiere. If the bank note had to sum its contribution to the world in one sentence, it would say; “What lives!”

As I thought about the story of the two bank notes I wondered which one had a more meaningful existence; one having lived the crème de la crème life of money in glamour and the dazzling lights of night life, or the other that lived the seemingly mediocre life of the poor; the feeding of a family for several days or financing a trip to take a sick person to hospital or buying the local brew that was used to make merry at a wedding?

That is when I was startled from the reverie by the conductor as he gave out the change: For my crisp new 100 shillings note, he gave 70 shillings change. For the Indian looking guy’s old and worn out 100 shillings note, he gave 70 shillings change. The value of a 100 shillings note is the same whether old, new, crisp, folded, clean, or dirty.

Between any two bank notes of the same denomination there are differences in looks and experiences in their existence. And yet, even though one bank note might feel superior to another, the fact is that their value remains the same. It is clear for you and I that if this kind of thinking were going on amongst bank notes, then it is very foolish for any one of them to judge themselves as better or worse because of being old, new, crisp, folded, clean, or dirty, or because of being exposed to any particular lifestyle. But what about human beings?