We all sat down at the bar table at ten o'clock and ordered coffees.
Sappe said we would soon have an appointment with the Council at MADCA headquarters.
Ignoring my questioning look, he went on to say, "Everyone knows that the Malindi District Cultural Association is an important foundation for the recovery and preservation of Mijikenda tribal traditions. Anyone who pretends to know Malindi," he continued, looking at me with an air of defiance, "knows perfectly well that not far from here, practically in the centre, a typical village of thatched huts and mud has been rebuilt in which some of the members of MADCA live, pray, honour the dead, prepare food, wash clothes and all the rest, and every day, from the surrounding countryside, many others, especially giriama, come to meet and give continuity to their traditions of songs, poems, dances...".
I was about to confess that I knew nothing about all this when Ivo, who had understood the Sappe's foul play against me, intervened in my defence, saying "I think our friend is a bit envious of us because it is the first time we are going to the MADCA centre, and as it was for him once, it will be an unforgettable surprise for us".
We all four climbed aboard the Pajero and Sappe said to me: "Do you know where the Come Back is?"
"The disco in Watamu?"
"Noo, the African restaurant between Casuarina and Mombasa Road, we had dinner there a month ago. MADCA is next door."
Now I remembered: I had enjoyed an excellent barbecued chicken, accompanied by potatoes also cooked, with all their skins, in the embers.
The Come Back in Malindi should be noted in the Michelin guide of the unabashed like us for the quality of the food and the reasonable prices.
I also remembered noticing, across the road, a long belt of palm leaves and bamboo a couple of metres high growing in the adjoining land, under leafy trees and wondered what it was hiding.
I parked, we approached the fence and entered a passage that led to a sort of small tunnel, also made of intertwined palm leaves, which ended in a...
I couldn't believe my eyes!
I saw around me the exact representation of what I had imagined reading novels set in Black Africa and then found in many films, with lots of huts made of straw and mud arranged in a circle around an open space, the one destined for prayers with animist fetishes, the kitchen area where a jet of steam came out of large pots boiling over the burning embers.
Near the entrance, a young woman carrying a baby swaddled with her on her back was hanging out cloths on wires. Further on, young, robust boys wearing simple sarongs (called kangas for men) tied around their waists were tuning their drums while a group of women of various ages were performing dance steps.
The women's giriama costume, which in addition to a sarong tied at the waist also includes a bodice, is called 'hando' and is blue for the older women and white for the younger ones.
That small thatched tunnel could have been a space-time portal to a timeless place, which could have been today as well as hundreds of years ago, but instead we were in the centre of Malindi, in an enclave that hardly survives in urbanised areas.
Our entrance went almost unnoticed by all who had anything to do, except for a motley group of men sitting on chairs arranged in a semicircle, some dressed in the mijikenda style with kangas around their waists and a thinner sarong as a scarf, others in an unlikely outfit of white shirt jacket and trousers, complete with tie and patent leather shoes.
Whatever outfit they had chosen, they all wore it with great dignity.
As soon as they saw us, they stood up, came towards us smiling and shook our hands with great enthusiasm.
Mr Emmanuel Munyaya, president of the association, was an imposing man with a proud look.
Mr Kazungu, an old man with round John Lennon glasses, was the poet who wrote poetry in the Giriama language.
Lawyer Joseph Karisa Mwarandu was introduced as the one who tackled the bureaucratic and legal hurdles often encountered by MADCA, and finally Mwanyule Baya Mweri, who in addition to being a cultural advisor in the governor's office, was also a musician and composer of folk songs.  The other elders whose names I cannot remember were passing through and came from remote lands.
In good English, Munyaya told Sappe the news about the cultural activities of the foundation and then, about the wedding, he told us that the following day, Sunday, the "Name Ceremony" had already been organised.
Munyaya continued, addressing Ivo and Scarlett, "Before you can marry according to our ritual, you must be adopted by two different families who must symbolically approve the marriage. From the moment your name is drawn, you will officially belong to our tribe and will be Tadpoles in your own right. The actual marriage will take place next week, on 12 August, in Bungale, during the MADCA festival dedicated to Mekatili Wa Menza.
"This is - intervened the Sappe - a Giriama "pasionaria" who lived between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, who dared to challenge British colonialism and crop taxes. She was imprisoned in the north of the country but managed to escape and walk back to Malindi, to take over the leadership of the local resistance. Eventually the British proxies were forced to come to terms with lie and she was buried in Bungale, on the banks of the Sabaki River, as a true queen. As you can see, this marriage was not at all taken lightly. Marriage in Bungale for a Giriama is like marriage in the Vatican for a Catholic.
These words probably impressed me more than the bride and groom, who looked as if they had studied the subject in depth, although I noticed that Scarlett's gaze was dreamy as if it were the first time she was getting married.
Before saying goodbye, Munyaya told us that a party was planned for the early afternoon to which we were obviously invited.
Then Baya would take the bride and groom 'shopping', i.e. to buy their wedding dress, a smart version of the uniforms we now know. Ivo also needed a bamboo stick with a curved handle, called a "kidata".
There was just enough time to have a little wander around, before going for lunch at the Come Back, whose proximity and the smell of the grills had prompted the choice.
I tried sticking my head inside one of the huts.
It was unbelievably cool in there, while outside it was sweaty. After a few seconds, as my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw a baby sleeping peacefully on a carpet.
In the "sacred" hut I could see some wooden objects, but I didn't have the courage to get closer and it was instead the poet Kazungu who approached me, always smiling, to explain that those fetishes, the "vigango", represented the spirits of the ancestors.
On the other side of the village there was a clearing in the shade of the trees where they were probably rehearsing the dances that would be performed in the afternoon.
I felt privileged because no one had ever given me the feeling of being considered an outsider. This magical place was certainly not a tourist attraction, nor was it a clumsy attempt at historical reconstruction. It was, to all intents and purposes, a gypsy village, such as there are around the Kenyan coast, with the only peculiarity that it had been built in the centre of a city that is aspiring more to modernity than to tradition.
Come Back is a simple restaurant with large wooden tables, a long bar counter and a cool makuti roof.
The only flaw? Those damn televisions that hang everywhere and are always on! They are everywhere, not only in restaurants and bars, but also in public offices, banks and doctors' surgeries.
Unfortunately, what is ancient to us is modern and indispensable to them. Fortunately, at our request, the volume of the speakers was lowered.
The chicken with potatoes was now a guarantee and we all ordered it, along with various vegetables, although the menu even offered pork chops, in addition to the classic kid. The occasion of being in a Christian-run establishment meant that rivers of beer flowed, boosting the company's spirits.
As always, there was a competition of anecdotes and I too was drawn in when Ivo, with his peculiarity of putting people at ease, showed much interest in my musical career.
After Kenya Coffee (a cup full of light but drinkable coffee) and a super cheap bill, we got up to head back to the village.
As we passed the Pajero the Sappe asked me: "Did you bring your guitar?
Yes," I answered, "it's in the boot, but what am I going to do with the guitar in a situation like this?
"How do you see it?"
I imagine," I hesitated for a moment and then continued, "that if the Sappe tells me to bring it, it's because he thinks it will be useful," I said in a hushed tone as I opened the boot and picked up the instrument, and finally had to reply to what was becoming yet another game between him and me:
"And you, how do you see her?"
"I'll see her in the front row! Now let's go, they're waiting for us.
The village was filled with people of all ages sitting on the grass, while the drummers played with great energy creating an overwhelming rhythm.
Many of the dancers had started with antiphonal or choral songs, and in the meantime they danced back and forth with surprising agility and sensuality.
Without any architectural element to delimit it, a space had formed, where no one dared to sit down, which could be called a "Stage", or rather: "Place for dancing".
The grass no longer grew there and a fine dust rose as the dancers passed by, without anyone showing the slightest annoyance about it.
In a connection of dust-related thoughts, I was reminded of the children in small villages who, in the middle of nowhere, walk many kilometres barefoot to fetch water or to go to school. There is plenty of dust in the dry season and the mijikenda are historically and stoically used to breathing dust when it hasn't rained for a while.
After the dancers had performed, Munyaya stood in the middle of the 'stage' and made a speech first in a language I didn't know - which I later discovered was the Giriama dialect - and then in English.
He said he thanked everyone for being there, spoke briefly about the importance of MADCA, explained that soon two Italian friends, Rossella and Ivo, would be adopted by the tribe and married in Bungale (applause), and that the Sappe - whom everyone knew - had brought with him a famous Italian musician, Ric Giambo, who would now sing a song for them on his guitar (applause).
I didn't have the time to cast an incinerating glance at that asshole from the Sappe who had played that nasty trick on me.
Now I had to gather all my energies to decide what the hell to sing, accompanied by my guitar and without a microphone, in front of that large and heterogeneous audience. Munyaya waited for me to join him, shook my hand and left me alone in front of a hundred or so people who were waiting in dead silence for my performance.
A whirlwind of thoughts flashed through my mind.
As a composer of music and not of words, I had no song of my own to propose, plus, due to my laziness, there were few songs of which I remembered the complete lyrics, apart from 'Fra Martino Campanaro' and 'Tanti auguri a te' and a few rare classics among the beach songbooks.
Imagine after the fumes of Tusker Lager...
I went through a few milestones, but none of them convinced me.
"Va pensiero?"
"Am I an Italian?"
"In the blue?"
"How do you see it?" I said to myself and bit my tongue at how much the Sappe had infected me with that catchphrase, and finally I had an epiphany and breathed a sigh of relief.
"What will be!"
Perfect, both for the music with its catchy refrain and for the almost autobiographical lyrics, and above all because I remembered it all from beginning to end.
It also occurred to me that I had read that this song, although interpreted by the Puerto Rican José Feliciano as well as by the group Ricchi e Poveri, had been written by the very Italian Migliacci, Fontana and Pes and therefore the Italian flag that I represented could fly safely.
And so it was that, as I began to sketch out the first chords on my guitar, I decided to say a few words in English as an introduction: "Ladies and gentlemen, it will be a pleasure for me to sing for you a song about a man who is very sad because he lives in a country that cannot offer him a future. For this reason he decides to leave everything he loves: his family, the woman he loves and his friends, many of whom will leave after him. He does not know what will become of him, but he is sure of one thing, that one day he will return, to kiss his love again. He takes his guitar with him, which he will play when he feels sad.
After my words, Munyaya stood up, translated what I had said into words, then smiled at me and sat down again in the middle of the audience who had drunk my words like spring water. I have done many performances in my life, but I have never had such an attentive audience.
I began to sing the first verse and the first chorus. By the second chorus everyone was clapping in time. By the third refrain they had all stood up and were singing along with me "Che sarà, che sarà che saraaaaà". By the fourth refrain the drums had started, the women were throwing their high-pitched warbles, everyone was dancing, including Ivo, Rossella and the Sappe with his typical smug expression.
A huge success! When I put down the guitar, an endless line of people formed who wanted to shake my hand, someone hugged me... I swear that I hadn't felt such an emotion for who knows how long.