Work begins immediately and will be completed in the last quarter of 2009.
Earlier last week, I found an old guitar in the basement of my current landlord:


“What’s the story on this one?”, I asked the couple that owns this house full of interesting stuff. “Aaahh….we got it some 15 years ago, inherited it from an aunt who loved playing it and since no one’s playing guitar in our family, we just kept it in the basement for no particular reason. Actually, we already wanted to throw it away…”. - “Well, I do play guitar..”, I replied, “is it ok if I have a closer look at it and, uhm, maybe refurbish it?” - “Yeah, sure, go ahead..” - “Coooool…”
So I rescued it from the moisture downstairs and completely dismantled it, cleaned it with some basic tools and tried to repair it by stapling the crack on the back and adding a new bridge + 1 new bridge pin.
[guitar owners & luthier - pls look away now :-)]



Lot’s of fun for just EUR 7,20 and, best of all: a working guitar with a superb sound that helps me enjoying those particular moments when I just feel the urge of playing along to my most favourite tunes…
Last week, I attended the funeral of a woman that I knew when I was very young. She was the mother of some of the first friends that I ever made. I had not seen her in a very long time, but I got to hear about an interesting turn of events in her life that I never knew. The story was being told by the preacher who was giving her body the final rights.
Several years ago, the preacher was a destitute and lived in a shanty village that exists at the valley of a dirty river that goes round some of the most sordid residential areas in Nairobi. However, each morning the man would pick an accordion and walk for around 10 kilometers to a relatively affluent residential areas. He would stand at a particular spot and play his beloved instrument until evening, when he would pack it inside a leather case and head back to his ghetto residence. He used to do that because he had heeded God’s voice telling him to do so.
One day, a woman appeared out of the blue and literally adopted him. She rented a modest house for him near her own house, furnished it and started taking care of all his financial needs. She then asked him to start a church and with her help, he organized some believers from the area to set up one of the most formidable sanctuaries in the area. During the funeral, one could see that the man had suffered as big a loss as any of her other children, but you could also see some light behind his eyes that told of determination to continue with the work they had started together.
There is a televangelist called Joyce Meyer that would impress even the biggest religious skeptic with her teachings. It is perhaps due to the simple way that she packages her lessons using daily examples of human struggle that would make a person who might not want anything to do with Jesus Christ pause for a while to listen. On many occasions, Joyce gives examples from her life with her husband called David. She talks about daily struggles with negative emotions and other undesirable human traits by quoting direct examples from her life with David. Unlike many mystical preachers who take great pride in presenting their ‘beautiful’ wives and ‘wonderful’ kids, or others who do not even bother to acknowledge them, Joyce has a great way of presenting herself first as an ordinary human being, and you can see that she is grateful to have a helper such a David to support her. She is never threatened by his quiet strength and acknowledges it on many occasions.
There are many people who disqualify themselves from service after recognizing that they do not posses the skills or qualities they admire in others around them who make a difference. For example, many people do not think that they have leadership skills that are essential to any person who hopes to influence others. And so they wonder what they are suitable for.
One of the most powerful ways that a person can serve is by supporting another. To a person who aspires to make a difference and yet does not have the stomach for the turmoil that comes with it, helping another to serve is very fulfilling. Even without being acknowledged in public like Joyce Meyer’s David or Preacher man’s ‘beautiful wife’, one is quite satisfied by doing the job to the best of their abilities.
Do you have children? Helping them to grow into all rounded human beings with adequate physical, mental and spiritual strength is an incredible responsibility. It is even more so these days when there is enormous pressure from negative influences threatening to sweep away every single lesson in positivity we try to teach. Nowadays being a full time Mom, or a full time Dad, takes as much effort and determination as is required to answer any other calling that a person might receive. Leaving behind a successful career for any reason always is a difficult decision to make. However, leaving behind a successful career to bring up one’s own children could turn out to be the most fulfilling sacrifice ever made in a person’s life.
Most people want to serve and to make a difference. But not everyone is flamboyant enough to stand at a podium and give a “I have a dream” speech. Not everyone will fit into a Little Sisters Of Mercy uniform and jump into the nearest ghetto to feed the hungry. Not everyone has children of their own to mould. And obviously some spouses try to stay as far away from the pulpit as they possibly can, and so one might not be able to be their spiritual helper. What to do?
No one should ever stop indulging that voice that keeps telling us that we can make a difference. Each one of us has a unique way of doing it that is just waiting to be discovered and allowed to grow. Let us pray to God to help us walk away from vanity and give us the courage to be what we need to be.
There is a stone wall enclosing a tent made from striped white and blue tarpaulin at a place called Ridgeways, opposite the junction branching into Garden Estate and Windsor Resort and Golf club, and right before the road branching into Runda Estate as you head towards Kiambu Town from the Nairobi City centre. It is a Catholic Church, and on Sundays, you will find cars parked into capacity in every available spot around it.
Last year I became curious about this church. For one, all the Catholic Churches that I know are grand stone and stained glass structures, and this is the first one I had ever seen operating from a tent. The second reason is that in contrast to the humble church, the many cars parked around it all bore top class models; Mercedes Benz, Range Rover HSE, Lexus, Toyota SUVs and so on.
And so, on one morning that I was passing by I decided to drop in, just out of curiosity. The church was already filled, and I had to stand outside the tent, but within the stoned wall. The preaching was well under way, and I only heard the last part of the sermon before the final prayers. The message was that doing good should start from right where a person is before it is spread to other places.
And so, today I am thinking about that day as I consider the issue of being of service to others. And I can perfectly understand what the preacher must have meant especially on looking back a few years ago when I decided to work for an NGO in order to make a difference in the world. And that is how I ended up in Somaliland on the strength of my skills, and the strong case I put forward to my employer about my yearning to serve during the interview. However I was to realize that unlike what many people think, working for an NGO is more about doing a job and getting paid fit it, rather than being of service to others. That becomes clear when one interacts with others in the same field, and even more especially when one questions his or her motive for being in a place like Somaliland.
It is ironic - almost obscene - being chauffer around in a huge car whose fuel cost from your house to the office is enough to feed a family for a few days while being protected by police bearing automatic weapons, to protect you from the same people who you are there to help. Just think; what would the reason be for anyone to want to harm you if you are truly helping that person? If you ever visit Mbagathi Hospital in Nairobi where the largest infectious disease clinic is located in Kenya, you become petrified on entering a ward full of people coughing their lungs out, knowing pretty well that many of them are suffering from TB and other air-borne diseases. A 30 minute visit to a patient is an ordeal, and yet the hospital staff works there day and night, even coming into physical contact with the patients. Despite the obvious danger they are exposed to, they never need to ask for police with Kalashnikovs to protect their lives.
I am not saying that NGOs should not help people, neither am I saying that aid workers are not in the world trouble spots out of a genuine need to help. All I am saying is that service to others should not wait until a person gets a job in Darfur or any other place in Africa, or in Asia or Latin America. When service calls, it does not start or end anywhere, and neither does it wait for one to be ready, or something to happen. Above all, true service does not need to be paid a hefty salary, given free accommodation and transport, and expense paid holidays once every several weeks. For the people who do not work for NGOs - and even those who do - the people who need help are all around us, and very close to us. They are in our families and among our friends. And so as you can see, we already have a lot of helping to do to the people we know before we move to strangers in our countries, and even citizen of the rest of the world.
The biggest challenge in life is heeding that calling that comes from deep down inside. That kind of calling is often averse to glamour. But interestingly, a person’s calling need not be so gloomy for it can lead them to unexpected glory in the most unusual way. Just pass by Ridgeways and see the many prestigious cars packed outside the tented Catholic Church! In the meantime, let us continue to pray to God to help us walk away from vanity and give us the courage to be what we need to be.
There is a nondescript restaurant called G&R along Muindi Mbingu Street in Nairobi, right opposite the City Market. If you look to your right as you enter the restaurant, you will see the arched opening to Cianda House along Koinange Street. At night, you would see the pink and blue neon advertising the Dolce discothèque that is located on the ground floor of that building flashing invitingly.
I do not know what G&R stands for. I doubt many people even bother to wonder since there is nothing ‘cool’ about the place. G&R is a restaurant for old people; the kind that is graced by teenagers only when a parent drags one along while on the way to school, usually under protest. Youngsters would rather hang out in crowded arcade inns where they can eat French fries and other greasy foods while listening to loud music accompanied by video on strategically placed plasma screens. On that account, G&R is way off since it specializes in serving foods such as arrow roots, sweet potatoes, mukimo, githeri and other such food that would appeal to the City Market traders that often frequent it. I doubt there has ever been any music at G&R.
What G&R does have is a fish aquarium. If you take a seat facing the street, you will have a good view of the swimming gold fish. Unfortunately, that is not always the case since the hawk eyed waiters at G&R usually strategically place themselves right in front of the aquarium so that they can have a clear view of all the tables. Watching a man and a woman standing next to each other with the backdrop of tiny fish swimming across the gap between them at groin level can really impregnate the imagination.
If you look carefully at the G&R fish aquarium, you will notice that apart from the beautiful gold fish, there is an ominous looking black fish. Unlike the goldfish that swims in open water, the black fish clings to the bottom and the sides of the aquarium. The fish is what is called a ‘bottom feeder’, and whose job is to clean up the mess that the other fish leave behind. The bottom feeder scavenges the bottom on the aquarium for discarded pieces of food and other waste, and generally plays the important role that the garbage man plays in our lives.
Have you ever felt like you are playing the role of a bottom feeder, cleaning up the mess that others have left behind? It sometimes feels like that when people are careless simply because they know that you will mop up after them. And yet, there are people who choose the role of serving others in life. When I think of service to others, nurses in hospitals come to mind. A nurse will clean up a messy person who walks into the emergency room with a fresh wound, clean up the person if he or she is too weak to even make use of the bathroom, and clean up the mess left behind by the doctors. Apart from that, nurses have to show a lot of constraint when being lambasted by the relatives, the doctors and even the patients under their charge. The reason is because the nature of their work puts them right at the end of the firing range and anyone can take a shot at them. And yet, despite working long and odd hours, they do not take home much in terms of money.
People who are in service to others out of choice often do that as an answer to a calling. They never get any meaningful compensation for their hard work, and often take a lot of unnecessary grief from others. And yet despite all this, they are certain that they are who they are supposed to be, are where they are supposed to be, doing what they are supposed to do. All they ever ask is to be treated with a little consideration. But even in the absence of that they keep a peace about them that makes them handle most situations with admirable grace.
Many people idly think about being of service to others. Many other people seriously think about it. Are you one of them? Are you able to give up your position as a gold fish to take the place of a bottom feeder? Are you able to lose the colorful glamour of swimming in open water, to the ominous dark gloom of scouring the bottom for remains others leave behind?
Last week, a group of school children laughed and pointed at a soot coated chokora (scavenger). He stopped at a distance from them and lifted up a huge gunny bag crammed with cardboards and said, “See! You are not the only ones who carry bags stuffed with pieces of paper!” He then walked away to do his scavenging as if nothing had happened. I suppose that is the kind of patience that every bottom feeder needs to have.
Perhaps people’s lives are like the aquarium at G&R. On the surface, everyone wants to be a gold fish – enjoying the colorful life while floating beautifully in the open water with not a care in the world. However, at the bottom, everyone yearns to be a bottom feeder – being of service to others and helping to make the world a better place.
The biggest challenge in life is heeding that calling that comes from deep down. True service is never glamorous, for not many – even of Mother Teresa stature - ever had their pictures splashed on the covers of even a local newspaper. That is why we need to ask God to help us leave behind vanity – thinking of our status in society - and give us the courage – not being afraid of what others will think - to be what we need to be.
My non-Kenyan friend who is visiting the country made me laugh when he narrated his account of boarding a matatu (public transport vehicle) at crunch time. In every evening of a working day, all the bus stops in town team with crowds of people waiting to board the few matatus that manage to slip through the traffic jam and into the city centre. And so, it usually is a struggle to find space inside the matatu and the law of the jungle determines who goes home first and who gets left behind. It was on such an evening that my friend was waiting for a matatu to go out of town. To pass the time, he was observing the cool, smartly dressed office girls that were standing patiently waiting for the next matatu.
When the matatu came, my friend joined the scramble to board. Being huge and athletic, he did not anticipate any trouble muscling his way into the vehicle. But then, he was to tell me later that he ended up being left behind since trouble came to him from the most unexpected quarters. He told me, “I thought those girls were ladies!” as he wretchedly rubbed his ribs and neck that had been mercilessly gored by the sharp elbows of the smart office girls. He was also massaging a foot that had been stepped on by a high-heeled shoe. He had just learnt the important lesson that you should never underestimate anyone in Nairobi. Being a city with many people chasing few resources, competition is very high and most people are fit for survival – especially those cool, smart office girls.
My non-Kenyan friend’s ordeal reminds me of the most competitive friend that I have. Having been raised in the rural areas in a poor family with many children, most of whom are boys, he had to learn about survival quite early in life. He once told me the story of the one hen that his family owned. Each of the children in the family took turns to eat the eggs that were produced by the hen. Considering that hens are consistent and lay one egg every 24 hours, each one of the siblings would be waiting for his or her turn to collect the egg every day at around 2 pm.
However, one could wait and realize that the hen was not going to lay an egg. After waiting for a few more hours just to be sure, the young girl or boy would curse loudly on knowing that he or she had been upstaged by another. The reason is because the children of that family had discovered a way to make the hen lay an egg on demand.
The trick was simple; one just needed to grab the chicken, part the feathers at its back and use the knuckles to rap the hen on the part between the two drumsticks. Just a few knocks were enough to make the dazed chicken stagger to the nearest corner and lay an egg. And so, as soon as day broke, an unscrupulous sibling could make the hen lay the egg hours before it was due. Unfortunately, such eggs could only be boiled since frying would give away the culprit to the rightful owner of the egg for that day. When each person’s egg day came, it was his or her responsibility to ensure that no one stole it from them. As a result, on any one day that the hen went about its ground pecking business it was guarded better than a president.
If you ever come into our city, expect some competition – sometimes crude, but often cool and smart. However most of it is home grown, so do not expect to immediately understand how it works.

The Acquisitions
Todays Online ltd was acquired under the agreement that they will successfully transfer their clients to AK’s network. In that case an initial amount was paid and a future payment was promised based on the successfully transferred clients. Todays Online personnel were also to be taken in as AK selling agents.