What returning to Kenya taught me after living abroad for 13 years

A woman with a travel bag walking in the airport. [Courtesy/GettyImages]

People in Australia often ask me what it’s like being home, while people in Nairobi ask why I would ever leave Australia.

Both questions are framed with the same fear of missing out as a child who sees that every other child around them has a lollipop except them.

Soon after migrating to Australia, there’s a nostalgia that hits like a bullet train a few months into migration.

All of a sudden, the brain begins to feed itself diabolical lies and you begin to tell yourself that you even miss fighting for your life in town to catch a matatu.

Out of nowhere, githeri, mukimo, mutura and other local delicacies make their way into your dreams and quickly graduate into fantasies that will result in numerous attempts to recreate these foods, but nothing quite makes the cut – because no matter how you dress GMO food, the fact remains that the taste will betray the manner in which the food was acquired, and so we learn to settle for what is available.

In Australia, time seemed to stretch to infinity, and I felt like I needed to find ways to fill my days so that I was not bored out of my mind.

My career helped, because being a lawyer meant that there was always a massive text book or case law folder waiting to be explored for precedents that would assist me in my cases, or bolster already formed arguments.

I voluntarily worked on Sundays rather than endure the extreme loneliness that sometimes engulfed me, especially during the holidays.

On the other hand, life in Kenya post Covid-19 pandemic seems to be more of a sprint than a marathon. I blinked in January and apparently the year is over now, and I genuinely have no idea how we got here.

I actively avoid a lot of social plans here, something that 2018 me would probably scoff at. There’s almost too many things to do everywhere all at once in Kenya.

The duality of life is not lost on me, because the 13 years I spent cultivating my identity and personality in Australia prepared me for a life that looks different from my lived experience in Kenya. The last five years as a returnee have confused and frustrated me, but have also been rewarding in unexpected ways.

Having lived both realities, I now straddle the fence of what is and what could be. I suspect the sweet spot lies somewhere between radical acceptance of reality and self, and community that reflects similar values and ways of life.

With that comes a lot of uncertainty and shaky ground, but the determination to master my shadow and my light remains of primary importance.

What becomes apparent now is that nostalgia is sold as a romanticised reminder, but it is actually curated suffering. If life is happening right now, then really, yesterday and tomorrow become irrelevant – we work with what we have now.

-The writer is a lawyer and podcaster based in Nairobi