‘Battle of the lizard’ and tales of boundless love at border town

If you stand near the tallest tree in Ogwedhi centre and look east, there is a wide space of uninhabited land before you see lush fields and rolling hills of Maasailand in the distance. And if you were that tree, then you would be the keeper of many historical secrets between the Maasai of Narok County and the Luo of Migori County, some violent, some even comical, others cordial. The empty space of unoccupied land between the two villages of Kikaat (Kilgoris constituency) and Ogwedhi (Suna-East constituency) represents the cautious handshake which the two communities offer to each other through inter-ethnic marriages.

‘Ogwedhi’ is the Luo term for ‘the blessed place,’ so named by the Josuna clan of the Luo people who first settled there before colonial days.