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Retirees used to urban lives troop back to the rural homes to start a fresh life in unforgiving environment but end up scrambling for some village jobs that can offer some dough to maintain a near pre-retirement lifestyle or keep them busy.
Such will hunger for chiefs or assistant chief job, church and factory chairmen, nyumba kumi leadership, constituency development fund posts and others throw net deeper into elective politics realms but when the going gets tough they will tumble down to misery.
Formal retirement age in Kenya's public and private sector ranges between 60 and 65 years with voluntary retirement from age of 50 years.
Former KCB boss Martin Oduor-Otieno says when planning for retirement, a lot of people focus only on finances and fail to think about how they will spend their time.
Many who lose job unpredictably or fail to invest and plan well for the time outside job world labour for extra coin yet they should be enjoying retirement.
Patrick Wamwea, 68 who was kicked out of military after the 1982 aborted coup shifted to photography to cushion his family.
Even with steady income, retirees find themselves isolated by kin and close friends. Alcohol becomes the solace.
"They can't till the land nor compete with energetic locals in business. Jostling for some leadership post does not come easy for them either. They start less demanding business to make them interact with society or turn to alcoholism and with time they slide into despair. Few make it through in the village if they don't get surrogate work" says Wamwea.
Actuarial analyst Sundeep Raichura says "Retirement years should be the golden years of our lives but for most people this can be very miserable time for lack of planning. More needs to be done to create awareness and provide solutions. The formal sector must have mandatory pension contributions legislated at a sensible level".
Otieno warns that retirement is a moment that come basketful of fear, uncertainty and confusion and emotional transition that take months to a year.
"For most people, the key to a happy and fulfilling retirement is simple: staying busy. So some people take up full-time roles again, in most cases, different from what they did previously. These days when I respond to people that I retired, I get that look of disbelief, with people asking. Surely, how can you just sit around doing nothing?" he says.
