Corinne Hofmann: Back from Africa

For the next few days I do nothing but take long walks with my daughter just to stop thinking about Kenya all the time. Whenever the phone rings I worry that it could be Lketinga again or somebody else from Kenya with bad news. All my letters must have arrived there by now. Sometimes I can almost physically feel the sadness and emotion of all those concerned, especially my dear mother-in-law and even Lketinga who by now must have realised that we really are not coming back. Finally, on 3 November 1990, I receive a long letter written by James at school.

Dear Corinne,

Hello from James. How are you? I hope your family and my dear sister Napirai are well. I got your sad letter which made me very sad too because you said you were in Switzerland and wouldn't be coming back to our village. Everybody who knows you here in Barsaloi is very unhappy. I feel like crying just writing to you, although I will only really be able to believe it all when I see it written on my brother's face down in Mombasa.

Corinne, I already felt in my blood what you are now telling me, when I saw how impossibly my brother was treating you. But what am I to say to everyone who asks where our dear Corinne is and why she has left? It is a curse that you had to leave because of Lketinga. He will be very lonely here now; everybody is cross with him because they saw how hard you worked.

All the things you want to give him will only confuse him. Ill help him and try to make sure everything is done properly, although I don't have that much influence over him. You know I used to argue with him a lot because he was so mean to you, his wife. Without you, my brother is now considered a useless person in our society, even with his car and shop. What can he do with a big shop when, as you know, he hates work? And what can he do with a car when he doesn't have a driving license?

The fact that you have left him all this, shows that you still love him in your heart. But he doesn't understand any of that and can't deal with it. Corinne, he is very confused and I'm sure he still loves you but his problem is that he talks like a bad person and doesn't think about how other people react to what he says. The only advice I can give him is to use the money you have left him.

But how can he sell the shop if you aren't here? Unless you ring up the Indian, the owner of the building. I have written my brother a letter telling him he has to send me money for the trip to Mombasa so I can come down and see him when the school term ends on 16 November. If he won't send me any, I shall go home and sell a couple of goats, then I'll go down and see what he's doing. I'll write to you in November or December to tell you how things are going and how things are back home with Mama.

Corinne, I don't think my brother will get married again simply because of you. I think he'll stay in Mombasa for the rest of his life, living on what you have left for him. In his position I would be ashamed to go home. I really don't know how I'm going to tell Mama and the rest of the family.

I hope you find somewhere to live in Switzerland or Germany so we can stay in touch. I'm sure Lketinga still loves you and will pine for you. I'll write and tell you everything. But please keep in touch with me, wherever you are in the world. I know God loves you and will find you a good home. Please don't forget us, think of us, you are part of our family wherever you are. We will never forget you, your family or our dearly beloved sister Napirai.

Think about coming back to see us in the months or years to come so that we can meet again, and send us photos or other things to remind us of you and your family. I will do my best to send you something so you can see you are not cut off from our family, because we love you. I have still one and a half years to do in school, then I'd like to get a job, earn money and invite you to come and visit us.

Please tell your brother Marc that the problem was not my family but just Lketinga. I'll end now Corinne with a sad face and in the hope of hearing from you soon.

Give our best wishes to your whole family, Marc and his girlfriend, and of course to Napirai.

I wish you all a very happy Christmas,

The letter opens up all those unhealed wounds again and I drop it and burst into tears. Despite everything, the last thing I want is for Lketinga to lose face with his tribe. I feel totally miserable and once again plagued with doubts! I tell all this to my mother who's sitting at the table watching me earnestly.

‘Look at yourself in the mirror,’ she says, ‘and you'll see you had no other choice. Even after two weeks you still look sick and you're so weak you have to sleep all the time. You have to stick to special foods because of your hepatitis and you're still nursing your baby. How do you think you're going to manage? You have to think of yourself and Napirai. You've got enough problems.’

She sounds stern but it's just what I need right now; I feel like a child in need of looking after again.

That afternoon I write back to James, thanking him for planning to go down to Mombasa to see Lketinga. It's a huge journey for him. He's only sixteen years old and only came down to Mombasa once, when we moved away from the Samburu district and drove the 1,460 kilometers to the coast. He came with us so that he and Lketinga could take turns holding Napirai during the bumpy ride. But now he'll have to make the journey on his own which is something people out there simply aren't used to; normally they always travel in pairs. The two- to three-day journey on the bus is expensive and as he says in the letter he'll have to sell a couple of goats to get the money for the ticket.

Lketinga won't send him any, because money sent in envelopes just disappears en route and James is still a schoolboy and doesn't have a bank account. In fact, very few of the people I know out there have any money at all. Their wealth is their animals and if they need money they sell one or just the pelt of a slaughtered goat or cow to buy the essentials. I hope James manages it and Lketinga reimburses him the money.

Napirai meanwhile has got used to the cold weather and doesn't protest any more when we try to put clothes on her. I use my last ‘emergency pennies’ to buy us winter clothing in some second-hand shops. I don't want to be a financial burden on my mother. It's costing her enough just to feed us. In any case she's always buying things for Napirai. Our relations with the dog have also improved although he can still be unpredictable.

From time to time my mother tries to get me to go and visit some of my old friends in order to get me out of the house and into company again. But I'm afraid of driving her car in the hectic traffic, and on the right-hand side of the road. Back in Africa you might run into elephants or buffalo on a road, which could be dangerous enough, but here in Switzerland I have the impression that everyone is out on the roads in their cars at the same time. So I'd rather stay at home with Napirai.

One evening in mid-November the phone rings and I feel immediately that it's going to be a call from Kenya. It turns out to be Sophia. I can cope better now that I've been nearly a month back in Switzerland and everybody knows what's what.

‘Hallo Corinne, how are you and Napirai? Are you still certain you're not coming back? Lketinga isn't doing much work. Whenever I pass the shop it's usually closed. I just wanted to tell you that your husband won't let me help him, and I don't know what to do about it. I've got my own problems as you know, because even though I've opened up my restaurant I still haven't got a work permit. And apart from that, other things are still the same! In any case I'm flying out to Italy in four days to spend a couple of weeks with my family.’