NPR

Kenyans Cheer Opening Of Mombasa-Nairobi Railway

The line was financed with more than $3 billion borrowed from the Chinese government. A Chinese company built it, and a Chinese company will operate it for the first five years.
A standard gauge rail locomotive carrying Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta pulls into the railway station in the city of Voi on Wednesday, during an inaugural ride on the railway from Mombasa to Nairobi. / TONY KARUMBA / Getty Images

Just after the sun rose on Wednesday, people began streaming into the Mombasa terminal station. There was a red carpet, a helicopter and Kenyans dressed in their very best attire, with shimmering fabrics and dazzling hats.

A little more than a hundred years after the British built a railway through their East African colony, Kenyans celebrated building one of their own.

Consolata Muvea took

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