Life Lessons of an Immigrant: Sustainable Community-Owned Enterprises

By John Makilya

John Makilya reveals an in-depth look of Kenya, its people, and its traditions in this memoir about growing up there and starting a family before immigrating to the United States of America.

He traces his roots, including how his father became a pioneer educator and was selected to lead a Kenyan delegation on a pilgrimage to Rome during the 1950 Catholic Jubilee. Upon his return to Kenya, he acquired land for the establishment of a Catholic church and later ventured into parliamentary politics.

Makilya also recalls his own career in various sectors, including savings and credit cooperatives, ranching and the beef industry, sustainable community-owned water projects, horticultural production and marketing, community-owned fishing enterprises, and wildlife conservation.

In doing so, he shares an intimate account of his work as a consultant making socioeconomic assessments of the World Bankfunded El Nio Emergency Project, his role in the enterprise development component of a USAID COBRA project, and his work as chairman of the board of governors of the Misyani Girls Schoolwhere he insisted girls were as talented in math and science as boys.

Join the author on an inspiring journey from Kenya to the United States in Life Lessons of an Immigrant.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Archway Publishing
• Release date: Dec 28, 2017
• ISBN: 9781480853713

John Makilya

John Makilya, a native of Kenya, has spent the bulk of his career working with communities to establish and implement sustainable community-owned enterprises. He is also the author of Life Lessons of an Immigrant.

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Copyright © 2017 John Makilya.

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ISBN: 978-1-4808-5370-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4808-5369-0 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4808-5371-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017919104

Archway Publishing rev. date: 1/23/2018

CONTENTS

Foreword

1 My Origins

Who Are the Akamba (or Wakamba)?

Mythology (Creation Story)

Language

History

Economy

Kamba Society

Family

Marriage (Ntheo)

Divorce

Childbirth

Circumcision

Naming and Akamba Names

Religious Belief

Music and Dance

Clothing

Death and Afterlife

Rainmaking Beliefs and the Akamba People

Rain Dance Ritual Process

Summoning the Spirits

Rain Dance—Sociocultural Implications

The Akamba and the 1938 British Livestock Control—the Beginning of Political Activism

2 My Family

Introduction

My Great-Grandmother

My Great-Grandfather

Chief’s Authority Act, Cap. 128, Laws of Kenya

Power of the Chief to Issue Orders for Certain Purposes

My Paternal Grandmother

The Kamba and Trade

The Ivory and Slave Trade

Decline in Trade

My Paternal Grandmother’s Story

My Maternal Grandparents

My Father, the Late Martin Makilya

Year of Jubilee—1950

Historical Perspective of the Jubilee

Celebrations of the 1950 Jubilee in Rome—from the Memoirs of Martin Makilya

Martin Makilya, Career in Education and Parliamentary Politics

Tribute to Martin Makilya

My Mother, the Late Mrs. Sabina Makilya

Tribute to the Late Sabina Makilya

3 My Extended Family—Uncles and Aunts

My Uncle the Late Simeon Joseph Katua

Simeon Goes for University Education in the USA

American Education for African Students

A Desperate Appeal

Simeon and the Makilya Family

Tribute to the Late Simeon Joseph Katua

My Uncle the Late Alphonce Kathii Wambua

My Aunt Josephine Kiloko Wambua

My Uncle the Late Michael Kilonzo

Tribute to the Late Michael Kilonzo

My Aunt Lucia Kilonzo

My Uncle the Late Raphael Nzuki Kakula

Tribute to the Late Raphael Nzuki Kakula

4 The Christian Churches in the Area and Their Rivalries

The African Inland Mission

Historical Background of the AIM

Influential Missionary Pioneers

Growth of the AIM

Education, a Means of Evangelism

The Catholic Church

Historical Background and Growth of the Catholic Church

Establishment of the Catholic Church in Kabaa, and Later (Misyani) Kanzalu

Our Lady Help of Christians—Catholic Mission Kanzalu

5 My Childhood

Introduction

My School Life

The Education System in Kenya

My School Life at Queen of Apostles Seminary, Kiserian and Roysambu

6 My Nuclear Family

My Wife’s Parents

The Late Joel Ngove Kathendu

Tabitha Kalondu Ngove Kathendu

Petronilla Makilya

Marriage

What Does a Kamba Marriage Involve?

Dowry Items

My Family Life and the Challenges of Bringing Up a Family In Kenya

My Children

7 My Working Life in Kenya

Kenya Canners Limited

Commercial Bank of Africa

Results through People Training

Technoserve

8 Milestones of My Career

Harambee Cooperative Savings and Credit Society Limited

Savings and Credit Cooperatives

Ardhi Cooperative Savings and Credit Society Limited

Allied Ranching Limited

Turkana Fishermen’s Cooperative Society Limited

Introduction

Turkana Fishermen’s Community

Fishing in Lake Turkana

NORAD and TFCS (Turkana Fishermen’s Cooperative Society Limited)

Kenya Union of Savings and Credit Cooperatives (KUSCCO) Limited

KUSCCO Corporate Information

Advocacy and Representation

Risk Management Program

Bookkeeping Services

Training and Education

Appointment of KUSCCO Management Commission

The Cooperative Management Improvement Project

Coffee Growing and Marketing in Kenya

Kenyan Coffee Markets and Prices

Ngorika Water Project

Taita Hills Horticultural Production and Marketing Project

9 Consultancies

Mapping of the Horticultural Export (Fruits and Vegetables) System in Kenya

Pesticide Initiative Program

PIP Modus Operandi

Socioeconomic Impact Assessment of the El Niño Emergency Project (ENEP)—World Bank and African Development Bank Component

Project Description

Project Implementation

Tasks of the ENEP Social Impact Assessment Assignment

Baseline Survey and Benchmark Report

Participatory Monitoring and Evaluation System Report

ENEP Impact Assessment Report

Special Assistance for Project Implementation (SAPI) Funded by JICA (Japan International Cooperation Assistance). The Project: Horticultural Producing Facilities Project Under HCDA (Horticultural Crops Development Authority)

Lessons Learned Under Three Community Wildlife Sanctuaries

The COBRA (Conservation of Biodiverse Resource Management) Project

Field Discussions

Conclusions from the Findings and Literature Review

Other Consultancies

10 Projects That I Oversaw as an Enterprise Development Specialist

Golini-Mwaluganje Elephant Sanctuary

The Mwaluganje Elephant Sanctuary Attractions

Elephants Experience

Botanical Experience

Baobab Trees

The Scenic Landscape

Educational Experience

Kimana Community Wildlife Sanctuary

Kimana Tikondo Group Ranch

Infrastructural Developments

The Il Ngwesi Community Wildlife Sanctuary

The Il Ngwesi Story

Early Days

Wildlife Returns

The Model

Shimoni, Mkwiro, and Kibuyuni Fishermen Project

Kisite Mpunguti Marine National Park and Reserve

11 Social Engagements While in Kenya

Misyani Girls Secondary School

12 My Life in the USA

My Work-Related Visits to the USA

My Daughter’s Relocation to the USA

The Kitele Family

My Daughters and the USA

Two USA Visits Prior to the Green Card

13 Relocation and Employment in the USA

The Providers’ Council Leadership Initiative Essay I Wrote in 2012

14 Vacations While Living in the USA

Kenya Destination—Introduction

My Visits to Kenya in 2012, 2013, and 2015

Cruise in the Southern Caribbean

Ocho Rios, Jamaica

Vacation in Cancun

The Platinum Yucatan Princess Hotel

The History of the Maya

Vacation in San Diego

City of San Diego

Vacation in Las Vegas

Las Vegas

Our Experiences in Las Vegas

The Hoover Dam

The Hoover Dam Bypass Project

Lake Mead

The Seven Natural Wonders of the World

The Grand Canyon

Aurora Borealis (the Northern Lights)

The Great Barrier Reef

Victoria Falls

Gorges

Table Mountain

Mount Everest

Iguazu Falls

Continuation of Grand Canyon Trip—Hoover Dam Viewing Point

Kingman and Route 66

The Kolb Studio

DEDICATION

To my parents, Martin and Sabina Makilya, who were pioneers of education and the Catholic faith in Ukambani, Kenya. The difficult choice they made to go to school while their peers continued to live comfortable traditional lifestyles and the difficulties that they endured while attending school together serve as a true testimony to their unrelenting determination to pursue human excellence. These things, and the outstanding work they accomplished as they pioneered in educating and evangelizing the Kamba community, continue to inspire me as I pursue my goals in life.

I also dedicate Life Lessons of an Immigrant to my family: my wife, Petronilla (Nilla); my three daughters, Jacqueline, Maureen, and Eve; and my son, John Paul (JP); for love, encouragement, support, patience, and care during difficult times when we lived in Kenya and now here in the USA. I recall the many times I left my family behind and crisscrossed Kenya as I supervised various projects and programs in the country—from the cattle-grazing lowlands around Voi and the Fertile horticulture-growing Taita Hills to the shores of Lake Turkana; from the hot and humid Lake Victoria basin to the cooler coffee growing highlands in central and eastern Kenya; from the dairy, pyrethrum, and coffee growing areas in Kisii to the nomadic communities in the Rift Valley; from the Shimoni, Mkwiro, and Kibuyuni fishing communities in south coastal Kenya to the communities in wildlife areas in the Laikipia, Samburu, and Baringo Districts; and from the group ranches bordering Amboseli National Park to the group ranches in Maasai Mara; not to mention time spent in other countries like mainland Tanzania, the island of Zanzibar, Rwanda, Burundi, Germany (Frankfurt), Sweden (Copenhagen) and the United States (Connecticut and Massachusetts). Thank you for bearing with me as I spent all that time away from the family attending to the various callings of my work. The time I spent in all these places without you can never be adequately compensated with money, but my consolation is the satisfaction I get when I consider the benefits that accrued to the beneficiary communities because of my work. Moreover, as I reflect on those times, I see that all of you continue to be my strength, even as I was writing Life Lessons of an Immigrant and going through the ups and downs of life here in the USA. May Almighty God pour his blessings on all of you as you continue pursuing your goals in life.

FOREWORD

Life Lessons of an Immigrant gives an account of my cultural origins, narrating the story of my dad’s rejection of the comfort of traditional lifestyles to venture into unknown school life during Kenya’s colonial administration and under very strict disciplinarians. My dad’s outstanding academic achievements made him one of the pioneer teachers/educators in his community. As a staunch Catholic, my dad was selected to lead a well-respected Kenyan delegation on a pilgrimage to Rome during the 1950 Catholic Jubilee. Upon his return to Kenya, he acquired land for the establishment of a Catholic church in the neighborhood of the very antagonistic Protestant AIM (Africa Inland Mission) church. He later ventured into parliamentary politics but lost an election to a candidate associated with the Protestant AIM. Prior to the elections, my dad had been appointed a member of the District Education Board by the president of the Native Council and, despite his loss in the elections, continued serving all people in the district irrespective of their religious affiliations (Catholic or AIM). His outstanding work in extending education to a community with antagonistic religious affiliations stands as a beacon of hope to be emulated as the world seeks a resolution to end hostilities among two major religions (Christianity and Islam).

Life Lessons of an Immigrant also gives an account of my outstanding career in Kenya and cites the milestones of my work in various economic sectors: savings and credit cooperatives, ranching and the beef industry in coastal Kenya, sustainable community-owned and -operated water projects, horticultural production and marketing, community-owned fishing enterprises, and wildlife conservation using the resources of community-owned tourist facilities. In addition to my work in these economic sectors, Life Lessons of an Immigrant gives an account of my work as a consultant making socioeconomic assessments of the World Bank–funded El Niño Emergency Project; the enterprise development component of the USAID COBRA project; feasibility studies for tourist development projects; and the EU-funded Pesticide Initiative Program. I also mentioned lessons learned from the establishment of community-owned wildlife sanctuaries funded by the CORE (USAID) project.

Also included in Life Lessons of an Immigrant is an account of my work as chairman of the Board of Governors of Misyani Girls School from 1989 to 2005. In this position, I launched a crusade insisting that the world should discard the myth that the girl-child is less endowed in mathematics and science subjects than her counterpart boy-child. It is my belief that the girl-child should be empowered through quality education lest society miss out on talent.

Finally, I discuss my immigration to the USA, attributing this to a belief I formed in my childhood days that my younger brother and I would leave Kenya and settle far away. This idea came out of a misunderstanding of a discussion my dad had with my mom. During the discussion I overheard my dad tell my mom the name of the then Catholic archbishop of Nairobi, John Joseph McCarthy. I mistook this to mean in local language "John, Joseph makathi, meaning John, Joseph will go far away." Since my younger brother is Joseph, I understood and believed that my dad was predicting that my brother and I would go far away from Kenya. The belief was planted in my unconscious mind. As we learn elsewhere in Life Lessons of an Immigrant, the unconscious mind works automatically and impersonally to achieve whatever goals are set in the conscious mind. In my case, my unconscious mind worked to achieve the goal of relocating to the USA.

On my life in the USA, Life Lessons of an Immigrant goes to lengths to discuss my experiences of my visits to the USA starting in 1985 and my subsequent visits. The results of these visits sparked what became a burning desire on the part of my daughters to set a goal of attending school in the United States and eventually living there. Later, my daughters’ relocation to the USA sparked an interest on the part of the rest of the family to also relocate to the USA.

Life Lessons of an Immigrant gives an account of the different jobs I have had since I moved to the USA, starting with Citizens Bank, Upromise, USPS, and Work Inc. It also discusses various vacation destinations I visited, including tourist facilities in Kenya, sunny beaches of Cancun in Mexico, a cruise to the southern Caribbean, sites and experiences in San Diego, Cape Cod, and finally Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon.

1

MY ORIGINS

I immigrated to the United States with my family in September 2005 after winning the green card lottery. My wife, our son, and I were coming to join our three daughters, who had come earlier to study in US colleges. We soon adapted to the lifestyle and integrated in the United States as I started working for a bank in December 2005; my wife began working the following month. Our son was admitted to Weymouth High School, and he would soon excel at the school and earn a scholarship to Tufts University.

I belong to the Kamba (Akamba in the plural) or Wakamba ethnic group of Kenya, East Africa.

Who Are the Akamba (or Wakamba)?

In the blog Trip Down Memory Lane, Kamba people are described as intelligent, brave, skillful craft men, drumming and dancing people of Kenya who also founded African Towns in Paraguay. In fact, they are the only black people who, in the era of the 1820s, came to the Western world as free people and not as slaves.

The Akamba or Wakamba are agriculturalists, and they love music and dance. These people who speak the Bantu language Kikamba live in the semiarid Eastern Province of Kenya, which stretches east from Nairobi to Tsavo and north up to Embu, Kenya. The Akamba refer to their land as Ukambani, which is currently constituted by Makueni County, Kitui County, and Machakos County. The Maasai call the Akamba by the name Lungnu, and coastal people refer to the Akamba as Waumanguo because of their scanty dress.

The Akamba—with a total population of over 4,466,000 people—are regarded as Kenya’s fifth largest ethnic group. Apart from Kenya, Akamba people can also be found in Uganda, in Tanzania, and in the South American country of Paraguay. The population of Akamba in Kenya is over 4,348,000, and there are about 8,280 in Uganda and 110,000 in Tanzania.

Undoubtedly, the most spectacular manifestation of traditional Kamba culture is their dancing, performed to throbbing polyrhythmic drumbeats. It is characterized by exceptionally acrobatic leaps and somersaults that fling dancers into the air.

Interestingly, Kamba people are as much music- and dance-loving people as the original African descendants that founded the city of Kamba Cuá, an important Central Department Afro-Paraguayan community in Paraguay. The Kamba Cuá people of Paraguay are known famously in South America for their awesome, intense, and lively traditional African drumming and dancing performances. The Akamba are known in Paraguay as Artigas Cue—or black Kamba Cuá. They arrived in Paraguay as members of a regiment of 250 spearmen, men, and women who accompanied General José Gervasio Artigas, the revolutionary independence leader of the Eastern Band (present-day Uruguay), in his exile in Paraguay in 1820.

After their arrival to Asunción, they settled in the Campamento Loma area, practicing dairy farming and secondary agriculture. However, in the 1940s they were dispossessed of their land by General Higinio Morínigo. Out of their one hundred hectares of land, they were allotted a paltry three hectares to stay on. However, the community survived, kept his chapel and dances, created a football club (Jan Six-ro), and founded one school of drumming and dance for children. Their ballet is the only Afro-Paraguayan expression, and it premiered at the folk festival Uruguay Yi Sings in 1992, where it won the Golden Charrúa. Their original lands at Campamento Loma remained vacant. Kamba Cuá recently occupied them and planted the manioc (or cassava), but by an unfair and discriminating government decision (post–Alfredo Stroessner), they were accused of being terrorists, beaten, and evicted. Today, according to official estimates, about three hundred families (between 1,200 and 2,500 people) live in Kamba Cuá. However, according to censuses taken by the Afro-Paraguayan Association Kamba Cuá, this community has only 422 people.

Historically, Akamba were ancient hunters who traveled together with their Bantu cousins the Kikuyus in the great Bantu migration from West Africa to Central, Eastern, and Southern Africa. It is believed that Kamba and the Kikuyus came to settle together in Kenya as one group and later separated. Kamba settled in Taveta until the seventeenth century, when they dispersed to the lower parts of the Eastern Province. The major reason for this migration was their search for water and to find pasturelands for their livestock.

Despite the incontrovertible evidence that Kamba are an undiluted Bantu group, some anthropologists believe that the Akamba, as a result of living among various Kenyan ethnic groups, are now a mixture of several East African peoples and bear traits of the Bantu farmers (Kikuyu, Taita), as well as those of the Nilotic pastoralists (Maasai, Kalenjin, Borana, et al.) and the Cushite communities with whom they share borders, to the east of Tsavo.

During the colonial era, British colonial officials considered the Kamba to be the premier martial race of Africa. The Kamba themselves appeared to embrace this label by enlisting in the colonial army in large numbers. After confidently describing the Kamba serving in the King’s African Rifles (the KAR, Britain’s East African colonial army) as loyal soldiers of the Queen during the Mau Mau Uprising, a press release by the East Africa Command went on to characterize the Kamba as a fighting race. These sentiments were echoed by other colonial observers in the early 1950s, who deemed the Kamba a hardy, virile, courageous, and mechanically minded tribe. Considered by many officers to be the best [soldierly] material in Africa, the Kamba supplied the KAR with askaris (soldiers) at a rate that was three to four times that of the overall Kenyan population.¹

The Kamba people were also very brave and successfully resisted an attempt by the British colonialists to seize their livestock by way of obnoxious livestock control legislation in 1938. They peacefully fought the British until the law was repealed.

Among the Akamba people, lack of rain is considered an event that requires ritualistic intervention. As a result, they perform a ritual rainmaking dance called Kilumi, which is a healing rite designed to restore environmental balance through spiritual blessings, movement, offerings, and prayers. According to the Akamba, Kilumi has been practiced since the very beginning of Kamba existence. This ritual emphasizes symbolic dance movements as a key force in achieving the goal of the ceremony. The heart of the dance ritual is its spiritual essence; in fact, it is the spiritual aspect that distinguishes the dances of Africans and their descendants worldwide. For this reason, it is important to understand the nature of rituals. Dance rituals take participants on a journey; they are designed to foster a transformation that moves the people into different states, with the ultimate goal of invoking spiritual intervention to resolve the problem at hand.

In line with other collective cultures, Kamba identity is based on the social system; therefore, it is not strange to find among the Kamba community proverbs such as "Kathoka kanini kaitemaa muti munene, which roughly translates as, A small axe does not chop down a huge tree. Another one is Kyaa kimwe kiyuwaa ndaa" (One finger cannot squash a bug), emphasizing how people’s allegiance to groups takes priority over their personal goals.

A famous Kamba woman called Syokimau, a prophetess and a great healer, prophesied the coming of the white people to Kenya; she also prophesied the construction of the Mombasa-to-Kisumu railway line. In her prophecy she said she could see people of a different color carrying fire inside water, which was later to be understood as white people in vessels carrying matchboxes and guns. She prophesied seeing a long snake whose head was in the Indian Ocean and whose tail was in Lake Victoria.

Notable people from the Kamba tribe include Kitili Maluki Mwendwa, the first black chief justice of independent Kenya; Dr. Willy Mutunga, a recent chief justice of Kenya; Samuel Kivuitu, a past chairman of the Electoral Commission of Kenya; and Professor Kivutha Kibwana, former dean of the law faculty at the University of Nairobi and current governor Makueni.

Kamba tribesman Benson Masya (May 14, 1970–September 24, 2003) was a Kenyan long-distance runner and marathon specialist who competed in the late 1980s and 1990s. He competed in the inaugural IAAF (the International Association of Athletics Federations, the international governing body for athletics) World Half Marathon Championships in 1992 and finished in first place.

Mythology (Creation Story)

Like all other Bantu communities, the Akamba have a story of origin that differs greatly from that of the Kikuyu. The Akamba believe that in the beginning, Mulungu (God) created a man and a woman. This couple came from heaven. God then placed them on a rock at Nzaui in Kamba land. Today the footprints of this couple and their livestock can be seen.

Mulungu then caused a great rainfall. From the many anthills around, a man and a woman emerged. These were the initiators of the spirits clan—the Aimo. It so happened that the couple from heaven had only sons, whereas the couple from the anthill had only daughters. Naturally, the couple from heaven paid dowry for the daughters of the couple from the anthill. The family and their cattle greatly increased in numbers. With this prosperity, they forgot to give thanks to their Creator. Mulungu punished them with a great famine. This led to dispersal as the family scattered in search of food. Some became the Kikuyu, others became the Meru, and yet others remained as the original people—the Akamba. The Akamba are not specific about the number of children that each couple had initially.

Language

The Kamba people speak Kikamba or Kekamba, which is a Bantu language belonging to the larger Niger-Congo language phylum. It is currently spoken by over six million people. In Kenya, Kamba is generally spoken in three out of the forty-seven counties. These counties are Machakos, Kitui, and Makueni. The Machakos variety is considered the standard variety of the three dialects, and it has been used in the translation of the Bible and in basic-level education.

About five thousand people speak Kikamba (or Thaisu) in Tanzania’s Tanga region, Muheza District, East Usambara Mountains (north base), and in Bwiti and Magati villages.

The Kamba language has lexical similarities to other Bantu languages such as Kikuyu, Meru, and Embu.

Its dialects are Masaku, Mumoni, North Kitui, and South Kitui.

History

One theory states that the ancestors of the Kamba can be said with some certainty to have come from the north, from the region beyond the Nyambene Hills to the northeast of Mount Kenya (Kirinyaga), which was the original if not exclusive homeland of all of central Kenya’s Bantu-speaking peoples, that is, the Kikuyu, the Meru, the Embu, the Chuka, and possibly the Mbeere. The people are believed to have arrived in the hills as early as the 1200s.

It is generally accepted that starting from around the 1500s, the ancestors of the Kamba, Kikuyu, Meru (including the Igembe and Tigania), Embu, and Chuka began moving south into the richer foothills of Mount Kenya. By the early 1600s, they were concentrated at Ithanga, fifty miles southeast of the mountain’s peaks at the confluence of the Thika and Sagana Rivers.

The other theory, which seems more credible, is that the Kamba are a relatively new ethnic group, having developed from the merger of various eastern Bantu communities in the vicinity of Mount Kilimanjaro around the fifteenth century. They are believed to have reached their present Mbooni Hills stronghold in the Machakos District of Kenya in the second half of the seventeenth century.

In fact, as late as 1840, the Akamba were still migrating from what is present-day Tanzania, where many Akamba are said to have been absorbed by the Pare people. When the early Arabs came to the East African coast, they met a people with sharpened teeth (believed to be Kambas). Sharpening teeth was a practice of the Akamba until very recently. It is likely that the Arabs were still trading with the coastal peoples as late as AD 943.

In the mid-eighteenth century, a large number of Akamba pastoral groups moved eastward from the Tsavo and Kibwezi areas to the coast. This migration was the result of extensive drought and lack of pastureland for their cattle. They settled in the Mariakani, Kinango, Kwale, Mombasa West (Changamwe and Chaani), and Mombasa North (Kisauni) areas of the coast of Kenya, creating the beginnings of urban settlement. They are still found in large numbers in these towns, and have been absorbed into the cultural, economic, and political life of the modern-day Coast Province. Several notable businessmen and businesswomen and politicians, as well as professional men and women, are direct descendants of these itinerant pastoralists.

In the latter part of the nineteenth century, the Arabs took over the coastal trade from the Akamba, who then acted as middlemen between the Arab and Swahili traders and the tribes farther up-country. Their trade and travel made them ideal guides for the caravans gathering elephant tusks, precious stones, and some slaves for the Middle Eastern, Indian, and Chinese markets. Early European explorers also used them as guides in their expeditions to explore southeast Africa because of their wide knowledge of the land and neutral standing with many of the other societies the Europeans traded with.

Akamba resistance to colonial pacification was mostly nonviolent in nature. Some of the best-known Akamba resistance leaders to colonialism were Syokimau, Syotune wa Kathukye, and Muindi Mbingu, and later Paul Ngei, J. D. Kali, and Malu of Kilungu. Ngei and Kali were imprisoned by the colonial government for their anticolonial protests. Syotune wa Kathukye led a peaceful protest to recover cattle confiscated by the British colonial government during one of their raiding expeditions of the local populations. Muindi Mbingu was arrested for leading another protest march to recover stolen land and cattle around the Mua Hills in Masaku District, which the British settlers eventually appropriated for themselves. J. D. Kali, along with Paul Ngei, joined the Mau Mau movement to recover Kenya for the Kenyan people. Paul Ngei was imprisoned in Kapenguria during the fighting between the then government and the freedom fighters.

The Akamba are a very diverse group. Some groups claim that it takes a while to understand the dialects of other groups. Following is a selection of terms employed by the Akamba people to refer to others within the ethnic group:

• The Akamba of Ulu call the Kitui Akamba the A-Thaisu.

• The Akamba of Ulu call the A-kamba near Rabai the A-Tumwa and the Ma-phikilambua.

• The Akamba of Kilungu call other Akamba the Evaao.

Johann Ludwig Krapf, who was the first white man to see Mount Kenya, was, courtesy of the Akamba, the first European to interact with them and study their language and culture from within. In one of his chronicles he noted that the Akamba slaughtered a cow in a manner that was alien to him. He reported, In the evening Kitetu slaughtered a cow to entertain the villagers; first the feet, then the mouth of the beast, were bound; the nostrils were stopped up, and so the poor animal was suffocated. I had not known that this was the usual way in which the Wakamba slaughtered their cattle. (Wakamba is plural in Kiswahili. They would refer to themselves as a group as Akamba and individually as a Mukamba.)

The Akamba were skilled metalworkers and one of the foremost Bantu group that introduced iron technology into East Africa. Krapf stated, "The more precious metals have not yet been found in Ukambani; but there is an abundance of iron of excellent