Chapter 1 - Part 2 -
Mary Bryant and Simon Mbilu (Commander Kenya Navy)
Although I normally used to rent a house when my daughter was staying with me during her summer holidays, I preferred to stay in a hotel when I was alone. One of my favourite places was the Ocean View Hotel just next to the Bamburi State House.
Here I met at the end of 1978 for the first time Mary Bryant. She had a small Safari Business and lived with her husband and two of their three children on a 300 acre farm near the Bamburi Cement Factory.
We became friends and I got to know that the big love of her life was Simon Mbilu, the Commander of the Kenya Navy. They had fallen in love with each other very young coming from the same village near Kitui. But her parents gave her to Phil Bryant, a white teacher and about 30 years older. Simon got then also married to somebody else and joined the Navy. (*)
Mary then even invited me to come to stay with her and her family at their farm.
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(*) When I came to Kenya in 1987 with a big Delegation from Italy, Simon and Mary invited us to their official Residence (the former Cathrin Bibi House) in Nyali for Lunch. They proudly showed me their wedding pictures since finally – after so many years of waiting - they got married after Mary’s husband Phil had passed away and also Simon had then divorced his wife. At that occasion I then also saw a photo of William Kivuvani (before Special Branch) together with his wife Dana (one of the Ugandan girls I will talk about later).
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This was then the first time that I came into contact with the ‘real’ life in Kenya after having enjoyed before only the privileges of first-class hotels.
There was a telephone - but the line was many times cut especially during raining season because the cables were passing over some trees and unsafe poles which broke under the rain.
There was no electricity - only a generator was giving some light during the night. But not enough to also supply a television-set and not even a radio. Sometimes the generator did not work at all (it was quite old or the workers had forgotten to buy the fuel). So we had to use candles instead - quite romantic but also quite dangerous.
There was no real road leading to the farm and passing it was quite an adventure especially at night and during Raining Season. I had a Golf Cabriolet, but soon exchanged it for a small Jeep making it a bit easier to pass these ‘roads’, where snakes used to cross in front of me attracted by the light of my car. This was at the beginning quite scary ….. but I got very fast used to it.
So I should have felt afraid and even unsafe - but funny enough - I never did.
I had to pass some villages before reaching the farm. The way was very dark, without any lights - quite lonely - but I was never afraid.
The village people got used to see me passing. They started to greet me, children waving their hands and after I used to have always some sweets for them, they always came to say ‘jambo’ with an open wide smile….. this was then also the first time that I heard the word ‘mzungu’ which they started to shout at each other whenever they saw my car arriving.
So when driving back to the farm, I always felt like ‘coming home’ - much more than I later felt in Nairobi when going back to my luxurious home in Karen …….
I also got to know that there was sometimes a shortage of rice, sugar, flour or ugali (white maize – the local dish which I started to love).
All these daily problems were totally new to me since the hotels always got their supplies making sure that the tourists never knew what was really going on in the country.
I also learned how important it was to secure the water supply and to have a reservoir to make sure that there was water not only for private use but mainly for irrigation and the animals during the dry season.
Phil Bryant (Mary’s husband) was a kind and gentle man. He adored his wife – although he knew about her still existing love for Simon.
He was very proud of their children and the children loved him. He was still teaching although he should have retired some years before. But their oldest daughter Wendy studied already in the States and the two younger ones (Timothy and Leah) went to private schools in Mombasa. So Phil’s salary was still needed to pay for their education.
The farm was then supplying most of their daily living costs added by some income from Mary’s Safari Business – and I think, also my money was a big help (I had insisted to pay to them the same amount I would have had to pay in the hotel).
At that time she had only one small bus and a driver to organize safaris. This bus was quite old and I learned how difficult it sometimes was to get spare parts. I think that Simon supported her via the Navy and helped to organize these repairs.
They grew some vegetables, sold mangos to the hotels and supermarkets. They kept some cattle and slaughtered calves supplying their meat to the hotels.
I even learned how to make cream since Mary had managed to get a small hand-driven equipment from Australia and we used to produce cream every evening from the fresh cow milk. This was then sold to the supermarkets like Uchumi in Mombasa.
When the American 7th Fleet started to come to Mombasa I also received together with Mary invitations for the official and private parties given by the American and Kenyan Navy.
I was then even allowed to visit the famous Aircraft-Carrier ‘Midway’ and later also introduced to Rear-Admiral, R.E. Kirksey.
But some people must not have liked this. Especially some women must have become jealous because the Kenyan Officers normally did not bring their wives to these venues and being a ‘white’ made my presence even more notable.
They started to distribute the rumor that I must be a spy working for the American CIA ………………………..
Chapter 1 - Part 3 - William Kivuvani (Special Branch)
These rumors about me reached such a level that the Special Branch had to intervene and I was asked to come to their office in Mombasa.
Here I met then William Kivuvani for the first time. He was at that time the Chief of Special Branch, Mombasa. He was also related to Mary and Simon.
We agreed that I should not attend the functions at the Navy Base anymore since he was sure that then all these funny rumors would stop. I understood and accepted.
So Mary started instead to invite some of the American Commanders who had in the meantime also become friends on a private basis. I remember, we once even made a ‘picnic’ party at a drive-in cinema together with Mary’s children…..
During our meeting at his office, Kivuvani had also asked me about my personal background. I told him that I had dual Citizenship (Swiss and German). He was very interested to learn that I spoke besides German and English also French and Italian.
Tomorrow: Ben Gethi
