Muthaiga Country Club celebrated its Centenary amidst an evening of New Year splendour, sirikisa dancers, much popping of champagne corks, an array of sumptuous dishes and dancing by nearly 400 members into the wee hours - and more until dawn. Members were in jubilant mood - becoming of its great traditions spanning ten decades from that first evening on 31 December 1913 when a mere fourteen founding members launched the establishment as darkening clouds of war scurried across Europe and ...

Dreams, Schemes & Flying Machines tracks the evolution of aviation in East Africa starting with the first lighter-than-air gas balloon ascent in Parklands, Nairobi, Kenya in September 1909, a ‘flight’ of 150 feet and a mere five minutes in duration. Then, as the military realised the potential of flying machines as a combat tool during WWI, aeroplanes were battle-tested in East Africa for the first time against the German cruiser SMS Königsberg in the Rufiji River delta in German East ...

The Lunatic Express was the name given to a railroad built by the British colonial government in East Africa during Victorian times. Officially called the Uganda Railway, it was constructed over the period 1895-1901 from Mombasa on the Kenyan coast to Lake Victoria in the interior and later onward to Kampala in Uganda. The term was first introduced in modern times as the title of a book by Charles Miller in 1971 (Macmillan) The Lunatic Express, sub-titled “An Entertainment in ...

A little more than half-a-century ago, there was no town of Nairobi. Lion and rhino roamed freely where modern streets and buildings now provide a centre for the commerce and administration of Eastern Africa. A great city has arisen where once the explorers, the missionaries and administrators pitched their lonely camps, and along the route they marched now speed the shining cars of a new age. The plain on which Nairobi now stands was part of the “no-man’s-land” to high adventure; the ...

Many settlers made the trek from their distant farms in the Highlands to revel in Nairobi during Race Week. Some came to get supplies.Others came to drown their sorrows following the latest crop failure, cattle disease, drought or flood. The only club available in those days was frequented mainly by Government officials, authorities who most settlers were at constant loggerheads with over their land policies. As a result, the settlers decided to build their own club on the other side of ...

Before the Second World War, game fishing, as we know it today, didn’t exist in Kenya, although a number of stalwarts must have ventured out in small boats or dhows, trolling along the reefs with split bamboo rods fitted with the old wooden Nottingham ‘knuckle-basher’ reels filled with linen line…

Until recently, there was nothing like Kenya. There was only, from Somalia down to the Comoros like the pearls of a Muslim rosary, a series of harbours of flourishing cities. Most were safely situated on islands where sailors had come since Antiquity from as far as Arabia, India and even China to trade and mix with the local African people. This is where the Swahili civilization blossomed. In 1498, Vasco de Gama was the first European to reach the area. Portugal established a few ...

Before the turn of the nineteenth century the white man’s destination in Africa was more often fixed in his mind than on a map; his route was unlikely to be charted; the land mass was known in Europe by three words… ‘The Dark Continent’… Every pioneering family in Kenya had equally fascinating tales to tell and each member of the family many unique anecdotes. Some pioneers were barely in their twenties, holding a common conviction of exchanging an old way life for something new brim-full ...

Over the last 100 years, EAWL members have dedicated themselves to work tirelessly for the benefit those less fortunate. Today, East Africa Women’s League members represent a broad range of ages, cultures, talents, and roles in the Kenyan community. Their diversity enriches their experiences and strengthens the League. This book celebrates their endeavours and records their excellent contribution over the past 100 years in the belief that their work will continue through the next 100 years.

Named after the Cambridge College attended by its founding Headmaster, Harold Turner, who established the school in 1927, Pembroke House has been educating children for over 90 years. From the outset, Turner conducted the School along the lines of a traditional British Preparatory school, a policy that has continued ever since. Within a few years Pembroke House had earned a reputation as a successful academic and sporting school, able to compete on equal terms with the English ...

I doubt if there is any man alive that hasn’t been at the brunt-end of periodic tantrums over his drinking habits, often combined with seemingly baseless accusations of not helping around the house, especially in the kitchen. This book therefore provides the perfect solution to both problems by offering all hen-pecked men a broad array of liquor-driven original recipes, guaranteed to cement a high level of domestic harmony, which can only result in a lasting bond between spouses through ...

Gentlemen, we’ve been had. Women’s wily ways have persuaded us to go along with arbitrary delegation of household chores we would never agree to if we only took more time to think about them. In this book, we have listed how us men have been brainwashed into domesticity. From vacuuming to taking out the garbage to mocking our dignity with doing the shopping, women have infiltrated our subconscious to persuade us to perform a select list of household tasks. Thankfully, we’ve ...

It is a proven fact that most wives have a major problem when their husbands decide to have a boozy night out. This book therefore provides the perfect solution to pacifying one’s loved one in ways which, following extensive research, are considered by leading professionals in their field, impossible to fail. Men, you also need to remember that the relationship between husband & wife is very psychological. One is psycho and the other is logical. This book is considered as a ...