German | Kenyan
I am a half Kenyan, half German Sufi. I consider myself mixed-race. I also identify as Black and African. My Mother is from Kenya and my Father is German. They met in Nairobi in the late seventies at a party. They married in Kenya and I was born in Bonn, West Germany in 1985. My Mother is half Luo and half Kikuyu, which is a combination that is still uncommon nowadays as the two tribes tend to distrust one another. As a result of the mixture, her parents spoke English to one another and not their mother tongue. My Kenyan Grandfather was fortunate to study at Oxford and worked as a diplomat in Ethiopia and Switzerland. His siblings were Ambassadors in various countries in Europe. So my Kenyan family is already very cosmopolitan. My cousin whom I grew up with is half Kenyan half Italian. Our families are very intertwined, so we grew up like twins. English was mainly spoken at home. Christmas is usually in warm Kenya, but we celebrate it on Christmas Eve like most Germans and we often have German Lebkuchen and Stolen. If we are with our Kenyan/Italian family then we have Panatone and if our Kenyan Swedish cousins are with us, then they make toasts in Swedish. I have experienced a lot of confusion about my identity. I have always felt like I stick out, often feeling like the odd one out which really unsettled me. In Kenya, I was never Kenyan enough. I get called Mzungu (White person) and in Germany, I am obviously Black and Germany, different to England, does not have real space for Black Germans. So feeling out of place, always made me want to blend in, which in its own way has worked against me. I am only now really owning my strength with having Teutonic blood AND coming from the Cradle of Africa where mankind began. Only now am I owning my ‘mane’ and wearing my hair out loudly and proudly, instead of making my hair neat, ‘acceptable’ and not ‘bushy’.
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