Introduction

I am Omogusii. A Kenyan. A black African in origin and ancestral lineage. This may sound loquacious in Western culture, but in this part of the world, it epitomises pride of belonging and readiness to stand for one's own.

Let me explain:
Omogusii (singular)
Abagusii (plural)
This refers to a group of people whose basic unit is a clan (group of up to 4 generations families) that speak in the same dialect and dominantly live in a particular region (an ancestral land, if you like).

In its depth, referring oneself to as Omogusii connotes that one is ‘pure’, that is all the four generations have no interruption of another tribe’s DNA import through intermarriage. In that sense, I may not be a ‘real’ Omogusii, since my great grandfather came from the Luo tribe (of Barrack Obama's, please this is for clarification; I am not trying to ‘relate’ myself to him!)

Kisii: This is the area where Abagusii live; their ancestral land.

Each Omogusii (men only, though nowadays women are increasingly being considered) must get a piece of land allocated to him for just being in the lineage. If a man has 10 sons, a common scenario in Kisii, and owns a 10 acre piece of land, the land will be subdivided into 10 equal portions and allocated to each son.

We are at a point where the land is no longer divisible and that is why, like the Kikuyu, we went out to buy land in Rift Valley. And that is how and why we got caught in the thick of the conflict. Nearly a half of the Abagusii population lives outside their ancestral land amongst other tribes.

Now, the right spelling for Kisii is Gusii; but the Sussex colonial master decided, I think to facilitate pronunciation, to call it Kisii. Our main town is named Kisii. The word Kisii is, at the national level, interchangeably used to mean Omogusii! Oh my, I hope it is not getting even more confusing!

Ekegusii:
This is our language; our dialect.

We have radio stations that broadcast in the language. Our (Kenya) national language is Kiswahili and our official language is English (British English). Every Kenyan speaks a minimum of 3 languages; the mother tongue, Kiswahili, and English (save for the uneducated, about 30% of the population). Since I studied in Kikuyuland and I worked for Italians, I speak 5 languages, though the latter 2 only a little bit!)

I am forty eight years old. I am a happily married man to one beautiful lady. She works as a volunteer in a non-government organisation that deals with women (human) rights. In African societies, the girl child and the womenfolk suffer inordinate deprivations of what would normally pass as basic rights. The organisation is trying to incentivise the recalcitrant African men with the benefits of a free world to let go of their archaic practices for the betterment of women in our society. We have three children. In addition we have adopted three more, in a perfectly quintessential African setup. Five of them are in school. All our children are between 1-18 years.

We live in the outskirts of Nairobi, the capital city of Kenya. We operate a 10-seater french fries restaurant. Our country (just like other African countries) is plagued with unbridled corruption, nepotism, and robbery. Self-employment remains one way of sidestepping this vicious cycle and treadmill ot frustration and misery.

Here's how I stumbled upon Swedenborg! It was in 2000. A customer at my restaurant "providently" left a copy of SILA behind. SILA (Swedenborg Information of Los Angeles) is a monthly newsletter from America about the Christian author, Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772). Madam Chair of SILA, Candace Frazee, had answered a reader's question in the SILA newsletter that struck me by the in-depth analysis of the answer backed by quotes from Swedenborg Writings.

I wrote to Candace Frazee. Presto! In her element of characteristic altruism, she answered my letter and mailed me all sorts of reading materials. And she still does! The Writings of Swedenborg have changed my life, my family's and of those close to me. They changed my subjective perception that I acquired from my religion of upbringing, Seventh Day Adventist.

I thought that all I needed was faith... I can write on and on and on about what the Writings mean to me, but I reserve it for another day. I just cannot get enough of the Writings. I'm forever a Swedenborgian!