New Year..........

Another year ? or is it just another day with a different number ending "06" . I bet is just another year for the thousands North Eastern residents who are suffering from hunger( Yet we have leaders who are still so power hungry ,that they would care less about the who I would like to call forgotten “other Kenyans”. I hope this serves as lesson to all those who talk the talk and not walk the walk. Why should we be begging for food and yet we wanted to spend millions for a snap elections to remove the so called bad apple Mr. Kibaki for misleading Kenyans and making us worse that we were 20 years ago!. Well it is '06 , lets see what has changed on this arena if at all!

We also have a ice skating ring. Waoh! we have money for such luxury?Private or not private, same thing, the monies could have been used for another worthy cause, like maybe feed hungry children? Surely, how much money will it take to maintain such a ring? Well maybe then, the owners are not into feeding hungry children, how about building a decent shelter for the street children if at all the aim is to make Nairobi more attractive? I suppose with this new interest, we shall have some entry in the next ice skating championships, why restrict our domination only on Marathon huh?. Michelle Kwan, Christina Yamaguchi, here we come!!! Watch out!

It is also another year for U.S and it is renewed warning for visitors to Kenya. You see ,Kenya is such a dangerous ground harbored with murderers who are out to harm any westerner who dare step on that rich red soil of our beloved motherland. Funny, that they issue the warning, just this past Christmas when trying to get a hotel in Mombasa I hear was a nightmare let alone get a flight out of Nairobi to Mombasa .Interesting the Germans, the Dutch,Danish(ask Friend of Kenya blogger, how dangerous Kenya was?), the Italian, the Swede, don’t feel so scared or their souls are not that valuable!

It is yet another year at work same ol’ Bs! different day! It is just another day that resolutions are being made left and right and next Monday oops already broken a few. It is a brand new year where some of us have ushered it with pomp, new lovers who have just discovered each other (happy for you my friend….I wish you all the love, you deserve it and for those of us who missed that bus or wished for it :-), well, that is just too bad but remember do not go for less!!!), new friendship has emerged in the mid of eating Nyama Choma and clicking that “salute” champagne glass. “Salute to a new found buddy!”

So this week, well I’m still in the holiday mood but I will have to sit down and evaluate the last thirty years of my life. You know kinda of SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity and Threats) analysis. Yes I ‘m going to treat my life like one big fortune 500 company and hopefully after this process is over (hopefully in the next two weeks) ,then I can charge forward.

You see , I miss Kenya and would like to go back home Kenya and jenga the nchi , lakini where to start .I’m jittery about that thought. There are many what ifs, Woulda, shoulda etc. I have discussed this with a few friends (some are reading this;-) but there is always that uncertainty about the whole deal. Questions like, if I give up what I have here and things do not turn out to be what I thought they would be in the motherland, then what? Will I survive the regrets, the lets downs, the guilt trips , the I should have known?. I do not expect heaven with maana flowing freely that is for sure. I do not expect things to work out like in the “first World” whatever that word means. But there is this hope that it is possible. Many have gone back and made it but is my skin still thick enough or will I be a mama's girls and chicken out?

Then, there is another thought, how bout commuting from Kenya to US and vice versa? .Is that doable? Can one get a temp jobo for 6 months and run back home to run a business? Does that sound like a crazy out of this world thought? Well, this is the year that decisions have to be made, serious ones ! This is the year of ultimatums and like a fortune 500 company; there will be retrenching /layoffs of the unproductive factor. This SWOT Irena’s life analysis will help me to focus on my strengths, minimize weaknesses, and take the greatest possible advantage of opportunities available and surely after 2006, there will be a take off point somehow