The detractors of Malindi are strange funny people: they sprout like bullfrogs from every pothole full of rainwater on the road and croak that there is no more tourism, that broken promises have sunk it, that only old caryatids are turning around, that it is dirty corrupted traffic disgraced disgraced disgraced ... that nothing will be like before. 
In a few words, quoting a refrain dear to the songwriter, "Malindi is dead".
Those who support it often no longer live in Malindi for years, or have never lived there. He loved it and was betrayed by something or someone, but certainly not by Malindi and its magic. Or they are pensioners who dream of a completely empty town, without the beak of a tourist to enjoy it all. Without imagining the tide of unemployed people who would eat not only his pension, but also his tired old wrinkled limbs, plucking him to the bone. But perhaps, as Jean Baptiste Grenouille, the protagonist of Patrick Suskind's great novel "The Perfume", thought, the perfect end is to be devoured.
In any case, on this last day of 2019, I am sorry to have to give a displeasure to these creatures half human and half pain in the ass: Malindi is more alive than ever and it is not only the numbers (and the photographs we take as evidence) that speak, but especially the reservations for this period, despite the high cost of flights. Many people have wanted to spend their Christmas holidays here anyway, in spite of other destinations, because, as the many readers I meet on the street and who congratulate us say to me, "it's nice here".
Those who write badly, think badly and live badly, said a well-known Italian director. Those who want to live well often have no time or need to write and think about it. They enjoy their well-being, especially when contrasted with a European life full of stress. Seeing Sunday evening, around 11pm, Malindi's restaurants overflowing with happy people, the Baby Marrow full of young people's tables almost all of them Italian, as well as other places hosting wealthy families from Nairobi, groups of Indians and English, is the most sunny and true answer to Malindi's dying solos. If this period will last only until the Befana, as almost every year, it's only because it's Europe that's raging, Malindi knows how to rejuvenate, it has the antidotes to sick capitalism, it fights globalization with a mango juice or a freshly caught octopus, the stress with a sunset in Silversand, the uncertainty of the future with living to the day of its people. And it is to his credit that here even the "cons" often become "pros".  
Rest assured, my dear detractors: Malindi is more alive than ever. In fact, take an example from her, she can only do you good. Happy 2020 and have a good life!

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)