EDITORIAL
20-04-2025 by Freddie del Curatolo
He says that in Kenya one Easter is as good as the next, that as usual the sun rises at 6.21am and sets at 6.26pm, the saints of the weekend are Friday (a Bantu relative stationed on Robinson Island) and a certain L. Dell'Angelo, not a singer nor a relative of Eritrean divers.
In Malindi and Watamu, however, there is a disproportionate difference between High and Low Easter.
Speaking Christianly, and not very Oxfordianly, it is not a matter of waiting longer for the resurrection of Jesus, also because in these parts we are used to exhausting waits, but of being fed up, after a season that went more than well, of seeing the tourist as a god.
Easter ‘pole pole’ simply goes out of season and hardly anyone takes the opportunity to have a little holiday on the Kenyan coast.
In Egypt, between a shark waiting behind the reef and fundamentalist instincts, it is starting to get warmer and the offers for a week's holiday are equivalent to the price of a one-way train ticket from Sesto Calende to Bassano del Grappa.
In second class, of course. In Kenya, on the other hand, there is a risk of rain, an air of demobilisation that puts one in a melancholic mood, and above all, there are many residents who can't take it any longer and can't wait to enjoy their well-deserved holidays.
An African safari, above all.
But some chronically ill people, after a lot of sand, sun, sex and samosas (the famous 4 ‘s’), also dream of the fifth, shopping at the mall or Ikea.
So on the ‘Italian’ coast of Kenya, High Easter is a real bummer!
In the post-pandemic era, for example, Easter happened in mid-March: fellow holidaymakers overflowed, Silversand beach boasted a good density of beach-boys per tourist, the many restaurants only accepted customers by reservation, fish vendors turned into pushers, for a sniff of lobster they would ask you what in November is enough to buy two kilos.
House sellers were easily getting rid of old villas, auctioning off modern flats and promising, after a juicy down payment, every single concrete pour on Kenyan land. Golden business for the interior decorators, boutiques, antique dealers, greengrocers and body shops.
Safari vans whizzed by every morning to the national parks and then queued up in the heart of Africa so much so that lions wondered if it wouldn't have been better to be born a tollbooth; rented cars and taxis filled the streets with healthy smog absorbed by baobabs in secular abstinence and at night the discos were beehives full of honey (more than acacia, armpit) and human jams.
Dancing were the V.I.P.'s who, after hours of total screen sunbathing (if there's no screen somewhere, they don't live) were indulging in aperitifs at the Billionaire, between Naomi's cleavage and Noemi's sunburn.
Africa acted as a backdrop, romantic fascinating exotic mysterious heavenly relaxing invasive depending on the mood and state of mind.
For the Italian residents that brothel meant ‘hay in the farmyard’, for the Kenyans that brothel meant ‘grab it while you can’.
But when, like this year, Easter arrives as late as possible, and the sun desperately searches for a tourist at midday to cast its perpendicular shadow, the few holidaymakers feel disoriented, inadequate, out of catalogue and context. As bewildered as a catamaran in a heliport, they wander in search of a ball-busting entertainer, a beach-boy to cheat them, a marijuana dealer to inform the police, to finally feel on holiday.
Silversand beach in Malindi looks like a Palermo course five minutes before a murder-for-hire, the few restaurants left open greet customers like cousins from Europe whose visit they have been waiting for for twenty years, the fish vendors cycle past throwing lobsters into the restaurant as if they were copies of the Daily Nation and picking up the cents left on the stones at the entrance. The house sellers get drunk and throw lonely parties every night in a different villa, choosing from those returned after the first installment, renting the modern flats left empty to Indian families and preventing every single concrete pour on the Kenyan land. Furnishers rest, boutiques close, antique dealers sell off, greengrocers go out of business, and corpivendolas switch from disco jumping to end-of-season sales. Italian residents have the grin on their faces of someone who is smoking some of his (thankfully!) substantial hay every day.
All right, I've gone too far, I got carried away. All in all, it has been a wonderful, record-breaking season.
We are all looking forward to the resurrection!
Nooo, not our Lord's for once... the one on the Kenyan coast, starting in July:
Also because if you live great and die well, what's the need to resurrect at Easter?
EVENTS
by redazione
An Easter of music and beauty from Africa and good things from Italy at Olimpia...
EVENTS
by redazione
Easter between relaxation and pleasure in Mayungu. The Malaika Beach Villas for the evening of Saturday, April 15 organized a special evening with dance show Giriama with free buffet dinner for guests of the resort and pay for outside (just...
FLIGHTS
by redazione
With the resumption of tourism at more than acceptable levels, both in terms of the sea and safaris and...
EDITORIAL
by Freddie del Curatolo
Easter week in Kenya often puts the coastal tourism-related businesses in an awkward position. In the...
FLIGHTS
by redazione
The possibility and the hope of having a flight more per week from Italy to Kenya, in a few days it has gone not to be for three weeks, including Easter, even the existing one.
The charter airline Meridiana Fly...
WATAMU EVENTS
by redazione
It's going to be a smashing April at Paparemo Beach in Watamu: a fun-filled end to the season with...
For Easter Sunday in Malindi, in one of the most scenic and enchanting locations on the shores of...
NEWS
by redazione
Paradoxical situation for tourism in and around Malindi.
At Easter they all want to take a week of vacation on the sea in the resort areas that have begun to "pull", but there are not enough flights from Nairobi.
This...
NEWS
by redazione
Malindi and Watamu tourism queens of Kenyan Easter.
The success of the north coast is certified by the arrivals of these days Malindi airport, who beat to Ukunda and presence in the hotel which, thanks to Watamu, new destination elite Kenyans,...
TOURISM
by Freddie del Curatolo
Whether it falls early or late, Easter has always served as a watershed (or rather, a traffic divider, especially...
NEWS
by redazione
The season that has already gone beyond all expectations, for tourism in Kenya, will be good at least until the week of Easter.
These are refuted forecasts looking hotel reservations and especially those of the many bed and breakfast, accommodation...
The stoppage of travel from Nairobi to the coast has convinced one of the Malindi clubs that had...
LOCALI
by redazione
An Easter weekend full of music to dance, including dinners and drinks until late at night at...