From Namibia with Love: A daughter traces her roots to Kenya

Aska Ndatekago and her uncle Odhiambo Orlale outside City Market in Nairobi on March 23, 2026 /Handout

For 32 years, Aska Ndatekago Orlale had one dream: to discover her Kenyan roots and meet her paternal relatives. 

The dream came true last month when Ndaty, as she prefers to be called, travelled by Ethiopian Airlines from Windhoek, Namibia, to Nairobi via Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to set foot in her fatherland.

But the journey was not smooth sailing, as she had to use social media—Facebook and X (formerly Twitter)—for the past decade to trace her paternal relatives. Her trip coincided with the 24th anniversary of her late father, Kenneth Cainan Orlale, on January 10, 2002.

 According to her mother, Hertha Kiifa Kuume, Aska’s father was one of the hundreds of professionals and foreigners, especially from Africa, who ventured into the new nation on the eve of its Independence in 1990 from the apartheid-led neighbouring South African nation, to fill the gap left by the former colonial power. 

Just like her adventurous daughter, Ken boarded several buses from Nairobi through Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, Zambia and Botswana to Windhoek for the four- to five-day journey of more than 4,000km in search of greener pastures.

The couple met when he was working in Ovamboland as an English teacher under the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), when the lingua franca was changed from Afrikaans—a combination of Dutch and Zulu—to English.

Many Kenyans travelled abroad in the 1990s in search of greener pastures as professionals, businesspeople and university students. Some returned to their country, like Ken, while others chose to marry Namibian women and either stay, relocate or settle in the south-west African country, previously called South West Africa. 

Aska is now among the generation of Namibian-Kenyans who were born and raised in Namibia and have come of age. She has a stepbrother, Enos Martin Cainan Orlale, named after their paternal grandfather, Enos Seth Okongo Orlale.

So when she finally decided to trace her roots and travel to Kenya last month, she was filled with a daughter’s deep passion and urge to visit her fatherland and meet her father’s relatives, friends, and former school and college mates.

And just like a whirlwind, she booked a return air ticket to Nairobi and alerted her uncles that she would be on board an Ethiopian Airlines flight on March 10, 2026, and asked them to meet her at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) at 2.30am.

She then coordinated the trip with two of her uncles, Dan Odhiambo Orlale and Martin Juma Orlale, who came up with a 14-day itinerary of road trips, boat rides, game drives and visits to the best public parks and museums in Nairobi.

Her search for her father’s roots was reminiscent of the famous American author Alex Haley in the 1970s, who researched and documented his roots in West Africa. He produced the international bestselling book Roots: The Saga of an American Family, which was serialised on a leading American television station and broadcast worldwide.

Indeed, Aska’s story of soul-searching and self-discovery is also similar to that of former US President Barack Obama Jnr, whose father was Kenyan. He visited his fatherland as a university student in 1992 and later wrote the bestseller Dreams from My Father. 

Obama later visited Kenya as a senator for Chicago in 2006 and as the first sitting US President to visit the East African country in 2015.

So when Aska’s plane landed at JKIA and she joined the hundreds of passengers and cabin crew disembarking, it was with a sigh of relief and joy to breathe the fresh air of her father’s birthplace.

Tears of joy rolled down her cheeks as she remembered the short time she had with her father in Windhoek when she was a toddler before his contract with UNDP ended and he returned to his home and family in Nairobi.

Since then, the only contact she had with him was through letters he occasionally wrote to her mother, asking about them and her in particular.

In one of the treasured last letters to Aska’s mother, dated October 14, 1996, on the eve of her birthday, he said, “How are you and Aska doing? Did you get my last letter? You have been very quiet for too long. Are you now working, and is Aska with you? Did Fred give you my gift as promised? If not, do get in touch?” 

“I have just returned to the office and will be very busy for the next few months, but hope to visit Namibia in October or November. Wish Aska a very happy birthday from me. Best wishes from us, and greet your friends.”

So when Aska saw her dream come true on that dark Wednesday morning at JKIA, she thanked God for the safe and relaxing flight and the opportunity to meet the paternal side of her family, with the full blessings of her mother.

The journey from the airport to her uncle’s house in Jamhuri Estate, 20km away, took 30 minutes, allowing time for bonding as she came face to face with the beautiful Nairobi skyline and modern expressway.

For the next 14 days, Aska’s itinerary was packed with activities in Nairobi, including a train ride to the city centre, some 10km away, a visit to the Kenya Railways Museum, and a return to her uncle’s house by matatu (minibus). 

The following day, Aska went on a road trip with her uncle from Nairobi to her father’s home in Lambwe Valley in Homa Bay county. They passed through the escarpment in the Rift Valley region, Narok county, where she met a Maasai family friend of her uncle, before making a brief stopover along the tea plantations in Nyamira and Kericho counties.

The moment of reckoning came at 4pm when they arrived at her father’s home, where uncle Martin, the eldest, welcomed her with a bear hug and a broad smile before ushering her to the family gravesite where her father’s body lay, 24 years after he passed on. 

She knelt down and said a prayer of thanksgiving as her uncles joined her in that memorable and emotional moment, with photos taken to capture it.

Her dream had come true, and she sighed with relief as she later met her father’s best friends, school and college mates and relatives. They included Earnest Kiano, David On’golo, her grandfather James Oluoch, grandmothers Margaret Wasonga Nyawaka and Bona Otti Odhiambo, and uncles Stephen Nyawaka and Bill Okeno Olale, among others.

For the next 10 days, her uncles took her to a neighbouring school, Kamato Mixed Secondary, which is part of her father’s legacy. After returning from Namibia, he started a private school, which was later taken over by the local authorities.

 Aska was given the privilege of addressing more than 300 students the following day to encourage and mentor them, saying she was a product of her father’s zeal and courage to take education to the next level by teaching English in Namibia and returning to Kenya to start a private school.

Later, she enjoyed a game drive at the nearby Ruma National Park before going on a boat ride on Lake Victoria from Mbita to Takawiri, Mfangano and Rusinga islands.

 She also had the opportunity to visit the mausoleums of some of Kenya’s freedom fighters and politicians, including former Vice President Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, Cabinet ministers Tom Mboya and Robert Ouko, and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga.

On her last weekend in Nairobi, Aska was taken on a matatu ride at night, where she enjoyed the loud music and disco lights in the speeding public service vehicle. She also went to the city centre, where she took many portraits, thanks to professional street photographers, to remember her Kenyan visit.