An Unforgettable Nairobi Tour

On a unique tour through the busy Downtown neighborhood of Kenyan capital Nairobi, you can get to know the guys of Nai Nami. Through interaction and conversation, they will get you up to speed on what their city is all about.

“Do you see those tourists, over there, with those expensive watches and big cameras around their necks? Those are the people we would have robbed back in the day.” It’s a peculiar quote that we will not soon forget, coming from Cheddaz, one of our tour leaders. It’s exemplary for this tour organized by guys who used to live on the streets of Nairobi - they are showing a world that for most visitors, would’ve stayed hidden.

Earlier that day, we received a message in our Whatsapp group chat. “Hi everybody, thanks a lot for booking our Nai Nami Tour and welcome in this group chat with your guides Cheddaz, Kissmart, Mrembe and Donga. Make sure that you will be at the Bata store in Nairobi’s CBD at 2pm! Thanks again, we’re looking forward to giving you an unforgettable experience!”

If you read the nice message, you wouldn’t say that it comes from guys who used to live a rough life on the streets of Nairobi. The city is still called "Nairobbery" by some - a cynical nod to the high number of robberies that plagued the city for years. Robberies still occur, but luckily much less than five to ten years ago. Yet, just like in about every metropolis, there are neighborhoods that are probably not the best tourist destinations. According to the guys of Nai Nami, "Downtown" is one of those neighborhoods.

I recognize Cheddaz from the picture in our group app: he wears dreadlocks in a tail on the back of his head and is slightly smaller than his smiling friends Donga and Kissmart. The boys look just as slick as the app they sent: it is clear that Cheddaz and his companions no longer live on the streets. “You must be Joost!” He says as he comes to me. “Good to meet you. We are just waiting for our other guests and then we can start the tour. "

While we wait for the rest of the group, Cheddaz tells us what we can expect from the tour, which started out as a social enterprise a few years ago. “No Nai Nami experience is the same. That is not only because we never really take a fixed route through Downtown. That’s also because the tour mainly consists of a conversation between you and me. I learn from you, and I hope you learn something from me too. "

Nairobi's CBD from above (under license of WikiCommons)

Nai Nami, which literally means "Nairobi with me", therefore focuses primarily on interaction with guides. This is also because there are not really that many sights to be found in the center of Nairobi: the city is not that old yet - 150 years ago it was not even a village. We can clearly see that many of the colonial buildings that the British have built have been replaced by large apartment buildings.

When the other participants, an American and a Japanese, have arrived later, the tour can begin. Each "guest" is assigned one guide, but we are told that we can of course talk to everyone. "Even if the total group of guests consists of twelve people, we ensure that we have twelve guides," Cheddaz explains. "This way everyone gets a personal experience."

In Nairobi, an immense city with many slums, you can also do a tour through, for example, the Kibera or Mathare slum, but we soon find out that the gentlemen of Nai Nami don’t like that kind of tourism at all. "We could also organize this tour in Mathare, because that's where we come from," says Kissmart. “But we consciously don't do that. We do not like slum tourism.”

And indeed: the Nai Nami tour does not appear to be a "people-viewing safari". During our walking tour we do not travel through a residential area, but through the lively "Downtown" district, where everyone is busy. When we walk through the neighborhood, our guides are busy shaking hands with and waving to friends. The "street smart" guys know everyone, and it is clear that they are respected.

When a teenager who is clearly under the influence tries to sell me something, Cheddaz keeps him at a distance. We don't understand what is being said, but soon the boy walks away. About a minute later, when we come across the tourists that Cheddaz "had certainly robbed in the past,” I ask him about his criminal past.

Cheddaz tells the story easily, like someone who has told a specific story many times before. “I was no sweetheart, and I have committed many crimes. Almost all of us have been in jail," he says. Many of the boys did not even pick pockets, but committed serious armed robberies in which people were injured. "We are open about our criminal background, because we had no choice," says Kissmart behind us. “Life on the street is hard. It is eating or being eaten."

Many of the Nai Nami boys grew up in the slums, disadvantaged. They were introduced to drugs at a young age: they sniffed glue and smoked marijuana. Because they came into contact with drugs at a young age, it was a small step to dealing in drugs, pickpocketing and committing robberies.

Cheddaz already knew Kissmart from the streets, but he only really met him at one of Kissmart's concerts, he says: "Although I actually came to his gig to steal from the people who gathered for his show, I got inspired by his music." Together with Donga, the three would later make music under the name 'Nairobeez'. But the fact that the trio now made music, did not mean that they were no longer active in the criminal world - making music didn’t pay their bills.

Yet, it was the music that has pulled the three guys from Nairobi’s criminal circuit. At one of their performances, they met Gianmarco, a Swiss student 'social innovation management'. He didn’t see three criminals, but three talented but underprivileged guys. "Together with Sriram, another social entrepreneur from India, they came up with a way to build a lasting business,” Cheddaz says. And so Nai Nami was founded: a tour through the streets on which Cheddaz and his friends grew up. That's a few years ago now, and the three guys have been making clean money ever since.

After our tour along the old train station and through a colorful market full of diligent market women, our tour ends in a small restaurant specializing in Kenyan cuisine: ugali, spinach and some naam choma, roasted goat. We ask Cheddaz what he will do when our tour is over. "We will be in our studio this afternoon," he says. "More and more people listen to our music, including the kids from the slum where we come from. It feels good to show them that they can live a life without crime, even if you grow up in a challenging neighborhood."

When we say goodbye, we realize: the experience that the boys promised in their first Whatsapp message indeed is unforgettable. And because everyone in our group has been walking and talking with a different guide all afternoon, we find out that we have all talked about different things. But one thing we know for certain: we learned a lot about what life in Nairobi can be like.

Hoi! My name is Joost Bastmeijer, and I’m a Dutch freelance travel writer and photojournalist currently traveling through Africa. Check out my photos on Instagram at instagram.com/joostbastmeijer, or visit my website to see some more of my work: joostbastmeijer.com!