Lost White Kenyan Chick: Nation

Quiet reigns for now which is great news. People seem to have got the memo that they should not take to the streets and they have stayed away. Police presence is very high in town but quite relaxed. In the morning we all weren't sure if people may or may not heed Raila's cancellation of the rally to be held today so most of the public transport seemed pretty quiet coming into town this morning and traffic on the roads is also quiet again, so we seemed to have taken a small step backward again on the 'almost normal' situation that we had yesterday.

Once Raila agreed that he would negotiate with Kibaki with a mediator, Kibaki immediately invited him to a meeting at State House, which then he refused to comply with - unless the mediator tells him to go for the meeting, he will not do anything Kibaki tells him to do, as he keeps reiterating, he is the rightful President of this country and Kibaki is illegally sworn in and therefore should not be recognised!

Smells a bit of one step forward, two back to me!! Anyway I shall try my best to have faith and keep positive although I must say i am finding it particularly hard today - the lack of sleep from all the worry, and the fact that most of the people around me (not my employees who are the average poor Kenyans that are suffering in all this), but all those wealthy lot that are our directors (and sadly who we should be answering to), who have their heads stuck firmly up their arses or buried in the sand, is really getting me down.

There is a commentary here from the Daily Nation today here in Kenya which really tells it all. http://www.nationmedia.com/dailynation/nmgcontententry.asp?category_id=25&newsid=114132

Please read it if you get a minute. He is thinking how I am thinking and it's really very depressing.

I really never thought I would get to a place where i wasn't sure any longer that my future is in Kenya, but for the first time in my life I have started to consider my options, and what would be the best thing for my son and I.

I'm not saying I won't survive if I stay, but it will be so much harder as a single mother with exorbitant school fees that will probably go up again, (currently about $4,000 per term), the price of food, and fuel, and seemingly everything around me, also going up apart from my salary, which I am reluctant to put up. (I have already given the majority of staff raises but now business is so low I don't feel I can justify raising my own, especially as chances are in the next few weeks that I'll have to lay off some of the junior staff which is playing on my mind, as I have no idea what they will do if I lay them off as business is so bad all over the country and there is no work, and it will probably get a lot harder before it gets better.)

I think perhaps I should stick my own head in the sand and not get quite so stressed about the situation and what these poor people are going through. Maybe I'd feel a whole lot better.