A legend from the Kenyan mountains

"Kamran", "the place of the men".

According to the story, 500 years ago the mountains of West Pokot were affected by a long drought, which caused a devastating famine.

The men, the head of the households, the breadwinners couldn't accept to see their wives and kids to die. As so, they all went to the cliff, held each others hands, and sacrifice themselves jumping from the cliff.

Kamran, said with a harsh pronounciation which somehow remind me the sounds of the dialect on my home place - only readers from Baruffini will understand what I am talking about.... 

My hosts in West Pokot want me to see the cliff. They call a boda (motorbike) and they send me off under the protection of one of their son - both on the same motorcycle, obviously. 

We leave Tamugh behind, and start climbing the mountains again, and again, like the days before. Completely lost, immersed in nature, in the nuanced green of a florid nature and in the steepness of a muddy road which escalates this place always higher, higher, and higher. I wonder where we will stop finding households. The reply is "never". At some point the road becomes a path, and we abandoned the motorcycle. We start walking, the boys walk too fast: they keep asking "you okay, m'mam?", and then walk away leaving my alone in the maze of the jungle.  Sometimes some kids appear from the bushes, and then run away shouting at me.

We meet two other guys, two shepherds in charge of some goats. They join the group. One of them actually starts waiting for me, and tells me the story of the men of Kamran.

Going to the cliff was amazing: I never saw such a place. Mountains which suddenly stops and leave space for a limitless flatness to start. The only thing which connect the highs and the lows are the trees, a multitude of trees that cover the land as well as the peaks. It is unbelievable. It causes me an uncontrollable feeling of vertigo. It kind of confuses me - again. It reminds me once more how varied, and geologically surprising, and incredible this country is. How amazing, exciting and resourceful. But also, with the story of Kamran, how difficult it can be for its inhabitants...