In the nineties, at the height of international tourism in Kenya, when Italy alone was close to a hundred thousand presences a year, it was said that there were three Kenyans: the rural, tribal and difficult to penetrate one, the one in the capital Nairobi, the button room, and finally the holiday paradise, safari and sea.
The first comprised the vast north, taking you to Ethiopia, Uganda, Sudan and Somalia: Semi-arid areas to cross to get to nowhere where, in thousands of kilometres, only Lake Turkana was mentioned as memorable, endless strips of borders to avoid, especially the one with the turbulent Somali Islamic anarchy, inextricable forests populated by almost unknown ethnic groups, among former cannibals and elephant hunters, and mountains equipped neither for mountaineering nor for curbing certain endemic diseases. Shepherds and farmers frequently slaughtered each other, but no one came to know, child brides were infibulated, sold and raped, but no one objected, and so on.
The second Kenya was growing and becoming more civilised every day. The US (which at that time, remember? They were a power, indeed 'the' power) was pressing for a true multiparty and democratic system, making the presidentialism inherited from independence wobble, with 24 years of Jomo Kenyatta and already about fifteen of his dauphin, Daniel Arap Moi. In an attempt to maintain ancient privileges, with the international alibi of warding off tribal wars, every now and then a rampant politician or a lively opponent was disappeared, an intellectual imprisoned and a rebel tortured.
Whether for work or bureaucracy, every three or four months from the coast I would travel to the capital, and alongside the colonial patina, the confusion of the working-class neighbourhoods and the dangerousness close to the centre, every time a new skyscraper, a widened street, a shopping mall, a new piece of metropolis would appear.

Today we speak of an enormous social divide, observing the decay of the slums and the modern luxury of hotels, clubs and offices, but it is above all an economic divide. Only three decades ago, on the other hand, it was less than an hour's flight from witchcraft rituals and the handing over of widowed brides to the dead man's brother, to the opening of a multinational company headquarters.
But those who discovered the beauty of Kenya more or less ignored all this or, better still, branded it as the inevitable savage, cruel, unfair if you will, part of the wonder. The flip side of a golden medal, the 'A-side' that one could safely disregard, seeing and enjoying so much 'B-side'.
Tourists discovered the savannah overflowing with animals and where for hours and hours of off-roading there was no sign of civilisation, very long white beaches without a sound or noise other than that of the ocean, all sorts of comforts at bargain prices, a cheerful, naive and hopeful welcome from the sunniest part of the population, as well as friendly, accommodating and cunning from Arab and Indian merchants selling everything they could sell.
There was so much freedom that tourism has evolved in a way that is far too cumbersome and disrespectful of the environment, with hotels and residences like barracks, between Nyali and Malindi, and without master plans that would preserve that precious Middle Eastern heritage of Swahili Africa harmoniously embedded in the settings of sand, palm trees and coral reefs.

What remains, after more than thirty years of travelling in Kenya?
Almost suddenly, the digital age of connection arrived, making everything visible and bringing it mentally closer. The border with Ethiopia is still a thousand kilometres from Nairobi and two days' drive away, but on the Internet you can get there in thirty seconds, aboard a drone. The breaking down of certain barriers, although positive from the knowledge point of view, has however created the unfortunate effect of believing that all aspects of the country are now coexisting and can create conflicting situations and insecurity. The media, riding the wave of sensationalism for years, has begun to convince itself of this, telling stories of conflict and tension even where there never was any.
Kenya number one, the vast and rural one, is still such but much more urbanised, so much so that the man-animal conflict is an everyday occurrence, women have emancipated themselves and so many are escaping from ancestral slavery and are organising themselves into communities, in the 'hot' areas there is more warfare over a cow and a mobile phone than over ethnic issues, and the indigenous people of the forests are so few in number that they cannot even organise a football match between bachelors and new widows' husbands.
Nairobi is 'caput Africa': a metropolis with all the pros and cons and above all the opportunities of the world's big cities. With exponential growth and the risk of default just around the corner, with life increasingly constrained by expenses, rules and digitalisation, but with immense scope for creativity and profit for those with the will to do.

And tourism? The risk of the 'social' era of making all the grass into a broad band is to think that Kenya is just one and that it encompasses all its ancient worlds. Instead, in the end, the places that have changed the least and remained detached from the rest of the country that is being told about, are precisely the tourist destinations: where a beach boy is more of an 'influencer' than a 2 million 'like' politician, where she is still 'different from all the others' and has no intention of changing, where the mango is still incredibly sweet and fragrant, and if you go to the beach, the fisherman gets off the boat and sells you something fantastic that still wiggles, where despite the fact that monthly subscriptions to everything are more affordable, people continue to live by the day. Where security and cheating for tourists are always directly proportional to their ease and recklessness, and where in the end nature, though slapped with concrete hands and robbed with the invincible weapons of corruption, always manages to enchant.
In conclusion, for the very few who have made it this far, this excursus is to explain to those who write to us who are worried about the new social uprisings and street protests by young people, that if there is one thing that has not changed in so many years in Kenya, while the world has changed features and almost a geological era, it is holidays in its dream places.

"And you could have easily told us in two lines, couldn't you?" (cit.)
Excuse me, I ply the trade of reporting Kenya on a voluntary basis, let me at least have some fun....