From The Daily Nation October 5, 2008

In a marble hall at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, the remains of two lions from Tsavo have been reconstituted into lifelike mounts.

One stands watch over the savannah while the other crouches as if waiting to pounce.

But Ghost and Darkness, as they have been named, gained worldwide notoriety over 100 years ago for their taste for human flesh when they attacked and killed an estimated 135 Indian and African labourers working on the Tsavo Bridge in 1898.

The “man-eaters of Tsavo,†as the lions are popularly known, are a major attraction at the museum, as well as one that has joined the controversy over the desirability of returning artefacts and objects removed from their places of origin during the colonial period.

Sharing scenic complex

Another ‘lion’ from Kenya shares the same scenic complex with the big cats from Tsavo. He is Dr Chapurukha Makokha Kusimba, Curator of African Archaeology and Ethnology at the Field Museum and Professor of Anthropology at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

“The lions of Tsavo play a very useful role as a bridge between the US and Kenya and as a source of great inspiration for Kenyans in the diaspora,†Dr Kusimba told Lifestyle.

“I have been witness to the lavish display of affection and pride when Kenyans visit the Field Museum and see the lions.â€

The two maneless male lions have been in Chicago since 1924 when the man who hunted them down, Colonel John Henry Patterson (1867-1947), sold their skins and skulls to the museum (reportedly for $5,000, quite a tidy amount of money by the standards of that time).

Dr Kusimba joined the museum 70 years later in 1994. A man roaring with as much zeal for life as for his profession, he leads an ‘eat-and-think’ breakfast club of professionals who meet regularly to ponder weighty issues of the day while enjoying themselves at the same time.

Chap, as Dr Kusimba is known to his friends, finds the patriotism of overseas Kenyans remarkable and says their commitment to the country is heightened when they see the big cats from Tsavo at the museum.
But shouldn’t these Kenyan lions be repatriated as part of Kenya’s historical legacy instead of hanging out in an American museum?

“After seeing the historic man-eaters in Chicago, thousands of Americans join safaris to Kenya’s Tsavo parks to see the country’s unique maneless lions in their natural environment,†Dr Kusimba replied.
But he fears that if the lions are repatriated, they would disappear like many other valuable relics of Kenya’s past.

“When was the last time the National Museums held a workshop to educate the Customs officials on how to detect and prevent antiquities from being smuggled out of the country?†he asked, insisting that more care should be taken of indigenous artefacts to avoid their being neglected and simply becoming ‘‘home to rodents.’’

For Dr Kusimba, a more urgent project is to protect artefacts still in Kenyan museums from disappearing from under the noses of unscrupulous officials.

Although he doesn’t say so outright, he is sceptical about trying to repatriate the man-eaters if they could serve a higher purpose by remaining where they are in an increasingly interconnected world.

Chap Kusimba’s life has been defined by crossing borders. He was born in 1962 in Uganda where his father worked at the Kilembe copper mines. He grew up in the remote village of Kaptola in Mt Elgon District on the boundary between Kenya and Uganda.

Respected scholar

Now a respected international scholar, he was the third child out of nine children born to Jacob Makokha Kusimba and Dorcas Nabangala Wepukhulu, and the first in the family to go to college.

While his father was a self-made civil engineer who later rose to be a senior engineer with Kenya Railways, his mother had only four years of education. She married Chap’s father when she was 15.

Proud that he shares the same roof with the lions of Tsavo, Dr Kusimba observes that Kenyans from all corners of the world are intertwined with the history of these big cats.

“The lions are a lasting cord connecting the children of diaspora Kenyans to the country of their ancestral home.

This link will become more and more relevant for Kenyans in the homeland when we consider the opportunities about to be unleashed by Barack Obama’s candidacy and the possibility of a son of a Kenyan attaining the most important office on the planet,†said Dr Kusimba, who is a resident of Chicago, where Obama also lives.
Educated at Kenyatta University and Bryn Mawr college, in Pennsylvania, Chap Kusimba spent his formative years working under some of Kenya’s best minds, including Prof Bethwell Allan Ogot, Prof William Ochieng’ and Prof Simiyu Wandibba.

He credits the excellent prose of Kenya’s foremost woman writer, Grace Ogot, with his early love for books.
His elder brother, Musikiti Makokha Kusimba, now a highly decorated police officer and the Director of Intelligence at the National Security Intelligence Service, served as a role model. “Kity inspired me with his determination, hard work, patriotism and devotion to family and country,†Dr Kusimba said.
At Kenyatta University the young Chapurukha Makokha studied history and linguistics with a special focus on Kiswahili language and literature. But he harboured a burning ambition to study human evolution, a course the institution did not offer.

Kenyan conservationist and archaeologist Dr Richard Leakey was among the mentors who encouraged Chap to pursue higher education in the United States.

After internships with various Kenyan institutions and interactions with visiting international scholars, in May 1987 Chap accepted a five-year fellowship to study anthropology at Bryn Mawr.

Although the college may not be well known in Kenya, it is ranked among the top 10 in the United States in many of its fields, and Dr Kusimba was happy to have had a chance to go there.

Reputation and commitment

“Bryn Mawr was the best thing that ever happened to me,†he said. “Besides its reputation and commitment to excellent teaching, research, and a liberal education, Bryn Mawr attracted exceptionally talented students, many of whom were women.â€

He has spent time at the University Museum of Pennsylvania, Temple University, the Peabody Museum at Harvard University and the University of Arizona.

“I am humbled by my fortune to have received an outstanding education and training both in Kenya and the United States,†he said.

“Throughout my career I have had dedicated mentors who have moulded and shaped my perspective that teamwork, hard work, vision, mission, discipline, independence, and direction are the most critical ingredients in forging successful careers.’’

Proud of his Kenyan roots, the man who grew up on the rural slopes of Mount Elgon before joining Kimilili Boys Secondary School (1976-79) and Chesamisi High School (1980-81) — both in Bungoma — has fond things to say about America as well, especially for giving him unlimited opportunities in his area of expertise.

“I have discovered that a level playing field, which includes equal access to resources and a strict adherence to meritocracy, will often bring out the best of our potential,†he said.

“Many a time I have been saddened that this philosophy is not observed in Kenya.

Failure to offer equal opportunities to all remains one of the most crucial challenges that we face in our fledgling democracy.â€

A member of the Bukusu community whose ideals connect him to the rest of the world, Dr Kisimba said the Bukusu call themselves “the children of the ‘thigh of the elephant’ in reference to their multi-ethnic origins that can be traced to all the groups in and around Mount Elgon.

Their most immediate neighbours are the Iteso, Sabaot, Ogiek, and Nandi, with whom they have interacted for many generations.â€

He says that although the country is now divided along tribal lines, Kenya’s traditional lifestyles emphasised inter-ethnic harmony.

“My grandparents always emphasised that we were related to all neighbouring groups, and their message was always one of love and tolerance. Grandfather spoke all the languages of his neighbours and was at home among the Sabaot, Ogiek, and Iteso, to whom he preached the Quaker message of universal peace and brotherhood between 1930 and 1950.â€

Turkish physicist

Dr Kisimba is married to Sibel Barut, an American from Boulder, Colorado. Her father, Asim Orhan Barut, is a well-known Turkish physicist and her mother, Pierrette Helene, is Swiss.

The couple have two children, Jesse, 13, and Eve, 10, whom their father describes as “citizens of the world boasting Kenyan-American-Swiss-Turkish heritage.â€

An archaeologist interested in prehistoric and historic African cultures, Sibel Kisimba is a professor at the Northern Illinois University in Chicago.

Her fieldwork in Kenya has focused on the origins of food production and the development of urban settlements and pre-colonial East African states.

“I owe my success to my wife,†Dr Kisimba said. “She has nurtured me and continues to provide dedicated support from the time I planned my first major fieldwork at the coast in 1989 to the present time.

Since 1998 we have worked together as a husband-and-wife team. We alternate, as much as possible, the times we go to the field, and we are each other’s critics.â€

His children have developed an interest in their parents’ work and are proud of their Kenyan roots.

“They are already world travellers and are learning the joys and frustrations of doing archaeology, enduring the often long exile of Daddy as I do my fieldwork in different parts of the world.â€

His own early childhood was divided between town and country, and his father was often absent.

“My father worked in several places,†he explained. “We saw very little of him, mostly once every three months when he would come home to visit.

His grandparents, Jesse and Rachel Kusimba, filled the void. They were devout Quakers who converted to Christianity in 1916.

“We all gathered with them to listen to Bible stories and fairy tales and to sing traditional and Christian hymns. This was also the only place to take refuge from vexed parents offended by our antics.â€

Despite the high esteem in which academic institutions are held as sites of knowledge, Kusimba is aware of their soft underbelly.

“I have learned through experience to be wary of fair-weather friendship,†he said.

“I despise the posturing that is so evident in academia today. Some people don’t pay attention to your commitment to your work.â€

He says to succeed in life and in your career in the United States and elsewhere, you must have thick skin and be willing to take criticism from others.