Every morning, from 6 to 7 a.m., they arm themselves with sacks and good will, face masks and social distances, and clean "their" beach, that of Silversand in Malindi.
It's the beach operators (don't call them "beach boys", because they have formed an association and they do things seriously, while maintaining their jovial and jaunty air) who in hard times like these, when the low tourist season has been flanked by the plague Covid-19, have no income to survive and feed their families.
The Progress Welfare Association of Malindi of which we are part, with some supporters and readers of our portal, have helped these "eternal boys", who are also fathers and husbands, to overcome in some way this bad time, supporting them with a food program implemented by providing them with monthly vauchers of the Tuskys supermarket and allowing them to stock up on corn flour, oil and other basic kinds to get by.
In return, it has been explained to them that from now on they will have to be the "guardians" of the beach, which in this season is very good for tourism but scourged by tides and plastic and debris brought by the river and deposited by the ocean. First of all, the daily cleaning activity has started, which is bearing fruit. Sometimes there are more than ten shifts, other times there are 4 or 5, but there is a lot of work to be done. PWAM has put them in contact with the county environment department and the garbage truck now makes an extra stop in the morning at the beach to load the bags full of "taka taka" that the beach operators, led by the manager Emmanuel, collect.
For this initiative we would like to thank, in addition to Kate Mwikali and Rita Valentini, Pasquale Pes, Roberta Lar and Enzo D'Antuono for their contribution.