when I was in my third year of high
school my dad and I started this thing
of trading letters so every few weeks I
would write a letter to him or he would
like write a letter to me and in the
letters would tell each other how our
weeks were and what we planned for the
next week so one day I received a letter
from him and it had a printout and they
had in on that printout was advisory but
I’d like to call this story the coffee
bean story because it is my story and I
see myself as a coffee bean there’s a
man who was a cook and he had a teenage
daughter and the daughter I wanted to go
to the mall to hang out with her friends
and so he took her to the kitchen when
she asked for some money to go and hang
out with her friends
he took her to the kitchen and took
three super ears three pans in one he
put some carrots in the next he put some
eggs and in the side when he put some
coffee beans and then he puts equal
amount of water and he put them on the
fire after some time the girl started
wondering how is this going to give me
money how will I go and hang out with my
friends then he took three bulls in one
he put the carrots in the second he put
the eggs and inside he put the coffee
beans and he asked her what do you see
and she was bought at this time so she
just said loosely I see some mashed up
carrots I see some eggs that have a
hard-boiled and I see some coffee beans
that have changed the colour of the
water and he said this is exactly what I
wanted you to see in life we all go
through some form of adversary’
some form of hot water
and some people are like carrots they’re
strong and orange and flashy and you can
see them from afar but once they go
through the hot water they become mashed
up sometimes even tasteless when you put
mountain and other people are like the
eggs they’re so fragile and they can’t
stand on their own but once they go
through the hot water they are strong
they’re hard-boiled then there is final
group the coffee beans they do not let
the color of the water change them but
they change the color of the water and
he finished by asking her of these three
which one do you identify mostly I felt
like my dad had asked me that question
so in my response to him I told him that
I am a coffee bean I want to change the
color of the water little did I know
that in my third year of high school I
was making a statement that I would live
with for the rest of my life the next
year I was diagnosed with epilepsy I had
to spend most of my time out of school
and only came back during the final
exams which i sat mom passed and was
admitted at the University of Nairobi to
pursue a degree in actuarial sense but
as I was waiting to go to uni I was
sexually assaulted by someone in you and
so I went to uni and could only stay for
two years and I dropped out because I
didn’t have proper support system and I
didn’t have good coping mechanisms I got
a job after that and I was fired from
that job I had a seizure in the
workplace and fell on a client and so I
was fired then chucked trauma from the
repo deal was later diagnosed as bipolar
and so there was
out of university out of a job with two
illnesses that no one knows much about
and so I got really really depressed to
the point of suicide and I got to a
point where I felt the universe was
asking me of these three things which
one are you are you going to be mashed
up carrots because of your experiences
are you going to be a hard-boiled egg
are you going to be a coffee bean and
change the color of the water Africa as
a continent has gone through its fair
share of hot water we’ve had most of the
things being said here we’ve had about
leadership we’ve had about corruption
we’ve had about diseases we’ve had about
harmful cultural practices and almost
every day we as Africans wake up and
face that question do we want to be
mashed up carrot so hard boiled eggs or
coffee beans that change the colour of
the water and something we never really
talk about something that we even
consider a taboo is the psychological
effects of all these things World Health
Organization estimates it estimates the
one in every four of us will experience
a mental health condition so just the
way you’ve said count four and then one
of you would be holding it out for the
team
and all these people should they have
the information and the resources and
should they live in a country like Kenya
will have to compete for the services of
only 79 psychiatrists that’s one in
roughly 500,000 Kenyans are compete for
space in one major referral hospitals
and when we talk about one in every four
of us we mean that at least one person
in each household in this country having
a brush with depression or anxiety
disorders or like me having bipolar or
even having schizophrenia one in every
person in this household been told that
what they have might be a spirit or
maybe as a result of witchcraft one in
every four of us finding themselves in
that space where they have to decide if
they’ll be mashed up carrots or eggs or
coffee beans that change the color of
the water so when I think of New
Horizons in Africa I don’t think of new
innovations I think of new ways of doing
things
and I picked up one old age way of doing
things
storytelling and I told my story I told
it on my blog even if just to myself
because no one else ever told the story
I had never read about anyone’s repo
deal I had never read about living with
epilepsy or bipolar and so I told my
story and then why told it’s the most
demo people told me their stories and my
told it the more I got closer to opening
up this composition then Google came
along and they had this competition to
see how Africans by using their products
and they picked my blog as one of the
win
the Google Africa competition because I
told stories no one wanted to talk about
and I used the money to start to set up
a platform where other people in this
country can tell those stories that they
have fraid to tell anyone about and
within our first year we had 11,000
people who’d written in and who we had
connected to psychiatrist and counselors
and support groups and I kept telling my
stories and I found myself sitting at
the national mental health policy review
board speaking on behalf of people like
myself who had no one to tell their
stories to and last year were able to
launch the first version of Kenya’s
mental health policy and I kept telling
my story in wax pieces and schools
places that I wish someone had told
their story so that I had a story to
lean on too so when I think of New
Horizons in Africa I think of people who
decide to be coffee beans to change the
color of the water where they are with
whatever they have
[Applause]
school my dad and I started this thing
of trading letters so every few weeks I
would write a letter to him or he would
like write a letter to me and in the
letters would tell each other how our
weeks were and what we planned for the
next week so one day I received a letter
from him and it had a printout and they
had in on that printout was advisory but
I’d like to call this story the coffee
bean story because it is my story and I
see myself as a coffee bean there’s a
man who was a cook and he had a teenage
daughter and the daughter I wanted to go
to the mall to hang out with her friends
and so he took her to the kitchen when
she asked for some money to go and hang
out with her friends
he took her to the kitchen and took
three super ears three pans in one he
put some carrots in the next he put some
eggs and in the side when he put some
coffee beans and then he puts equal
amount of water and he put them on the
fire after some time the girl started
wondering how is this going to give me
money how will I go and hang out with my
friends then he took three bulls in one
he put the carrots in the second he put
the eggs and inside he put the coffee
beans and he asked her what do you see
and she was bought at this time so she
just said loosely I see some mashed up
carrots I see some eggs that have a
hard-boiled and I see some coffee beans
that have changed the colour of the
water and he said this is exactly what I
wanted you to see in life we all go
through some form of adversary’
some form of hot water
and some people are like carrots they’re
strong and orange and flashy and you can
see them from afar but once they go
through the hot water they become mashed
up sometimes even tasteless when you put
mountain and other people are like the
eggs they’re so fragile and they can’t
stand on their own but once they go
through the hot water they are strong
they’re hard-boiled then there is final
group the coffee beans they do not let
the color of the water change them but
they change the color of the water and
he finished by asking her of these three
which one do you identify mostly I felt
like my dad had asked me that question
so in my response to him I told him that
I am a coffee bean I want to change the
color of the water little did I know
that in my third year of high school I
was making a statement that I would live
with for the rest of my life the next
year I was diagnosed with epilepsy I had
to spend most of my time out of school
and only came back during the final
exams which i sat mom passed and was
admitted at the University of Nairobi to
pursue a degree in actuarial sense but
as I was waiting to go to uni I was
sexually assaulted by someone in you and
so I went to uni and could only stay for
two years and I dropped out because I
didn’t have proper support system and I
didn’t have good coping mechanisms I got
a job after that and I was fired from
that job I had a seizure in the
workplace and fell on a client and so I
was fired then chucked trauma from the
repo deal was later diagnosed as bipolar
and so there was
out of university out of a job with two
illnesses that no one knows much about
and so I got really really depressed to
the point of suicide and I got to a
point where I felt the universe was
asking me of these three things which
one are you are you going to be mashed
up carrots because of your experiences
are you going to be a hard-boiled egg
are you going to be a coffee bean and
change the color of the water Africa as
a continent has gone through its fair
share of hot water we’ve had most of the
things being said here we’ve had about
leadership we’ve had about corruption
we’ve had about diseases we’ve had about
harmful cultural practices and almost
every day we as Africans wake up and
face that question do we want to be
mashed up carrot so hard boiled eggs or
coffee beans that change the colour of
the water and something we never really
talk about something that we even
consider a taboo is the psychological
effects of all these things World Health
Organization estimates it estimates the
one in every four of us will experience
a mental health condition so just the
way you’ve said count four and then one
of you would be holding it out for the
team
and all these people should they have
the information and the resources and
should they live in a country like Kenya
will have to compete for the services of
only 79 psychiatrists that’s one in
roughly 500,000 Kenyans are compete for
space in one major referral hospitals
and when we talk about one in every four
of us we mean that at least one person
in each household in this country having
a brush with depression or anxiety
disorders or like me having bipolar or
even having schizophrenia one in every
person in this household been told that
what they have might be a spirit or
maybe as a result of witchcraft one in
every four of us finding themselves in
that space where they have to decide if
they’ll be mashed up carrots or eggs or
coffee beans that change the color of
the water so when I think of New
Horizons in Africa I don’t think of new
innovations I think of new ways of doing
things
and I picked up one old age way of doing
things
storytelling and I told my story I told
it on my blog even if just to myself
because no one else ever told the story
I had never read about anyone’s repo
deal I had never read about living with
epilepsy or bipolar and so I told my
story and then why told it’s the most
demo people told me their stories and my
told it the more I got closer to opening
up this composition then Google came
along and they had this competition to
see how Africans by using their products
and they picked my blog as one of the
win
the Google Africa competition because I
told stories no one wanted to talk about
and I used the money to start to set up
a platform where other people in this
country can tell those stories that they
have fraid to tell anyone about and
within our first year we had 11,000
people who’d written in and who we had
connected to psychiatrist and counselors
and support groups and I kept telling my
stories and I found myself sitting at
the national mental health policy review
board speaking on behalf of people like
myself who had no one to tell their
stories to and last year were able to
launch the first version of Kenya’s
mental health policy and I kept telling
my story in wax pieces and schools
places that I wish someone had told
their story so that I had a story to
lean on too so when I think of New
Horizons in Africa I think of people who
decide to be coffee beans to change the
color of the water where they are with
whatever they have
[Applause]
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