On Fathers’ Day, Kenya’s trans community was in mourning for the loss of our father, Arnest Thiaya. We lost him on 14 June, not long after the passing of Nakshy Saeed, the director of Pwani Trans, a Mombasa-based initiative that advocates human rights, social recognition and inclusion for the country’s transgender community.
Thiaya would have turned 52 this year, a feat for a Kenyan trans person. Our life expectancy is 50; multiple socioeconomic vulnerabilities contribute to our short lives.
He started living his authentic self as a trans man in 1986, way before there was any trans community in Kenya to speak of. Way before he even had the language to say what he was going through. He remembered walking into Kenyatta National Hospital and telling a doctor that he felt like his body was not his, that there was something terribly wrong. Fortunately for Thiaya he found medics who were open to making the journey with him, to venture into what was then seen as uncharted waters for medical practice.
