Nikki spoke to the ordinary men and women of Africa to bring real flavour of what life is like on the continent. This is what you had to say about Africa.
Sanj, New Zealand I still find it hard to get Kenya out of my system. My immediate family and wife were all born in Kenya and we still frequently spend our holidays there - once we get over the jetlag.
We would all go back permanently if it weren't for the lack of security in Kenya - esp Nairobi (Nai-robbery). Also we have been in NZ since the 70s, so its difficult to uproot ones self.
Its a shame what has happened to the country and how corrupt it has become - we rarely venture into Nairobi city any more and most Asians hang out in the outer suburbs - esp Westlands.
Favourite places in Kenya - Masai Mara, The Arc, South Coast Mombasa (Diani Beach), Ali Baba's Restaurant, Snake Park, Gypsies (Nightclub in Westlands - my liver has still not recovered.)
Regards, Sanj NRK(Non Resident Kenyan)
Birmingham, UK
Hello Nikki, I have been enjoying you talk on Africa on Drive, I was born and raised in Harare, Zimbabwe. I left Harare about 4 years ago. My grandad arrived from India, he then went to Tanzania, moved to Zambia, Mozambique then finally settled in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe is a beautiful country with plenty of tourist attractions like Victoria Falls, Kariba, Nyanga and the Great Zimbabwe Ruins. Tobacco and tourism used to be one of the foreign currency earners for the country but not anymore as tourists are scared to visit and most of the farmers have left the country I miss my family and friends, the lifestyle, the weather. My husband is from Zambia and we both hope to move back to Africa one day.
Toral Tank, NewJ ersey,USA I was born and brought up in Africa, specifically Zambia and Kenya. Though I have been out and abroad for a few years the changes I saw happening the last year in Kenya, where I live and Africa as a whole are great. There is still some more to do and a long way to go but the main thing is the corruption and the literacy levels that have to be looked into. Nairobi is truly a city that tourists like and many compliment it. Maybe with some aid it can be made to an equivalent to some of the world 's great cities to come.
Ajit, Australia I was born in a town called Kibos near Kisumu, an area surrounded by sugar cane farms, on either side were Punjabi farmers. To a person coming from overseas it would have felt like the fields of Punjab. My favourite memories are of my grandmother and mum cooking food on the weekends under the massive jamna trees on the farm we called a shamba. I remember driving with my grand dad to miwani sugar cane factory with tractors and trailers filled with sugarcane on either side of the roads. Everyday I think of those happy days when as a child I had not a care for the world. One of the saddest days in my life was when we left Kenya and when my grandparents passed away. One day I hope to return to Kenya to live in my motherland.
Aasif Chanandin; Nashville, TN USA Nikki,
My grandparents moved to Uganda, back when the country was all part of the British Empire. My parents were born and raised there. I was bornt here as well, but had to leave when I was 3 years old. What my parents told me of Africa and what I can see now are completely different. Africa needs to realize that corruption and nepotism will never help, but we in the west must also understand that we cannot prop up tin can dictators for our best interests only. My father passed away always wanting to go back to his birth place. I hope that is not my fate either.
Robin, Leicester Live 8 will not help politically to stamp out poverty, because politicians don't care anything for the poor, they are clever business men who have been groomed since childhood to become the best, most successful money making machines and that is all they know and are very good at........ with most going on to own huge companies and owning vast shares in other huge multi-national companies where many create smaller companies which create addictive and habit forming products like tobacco, alcohol etc because they know people can be bought through their desires, habits and greed’s.
A friend of Manubhai Over Thirty years ago, my friend Manubhai Madhvani joined thousands of Asians fleeing Uganda in the exodus of 1972. It was a traumatic uprooting, precipitated by the ruthless dictator ldi Amin, who with Teutonic efficiency purged the country of around 80,000 Asians in just 90 days. Madhvani's first glimpse of the dull grey skies of England was from an old army barracks set up near Stansted to accommodate planeload after planeload of refugees. Around 35,000 landed with very small suitcases and a handful of their possessions, some with no more than the shirts on their backs, as the army would often stop departing immigrants and steal everything they had. Before leaving, Madhvani was imprisoned for three weeks - suspected by the Ugandan authorities of being a British spy - an episode linked to the English director of one of his companies, a man he remembers only as "Mr Stewart". Mr Stewart, based in Kampala, wrote regularly to his wife who lived in Britain. On one occasion, his letters were intercepted and opened by Amin's police but he still loves his place of birth, Uganda.
Isidore, Former French soldier I was fighting African people on behalf of the Europeans doesn't mean that I'm not proud of being black. I'm very proud of being black. But what I want to make clear is that I had no choice. As a French soldier, I had to obey the orders. I fought my African brothers, simply because I didn't have a choice. I lost many of my friends and relatives in Algeria. And even now sometimes, when I sleep at night, I can see them in my nightmares - just the way I'm seeing you. This is a very painful situation. I am an old man now here in Dakar who walks the streets saying, "I'm going mad, I'm going mad", because it's still a nightmare.
Gurjit Singh Bahra Hi Nikki, Mr Matharu was my school teacher here in the UK, although my family was also from Kampala Uganda. I was born in Kampala - Uganda but have very few memories as I was 7 when we came to the UK. But I do remember the weather, the home we left behind and the Ed Clay hockey pitch near our house. Our grandfather first settled in Uganda after the Second World War in which he was a Sergeant in electrical core. My father then joined him with his brother in the early fifties.
Ajaib Matharu, Leicester I was born in Punjab India; from there I was brought by my father to Tanzania when I was only ten years old. I studied in Tanzania and after my school certificate I moved down to Kampala Uganda, where I enrolled in an Asian teaching training college. Uganda was where I matured myself in every aspect, both playing hockey, and teaching at different schools. Hockey was my main interest. My best memory was playing at the Olympics has to be one of them but there are also a few others. My father was working for the Ministry of Works. His job was to connect villages by building roads, and most of these villages were far out in the jungles where there were lots of wild animals. Every holiday me and my friends would go and visit my father and we would come across all of these lions and wild animals, we used to see them from very close up! At night when you were sleeping you could hear all of these noises; lions and hyenas, it was spectacular. Those days were God given gifts to us. They were really wonderful days.
Read what others have said..
Sanj, New Zealand
I still find it hard to get Kenya out of my system. My immediate family and wife were all born in Kenya and we still frequently spend our holidays there - once we get over the jetlag. We would all go back permanently if it weren't for the lack of security in Kenya - esp Nairobi (Nai-robbery). Also we have been in NZ since the 70s, so its difficult to uproot ones self. Its a shame what has happened to the country and how corrupt it has become - we rarely venture into Nairobi city any more and most Asians hang out in the outer suburbs - esp Westlands. Favourite places in Kenya - Masai Mara, The Arc, South Coast Mombasa (Diani Beach), Ali Baba's Restaurant, Snake Park, Gypsies (Nightclub in Westlands - my liver has still not recovered.) Regards, Sanj NRK(Non Resident Kenyan)
Birmingham, UK
Hello Nikki, I have been enjoying you talk on Africa on Drive, I was born and raised in Harare, Zimbabwe. I left Harare about 4 years ago. My grandad arrived from India, he then went to Tanzania, moved to Zambia, Mozambique then finally settled in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe is a beautiful country with plenty of tourist attractions like Victoria Falls, Kariba, Nyanga and the Great Zimbabwe Ruins. Tobacco and tourism used to be one of the foreign currency earners for the country but not anymore as tourists are scared to visit and most of the farmers have left the country I miss my family and friends, the lifestyle, the weather. My husband is from Zambia and we both hope to move back to Africa one day.
Toral Tank, NewJ ersey,USA
I was born and brought up in Africa, specifically Zambia and Kenya. Though I have been out and abroad for a few years the changes I saw happening the last year in Kenya, where I live and Africa as a whole are great. There is still some more to do and a long way to go but the main thing is the corruption and the literacy levels that have to be looked into. Nairobi is truly a city that tourists like and many compliment it. Maybe with some aid it can be made to an equivalent to some of the world 's great cities to come.
Ajit, Australia
I was born in a town called Kibos near Kisumu, an area surrounded by sugar cane farms, on either side were Punjabi farmers. To a person coming from overseas it would have felt like the fields of Punjab. My favourite memories are of my grandmother and mum cooking food on the weekends under the massive jamna trees on the farm we called a shamba. I remember driving with my grand dad to miwani sugar cane factory with tractors and trailers filled with sugarcane on either side of the roads. Everyday I think of those happy days when as a child I had not a care for the world. One of the saddest days in my life was when we left Kenya and when my grandparents passed away. One day I hope to return to Kenya to live in my motherland.
Aasif Chanandin; Nashville, TN USA
Nikki, My grandparents moved to Uganda, back when the country was all part of the British Empire. My parents were born and raised there. I was bornt here as well, but had to leave when I was 3 years old. What my parents told me of Africa and what I can see now are completely different. Africa needs to realize that corruption and nepotism will never help, but we in the west must also understand that we cannot prop up tin can dictators for our best interests only. My father passed away always wanting to go back to his birth place. I hope that is not my fate either.
Robin, Leicester
Live 8 will not help politically to stamp out poverty, because politicians don't care anything for the poor, they are clever business men who have been groomed since childhood to become the best, most successful money making machines and that is all they know and are very good at........ with most going on to own huge companies and owning vast shares in other huge multi-national companies where many create smaller companies which create addictive and habit forming products like tobacco, alcohol etc because they know people can be bought through their desires, habits and greed’s.
A friend of Manubhai
Over Thirty years ago, my friend Manubhai Madhvani joined thousands of Asians fleeing Uganda in the exodus of 1972. It was a traumatic uprooting, precipitated by the ruthless dictator ldi Amin, who with Teutonic efficiency purged the country of around 80,000 Asians in just 90 days. Madhvani's first glimpse of the dull grey skies of England was from an old army barracks set up near Stansted to accommodate planeload after planeload of refugees. Around 35,000 landed with very small suitcases and a handful of their possessions, some with no more than the shirts on their backs, as the army would often stop departing immigrants and steal everything they had. Before leaving, Madhvani was imprisoned for three weeks - suspected by the Ugandan authorities of being a British spy - an episode linked to the English director of one of his companies, a man he remembers only as "Mr Stewart". Mr Stewart, based in Kampala, wrote regularly to his wife who lived in Britain. On one occasion, his letters were intercepted and opened by Amin's police but he still loves his place of birth, Uganda.
Isidore, Former French soldier
I was fighting African people on behalf of the Europeans doesn't mean that I'm not proud of being black. I'm very proud of being black. But what I want to make clear is that I had no choice. As a French soldier, I had to obey the orders. I fought my African brothers, simply because I didn't have a choice. I lost many of my friends and relatives in Algeria. And even now sometimes, when I sleep at night, I can see them in my nightmares - just the way I'm seeing you. This is a very painful situation. I am an old man now here in Dakar who walks the streets saying, "I'm going mad, I'm going mad", because it's still a nightmare.
Gurjit Singh Bahra
Hi Nikki, Mr Matharu was my school teacher here in the UK, although my family was also from Kampala Uganda. I was born in Kampala - Uganda but have very few memories as I was 7 when we came to the UK. But I do remember the weather, the home we left behind and the Ed Clay hockey pitch near our house. Our grandfather first settled in Uganda after the Second World War in which he was a Sergeant in electrical core. My father then joined him with his brother in the early fifties.
Ajaib Matharu, Leicester
I was born in Punjab India; from there I was brought by my father to Tanzania when I was only ten years old. I studied in Tanzania and after my school certificate I moved down to Kampala Uganda, where I enrolled in an Asian teaching training college. Uganda was where I matured myself in every aspect, both playing hockey, and teaching at different schools. Hockey was my main interest. My best memory was playing at the Olympics has to be one of them but there are also a few others. My father was working for the Ministry of Works. His job was to connect villages by building roads, and most of these villages were far out in the jungles where there were lots of wild animals. Every holiday me and my friends would go and visit my father and we would come across all of these lions and wild animals, we used to see them from very close up! At night when you were sleeping you could hear all of these noises; lions and hyenas, it was spectacular. Those days were God given gifts to us. They were really wonderful days.