Former US President Barack Obama is expected to make his third visit to his late father's homeland this Sunday.
Obama's first visit to Kenya was in 2006 while he was a Senator at the US Congress, the second one was in 2015 while he was the US President and the third one he will be coming as a private citizen.
However, what may be unknown to many is that this third visit may be the most important and exciting to Obama as he had once indicated in 2015 while still serving as the US President.
"I'll be honest with you, visiting Kenya as a private citizen is probably more meaningful to me than visiting as president because I can actually get outside of a hotel room or a conference centre," Obama was quoted saying by the BBC ahead of his 2015 presidential visit.
When he made this comment, BBC reports that Obama was wistful about the then-upcoming presidential visit making it clear to his handlers that he would rather go without security restrictions. But despite his wishes, this couldn't be allowed as he was still the US President who had to be protected around the clock.
Nevertheless, his upcoming visit which he has seemingly been longing for will be very different from the previous one which perhaps will make it 'meaningful' to him.
For instance, he will not be travelling in a 'bubble' as it was the case last time. A bubble is a tightly managed network of aircrafts, vehicles and communication that lets a US President move easily around the world. The bubble provides safety, but it's confining.
Other things that will be spectacularly missing from this visit include the Airforce One, Marine One and the Beast. Security Service (SS) agents will also be fewer in number. Obama will, therefore, be at ease to interact with those he will meet during his visit.
Finally, you can expect that there will be no much media craze as it was in 2015 where cameras both local and international were chasing him left, right and centre. This will, of course, enable him to enjoy some private moments with his Kenyan family members.
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