Wolfgang Fley in his hotel. [Photo/www.sde.co.ke]
Wolfgang Fley is a foreigner from Germany who ha been in Kenya for years.
He has a hotel in Coast where he sells varieties of food to earn living.
It might sound weird to many people to see a white man selling food like githeri in Kenya for a living but believe it or not, Wolfgang Fley owns a hotel in Ukunda, selling local good foodstuff and he claims that the job is quite promising.Fley's hotel is a single room covered with coconut palm fronds, known as "makuti" suited in Ukunda in Kwale, with an open entrance and a menu displayed next to the door.On the menu, there are some of Kenya’s favourite meals with their respective prices. Food prices are affordable and friendly. Local people around there can afford. On the menu, the food names are written in an amusing way with spelling errors, for instance, black tea is spelled as ‘blach tea,’ while ‘giteri’ is meant to be githeri. The cost of food ranges from Sh10 to Sh40 per plate.Wolfgang stipulated that he cooks and sell githeri, cabbages, sima, chapati and other dishes and will soon start makingpilau.Fley has employed a worker who assists him in running the hotel. He works with his 57-year-old Kenyan wife, Maureen Samuel, with whom he lives in a rented Swahili house. He discloses that he was a chef in Germany and cooking is his favourite job.He was asked why he couldn’t come up with a nice restaurant along the beach, Fley responded that there are no tourists flocking the Coast currently and Kenyans will definitely buy local.He discloses that its now two years down the line since he opened the hotel and that most of his clients are local business people in the adjacent Ibiza market.“Kenyan meals are easy to cook,” says the German as he walked out to get change for Sh500 for his customer.Maureen Samuel, the only waitress says that she was employed to assist him in communicating with customers who hardly speak English or German.Maureen Samuel stipulated that Fley do most of the work like washing utensils, cooking and even serving. I also do the same, but mostly for those clients who are comfortable communicating in Kiswahili. Masha Katana is one of the clients we found in the restaurant. He says the food, especially the githeri, is really good and delicious.“The food is good and quite cheap though the portions are a bit small. Most of us prefer quantity to quality,” quoted Masha.
His hotel is designed in a way that can't attract royal customers but customers who have been there are claiming that their food is 100% hygienic and nobody has ever complained about a stomach upset.