As football enthusiasts watched Arsenal unleash a torrent of goals against Chelsea on the night of April 23, a cloudburst descended on Nairobi, wreaking havoc on the poorly drained roads, flooding homes and sweeping away dozens of residents who live by river banks.
Caught in the unforgiving deluge was a grandmother who had travelled from Homa Bay County to stay at her daughter s house as she sought medical treatment in the capital.
The horror that Salome Anyango encountered that night as she fought to save her own life and those of her daughter, Jacinta Adhiambo, her grandchildren and a friendly neighbour she had just met left permanent physical and emotional scars.
So heavy was the downpour that the characteristic night sounds were silenced by the rains pitter-patter. With every drop of rain on the roofs of their corrugated iron sheet shacks, water kept rising, resulting in flooding that caught many families in Mathare slums by surprise.
Some rivers within the city and dams in the outskirts soaked so much rainwater that night that they ended up vomiting overflows that snaked their way to houses built in low-lying areas.
That night, Ms Anyango was with her daughter in her house in Mathare Area 4, together with her two grandchildren, Austin Ochieng and Jillvin Sherry.
The Mathare river, one of the tributaries that form part of the Nairobi river basin, had always meandered by her daughters house, but never in her wildest imagination did she think that it would one day break its banks and become a merchant of death.
The rain started pouring a few minutes after we went to bed. It was at around 11pm when we first saw water flowing into the house. None of us could sleep, so we sat on the bed. As the water kept rising, we decided to seek shelter in our neighbours house, which was on slightly higher ground, Ms Anyango says.
The neighbour had two beds, she sat on one bed with her children while Ms Anyango, her daughter and grandchildren sat on the other. To their surprise, water kept rising.
The more it rained, the higher the water rose. From the ankle, to the knee, to the waist. One of my grandchildren was so panicked that she asked me to take a table and put it on top of the bed so that we could all be safe, she recounts. Even after they climbed on top of the table, the water kept swelling around them.
Ms Anyango started screaming with the hope that people would come to their rescue. It was in vain. She added prayers to her screaming.
She remembers seeing her neighbour taking her youngest child and carefully tying her on her back to keep her from the water.
As they rummaged around the semi-permanent house that was now flooded, a crack at a corner gave way to pressure and caved in. The other parts of the house soon followed, and that was the last time Ms Anyango saw the seven other people she was with in the house that night.
Everything fell apart in that house. I saw trees falling down from outside. Stones that put the house together crumbled. The iron sheets were swept away. I got lost in the water while still in the ruined house. Most of the household items were blocking my way, and I couldnt see an inch ahead of me, Ms Anyanyo recounts.
Whenever her head rose above the water, she screamed for help.
I couldnt spot any house from where I was, all the houses were buried in water. It was as if I was in a big river. I got hold of a log that was part of a house and, that way, my head remained above water. I was too tired and cold. I felt a sharp cut on my right leg and it became numb for a minute. I felt relieved when I saw people coming my way, she narrates.
She stayed by the river from about 1am to six in the morning. She did not want to leave her other family members behind.
My heart was in pain. I was hoping to see my daughter, grandchildren, our good neighbour and her children. Onlookers surrounded me, one of them asked if I had any other relatives in Nairobi. Another gave me a sweater. I told them about my son and one of them contributed Sh50 for a motorbike ride to where my son stays in another part of the Mathare slum, she recalls.
Her son, Charles Ombidi, remembers meeting his mother that morning on his way to his friends place.
My mum was limping, and bleeding. I asked her why she came to my place barefoot that early. She didnt respond. We walked to my house and since I could see how cold she was, the first thing I did was to prepare tea. When I was stepping out of the house to get an accompaniment for the tea, my mum told me what had happened. She thought I was going
