A Quiet Christmas Pilgrimage on Sergoit Hill Faces Pressure from Development
Every Christmas Day and on December 26, thousands of children and young people converge on a cluster of rocky hills in Kenya’s North Rift, about 20 kilometres northeast of Eldoret along the Moiben road. There are no posters, no social media campaigns, and no official organisers. Yet for more than four decades, the annual climb to Sergoit Hill has continued—an unspoken tradition passed from generation to generation. Locals describe it as an annual ritual, even a pilgrimage, though it carries no formal religious or cultural meaning. What sustains it is memory, habit, and the simple pull of the hill itself. “It was like a must-do thing,” recalls Sammy Bungei, who participated frequently in the late 1970s and 1980s. “Every Christmas we would walk from Kuinet, nearly 20 kilometres, to climb the hill with other children.” Roots in a Simpler Time The tradition is believed to have begun in the early 1970s, when entertainment options in rural Uasin Gishu were limited. With no television, video ...