"I want to be President. Will you be my first lady?" That was how Peterson Ngetha 'Pitson' asked Caroline Nyokabi to date him.
He has always had a way with words and a knack for big dreams. When he asked Caroline Nyokabi that question, he was not the famed Lingala ya Yesu singerthat he is now.
He describes his background as 'very humble' while Caroline hails from a relatively privileged background. When he asked Caroline Nyokabi that question, he was only 17, harbouring grand aspirations, one of which was to be a musician.
"I had decided two things: One, that I would be a lawyer, the other that I would be married to a lawyer," he says.
He met Carol in Limuru where he had gone as part of a group to sing during a kesha in August 2006. "She was one of those girls that would never stay behind after keshas to mingle and talk to artists. That day when she heard me singing, she came back inside even if her friends left, as usual," he says.
When he was done singing, out of character, Caroline went and said hallo to him. "She said she was a law student in first year at Moi University and bingo! I knew it. Here was the wife I wanted to marry!"
They exchanged numbers and continued talking until a few months later in December that year when he popped the question. Unbeknownst to her, he only had Sh200 on their first date at River Road.
"We used to call it the third world. That day I only had Sh200 in my pocket and fortunately, she ordered food worth Sh190," he says, laughing, and explains how he claimed to be so sated that he didn't even need to take a glass of water.
What followed was a long, almost 7-year courtship from 2007 to 2013 that was long-distance for a large part of it as she was in Eldoret while he was in Nairobi.
"We broke up three times, but every time, none of us would move on," he says. The last time they broke up though, they were really done with each other and it had to take divine intervention to bring them back together.
"We were visiting a friend, and we said that if God wanted us to be together that day, it would rain," says Pitson. "It was a very sunny day in a hot season. But in the evening it suddenly rained heavily and we knew that God wanted us to be together, so we decided to work on our issues."
He proposed to her at another kesha two months before their wedding, which was held on December 7, 2013 with close to 1,000 guests.
A rocky start
Their first three years of marriage were tough and they came close to divorce, almost signing the papers. What saved them was introspection, mostly by Pitson.
"The ability to look at yourself in the mirror and admit that that person in the mirror is the problem, is what saved my marriage. I had admitted that I was the problem," he says. "I resolved to work on myself so that my family would be together.
There are things I know now that I did not know then, which if I knew would have saved us a lot of time and heart ache in those first three years."
He advises that giving up on each other should never be an option. "When it comes to marriage, this is it. This person is your life partner. Work things out.
When you look at Pitson now, groomed and with all these things, you might want me but you do not know my story. You do not know that this woman gave me.
Sacrifices borne from love
"Carol got a job before me and at some point when Carol was on attachment she was being paid Sh8,000. She would pay Sh4,000 for my house out of that. Many times she would call and ask if we were meeting and I did not even have Sh20 to leave the house and she would send me money or come from their place in Hurlingham and pick me at Eastleigh, pay for my fare and food and then go back. People do not see that," he says.
However, it has never been lost on him and they cherish each other as a result.
"There is a trend of men now struggling with women, yet this woman has been on your side for a very long time, then the day you get financial breakthrough and you have money, some yellow yellow girl comes along and runs with your heart.
A trophy girl is one whom you can walk into with a meeting with and people's heads turn. The day you lose your money, that girl will leave. I would advise men to stick to the woman who stuck to you when you had nothing," he says.
They have one child, Havilah Ngonyo, who is a year and four months old.