Meet the family

KENYA: Following the inauguration of US president Barack Obama, Kenyans are hoping that Obama fans will want to see the country of his relatives and ancestors.

Kenya's own presidential election in December 2007 saw violent protests and killings, and tourism fell to nearly zero. Now, travel companies hope to bring tourists back, creating tours based on the places mentioned in Obama's 1995 book Dreams from My Father.

At the same time, the government is paving new roads, expanding the airport in Kisumu and building a museum about the Obama family near Kogelo, the Kenyan hometown of the US president's father. Delta Air Lines will begin flying to Nairobi four times a week from Altanta in June.

The Kenyan government is building a museum about the Obama family near Kogelo, the hometown of the US president's father.

In particular, the 5,000 villagers of Kogelo expect crowds of foreign visitors. Mutua Kivuitu is the director of Intrepid Travel in Kenya, which is planning an eight-day "Roots of Obama Tour".

Kivuitu says that a number of foreigners have already signed a guestbook at the home of Sarah Onyango Obama, the US president's step-grandmother. "You can see that quite a bit of visitors from all over the world came to see the house," he told The New York Times.