'Milkshake' singer Kelis quit the US for completely different life
If you can believe it, it’s been a whole 23 years since Kelis released ‘Milkshake’.
And yet it still remains an absolute banger, quoted endlessly in Instagram captions and conversations and played at parties.
But while the now 46-year-old still has success with her music, she previously decided to quit life in the US for a total change-up.
I mean, she’s not left ‘Milkshake’ and her other tracks behind, performing at a number of festivals this summer in the UK and Europe.
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‘Milkshake’ was the lead single on Kelis’ third album, and she has sold six million records worldwide with particular success here in the UK.
But last year, she decided it was Kenya that she wanted to call home, moving out there with her children onto a 300-acre farm.
When she’s not performing, Kelis often shared social media posts about her life there now and opening up about what it’s like to live there.
While she makes it clear she loves being there and that ‘Kenya is still one of the BEST countries on the continent in my opinion’, she opened up about the shift from being in the US.
“The roads, some of the potholes will literally take your car out,” she said in a previous Instagram video. “They also have these speed bumps, like they give you a warning, they are in the dark, they are not marked, you hit a bump and leave your soul behind you.”
She also said the ‘waste management’ is ‘absolutely awful’ and struggles with importation.
“If you want to live here like an American, it’s definitely going to cost you triple the price. When you bring anything into the country, not just American stuff, it’s definitely going to jack you,” Kelis continued.
“They say that if it’s not used here in Kenya, then it’s like new, which makes no sense. It can be 20 years old in another country, probably Japan, and they’ll still charge over Ksh8.4 million.”
During an appearance on the Earn Your Leisure podcast last year, Kelis said she was living there because ‘it has all the things you need’.
“Kenya has everything. You can be far removed in rural areas or in bustling Nairobi. It’s super safe, you can invest money and be here,” she added.
As well as sharing content about her life on the farm and performing, Kelis also has spent time travelling the continent and seeing other parts of Africa.
Oh, and to add to her varied list of credentials, she did in fact take a hiatus from music in the late 00s to train at the renowned Le Cordon Bleu cookery school.
Topics: Entertainment, Music
Jess Battison