Cejjay Jelimo-Rolfe and Gerry Rolfe

Birthplace city of champions

Her birthplace Iten is championship territory. It is where long-distance runners go to train at high altitude and is proudly known as The City of Champions. The list of athletic alumni its produced is lengthy and impressive.

At eight, Cejjay went to boarding school, as did her six siblings. Their father insisted on it.

“It was his desire to give all his children the highest level of education possible irrespective of the personal cost to himself.

 “He was an English, maths and science teacher. He wanted all his children to have the advantages associated with starting and maintaining their adult lives with gainful employment.”

She describes her family as middle class “in Kenyan terms”.

 “My paternal grandfather also put his children through the best schools they could go to.”

She tells how he worked for white settlers who’d gone to Kenya in its colonial days.

“He was given the first right of refusal to purchase their huge wheat and maize farm when the colonists left after independence in 1963. 

“Members of my family still live and work on it.” 

From Dubai to Afghanistan

From school Cejjay went to Nairobi to gain a diploma in travel and tourism. Her first overseas job was in Dubai where she worked as a travel specialist.

When the novelty wore thin she searched online for something less orthodox and with a bigger pay packet.

 She bagged both when she signed on as an administration supervisor with international company Supreme Fuels.

Its website emphasises its work distributing water, food and fuel to military and peacekeeping forces in war zones and remote places across the globe is demanding and often dangerous. 

Cejjay endorses that. Global Fuels assigned her to Afghanistan.

“I wasn’t told where I was going until after I’d signed the contract.

“I thought ‘wow’. I rang my sister and asked her if I should go. She said “I think you are crazy”.

“I told her not to tell my dad because I knew he’d banish me if he found out. He never knew for the three years that I was in a war zone. He always thought I was still in Dubai.

“I knew what a burden I’d put on my sister. If something happened to me she’d have had to tell our father where I was.”

Taliban terrorism at peak

 The year was 2011. The war against Taliban-led terrorism continued at pace.

On the day Cejjay arrived in the troubled country Gerry met her at Kabul airport and escorted her on a military aircraft to the company’s Herat compound in the west.

 As Supreme Fuel’s regional general manager it was one of three bases he oversaw.

 “Ours was always a purely platonic, professional relationship. He was my friend, my protector.

“I had his ear. He looked out for me and kept me safe.”

Her first impressions of Herat weren’t good.

 The compound that became her home was heavily fortified and closely guarded.

Lone woman – woman of colour

There were around 1000 men and one woman.

“That was me.

“When I arrived I thought I’d made the biggest mistake of my life, that if I come out of here alive it will be thanks to God.
“A lot of men expected you to say ‘yes’ to everything and do what they wanted you to do.”

By “everything”, does she mean sex?

The answer’s a definitive yes. “That’s where Gerry looked after me.”

When he went back to New Zealand on leave there was a void. It was hard.”

Cejjay being Cejjay she schooled herself to dodge unwanted attention. She found ways to isolate herself and didn’t go outside the compound for six months.

On the plus side her accommodation was five-star. “The big boss was downgraded so I could have his self-contained space.”

Free time was spent at the gym, watching movies and keeping in contact with her family. 

 Expats, who were mainly former army men from the UK, Australia and South Africa, guarded the camp’s interior. Outside the perimeter the guards were locals.

“One day they could tell you they were Taliban, the next that they were priests. You never knew what was right. Their stories could change 50 times. 

She employed locals to work in domestic-related rolls.

Again, it was an all-male contingent and they didn’t make her life easy.  

“Most didn’t like the fact I was a woman and their boss or that I was a woman of colour. They thought I was an American and they didn’t like Americans.”

Once she made it clear she was an African tensions eased slightly. 

"I handled this environment because the job was the best opportunity I had ever been afforded in my life. I knew it was an experience I’d probably never get again.

“I just focused on embracing my work and actively participating in the Sunday fellowship in our compound.”

Strength through prayer

“The prayer helped me to remain spiritually strong throughout my time there.

“It got me through the hard times.”

Her job included providing relief administration support to other provinces when their staff went on leave.

This included the capital city, Kabul. 

“That was a really, really scary place. There were a lot of incendiary devices going off, exploding. The next minute gunfire and lots of death. It was bad, I didn’t like it. I couldn‘t wait for my time there to finish.”

With that potted backgrounder on the Kenyan who is now a New Zealand citizen we turn our attention to the man who brought her to this country, Gerry Rolfe. 

Career soldier

His schoolboy ambition was to join the army. From Rotorua Boys’ High he headed straight to Waiouru.

He climbed the ranks to become a Warrant Officer Class One and a regimental sergeant major (RSM).

He was also appointed a conductor, a position he held for 15 years. Gerry was the last in this country to be assigned the rare role which was to care for the welfare of the ordinance corps’ non-commissioned soldiers.

It was one that at times could be at odds with his work as a RSM.

“I had to tread very carefully. As an RSM I still had to discipline people but I never felt conflicted.”

 His military service included deployments to Singapore, Somalia, Bougainville, East Timor, Sinai-Egypt and Afghanistan twice.

“New Zealanders were there as peacekeepers. There was no patrolling. We had a mandate that the only time you could aim a weapon was if there were threats to life.” 
Sport was an overseas deployment bonus.

“While in Egypt we played a lot of rugby, flying in choppers to Tel Aviv for weekend competitions against the locals.

 “They wouldn’t let us play in the finals because with all those Kiwis, Australians and Fijians in the team we always won and were,  according to the rugby administration, not real locals.”’

Gerry’s time in the military spanned 37 years. He’d been out of the army a mere nine days when he headed back to Afghanistan.

He’d called a former commanding officer who was already with Supreme Fuels and asked about vacancies.

“He said ‘there’s one as a relieving operations manager. Hop on a plane right now’.”

 Gerry did and six months on was promoted to general manager.  

Civilian life in Afghanistan

That as we know is where Cejjay comes into the frame. Gerry’s interpretation of   “operation Cejjay” was  to ensure she wasn’t left floundering out of her comfort zone.

Having switched so quickly from the army to civilian life he knew the feeling.

“With my rank when I said ‘jump’ the answer was ‘how high?’.
“I was suddenly in this totally different environment. It was a big adaptation to make.”

Fast forward three years to Cejjay’s return to Dubai.

She was working in high end travel “looking after all the rich A-listers like the Kardashians” when Gerry dropped by to exchange a friendly “kia ora”.

They clicked on a level they previously hadn’t. Cejjay invited him to Kenya.

“From there on in our relationship just skyrocketed but I lived in New Zealand, she lived in Dubai and Kenya.”
Gerry decreed the solution was for them to marry.

Cejjay was slightly more cautious. She wanted to ensure they were each other’s perfect fit.

In Kenya she insisted on a team building exercise.

“She had us walking up Mt Kenya. It took four days. It was a great way to find out if we were compatible. Yeah, we were.”

Dowry negotiated

Gerry has vivid recall of negotiating a traditional Kenyan dowry with his bride-to-be’s father and male relatives.

“All the heavyweights were there. We had two or three meetings sitting at these long tables.
“They were absolutely fantastic. Normally the groom gives the parents a cow or a sheep as a way of saying thank you for letting you marry their daughter, but of course we didn’t live in Kenya so it was just money, no figure was set.”

It was Gerry who insisted they had a Kenyan wedding too. It was in Nairobi’s Karen Blixen Coffee Garden.

“I wanted to give Cejjay’s parents and family the opportunity to see her as a brand-new bride in a white dress. People say the wedding was the most beautiful ever seen in Nairobi and it was recorded on live TV.”

The “re-weds” honeymooned on safari with Cejjay’s parents and sister.

The plan had been for them to rejoin Supreme Fuels in Somalia but the contract didn’t go the company’s way.

“So we concentrated on getting Cejjay through the New Zealand immigration process. She’s now a New Zealand citizen.”

Rotorua becomes home

 Rotorua replaced living in the world’s pirate capital. Settling in was a breeze compared with her Afghanistan arrival.

Until her work visa arrived, she volunteered as a teacher’s aide and librarian at Rotorua Primary. Gerry was managing Allied Concrete.

Today Cejjay is logistics manager for a global company exporting logs and sawn timber around the world. She’s also treasurer for St Faith’s Anglican church.

“I was born and bred a Catholic. I have not changed my faith.  I do it for the church. I like to support the community.”

Gerry is a supervisor with a Kaingaroa Forest security company.

They speak as one when they say life is good.

Gerry: “We have a likeness of mind. Cejjay’s taught me the value of money, that life is so short.”
Cejjay: “He looks after me. He’s taught me to live outside my shell, to stand up for myself.”