Tribute: Better Than the Last Conversation

Eva once said
she always wanted to be
better than the last conversation.

Perhaps that is where we should begin.

Beyond the title on the business card,
beyond Visa,
beyond the years in banking,
beyond payments, markets, strategies
and the rooms where important decisions are made.

Begin with the woman
who kept becoming.

The woman who could be warm
without needing to be loud.
An extremely private person, yet deeply present.
Ambitious, yet reflective enough
to ask herself whether ambition
was still serving purpose.

She believed everybody at the table
had something critical to offer.
She cared about relationships over hierarchy.
Beyond leading from the front,
she did the quieter work
of making her team feel
that their views mattered too.

And perhaps that is why
many across Kenya’s technology
and financial-services community
are struggling for words today.

Because some people leave a job
and you remember the work.
Others leave
and you remember how the room felt
when they were in it.

Eva understood money.

She had spent much of her professional life in financial services,
thinking about how it moves,
how merchants and businesses use it,
how digital payments can make trade safer,
faster, more reliable.

Yet her biggest lesson
was wonderfully simple.

Money is an enabler.
It does not define you
or guarantee tomorrow.

Today, those words carry a weight
they did not carry when she first spoke them.

Suddenly,
the promotions, the targets,
the transactions and the strategy decks
become very small things.

We remember instead
the mother.

The birth of her first son, she once said,
gave her a clearer sense
of what she wanted from life.

She went back for her MBA
because she wanted to build her career
while raising him.

Then came another son.
Then a daughter.

Three children with a mother
determined to show them
what courage, work and possibility
could look like.

She knew what it meant
to be underestimated
as a woman and a mother,
and still kept moving.

She was also honest enough
to speak about impostor syndrome,
that quiet doubt that can follow accomplished people
into spaces they have already earned.

And still she went.

Every step of the journey made her bolder.

She told women
not to lose themselves trying to match male counterparts
or trying to become the ever-present super-mum.

We cannot do it all, she said.

Ask for help.
Delegate.
Choose.
Embrace your own style of leadership,
however unpopular it might be.

Eva kept relationships.

Old colleagues stayed close
long after the job changed.
Networks became friendships,
and conversations became bridges.

And behind the executive
was still a woman who laughed heartily,
loved the good life,
admitted cars were her weakness
and dreamed of visiting Jamaica.

Death makes one truth unbearably clear.

A person can be many things at once.

Executive.
Mentor and colleague.
Friend, mother, daughter.

Someone’s safe phone call.
Someone’s example.
Someone’s reason for believing
there might be room for them too.

And when such a person dies suddenly,
the loss travels far beyond one home.

It moves through offices and WhatsApp groups,
through old colleagues
who stare at the message twice,
through women who once heard her speak
and quietly thought,

Maybe I can do this too.

It moves through children
for whom the world has changed
in a way no corporate language can soften,
and through friends remembering
the last conversation
and wishing, just once,
there could be another.

Eva,

you wanted the world to know
you were living your purpose
a day at a time.

You did.

You wanted the people around you
to know their contribution mattered.

They did.

You wanted to be a good role model
to your children
and give them the best opportunities.

And perhaps now
the rest of us are left with the questions
your life quietly asks.

Are we becoming better
than our last conversation?

Are we making room for others?

Are we telling the people we love
that they matter?

Are we living our purpose today,
instead of waiting for a later season?

So may your children always know
how their mother rose
and made the climb wider for others.

May your colleagues remember
not only what you delivered,
but how you made them feel heard.

May the women coming behind you
refuse to shrink themselves
to fit somebody else’s idea of leadership.

And may everyone who loved you
eventually reach that gentler place
where your name brings a smile
before it brings tears.

Rest gently, Eva.

Your last conversation came too soon.
But your life said enough
to keep the conversation going. 🕊️