When he came to Nepal to help the Gandaki Boarding School modernise in 1984, Ken Afful had no idea he would be beached in landlocked Nepal for almost two decades. But that is what happened and this affable Ghanian is still working on plans to go home. "Maybe in a year's time," he says wistfully. You can tell he doesn't really mean it.

Ken's got to love Nepal. He has scores of friends and although it is a long way from the village of Anomabu on Ghana's Atlantic coast to Anamnagar he feels perfectly at home here. He is still "Ken Sir" to GBS alumni and Kathmandu University students. And to grocers and farmers in Okhaldhunga he is "Ken Daju". (He was a rural development consultant with the United Mission to Nepal). In his time in Nepal, Ken has seen development workers come and development workers go. Some may have forgotten him, but none has forgotten his famous peanut soup. "You really have to teach me how to cook that soup without meat. How come it tastes that good," a guest at Ken's in 1991 wrote in his Visitors Book. The secret of Ken's "national" soup is a closely guarded secret.

And Ken the person? "You are a crazy academic dedicated to Nepal," wrote another guest in his Visitors Book. Many find it difficult to explain what the stocky, African with degrees from Lancaster and the London School of Economics sees in Nepal and why he lingers. We put it to him, and he thought about it before replying: "They had warned me when I first came that I may not survive long in Nepal. But I wanted to prove them wrong."

In his latest avatar, Ken calls himself an Organisation and Management Consultant, busying himself with the Organisation Development Centre that he helped set up in Kathmandu. Staffed mainly by former colleagues and students of Ken, the ODC is an attempt to try to pass on their experiences in the management of Nepali organisations. He spends the rest of his time writing books and reports on management and behavioural approaches to organisation development. And when he eventually gets back home, he wants to set up a similar organisation there.

We asked Ken if being African was a problem in Nepal, and if Nepalis are racist. "No they are not racist," he answered firmly. "I have experienced racism elsewhere, not here. If Nepalis sees a dark, stocky person with a flat nose and curly hair they are not used to it, but they always accept you." Maybe here is a candidate for Nepali citizenship?