Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2006. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
BBC News - August 29, 2006
Muliro Telewa, Nyangoma Kogalo
As the Illinois Democratic senator entered his family's compound - surrounded by both Kenyan and US security - his grandmother Sarah Hussein Obama could not hold back tears of joy as she hugged him.
It was Mr Obama's first visit to Nyangoma Kogalo in Nyanza province, where his father was born, since his 2004 election to the US Senate.
Local women, dressed in their colourful clothes, sang and ululated as he used his left hand to wave at them and held onto his grandmother tightly with his right.
The security teams struggled to keep uninvited members of the press out of the compound, as Senator Obama, followed closely by his wife Michelle, two daughters and a niece, walked towards his uncle's house to greet the family elders.
But an old lady in her 70s weaved her way through the guards, grabbed hold of the politician's hand and only released him after he had danced with her to the cheers and applause of several hundred people who had made their way into the compound.
Thousands of other onlookers were kept out of what the Obamas had said was a private function.
T-shirts
Before Mr Obama's arrival on Saturday afternoon, his grandmother admitted to me that she usually had trouble communicating with him.
"My grandson does not understand Luo or Kiswahili and I cannot speak English, so I need a translator to talk to him," she said.
But as he moved around the compound, he kept nodding to his grandmother saying, "Ero kamano" (meaning in Luo: "thank you very much").
The Luo tribe of his late father, who are the majority in Nyanza province, were celebrating in style.
They had printed T-shirts, mainly in bright yellow, and one would have been forgiven for thinking that Senator Obama was conducting a presidential campaign in Kenya.
In fact, although most of T-shirts were emblazoned with the slogan: "Welcome home Senator Obama", there were a few that read: "Obama for President."
I asked those wearing them if they wanted Mr Obama, who is the son of a Kenyan father and an American mother, to be president of Kenya or the United States.
"It does not matter. If he becomes the president of Kenya, fine! If on the other hand he wins the American presidency, it is all right too," one of the young men quipped.
Beer cheer
Earlier, addressing a public rally attended by thousands of people, Senator Obama stated that he was a US citizen and senator to the American people.
However, he said that he wanted to assist some young people from his father's homeland to attain their goals.
"It is people of Nyangoma Kogalo who assisted my father to achieve his academic goals," he explained.
During his busy one-day tour of Nyanza province, Mr Obama publicly went into a Voluntary Counselling and Testing Kiosk, accompanied by his wife, for a HIV test.
After taking their blood, the medical officers promised to send the results their HIV status through to the US embassy in Nairobi.
Nyanza has one of the highest HIV infections rates in Kenya, but most people are unwilling to go to the test centres to find out their status.
Mr Obama also visited two schools next to his grandmother's compound, both of which have changed their names in his honour to Senator Barack Obama Nyangoma Primary School and Senator Barack Obama Nyangoma Secondary.
And although Mr Obama's Kenyan tour has come to an end, the makers of a local beer called Senator are still reaping in the rewards of all the free publicity.
When people go into a bar here, they simply ask for an "Obama", and the waiter knows what to bring.
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