Veteran radio personality Caroline Mutoko has opened up on the tribulations of her otherwise glitzy radio career.
Addressing fellow radio personality Jimmi Gathu in a video posted on her popular YouTube channel on Monday, March 9, Mutoko confessed that the 2007-2008 elections period was one of the hardest times she had ever had in her career.
"We were never trained for conflict radio. I've always said to this day, Carol Radul, Rama Nyang, and a guy called Ben Amoh... we had 14 hours on air-shift and every time the song was about to end, we would realise that we were going to switch the microphone and wondered what we would say to calm the entire nation down," Mutoko recounted.
She stated that at the time, she would stare at her co-hosts who would equally be lost for words like herself and gave excuses just to avoid addressing listeners.
Mutoko added that years later, she told her new co-hosts Adelle Onyango, Linda Nyangweso, and Chipukeezy Vinny that the following election period would not find her in studio.
"Elections take everything out of you. They wring you out. I was like...'this is my last one'. I have done five elections and two referendums, I am done," she recounted.
Apart from the struggles during the election period, she added that there were times when challenges would arise in the basic day to day deeds in the life of a radio show host.
"The loneliness of the work is that nobody knows what it takes to go to bed at nine and be up at four. Nobody knows what it feels like when your brain is shutting down, it's 8.45 p.m., and you still have another hour of being actively engaged mentally on air," Mutoko further revealed.
She added that marketing was also another challenge that she endured given the repetitive nature of the campaigns the hosts would have to run for the clients and the tailored demands that came with them.
"As a host, you literally realise that the news [bulletin] will end at five minutes past six and you will need to start selling.
"Every client wants the same energy for their product every time you advertise it on air, and also expects the same energy on their product as every other advert during the session," she recounted.
Mutoko told Gathu that she no longer misses going back to the radio, but if she was made to go back, she would still beat the current crop that is ruling the radio waves.
Her sentiments were echoed by Gathu who insisted that working on the radio was a science that not many would figure out despite their exposure to the airwaves.
Caroline Mutoko officially quit Radio in September 2014 after years of hosting the popular Kiss 100 Big Breakfast Show.
