Joe Muriuki was travelling with an associate using a matatu in the city when a tout recognised him.
The tout declined to take their fare and ordered the two out of the vehicle.
This was shortly after Muriuki announced to the world that he was HIV positive in 1987.
And when they found their way to town, they went into a small hotel along Accra Road. He was once again recognised and the plates they had used were collected and trashed.
The waitresses refused to collect their money and they were ejected from the premises.
After he was diagnosed, the doctors had told him he had 90 days to live and put him on a counselling programme. But he lived for 35 years after the diagnosis.
Of the years he lived with the virus, he had refused to take ARVs for 27 years.
He said his positive lifestyle, good attitude and proper diet had enabled him to maintain a stable T-cell count of more than 400.
The father of four died early this month aged 63. He succumbed to colon cancer, which he had nursed since 2018.
During his funeral service on Friday, mourners eulogised him as a fearless and determined person who braved a wave of dehumanising stigma associated with the virus.
First Lady Margaret Kenyatta, in a message delivered to the family through NASCOP chief executive officer Ruth Masha said Muriuki worked hard to give the virus a human face.
At the time he went public, there was a blanket of stigma associated with the disease, and a lot of myths existed to explain it, many linking it with witchcraft.
He got sacked from the Nairobi city council where he was working as an accountant.
His wife Jane was pregnant but did not have the virus. Doctors recommended that she seek abortion services because the child would allegedly be deformed and not viable.
And when the baby, Erick was born, the doctors said he would only live for two weeks. He is 31 years old now. He is the third born son.
NEPHAK executive director Nelson Otuoma said the government did not want the news of the presence of the virus in the country to emerge for fear that it would adversely impact tourism.
“The government initially claimed that the person who had come out that he was positive was a Rwandan who had come to the country from Uganda,” Otuoma told the congregation.
Otuoma urged the government to start integrating HIV care with cancer management because the two are closely linked.
