Australian architect Ross Langdon was working pro-bono on an aids hospital in Kenya. His wife, 33-year-old Dutch citizen Elif Yavuz, was due to give birth in two weeks. She had a PhD from Harvard and was recently praised by former U.S. President Bill Clinton, who personally visited her, for her work with the Bill Gates Foundation in Kenya.
“This morning I slammed down the phone hard and burst into tears when told of Ross Langdon’s death in Kenya at the Nairobi mall. The screams that came out were guttural and intensely grief stricken,” wrote Tasmanian sculptor Peter Michael Adams in a poignant expression of grief for his friends.
Adams wrote on his blog: “Ross always returned to his family and cultural roots here on the Tasman Peninsula and we all took immense pride in both his architectural abilities and his very generous, positive, and loving personality. There just was no dark side to Ross that I ever saw in the twenty or so years I knew him.”
He wrote about the couple as “agents-of-change in the best sense.”
Langdon had dual UK-Australian citizenship. Yavuz was from the Netherlands, but lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The couple died in the terrorist attack on the Westgate mall in Nairobi, Kenya, Saturday. The death toll is 62, according to the Red Cross, with more than 175 injured. Hostages were still being held as of Monday; no official number has been given on the current number of hostages, but the Red Cross reports that 49 people have been reported missing.
Somalia’s al-Qaeda-linked rebel group, al-Shabab, said the attack, targeting non-Muslims, was in retribution for Kenyan forces’ 2011 push into neighboring Somalia.
Langdon’s employer, Regional Associates, released a statement: “We are deeply saddened by the tragic loss our friend and colleague Ross Langdon and his partner Elif Yavuz.
“Profoundly talented and full of life, Ross enriched the lives of all those around him. Ross’s leadership on projects throughout East-Africa was inspirational, and he will be will be very, very sorely missed by us all. Our deepest condolences and thoughts are with Ross and Elif’s families at this very difficult time.”
