The Ferry

As we’ve alluded to in previous posts, Diani is on the south coast of Kenya and is connected to Mombasa by a ferry that transports passengers and vehicles. While it’s nice to take a boat ride now and again, this is generally not a leisure cruise.

Mombasa is a fairly modern city as far as Kenyan cities go, and has a great deal of vehicular and pedestrian traffic. Nearly all supplies to the various towns on the coast, save locally-grown produce, comes from Mombasa, so it’s a very important hub. Mombasa is connected to the mainland to the north by a causeway bridge. Why not build a bridge to the south, one might ask? Apparently, this is one of those questions that has been asked for the past 30 or so years. Cargo ships come and go, so a bridge would have to be high enough for them to pass. Given the relatively narrow span of water, this would be a challenge, no doubt, but I bet it’s doable. In this picture, you can see that the other side is very close.



Usually about two or three ferries are running to keep things moving. Once it docks, all of the cars, motorcycles, bikes, and handcarts unload, and then all of the pedestrians. The waiting vehicles then load on, followed by the literal and figurative crush of pedestrians. People wait to board on either side in corrals, where hundreds, perhaps thousands of people wait for their opportunity to cross.

The south side corral is a little scary, as it is narrow and has high concrete walls. When we went to Mombasa to catch our bus to Lamu, we were walking through the corral as people began to board, and some people towards the back who realized that they weren’t going to get on that ferry began running forward and pushing, starting a stampede. We were luckily along the wall, so we were able to avoid the brunt of it, we were pretty concerned for E and Indu, who were pinned between us and the crush of men. There’s a separate corral for women and wary wazungu, which we’ll be using from now on. The boarding process.



It’s quite a sight seeing the mass of humanity board the ferry. When you think the ferry is full, they squeeze a few hundred more people on. The ride should only last a few minutes, but quarters can get pretty close. Here we are blending right in.



One of the more amazing sights is the fully-loaded pushcarts filled with produce being pushed and pulled up the steep ramps. People head into Mombasa every morning at like 3 am to hit the wholesale produce market before heading back to their stores or kiosks to hawk their goods. I don’t think we have a good picture of one, but picture an overloaded pick-up truck bed, and that is what these men are moving. There are some men who hang out at the unloading zones and are paid a small amount to help push the carts up the steep section before the main road. A good two-a-days substitute for offensive linemen.

The ferry is a well-known hotspot for pickpockets, so we’re hyper aware whenever we take it (i.e. wear backpacks on front, don’t bring anything valuable, etc.). We’ve had good luck so far, knock on wood.

Now the major ferry downside: Delays. Remember when I said the ride should only last a few minutes? Yeah, well, sometimes it doesn’t.

At first we didn’t quite understand the big deal about heading to Mombasa. When we were originally picked up from the airport, we waited about 15 minutes, boarded, and were on our way. A few weeks later, we went into Mombasa with mzee to drop off a computer at a repair shop. We figured we’d be back shortly after lunch. On the way there, we waited about an hour to board. A little long, but manageable. On the way home, we waited fully three hours to board. The other day, mzee waited four hours. Apparently several of the ferries were in for maintenance, which seems to be a daily occurrence. There are five ferries to mitigate this issue, but I’ve never seen more than three running.

Because of the probable nightmare of crossing in a car, we prefer now to just be dropped off and cross on foot, as typically one never has to wait for more than 15 or so minutes. Except for that time you have to wait 2 hours since nothing is a given in Kenya, it’s just slightly better odds that you won’t be delayed. A few times, there have even been delays for the foot passengers like when a Tanzanian lorry somehow missed the ramp and drove right into the water. This delayed the whole ferry system all day. Or when the Kenyan navy bus got stuck on the wet ferry dock prompting all the sailors to have to disembark their bus to push it onto the ferry. Or when delays caused by fuel trucks caused a build-up of passengers to rush the ferry as soon as it docked, prompting the ferry driver to back away and refuse to dock for over 90 minutes.

In the US or a European country, people would literally move mountains to figure out how to solve this problem. A bridge would be built. Here, people simply accept that the ferry is another one of those things that’s out of their control, and in general, have exceptional patience, as there’s not much one can do if he’s two hours late to a meeting because of the ferry. Pole pole [slowly slowly] as the saying goes.

School Prep (Alternative Title: I’m A Photocopier)

School is generally broken into alternating segments of learning time and break time. In fact, there are 3 hours of down-time built into the day and I was initially confused as to what the teachers could possibly be doing during this time (the kids are playing outside in 95 degrees, with their sweaters on, obviously).

It quickly became clear though that this time was necessary for school prep unless Mary wants to be at school for several hours after closing time each day. Our students are too young for formal school books so all their work is done in the small notebooks pictured above. Their “subjects” include Language, Numberwork, Environmental (basically the study of different sets of objects: fruits, utensils, clothes, etc.), and Creative (basically Art). Language and Numberwork are completed each day and Environmental and Creative alternate.

Since their books are blank, we write their exercises into each book. The upside of this is that we’re able to tailor the work to allow the weaker students to complete easier work while the advanced students are more challenged.

The children alternate between recitation type work like write a-z or 1-40, dictation, filling-in missing numbers or letters, or determining which letters/numbers come before or after a presented letter.

An example of their numberwork is below.


Mary does all the lesson plans and then we split the tasks to copy the work into the book. Mary told me that when the kids get older, they’ll copy from the blackboard into their own books but for now, she prepares everything they do.

We try to keep it fun for the kids using pictures and letting them color their work when they’re finished. My drawing skills have improved a lot over the past few weeks and I’m learning to write all the letters and numbers exactly as Mary does or the kids don’t recognize them. We had a few confusing incidents in the first week since I cross my sevens and my letter “z” but now that I’m on the program, we’re ok.



In the land of photocopiers (aka America), these tasks would be ridiculous but here this is how children’s books are prepared. This is obviously a huge departure from my previous workdays filled with Excel modeling and PowerPoints but the upside is that it gives me time to practice my halting Swahili with Mary.

Coming up: Teaching time & how class is actually conducted

The sukari (sugar)

I came to the hospital here expecting to see many medical conditions that I’d never see in the states. Indeed I have; malaria, leprosy, elephantiasis, to name a few. I spent some time in clinic with one of the doctors and guess what the visits were most frequently for? Diabetes and hypertension. I’m not certain of the exact rates, but these are no longer disease of the Western world. Many areas of the world that have become “Americanized”, and in some ways, especially with music and dress, Kenya is no exception. However, there are no McDonalds here (not even in Nairobi), and it is uncommon to see overweight Kenyans. Most people have enough food, but in some regions, such as Turkana in the northeast portion of the country, people are starving and eating their dogs.

The areas covered by this hospital are rural (as in, no electricity), and most people do physical work, so the population couldn’t be much more different from the American population. I’m sure the rates of diabetes are not the insane ~30% that we have in America, but seeing that these diseases were common at all here was surprising to me. I think that the reasons are twofold. 1) Though most of what people eat here is not terribly familiar, it is creeping toward the “processed foods” end of the spectrum. Sitting at break time and drinking chai and eating six slices of white bread slathered with margarine is a daily occurrence for many Kenyans. It’s cheap, tastes good, is filling, and devoid of nutrients; sounds a little more like McDonalds now. 2) People are living longer, and since they’re not dying at a very young age of smallpox or whatnot, something has to kill them.

Kenya remains a country where being overweight is considered a positive thing; it indicates that you’re prosperous enough to pack on some pounds. We had a few of E’s fellow teachers over the other day (young women), and they were saying how whenever they go home, their dads tell them that they should eat more and get fat, and how food is “wasted” on them if they don’t show signs of weight gain. E got a little slack-jawed at this point; this is not a directive typically heard in an American home, especially toward women. While gross obesity is not the goal, the typical Kenyan man definitely prefers somewhat larger women than most American men. This ideal used to make a lot of sense, as one could store some fuel for lean times, but now, as calories become cheaper, more processed, and less nutritious, the extra weight stops being an asset and starts being a liability. The Kenyan health system is ill-prepared to deal with complicated chronic disease management, which is a struggle even in the resource-rich US.

Chakula cha Jioni (Dinner)

Dinner, like breakfast, is prepared every day by Lucy to Mungai’s specifications. As previously mentioned, Mungai is Kikuyu so his specifications basically mean “cook it like githeri”. What is githeri you might wonder? Well here it is:



Githeri is a stewed mixture of kidney beans, corn, potatoes, and carrots; it’s the staple of a Kikuyu’s diet. The corn here is different that the sweet corn we’re used to in the US. It’s the corn that goes into making cornmeal, animal feed, high fructose corn syrup, and the many, many corn byproducts produced in the US. It’s much firmer than sweet corn and, crunches in your mouth; it’s quite good. As far as we can tell, Kikuyus eat their food entirely unencumbered by pesky things like spices or sauces. The blank slate of Githeri is certainly tasty and filling but after 10 weeks, we’re going through a lot of sauces. Living on the coast near Mombasa is interesting, as it is a melting pot of cultures as previously mentioned, and it is near the center of the spice trade (Zanzibar is a spice island). Native coastal food (aka Swahili food) is generally well-seasoned, but there are also so many transplants here from upcountry, that much of what is served in local restaurants, as well as in our house, is devoid of seasoning.

Our other typical courses are stewed veggies (below), and lentils. The veggies are healthy but not terribly tasty, while the lentils are one of our favorite dishes (Lucy adds some Indian flavors). It's all generally the same consistency as githeri.



In terms of starches, there is usually one or two of rice, chapatti, or ugali. The rice is always brown rice, as mzee is diabetic, and will occasionally come in “pilau” form, which is a combination of Indian spices cooked into the rice. Chapatti are delicious fried flatbread, but I think that it’s probably best not to become too attached to this oil-based food. M mentioned ugali in his previous post; very bland polenta. Many Kenyans LOVE ugali. We have marveled at slight men and woman taking head-sized slabs of ugali and wolfing it down in minutes. We tend to leave most of the ugali to mzee.

The proteins are the part that I don’t care for one bit; I’m pretty sure that Mzee is convinced that I’m a vegetarian at this point. All of the chicken and fish is stewed in tomato sauce, with generally unfortunate results. After having chicken for the first week, we asked Mungai about fish, as we’re right next to the ocean, and the village where M works is actually a fishing village. He was happy to oblige. A few days later, he and M came home with a large bag of frozen fish. I think that he bought about 20 kg of kingfish (not an exaggeration) because the price was right, but it has been sitting unwrapped in our freezer for nine weeks, with its moisture slowly sublimating from its tissues. M just complained to me that a fish head was biting a bag of his sim-sim. (see below)



I typically eat githeri, lentils/veggies, and then take a generous helping of salad with oil and vinegar dressing. For those of you keeping score, that’s a lot of veggies. Luckily I’m a creature of habit so it doesn’t really bother me to eat the same thing most weeknights.

This weekend, however, mzee was out of town so we told Lucy to take Friday-Monday AM off and proceeded to enjoy preparing our own food. Since we both really like to cook, we went to town. Rosemary-lemon chicken, roasted root veggies, and curried cauliflower for Sunday dinner, guacamole for Saturday afternoon, and American-style eggs for breakfast both days. We even managed to figure out how to finesse the oven to make Irish Soda Bread (thanks Mrs. Hill! pic below). So, so delicious. I now appreciate the variety in our diet so much more than I did before. We have so many great choices and yet when people ask us what “American” food is, we can’t really answer them.

Wild Kingdom: The classroom edition

Back by popular demand, more stories of the simians in my life. The other day, I sent the strangest text I will probably ever send in my life:

Me [To M]: “Mary just bounced a cocoa mug off a monkey’s head”

The monkeys may look like they have tiny brains but obviously they are capable of assessing the weak link: me. At cocoa time last week, I was passing out bread and many of the kids were already washing their mugs when the monkeys launched a coordinated attack on Timo, one of our youngest children. Totally gratuitous picture of him below because he is literally the cutest child ever.



They surrounded him and jumped at him to try and get him to drop his bread. I was the closest teacher so I turned my back to the bread table and started towards him to shoo them away. Rookie mistake.

Turns out that the attack on Timo was just a diversion. You see the monkeys have figured out that if they put all their weight on the branches just above the bread table, they can bend the branches to within 4 feet of the table and drop directly onto it (the branches are normally about 15 feet off the ground). As soon as I turned, the monkeys launched their main attack on the bread table. Mary sprang into action and ran towards them shooing them away. One monkey stood his ground and Mary grabbed the nearest item handy: a half full cocoa mug on the table. She hurled it at him and it bounced off the top of his head. Dazed, he scampered off to fight another day while we laughed hysterically. She couldn’t have aimed it more perfectly if she’d had 1,000 shots.

On a more serious simian note (yes, I just wrote that), today a group (pride? pack?) of baboons moved through the school grounds. While monkeys are a laughing matter, baboons are not because they’re huge and could do serious damage to an adult, let alone a child. Luckily they moved through during a time when we were all in a classroom and I captured this shot of one male baboon lunging for another male across our sandpit.




They really riled the kids up since our classroom doesn’t have windows with panes. Our windows have flimsy wooden bars designed to let light and air in so the kids could hear them moving and were instantly out of their seats. You can hear them excitedly discussing it on a video I took as they passed within about 10 feet of our classroom. They were especially excited when a mother carried a baby past us on it's back (mtoto = baby in Swahili):



So that’s the latest and greatest on the monkey front but I’ll be sure to keep you updated on the animal exploits at kindergarten in Kenya.

Keys

Ever since we arrived, there have always been logistics regarding keys, as there are only two sets: One set held by Lucy, and another set held by Mungai. We realized that this would be an issue in terms of getting in and out of the house at odd hours, but after asking mzee if we could make another set, he said “no, we don’t need it”. OK, we’ll have a go at it I guess. After four or so weeks, it was increasingly clear that it was necessary after several lockout incidents, so mzee resolved to take care of it in Mombasa.

Keys here come in two flavors: One is the standard key that we’re used to, and the other is a key like those that you hunt for in video games, like a dungeon key. We figured that the dungeon key would be pretty easy to copy, as it was very simple. We were wrong.

Mzee brought back copies of the three keys, and we were thrilled and thanked him. Lucy suggested that we actually try the keys before we celebrate. She's obviously been around the block. One of three keys worked. Two weeks pass. The second trip to Mombasa appeared to produce three of three functional keys, but one of them broke off in the lock during the second use. Damn. Another trip to Mombasa, another key that didn’t work. At this point, mzee was understandably tired of the half-day trek into Mombasa, so he opted to try one of the local keysmiths in Ukunda. We figured that he didn't want to use them because many people in Ukunda recognize the truck and mzee, and since locksmiths are some of the biggest criminals in the US, I imagine that they're worse here. We quickly understood another reason why he didn't want to use them once he brought home the finished product. The key on the bottom is the one we were trying to copy.



It actually looks worse in person. We think that the keysmith must have tried to replicate the key using only a metal file, with less than perfect results. Strike four. The key saga came to a mysterious end just yesterday when mzee handed me a full set of keys. I asked where they come from, to which he replied, “don’t worry about it”. I can tell you this, they did not come from Ukunda.

Water

One of the most obvious differences between Kenya and the US is the process of dealing with water use and consumption. In the US, water use is quite simple: you turn on the tap or your appliances are hooked directly to a water source. In Kenya, not so much.

We are incredibly fortunate to live in an apartment with running water. We have a tap for bathing (M uses the swimming pool as his personal shower also) and running water from sinks to wash our hands. This is far more than the average Kenyan has. Mary (my friend who I teach with) does not have running water in her place so all water must be carted from a well. Think about all the times you turn on a tap in your house and imagine that she has to accomplish all those tasks with water from a jerrycan (those are jerrycans in the back of Mzee’s truck above). Cooking, clothes washing, bathing, teeth brushing, etc. must all be planned in advance from the available water. Now you realize why the Swahili word for jerrycan was one of the first 100 words we learned. For those not lucky enough to live near a well, they have to either gather the water (usually the job of the wife or female children) or pay for it to be delivered in a jerrycan. Below is a picture of the water delivery cart:



None of this running water, however, is potable for us or for Mary. Some Kenyans do drink water straight from wells but they often boil their water too in order to avoid some of the water-borne diseases that are so devastating to developing counties. Cholera and typhoid might be things you’ve only heard about on the Oregon Trail video game but they’re very real here. Our drinking water comes from the well in Msambweni (Mzee Mungai thinks the water is too salty from the well in Diani). It is then boiled by Lucy and strained before being deposited in the refrigerator to be cooled for drinking.

All this processing results in far less water use and wastage than in the US. According to a book I just read about water use (yes, I know I’m weird), the average American uses over 550 liters of water per day while the average Kenyan uses about 55 liters (a little over 13 gallons, a typical showerhead uses between 5 and 8 gallons per minute). The UN suggests that people need at least 50 liters of water per day for their basic subsistence requirements but this number does not even include the amount people need for growing crops or raising livestock. So you can see that the average Kenyan isn’t living on very much water.

There are obvious impacts of the labor intensive water processing. First, water usage is not taken lightly since you’re sharing a limited supply with a household. If one of us fills his or her bottle too much, there is not enough for others. Second, you don’t make an off-hand request for water in someone’s home. This is a precious resource that they have to boil and prepare so you don’t ask for water unless you’re really thirsty. Third, you carry your own water with you everywhere since you can’t always trust the water processing. I took a course of Cipro last week after drinking some school tap water so I learned my lesson!

The other day, the pipe broke on the water to my school and it was chaos. The taps didn’t work (so no hand-washing), the toilets didn’t work (so no flushing the toilet holes used by 70 people), and there was one jerrycan of water (about 5 gallons) to be shared by 70 people in 95 degrees for 8 hours. I couldn’t help but imagine the rural schools where this is the reality every single day.

Water security, like food security, is not a given in Kenya (especially the poorer Western regions). The other day in church, people stood to share thanksgivings and one women stood to be thankful that “we all have food to eat and water to drink because there are people in Turkana who don’t (in Western Kenya)”. It’s very humbling to think about all the water wastage in the US, and how few people in the US would ever think to be thankful for water.

Kenyan Food Rocks

After over two months in Kenya, eating primarily Kenyan food for every meal, we’ve made a few observations.

1) Kenyans do not tire of foods.

If you ask 20 Americans what their favorite food is, you’ll likely get many different answers. Burgers, pizza, spaghetti, pad thai, etc. In our first few weeks here, we tried this question on several Kenyans, with surprising results.

Me: “If you could have any food in the world for dinner, what would it be?”
Person from Luo tribe: “Ugali” (very bland, polenta-like paste made from cornmeal).
Person from Kikuyu tribe: “Githeri” (stewed mixture of beans and corn).

Mzee, the man we live with, is Kikuyu, and he claims that he could (and used to) eat githeri for every meal and he never gets tired of it.

After thinking about it briefly, the reason for this is obvious: If you grew up in a village and climate where beans and corn grew well (like Kikuyu country), githeri was always on the menu. Here there is no thai takeout next to the cantina next to the pizza joint, so the diverse palettes that are so common in the US just don’t happen here. People become accustomed to their few specific foods are exposed to little else, so that’s what they like.

2) You have to be careful when eating food in Kenya.

There’s the obvious concern about food-bourne illness such as hepatitis A, typhoid, and old-fashioned food poisoning, and then there are other, less typical concerns. At our house, we generally eat at a higher standard than most Kenyans. No dirt floors, no wood-burning stove. However, the scourge of food eaters everywhere knows no socioeconomic boundaries; it doesn’t care that we’re wazungu. Rocks. They permeate the cuisine here in such a way that if you let your guard down for a second, they’ll replace that tender bite of rice with a tooth-shattering crunch. The issue seems to be with the processing of the food before it’s sold in the markets. In there US, I’m sure that there is a strict ounces of rock per ton of grain requirement, but here, as long as there’s more grain than rock, it’s kosher. Here, all rice, lentils, beans, etc. is picked through very carefully before cooking, but inevitably, the highly evolved rocks, with their chameleon-like colors and patterns, slip through security. If you’re fortunate, the rock is more of a dirt clump, and you just get the sudden flavor burst of earth in your mouth. A came up with a strategy for taking on the rocks; “you’ve just got to power through them and keep chewing”. Though brave, this approach may be on the myopic side.

3) The concept of starch v. protein v. vegetable doesn’t really exist here

In general, the traditional Kenyan diet is pretty balanced. Lots of veggies, some beans, some rice or ugali, and maybe a smattering of chicken. However, we’ve been served some meals that are bizarrely weighted. One night, Lucy cooked for us chapati (flatbread), ugali (polenta), rice, and stewed vegetables. This seemed perfectly reasonable to mzee, who topped his rice with ugali and went about his dinner. Now that I think about it, maybe this isn’t that foreign. The Double Down sandwich from KFC just came to mind as an American equivalent:



Coming soon: Dinner and Street Food

A Day at The Races in Kenya: The Goat Derby

When we heard that the 11th annual goat derby would be in Diani this weekend, we knew we could not pass up the chance to witness whatever a “goat derby” was. It is telling that none of the Kenyans we spoke to last week knew anything about the goat derby despite it being hosted in their hometown the last 11 years. This was pretty clearly an event for expatriates and it raised money for several excellent causes [Kenyan Red Cross, Kwale Eye Hospital, Association for Disabled Persons of Kenya].

We arrived on the derby grounds (aka the local golf course) to find several tents selling food, promoting local businesses, and selling crafts. In the center of all this action was the racetrack and milling all about were Brits in derby hats and “fancy dress”. It was 95 degrees in the beating sun but this did not deter the Brits; the Brits love their fancy dress and they even had a contest to determine which child was the fanciest dressed (or something like that).

We did not have to wait long until the first race. The goats were all sponsored by local businesses and sported colored bibs with their number and sponsor. The jockeys wore white T-shirts with the sponsor’s name and carried straw brooms to encourage the goats. Below you can see the starting line:



Given the organized appearance of the starting line, we began to think that maybe the goats were trained to actually race. Perhaps we had overlooked the competitive spirit of the goat? Was their blank stare actually hiding a thoroughbred drive?

Look at the staredown between the leftmost goats:


Soon, they were off though and it became clear that they were not competitive, they were terrified. The jockeys chased them screaming and sprinting with the straw brooms. Here you can see the turn and the general chaos that ensued:



After a single lap, the race was over but the goats in their terror managed to trample the starter (who was luckily unscathed) and one goat actually got stuck in the center when he jumped the barrier.

There was lively play-by-play accompanied by photo finishes and significant betting as the Brits continued to day drink in the oppressive sun. After enjoying a few beers (aka melting in the sun for 2 hours), we decided that a swim was in order so we headed out of the land of derby hats and Pimms cups back into Kenya. I’d say our first goat derby (and possibly our last goat derby) was a success.

Living Pains

While the actual lab research is off the ground and has been keeping me busy, I’ve still found some time to get into the operating room to observe surgeries. The constant stream of patients with advanced hernias, hydroceles, and various other ignored maladies continues to flow through the doors. Learning the details about the procedures has been nice, but I’ve also been trying to keep my eyes open to the unique cultural experience of medicine in Kenya.

As I previously mentioned, most of the surgeries here are done using spinal anesthesia, which involves sticking a long needle into the spinal cord of the lower back, and injecting lidocaine. It sounds a lot more dangerous than it is, as the only real risk is a headache if you let too much cerebrospinal fluid drain out. As you might imagine, the procedure is not comfortable, but it is usually pretty quick; 10 seconds if the anesthesiologist is good. If anyone has ever had or seen a “spinal tap”, or lumbar puncture (LP), performed, it appears to be the worst pain imaginable. During my neurology rotation in medical school, we had to perform an LPs on patients in the hospital for various reasons. The first one, I watched the second year resident as she injected copious amounts of lidocaine into the woman’s back around the site where she was going to place the longer spinal needle. The women screamed and cried and cursed, despite the lidocaine. This scene was repeated when it was my turn for an LP.

Now back to Kenya. I watched the anesthesia tech as he positioned the patient, cleaned the lower back with alcohol, but then skipped the “critical” numbing step, and simply inserted the needle into the patient’s spinal cord, injected lidocaine, and removed the needle. Not a peep from the patient, barely a flinch when the needle was inserted. Huh. I have watched this scene repeat probably 100 times, and only a handful of times has a patient even so much as reacted to a needle being inserted into their spine.

I have a few theories to explain this:

1) The anesthesia techs here are more skilled than anyone in the states with a spinal needle. Considering the number of “reps” that they get here compared to the nervous residents and medical students who do LPs every few months, I fully believe this.

2) Patients in Kenya have different expectations regarding pain than patients in the US. Stoicism is highly regarded in many tribes in Kenya. For example, some tribes practice adolescent male circumcision, and if the boy cries or shows that he’s in pain, he is ostracized by the community for some period. In general, there is just much more physical pain associated with everyday living in for many in Kenya. Especially the population at our hospital, who are primarily rural laborers, backbreaking physical work, accidents, and chronic medical conditions that they can’t afford to properly treat are a fact of life. Just as there’s no expectation for a life without danger (as E mentioned), there’s no expectation for a life without pain. By the time many of these people reach the OR, they have been living for years with a condition that we would consider unbearable. Maybe they’re being stoic and the spinal needle hurts like hell, or maybe it is just another discomfort, and this fleeting pain is not a big deal.

In fairness, I’ve never had an LP, and I don’t know if I’d cry like a baby during the procedure, but I think that most people in the US are used to a life devoid of much physical pain. If our back hurts, we take some ibuprofen, and if that doesn’t work, we ask our doctor for some of the good stuff. We have the right to a pain-free life. When you’re making $1 per day and struggling to feed your family, not much income goes to relieving that backache, or the festering two week-old machete wound that I saw a few weeks ago.

No value judgments here; I appreciate that I can choose to alleviate my pain should it arise, but I think that it’s important to remember that not everyone has that luxury, and that the expectation of a pain-free existence can actually make otherwise tolerable situations (like an LP), excruciating.

M the "Tyrant"

Each day on my walk to school, I pass the shopkeepers set up on Diani Beach road in huts that sell various curios and knick-knacks to tourists. They sell items made in factories in Mombasa, according to Mzee Mungai, but of course they tell the tourists that they made the items.

M interacts with these folks significantly less than I do because he rides to work with Mzee in a car each day. So, after a few days of significant (though not dangerous, just annoying – hi mom) harassment, I devised a clever strategy to avoid having to purchase anything. The standard polite refusals were not working so one day I said “I can’t spend money without asking my husband.” Instant results.

Kenya is still an extremely patriarchal society. Despite the fact that girls are now being educated almost to the same level as boys, men still control almost everything in the average Kenyan household. People are thoroughly confused, for example, that I work and M is a student. For the people we’ve spoken to (including the teachers, doctors, church folk, Mzee Mungai, etc.) , this arrangement is bizarre to them and they don’t understand how M can “let this happen”. Right.

This explains why my response about needing M’s permission to spend money was so readily accepted. In fact, one of them approached him later that week to commend him on his excellent wife. The notion that M would ever be controlling about money is purely ridiculous even if I wasn’t the sole breadwinner right now but it’s totally accepted here as “the way it should be”.

I thought I was pretty clever but then I realized it actually works for both genders! I heard an Italian tourist say “well, this carving is very nice but my wife is in charge of decorating in our house so I can’t buy anything without asking her”. Genius. In Kenya, the home and domestic tasks are pretty much the sole responsibility of the woman. So, this response makes perfect sense to a Kenyan.

M also used this technique with great success when he was approached by one of the women who run beachside massage huts. He said he couldn’t “because his wife would be jealous”. The woman nodded knowingly and backed off though she did suggest that “he and mama could come back later for a couples massage”.

This is now our running joke that M is such a “tyrant” that I’m not allowed to do anything without his permission. In addition to the joke, I think it has demonstrated to us the importance of attempting to communicate in a way that Kenyans understand. Plus, it keeps me from having to explain for the 400th time why I don’t want or need a key chain or elephant carving.

Lamu

E filled you in on the to and from Lamu, so here’s the actual visit. We pulled up to the dock right after sunset on Saturday, and were immediately greeted by a mob of young men offering to help carry our bags. They weren’t going to directly rob us, but thanks to our guidebook, we knew that if we let them carry our bags to the hotel, our bill would be increased by 50%, as the hotels pay the bagboy/hustlers some ridiculous sum for their services. Our hotel, Kipepeo (butterfly, in Swahili), sent an employee with a sign to meet us, who we thankfully found very quickly, and then walked a quarter mile to the guesthouse. We were greeted by a charming German woman and her Kenyan husband, who showed us to our rooms. The rooms were small, but charming, with big windows overlooking the ocean. A and I’s room was on the top floor with a large breezy roof deck. Thank you, Rough Guide to Kenya. We settled in, unpacked a little, showered off our dust-covered bodies from the bus ride, and headed out to dinner.


We haven’t done much walking around after dark, as many areas in Kenya (and Cleveland, for that matter), aren’t safe. Lamu, for some reason, is perfectly safe after dark. Sleep was unfortunately somewhat fleeting that first night. Mosquitoes found a chink in our bed net armor, and terrorized us throughout the night. It’s a catch-22 here: Without open windows, the air is stifling, but with the screenless windows open, the mosquitoes come. My poor sweet wife welts up immediately after being bitten, so she especially was not a happy camper. We did sneak some sleep here and there, but were awakened for good by the salat (call to prayer) at 4 am. This was followed shortly after by an earlybird rooster that decided that 4 am was sunrise, and literally crowed non-stop the rest of the morning. Several donkeys soon joined in for an early morning surround-sound experience. We did enjoy a nice sunrise from the balcony of the hotel, and once we found an awake A and I, we headed out into town for breakfast.

Sunrise from our balcony:



Lamu is on the north coast of Kenya, less than 50 miles from the Somali border. The town has been continually inhabited for over 800 years, and like much of the coast, it has the attractive blend of Arabic, Indian, and African influence. One claim to fame is that there are no cars on the island, save one: An ambulance. For donkeys. These things aren’t just pets, they really work them. Those are coral bricks he’s carrying. (shout out to E for the excellent photography).



Walking and riding donkeys are the only ways to get around the town, and the “roads” reflect this. The town is a labyrinth of alleys lined by three and four-story buildings of Arabic styling. Though I’ve never been, apparently it is reminiscent of Venice. It’s a unique experience to be walking through a narrow alley, and then ducking out of the way after hearing the frantic “clip-clop” of running donkey with a boy on its back. Lamu is actually a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as it’s the oldest Swahili town to retain its original city plan. In general, this retention of history is charming, but it has a downside, as the open gutters flowing through the back alleys are also original.



We walked to our intended breakfast spot, a nicer restaurant that is renowned for their excellent western breakfast with coffee, and at the threshold of the restaurant, a pleasant man walked in before us and led us to an empty table in the back of the restaurant. “Karibuni sana”, “you’re all welcome”, he said. Soon after, another man came over with menus and asked if we were with the man who led us to the table. No, we weren’t. “He is not a good man”, the waiter said plainly. This is something that we’ve begun to notice more and more. Hustlers just hang out around popular wazungu sights, and when they see that you’re about to enter, they “lead” you in, and unless you tell the proprietor that that person is not your guide, there will be a hidden surcharge that goes to your “guide’s” commission. Sneaky.

Anyways, surcharge successfully avoided. Breakfast was delicious, and with that fuel, we headed back out and saw the excellent Lamu museum, the Lamu fort, and walked by the Donkey Sanctuary, which was unfortunately closed on Sundays. We then walked a few blocks from Harambee St (the main street), and found the largest mosque in town. A and I decided to head in to check it out, but unfortunately, the ladies had to remain outside due to Islamic cultural practices in Lamu. We took off our sandals and headed in, noting the few men around praying, as there was recently a huzzan. We sat down and were just looking around, when two young men came over and sat down near us. They smiled and asked our names, and we did our best Swahili introductions. They asked if we were Muslim or if we knew Arabic, and we said no on both accounts. There was a bit of a language barrier, as they obviously spoke little English, but we managed to ask if it was OK that we were there, and they responded with a friendly “karibu”. The man with the best English asked if we were Catholic, and I responded, “no, but we’re Christian”. “Do you not like Muslims?”, he queried. A little nervous, I told him that we did like Muslims, and we respect many things about their religion. The conversation stalled a little at this point, and we took the opportunity to head back out to join the rest of the party.

A and I talked about the interaction, and we both agreed that it was kind of uncomfortable, probably more by fault of us than them. We were both self-conscious about being disrespectful to another religion, but when you add on top of that the historical tensions between Islam and Christianity, especially since 9/11, I was definitely nervous. I think that they were honestly just trying to make conversation, or “shoot the shit”, as A put it.

We spent the rest of the day slowly wandering the narrow streets of Lamu, ducking in and out of shops, sampling the street food, and just enjoying a rather unstructured stroll. Though I wasn’t aware before our visit, Lamu is actually renowned for their woodworking, especially the doors. Below is a “Zanzibar door”, but the Lamu doors are similar. We found a small woodworking shop where the guy specialized in furniture and crafts made from salvaged dhow wood. This was appealing both because it didn’t require the hacking down of old-growth forests, and because E is a sailor. While we both loved a coffee table made with the transom of dhow, we agreed that it’s 150 lbs would make for ridiculous shipping costs, so we settled on a medium-sized picture frame of salvaged wood, which is still very cool.

We had a great and inexpensive dinner of snapper, giant local crab, lobster, and coconut rice, and then headed up to the roof deck for a few drinks. We managed to get a fan inside of our bed net to literally blow the mosquitoes off of it, and it actually worked! The next morning we were still up at 4 am with the salat, roosters, and the hee-haw of donkeys, but got better sleep.

Our final task was getting a ferry back to the bus on the mainland. The public ferry assured us that the 7:30 ferry would be back to the mainland by 8, and we’d have plenty of time to get on our bus that was supposed to board at 7:30. We found this to be fuzzy math, so we ended up taking a speedboat taxi which was only a few shillings more. When we arrived at the mainland 2 hours before our bus actually left, we realized that the fuzzy math was actually just Kenyan-reality math.

E already apprised you of the return home. All in all, it was a lot of travel for a short visit, but the full day was actually about enough to experience the atmosphere and sights of Lamu.

To Lamu and back

This weekend, we went to Lamu with A and I (the primary investigator of M’s research who is here for another few days). There are two options to get to Lamu: fly or take a bus. We were all up for a little adventure (and way too cheap to pay for flights) so we choose the bus route which was estimated to take around 7 hours.

The bus was to leave at 9 AM according to our tickets (bought in Mombasa the previous week) and like good wazungu, we reported as instructed at 8:30 AM after a harrowing ferry ride (there was a stampede and a fight but neither of those are particularly uncommon, they’re just stressful for us because it gives people the opening to pickpocket). We had paid extra (read: we’d been duped into paying about 4x what we should have) for guaranteed seats. M needs leg room and of course we didn’t want to stand for 7 hours. At 9:20, the people told us “oh, your bus just went by but it’ll come back to pick you up.” We thought that was a little odd but followed a Kenyan across the street to catch “our bus”. They hurried us onto a bus and herded us toward the back away from our assigned seats upfront. We protested several times only to be told “this isn’t your bus so you can’t have those seats. Sit DOWN” by the conductor. We looked around to protest to the ticket broker but he was of course long gone. Damn. Well, we lasted 8 weeks in Africa before being taken for a ride so I think we’re doing pretty well. Plus, not to spoil the story but we did actually make it there so it wasn’t a complete loss.

The seats we were given were the aisle and middle seat of a 3 seat row. I and A were seated behind us at the window and the middle. We were fuming both because we’d been duped and because it was 90 degrees on the bus. All the seats were packed (2 seats to a row on the left, 3 seats to a row on the right) with at least the 2/3 people designated for that seat though there were often more. A family of 5 shared 2 seats next to A at one point.

Our pace was painstaking and it took us over an hour to even leave Mombasa. We stopped many times to load more people and more goods in the bottom of the bus. People now packed the aisles as well as the seats. The air coming from the windows was hot and choked with dust.

We rode for about 3 hours until we got to Malindi, a large town to the north of Mombasa. Here we stopped “for 10 minutes” (that’s 45 minutes if you’re an American) to have a bathroom break and lunch. Townspeople swarmed the bus (and would do so at every stop) offering everything from cold water, to Indian delights like Sim Sim and Samosas, to Kenyan street foods like cassava and roasted maize. Our favorite though was the woman selling live chickens and indeed later someone did board with a live chicken who squawked for quite a while before going ominously silent. We hoped that some people were getting off in Malindi and we could spread out more but it was not to be.

You’ve got to hand it to the Kenyans, there are absolutely no inefficiencies in travel. We stopped probably well over 50 times on our journey and people getting off were always replaced by people getting on. It’s not that they had some magical computer system that accurately booked people into slots, it’s that the average Kenyan is much more willing to put up with transportation inconveniences than the average American. The idea that you could pay for a seat on a bus and then be forced to stand for multiple hours while others who paid the same price were sitting, is completely foreign to an American but the Kenyans uncomplainingly do this.

We believe that we got into some trouble with the bus inspectors because at one point the bus stopped abruptly and all the aisle passengers were hustled off. The bus drove on to a checkpoint and was boarded by an official who yelled in rapid fire Swahili for several minutes before disembarking. The bus drove on and then sat for ~25 minutes while the aisle passengers circumnavigated the checkpoint to reboard the bus.

In fact, there were numerous checkpoints that looked like this:


See the spikes welded to those little barracades? Those are for the bus tires if the driver is stupid enough to ignore the checkpoint. Sorry the pic is bad, I was sneakily taking it from our seats on the way home. Each was manned by a single, uniformed person. The conductor would usually get out, “make small business” and then get back in thus ensuring our passage through the checkpoint. I’ll let you form your own opinions about these checkpoints but I will say that the Kenyan passengers seemed utterly unfazed by their appearance in random spots on the roads 25 miles from the nearest towns.



It was also in Malindi that we acquired an armed guard holding an AK-47 (pictured above). (Don’t be alarmed, AK-47s are fairly common in Kenya and you see them on almost every officer or policeman). Buses have (very rarely) been attacked between Malindi and Lamu by armed robbers looking for money. The area is pretty remote and very poor; there is no electricity for much of the stretch which you can see from the lack of electrical poles. Buses are supposed to travel in armed police convoys but the police seem pretty busy with the checkpoints so we didn’t see any convoys. Since we were traveling during the day, we weren’t that concerned and other than nearly sweating to death, we arrived just fine.

While we melted into our seats as the day wore on, the Kenyans began closing the windows because they were getting cold. Riding with the windows open on the dusty roads while sweating gave us all a dirty, grimy look but the Kenyans didn’t appear to ever break a sweat.

We rode for 3 hours after Malindi on paved road (or tarmac to a Kenyan) before switching to a dirt road for the last 3 hours. Yes, our 7 hour journey actually took over 9 hours. The dirt road slowed the driver to 40 km/hour (previously they’d been going 80 kmh while swerving to avoid potholes) and we were very sore by the time we arrived.

It was an adventure though and you realize why overland travel in Africa takes so long. The roads are difficult (or impassable in the rainy season), there are tons of checkpoints, and lots of loading and unloading since the bus will absolutely not drive on until it’s full. This is why tourists usually fly to Lamu but it was a good story and one that we won’t soon forget.

I have to admit though that we were relieved that our trip home was less eventful. We arrived 30 minutes before our 8 AM bus which of course left Lamu at ~9:30 (a full 2 hours after we arrived). This time though we purchased tickets directly from the bus company and insisted on decent seats (not difficult when you arrive 118 minutes before the rest of the passengers). The journey home took only 6 hours and we were thrilled to drink a beer and sleep in our own beds. Since this is already excessively long, I’ll leave it here and let M tell you about our actual visit to Lamu tomorrow.

Maasai Mara: Anniversary Night and Day Three

After our game drive, we headed home to shower and hang out until dinner. We showered pretty quickly and headed to the bar at the lodge which had a great sunset view. Sun sets early on the equator at about 6:45. Since all the other guests were European, we were the only ones enjoying the sunset. This is a phenomenon we noticed on our honeymoon. Europeans refuse to deviate from their schedule and eat earlier even to catch a spectacular sunset. Per usual, we enjoyed fantastic service since we were the only ones at the bar.

After our first drink, I asked the waiter to take a photo of us since it was our anniversary. What followed was a typical “crazy wazungu” moment (wazungu = white people). The waiter, in full Maasai wardrobe snapped the picture while moving backwards and moving the camera up to his eye. It was understandably blurry. I asked him to repeat the photo only to have the same thing happen. Hmm, ok. Normally I would have just forgotten the whole idea but I really wanted an anniversary photo! M was dispatched to the room to get a mini-tripod and I proceeded to build a little stand of cocktail tables to get an appropriate height to take this photo with the auto-timer. The Maasai thought I was insane. Here is this crazy girl running around stacking tables to get a photo they already took. At least 5 of them stood and watched us take photos.



M arranged for us to have a private meal (meals were served buffet style normally) so we ate on a little patio overlooking the Mara. It was amazing but we were a little confused when we were assured that “a Maasai warrior is just down the path to protect you so don’t be afraid.” Protect us from what? People or animals? And how dangerous could eating dinner be? Dinner was very good although we attracted a lot of attention from the bugs (non-biting luckily) because we had lanterns on our table. About ¾ of the way through our main course, an index card-sized moth made a dive bombing run on our lantern and ended up in our steak sauce gravy boat. My resulting squeak brought the Maasai warrior running but we assured him that the bug was no longer a threat since it was now wallowing in the sauce drowning. Needless to say, we finished up dinner quickly and retired to our screened tent.

The next morning, we set off early on our last game drive of the trip. We stopped at sunrise to snap a few photos of the amazing sky and our trusty truck before hearing that someone had spotted some mating lions. We pulled up to a shaded tree surrounded by 6-7 other safari vehicles. There we saw a huge male lion and a female in heat. The guide told us that when females are in heat, lions will mate up to 20 times a day every 15 minutes. This comment drew many off-color comments from the men in the surrounding cars although the women were given a quick rebuttal about 20 seconds later. Apparently, the mating of lions only takes 20 seconds and the male lion is snarled at and hissed at if he tries to stick around any longer than that. The female lion in this case nearly took the poor guy’s head off after 21 seconds. (As always, click into the photo to enlarge it)



We drove around for several more hours spotting some lion cubs and a million zebras until we heard that someone had spotted cheetah cubs with their mother. When we arrived, the mother and her cubs were hidden in a bush but you could see their little heads poking out.



After about 25 minutes, the mother decided to move to an adjacent bush to get a better sightline on some zebras. She left first and her cubs all followed except that instead of staying in the bush, one decided that it was time for his close-up. With several safari vehicles crowded around, he crawled out of the bush and started posing like a little sphinx. Everyone was shocked that the mama would let him come within a few feet of the cars but she appeared unperturbed (which makes you wonder about the “wildness” of these animals who apparently also use the safari cars to stalk game sometimes). Nonetheless, he gave me my favorite photo of the entire trip below.



We drove quickly back to the airstrip and a whirlwind 48 hours came to a close. A fantastic 1st anniversary as a close to a great year!

Masai Mara: Day Two

We awoke early on Sunday to the sound of birds and insects, and stepped outside of our tent to take in the sunrise over the Mara. It’s very cool at night, but we were comfortable in pants and sweatshirts. We soon proceeded to the main lodge, where we took a nice breakfast of cereal, fruit, tea, juice, toast, eggs, and bacon. The bacon was in really wide slabs and was quite good. I’m still under the delusion that it was warthog bacon. After breakfast, we met our guide (Edward) and headed into the bush. We tooled back in the way we had come, but soon took a turn and headed for new pastures. The wildebeest and zebra were too numerous to count, and within 15 minutes, we came upon a group of six or so giraffe.

Of all of the new animals that we’ve seen since arriving in Kenya, I think I’m most intrigued by the giraffe. Part of it may be the kinship I feel as a fellow tall, ungainly creature, but I think that it’s the improbability of its form that does it for me. From running, to drinking, to eating; they’re fascinating to watch. They’re also the most unassuming and gentle animal on the savannah, so we were able to get very close and it didn’t seem to disturb them. Check out the awkwardness of a giraffe drinking:



After the giraffe, we continued to motor around looking for other points of interest. Edward drove us to a small river (really more a string of small, narrow ponds), where we were greeted by a cacophony of snorts and bellows. Welcome to the local hippo pool. We were allowed to exit the car and walk a little closer for some pictures at this point. At first we were tentative, as it’s reported that hippos kill far more people every year than lions, leopards, hyenas, crocs, etc., but we figured that getting your clients killed within 24 hours of arrival was bad for business, so we went ahead. I’d conservatively estimate that this pool was 15 feet wide by 60 feet long, and maybe six feet deep, and it contained about 30 snorting, farting, wallowing hippopotami. It’s pretty amazing that so many very large mammals could all be content in one place, but they seemed pumped to be there. At times, there would be very little visible other bubbles and maybe a few nostrils above the water, and then all of a sudden, the water would erupt in a spray and huge hippo bodies would be sliding over other huge hippo bodies. It was quite a sight. Our guide, who’s English was not-so-good, explained to us that they just “shit and live in their shit”. We stayed there for about 20 minutes or so, much of the time waiting for the famous “open maw” picture, and once E had captured her shot, we decided that we had done a good job not getting eaten, and left the hippo pool.



After swinging by the airstrip to pick up a couple of British honeymooners (Justin and Lisa), we went back out in search of the cats. At this time, it was nearing midday, and with the beating sun, most sensible animals hunkered down under a shady bush to nap away the heat of the day. This appeared to be the case, as we weren’t having much luck, aside from the omnipresent wildebeest and zebra. Edward drove us to the famous Mara River crossing, where the millions of wildebeest cross and the not-so-lucky ones fall prey to the giant crocodiles or the hippos that develop a taste for meat. Unfortunately, the majority of the migration back from the Mara to the Serengeti had occurred in the previous month, so the crossing was quiet, save quite a pile of hippos, some crocs, and countless wildebeest carcasses. We ate a packed lunch under the shade of a isolated tree at the top of a knoll, and headed back out.

So game drives generally consist of three elements: 1) Enjoying the scenery, being awestruck by the vastness of the park, 2) Looking intently into the trees and bushes for the more secretive animals, and 3) Looking for congregations of other safari vehicles, as they have likely found one of the more secretive animals. Now, obviously the first two options are the most pleasant and enjoyable experiences, but if you want to see all that you can see, follow the Land Rovers.

In the early afternoon, we came upon a small herd of Land Rovers across a narrow creek, and of course, crossed the creek to join our ilk. Our guide caught wind that a leopard had been spotted nearby. The leopard is the most elusive of the “Big Five” (lion, cape buffalo, rhino, leopard, elephant), as it’s nocturnal, and being a cat, very stealthy (and likely untrustworthy, but that’s another blog). Most of the “bush” is actually not bushes, but rather grass and dirt, so it is not difficult to drive off of the trails. At this particular location, it was much more bush, so we began stalking our prey by subtly plowing over every bush in our path. This was rather cringe-inducing, as we are generally not anti-bush (pun intended), but we didn’t really have too much say in this, as Edward was going to show us that leopard, damnit! We got a glimpse of it for a few seconds, and then in fled deeper into the bush. The convoy followed, and by this time, there were probably six or eight vehicles in pursuit. We stopped and waited for a few minutes, and eventually the leopard ambled slowly in front of most of the vehicles, as if saying “alright, look at me, I’m a leopard, now please leave me alone”. After he disappeared from sight again, Edward geared up to go after him, but we said that that was enough for us.



We left the leopard area, pretty pumped that we’d seen the elusive leopard, but still slightly uneasy with what it had taken to see it. E and I both found this one of the more unsettling parts of safari. Anything beyond the mundane is called in by radio to the other guides, and soon, what was previously a wonderful sight in nature becomes animals doing things in an outdoor zoo. There is a “rule” that no more than six vehicles can congregate at a time, but it is frequently broken. We benefited by this arrangement in that we were able to see things that we wouldn’t have otherwise, but we both agree that some of our favorite times on safari were when there were no vehicles, and actually, no animals around.

A little later, we came to a lioness lounging under a bush during the heat of the day. Lions are incredibly “lazy” spending up to 20 hours per day in repose. When they’re resting, one can get very, almost uncomfortably close to them without much to fear. It’s pretty unsettling being close enough that the lion could bite your face in two seconds if she wanted to, but again, we trusted the guide. No face-biting occurred, but instead, E spotted a young lion walking through the savannah directly towards our site. We stayed still, hoping that it would keep its course, and it did, passing directly in front of our truck before taking a load off right next to what we presume to be its mother. I believe that this was our only solitary big cat experience of the weekend, and though we aren’t quite as natural as a bush, I’d imagine that the situation wasn’t as stressful for the animals.



We ended the game drive at around 4 pm, and headed back to the camp to rest up, have a cold beer, and celebrate our anniversary!

Maasai Mara: Day One

Before we arrived, we did a lot of reading about Kenya and compiled our list of “must-do’ activities. The Maasai Mara was at the top of this list. The Maasai Mara is the northern part of the Serengeti and the part that is in Kenya. Apparently Tanzania has a monopoly on the name “Serengeti” and this causes no love to be lost between Mara and Serengeti safari guides.

There was no better time for a splurge trip than for our 1st anniversary so we booked a 3-day, 2-night safari at a tented camp just outside the Mara. (Travel tip: the animals aren’t wearing electric collars, they have no sense of the distinction between being in the Mara and being outside. It’s cheaper to stay outside. Our lodge was 100 yards from the Mara). As you can see from the photo below, our accommodations were awesome:



We took off from the airstrip in Diani and two hours later touched down in the Mara. The flight was beautiful and you could see a ton of animals before we landed on the dirt runway. We were met by park guides in traditional Maasai costume and immediately began a game drive slowly slowly.

The first thing that strikes you is the vastness of the Mara. It’s big sky country similar to Montana or Wyoming. It’s astonishingly beautiful and the 360 degree view is amazing, oh and then you add animals so it somehow gets better. Check out the video below.



We immediately saw herds of wildebeests. These animals number over 2 million in the Serengeti ecosystem and comprise the largest land migration on earth each year as they follow the grasslands from Kenya into Tanzania and back. We were at the tail end of the migration in the Mara but their numbers are still startling despite being at lower capacity than normal.

We quickly realized that wildebeests are the Bakers of the animal kingdom. As most of you know, Baker is our adorable, clinically insane, rather spacey Springer Spaniel. Baker has no nerve endings (he’ll dive into streams in January and just lay down contentedly) and no common sense (he is scared of virtually all sounds including the sound of his own voice when it echoes). As we drove along the dirt track towards the wildebeest, we noticed that they like to stand in the road until the truck gets pretty close and then run frantically out of the way and often veering back into the way in their panic as they sprint and toss their heads. We saw one literally dart across the dirt track 4 times. This happens whether the truck is going 5 miles per hour or 30. Often they have ample time to mosey out of the way but instead they prefer to wait until they can freak out. Sounds like Baker.



A few elephants and lion later (we’re saving the lion pics for another blog), we arrived at our lodge for lunch and a short siesta before we headed out for an evening game drive. During the evening game drive a storm swept over the plains just as we were going out. It provided amazing light for this shot:



That’s a mama cheetah. She climbed the tree to scout out the game that she was about to hunt with her two juvenile cubs in tow. We eventually had to leave before she killed anything because you have to be outside the park before dark but it was incredible to witness her start her hunt.

Here are some pictures of the rain moving across the savannah. Those small dots are wildebeests.





It was a fantastic first day and we finished with our first real, hot water showers in a month which was also a plus!

Finn is born!

Yesterday we received the great news that our nephew, Finn, was born to C & K at 7 am! He was a little reluctant to join us, at just over 41 weeks, but we're glad that both he and mom are safe. At 10lb, 6oz, he made the doctors a little nervous that there might be issues, but they obviously aren't used to dealing with women of our family, as that's an average-sized baby. Though in Kenya, we got the news about an hour after the fact, and were able to call Dad from our cell phone. C sounded a little tired, but very happy that things went well. I'm really proud of my big sister! Before we left, C and K asked us to be Godparents for Finn, so we're honored to come home next spring to do that for the little / big guy.

Here's one of the first pictures of Mom and Finn.



Many prayers and congratulations for C, K, and Finn!