Sights of Kenya

The license plates in Kenya are different. They are white up front and yellow in back for just regular cars. The government cars have blue plates. The diplomatic cars have red plates and it is fun to watch them. Kristoffers car is 45 UN ----. The 45 meaning he works for the World Food Programme. The UN has many different agencies and they have different numbers. Now the diplomatic plates for the US begin 29 CD ---. Not sure what the other countries numbers, but if we ask Charles he either knows or gives a good guess.

The pictures I’ve asked Lisa to show here are some of the “Gates Of Nairobi” We’ve told friends that you can’t get into a compound, an apartment complex, a shopping center, etc. without having a guard open up the gates. You can see some of the fences with the electric wire on top of them. You can get claustraphobic here very easily.

There are pictures of some of the sights, like cattle walking along the city streets, men pulling carts, women carrying large loads, crazy matatus driving up on the side walk. Very few people stop for a red light. I’ve seen more games of “chicken” on the roads here that I can remember.

Now about the goats. Mike has decided to give Charles the money for the goats on his promise as a Christian Man, that he will buy the goats for his mother, who is the head of his family. Where Charles lives is so different from here, it is still very poor, but different. He doesn’t have running water, but does have some electricity thanks to Lisa and Kristoffer getting him a solar panel and buying them a huge water tank so that when it rains the water gets caught and stored. They do their laundry in the stream which is a long hilly walk. Not sure where they bathe , not too often I think. Kristoffer said that the outhouse was falling apart when he used it. BUT they are so much better off then many Kenyans.

We leave tomorrow night, and are ready to come home. DUNKIN DONUTS HERE I COME.

We Americans don’t appreciate our ordinary lives. When you see what ordinary lives are here, we can just thank God for what we have. We all have problems, but most of us can overcome them. Here problems are just what life is and there isn’t anything you can do to change it.

Hope to see or talk to everyone when we get home.

Some gates of Nairobi...

A cart full of bags of charcoal that will be pulled by men!

Women carry babies on their backs here.

By Grace

On Saturday we went back to the orphanage By Grace, which you may have heard Lisa and Kristoffer talk or write about. This was the second time we had been there – the last time was two years ago. It was no better – as a matter of fact probably worse because they had lots more children.

Kristoffer had texted the lady in charge the night before saying we were coming. When we go there, she told us that Friday afternoon she told her head teacher to have everyone pray because they didn’t have any food. She said we were the answer to her prayers. We had come with contributions. There are about 280 kids that sleep there and probably another 100 that go to school there. They are orphaned because their parents have died of AIDS. She told us that she now had children with AIDS and that the government gave them medicine, but no food. In Kenya you can learn to distrust what they say, but we saw her kitchen and there was nothing cooking for those kids. Before we left, she had food (beans and corn meal) being delivered.

This is only one of probably many places like this in Nairobi. It is not the slums, but not far from it. There were kids in class. This woman was so proud of the scores some of the students had with their state exams. One student had an A. She showed Kristoffer the sheet with the grades and was so very happy. These students would probably be able to go on to a college or university.

What we noticed from the last time was that there were a lot more young children. When we got out of the car they were all over Kristoffer who was holding Grace. They had never seen a Mzungu (white) baby. She was a little taken back. We went through a few classes, saw these kids trying to learn (most had on some kind of uniform). Where their classrooms were is the same place where they sleep at night. It was a dirty place and the smell was terrible. It was hard not to cry when you saw these children.

The Government of Kenya is rich and corrupt. Lisa has told us they make more than the US Senators and Congress. They drive around in BMW’s and Mercedez. And you drive around this country and see such poverty – that is criminal!

The head of the orphanage, Salome.

Empty stoves, cooking no food :(

The Mara – Our Safari

We flew to the Masi Mara a week ago. We flew in a 28 passenger plane – small. We were the second stop on this adventure. We landed on a dirt strip! We were taken to our camp by Paul, who was to be our driver. They showed us our room – which was not what we expected. We were told that all “tents” were on the river. This tent was not near the river. Well we were told that the place was sold out and that there were no more tents available. In Kenya you learn never to accept the first argument. They moved us to the last tent on the premises with a small view of the river from far away (there were 30 in all). Next day they moved us to a tent right on the river – just like we had paid for.

We went for our first game drive and Paul left to go to the more expensive camp and turned us over to Reuben. Reuben was terrific. He was better than the driver we had on the last safari – and we thought he was good. We saw many amazing animals. He tried so hard to find us a leopard but couldn’t. We’ve only seen 4 of the big 5 (lion, rhino, elephant, cape buffalo and leopard).

We saw 5 cheetahs (3 males trying to woo two females). While we were watching them, the three males decided to go hunting. They saw a young zebra and took off. It was so interesting. The mother of a young zebra protected him, and kicked and kicked and got one of the cheetahs. As a matter of fact we saw him limping the next day. We saw a pride of lions, a herb of matting buffalos (probably at least 300), we saw a baby giraffe with its umbilical cord still attached. Reuben would tell all kinds of stories about these animals. We saw a cheetah mother with 6 cubs, and the next time we saw them, they had just killed a gazelle and were having dinner. We saw a baby elephant with its family. There was a hippo pool with some very large hippos in it.

The interesting thing about Reuben is that he is Masai, but never had the costume on or told us that he was. Not until he told us he was one of 14 and that his father had two wives (polygamy still happens in Kenya) did I ask if he was Masai. Lisa said you NEVER ask what tribe someone is!

We met a couple from Poland – not too friendly. And a couple from England that were very friendly. We crossed an Indiana Jones Bridge across a flowing river. The reason for the bridge was we had rain and the place where they generally cross was too deep and flowing too rapidly. So Reuben arranged to swap vehicles with a friend so we could see more.

The first night there, we had a terrible thunderstorm. I was awake wondering what to do if lightning struck our tent. Never did happen. The camp grounds were surrounded by an electric fence so that animals wouldn’t come in, but we did hear some in the night. You would see some of these Masai walking around at night. Mike said they were the security. One night we went to a slide show and there in costume was a Masai Warrior giving a power point presentation!!!!!!! We also saw them at the airstrip in the field with their cell phones!

When we left, we left in a 13 passenger plane. Really 12, with 13 being next to the pilot. Mike could have driven the plane, we were right behind the pilot. I had my Rosary handy. We had 3 stops at dirt strips before we headed back to Nairobi.

What an experience.

Cheetah.

Indiana Jones Bridge!

Giraffe - my favorite!

Lion.

The bed inside our tent.

Just outside our tent.

Lioness.

Cheetahs eating a kill!

Masai doing PowerPoint.

Reuben our driver.

Inside our teeny tiny plane!

Elephant Visit

On Saturday we went to the "Art" exhibit at Grace's nursery school. The teachers went to a lot of trouble to show the work the children do. Each room had a different theme. Grace couldn't believe we were in her own classroom - it was decorated so differently. Late in the afternoon we drove to the Elephant Orphanage. We adopted an elephant for a year for Christine, she loves elephants. It was so interesting. We were there when there were no crowds and when they fed the elephants in their cages and stalls. They ranged in age from 5 months to 2 1/2 years. We adoped the 5 month old. The head trainer told us she had a 50/50 chance of survival. We asked about the baby rhino we had seen two years ago. He was so cute, but he has since died. He also told us about an 8 year old rhino that they finally released in the wild three weeks ago - he was killed by the wild rhinos because they are very territorial and knew he was different. There are keepers who stay with these elephants for a long time, and help them transition into the wild when they are around 2 1/2 - 3 years old. They have beds right in the stalls and sleep there and feed them every 4 hours or so, just like regular babies. If anyone is interested in this orphanage - at the IMAX theaters in April you will be able to see quite a film about them. I kept asking the trainers if they were in the film!!!

Kristoffer is looking for another job - probably out of Africia. When they leave here, they will miss Rose. Rose is their housekeeper/nanny. She is the third lady that Lisa has had - and the third time was the winner. She is wonderful. She is a great housekeeper and is amazing with Grace. Grace loves her and she seems to love Grace. She is waiting for permission from the Canadian goverment to come and work there. There is a family trying to sponsor her. If she would go, she would leave her daughter with family. Her daughter goes to a private school, which Rose works to pay for. Kristoffer says if she gets into Canada (not sure that will happen), she would probably find someone to marry there and stay. She keeps asking about the cold weather.

It has started raining here, and is a little cooler. Of course Mike and I are just in short sleeves, but a lot of people have winter gear on.

We went to the US Embassy to file Noah's papers. You have to go through several layers of security. When we started at the entrance, Lisa told the female guard that she could not use her security wand on her because of her pacemaker. Well the woman went right ahead and tried to do it! Then we proceeded to the next security stop. There was a building where we had to turn in our cell phones, no pictures are allowed at anywhere near the property. Kristoffer said if I tried to take a picture of the front, guards would come after me. Then we went into the building where visas and passports were processed. I was very surprised to see so many Muslim women with children and others with them. They were either looking for visas to get into the country or trying to get visas for family members. Lisa said a lot of them had American Passports and that they were from Somalia. Many may have gone into the country and got married, then tried to bring family there also. I am not too happy about our visa process! It is too easy!!!

I try to keep my camera handy to take different pictures. I missed a good one yesterday. We were close to Lisa's street, when I saw a women along side the road. She had a basket, which hung by some kind of cloth from the her head down her back. Well inside the basked were live chickens. Last time we were here, we saw a bus with live chickens tied to the roof.

We went to the butchers on St. Patrick's Day to try and get some corned beef. They knew what I wanted and said on March 16 and 17 they got requests for it. They use to make it themselves, but didn't have enough interest - so no corned beef and cabbage!!!!! We settled for beef stew!! While I was there, I browsed a little and thought they had good looking meat - then I saw chicken toes!!! Wonder what they use it for!!

Noah on St. Patrick's Day

At Grace's art exhibit.

At the elephant orphanage.

CHICKEN FEET!

Beach Trip

I thought I'd share our trip to Mombasa. We arrived at the airport: 4 adults, 1 toddler and 1 infant with lots of stuff. We left from an air strip - not an airport. It was a plane that was small, but okay.

We landed about 10 minutes from our hotel. We were met by someone from the hotel and left in a nice air conditioned van. The resort was fine, we were taken to a room that was not what we had paid for. We were supposed to have rooms on the beach, but we were nowhere near the beach. Lisa told the hostess that we needed new rooms. The manager came, and showed Lisa papers that showed no beach rooms. Now Lisa pulled out the papers that showed we had paid for beach front rooms. Someone had charged us for beach front and didn't expect us to make a complaint OR someone made a mistake! In Kenya you never know. Finally we got beach front rooms, really individual little cottages. The water was wonderful. The food was okay and the service was not so good.

The people there were very interesting. They have very few Americans, so we were constantly asked if we were from England. There were lots of French and I think Germans and Italians and several conferences of African associations. The clothing they wore was fascinating. There was one man, we think he was a king or tribal chief. Lisa was getting embarassed by my trying to casually take his picture. The older men wore their speedos - very interesting. The older women wore two piece bathing suits. Now these women did not have very flattering figures, very large muffin tops as my friend Carol Duffy would say. There was a man, probably in his late thirites or forties, who was the pool boy. It was his job to account for all the towels used, he got them from storage room in back of the kitchen. He also had to place all the cushions on the chairs and place all the umbrellas. Once you got a lounge chair and an umbrella, it was yours for your stay - no acceptions. It took us a day to get the umbrella.

There were plenty of monkeys on the grounds. Lisa and I rode the camels on the beach. She and Mike did the negotiating. We would sit on the beach and see these women walk up and down the beach trying to sell scarves. It is probably close to 100 degrees and they have layers of clothing on and go up and down that beach. The poverty is beyond what we are use to. On the drive to and from the air strip, you see thatched huts and tin huts; I cannot imagine what the temperature is in them. Once you were off the beach, where you got a great sea breeze, you were overwhelmed with the heat.

I should tell you about trying to get a drink there. We tried a pina colada - not made the American way. They pour two shots of liquor in a medium size wine glass, then put the coconut milk and other stuff in a blender with two or three ice cubes and spin. They then add this to the alcohol and call that a frozen drink. I tried to tell the bartender out by the pool how it was done, and he just didn't get it. He said you would lose the alcohol . I took a picture of some of the staff and the chef wanted me to send him back his picture. You can see one of our waiters who was pretty good.

Out next door neighbors were French. I have never seen people argue like they did. They were yelling and screaming right on the beach. They were talking so fast that Kristoffer couldn't translate for us. So Lisa and I made up some stories about them. At first we thought they were on a romantic weekend trying to save their marriage (that wasn't going to happen). Then we figured she was the mistress and was yelling because he told her he was leaving his wife!!!

Lunch was by the pool and dinner was buffet style in the main dining room. Our rooms were right next to the "exclusive" restaurant. So we made reservations for dinner one night. Well the restaurant was exclusive alright - we were the only ones there!!!! Both Noah and Grace were asleep and we had the waiter and chef to ourselves.

The trip home was interesting. We went back to the air strip in 95 degree weather and waited. The plane arrived close to being on time. So we got in line with the babies to get on this 16 passanger plane. We waited in the heat for approximately half an hour. There was a problem because a passanger had a dog and was told that the plane was pressurized and it wasn't. At this point three other planes landed on the strip and these people didn't know what to do with so much traffic. The lady was able to get on another plane with the dog and made it back to Niarobi before we did, because we had a stop before we arrived back here. The first part of the flight was terrible - so hot - the last hour and a half were okay. I just had the rosary going!!! I know that got us here safe!!!

I know that Lisa will edit this and put in the appropriate pictures. I'll try to do this again. I want to show you some more pictures of Charles' home - no goats yet!

Grace was excited for the plane ride.

This was our first plane.

This was the airport we flew into.

The exclusive restaurant next to our cottages.

Beautiful ocean.

Lisa and I rode camels!

Women selling scarves on the beach. Can you believe how hot they must be!

French couple fighting!

He might be a kind under that hat!

Two of the waiters. They were always dressed this way for breakfast.

This waiter really liked Grace.

The chefs who made omelettes and pancakes.

This was our second plane.

Can you say claustrophobic?!