#3: Muguga, Kenya

It is currently just after 1pm on Saturday, 14 March 2011 and I’m in Kenya! So far, so good. I mention the date because I am currently at the place I’m staying with no internet so I’m just typing up this blog entry as a word document on my laptop in the hope that I can post it later, possibly on Monday. I might get internet set up on my laptop at work then, so we shall see. I actually had the time to update yesterday while I was at work with internet access, but blogspot was down! Bummer. But I have the time to write now, so I might as well. Here’s a summary of what has happened so far:

I drove up to Columbus, Ohio on Monday evening with my parents. We ate an awesome dinner at Haiku and got ice cream for dessert at Jeni’s. It was a good way to end my time in the states. I’ve grown to quite like Columbus actually, after spending more time there in the past year+. That night in one last effort to pack super light I took a few items of clothing out of my pack. I was successful though – one backpack plus my computer/laptop bag, neither of which are really heavy. The next morning I got up at 6:30am to shower and headed to the airport. Then I had a big string of flights and about 30 hours of travel. Columbus -> Toronto -> Montreal -> Brussels -> Bujumbura -> Nairobi (finally!).

So, flight highlights: There was some pretty bad turbulence on the way to Toronto. I guess we were flying through some storms or something because a few times the plane dropped a bit and you could feel your stomach rise in your chest, like you do on rollercoasters. It reminded me of Lost. But no problems. Montreal was just a stopover that should be considered a layover because we had to go through customs and everything. I got a Canadian stamp in my passport, alright. Now I can prove I’ve been there, since last time I went was shortly before I renewed my passport. Air Canada is a really nice airline, by the way! My vegetarian meal of vegetable lo mein was actually quite decent. On the way to Brussels I watched “The Way Back,” which was fine. Brussels airport was surprisingly not that great, and neither was Brussels Airlines. However, the general mediocrity and length of the flight to Africa was made up for by the fact that they gave us ice cream bars as we were flying over the Sahara! It was dark by the time we were coming into Bujumbura and it was honestly a bit eerie flying in – even though it’s the capital city there were hardly any lights. I guess it makes sense because Burundi has the lowest per capita GDP in the world. Those of us headed onto Nairobi had to stay on the plane, and the crew had to go through and spray the cabin with some stuff. Weird. Then it was a short flight to Nairobi and I got there at about 10:30pm.

I was picked up at the airport by a guy who works at KEFRI and he just brought me to the place I’m staying, which is basically a collection of guesthouses. My room has a bed, a chair, a closet, a TV, and an attached bathroom with a toilet, sink, and shower (cold and not separated in any way from the rest of the bathroom). It’s fairly nice and I kind of like sleeping under the mosquito net. We’re a bit far from Nairobi  – with no traffic it’s about a 30-45min drive but traffic can apparently be a nightmare which makes the drive take hours. Where I am is also down one of the worst roads I’ve ever been on (more pothole than pavement) off the highway. There are a few small towns (villages?) along the road, then there’s KEFRI, then further down is where I’m staying. Some KEFRI employees live in the same area, so that’s nice.

I went to work Thursday and Friday, but didn’t do much. I mostly just met people, introduced myself, worked on figuring out/getting help with some logistics, and read and merged a couple of documents. My boss comes in on Monday so I’ll figure out what I’ll be doing more exactly then. And hopefully get internet set up there. Mostly I want to get a modem for my computer somehow, and apparently you have to go into Nairobi for that.

Last night (Friday) was nice. Thursday was boring – it gets dark around 6pm and I shouldn’t wander around after that so I was stuck in my room with just my Swahili book for company. But on Friday I was getting a ride home with two KEFRI guys who live nearby and I was asking about where I could buy food because I didn’t have any and am not paying for dinner here (another 1000 shillings = over $10, no thanks). One of the guys (a KEFRI director actually, who also visited the Soviet Union and still speaks Russian quite well!) invited me to his place for dinner so I got tea and food there and got to hang out with his family for awhile. It was really nice. Then he and his oldest son walked me back here because it was well after dark.

Bryson (a fellow SPEA student) came this morning. I am really glad to have the company! Also this means it is a bit safer for me to wander around. Since we’re only getting breakfast here, we needed to somehow get food. After breakfast we made the trek to the nearest town, found a super tiny shop, and got some PB&J supplies, mangos, oranges, water, and juice, all of which cost about $6 or so. I also topped off money on my Kenya phone. It was quite a trek – we left here around 9am and got back after noon. The town is I’d guess 3km away so it’s a walk, but also when we were leaving here a guy pointed us the wrong way so after awhile we realized we had to turn back. It was worth the long detour though – we saw a lot of cool creatures that you can’t really notice when you’re being driven around. For example, there was a field full of what Bryson thinks might be widow birds – they have really long tails. It was super cool and I got to take some photos of the scenery. And now we have food for later today, and I have company. He did steal my novelty of being the only white person around though, haha. I had seen no other mzungu (=white person, I learned quickly) around since the aiport until he came along!

Anyway, here are a few things I’ve noticed:

Being mzungu – standing out like I do here is something I’m really not used to. I can easily blend into the crowd in other countries I’ve spent extended amounts of time in, but no way here. I’m drawing a lot of stares and shouts, but nothing negative. People sometimes shout mzungu! or go out of their way to try to say hi to me. What is especially funny are the kids, who don’t quite know what to make of me. Some seem curious but scared – they’ll stare and come a bit close and usually wave back if I wave to them, but they don’t seem to want to get too close. A boy today kept gleefully yelling “hi! hi! hi!” to Bryson and me as we walked by. We also passed by a lady with a kid and she said something which included mzungu to her kid who whipped around and saw us so we waved and they were pleased. The best was yesterday when I was being driven to the ATM to get more shillings a really small child, between one or two, saw me and his mouth and eyes got so wide and he just pointed. I waved to him and he got the biggest grin on his face and waved back. Generally people have pretty serious looks their faces but if you smile and wave and say hello they become quite animated and respond. I must say though, never before have a felt so pale… or translucent, almost!

Friendliness: People here are really friendly, more so than any other place I’ve been, I think. It’s really nice. All of the people at KEFRI have been really helpful and like I said, I was invited to dinner by one of the directors who I had only chatted with a few times before. I’ve received several other invitations for tea, etc from people I just met.

Food/Weather: Lots of carbs! Lots of tea too. They make their tea by adding tea to hot milk (not to water and then adding milk) but I quite like it this way. Also right now everything is served warm or hot because it’s their winter. It’s not that cold, maybe getting down to the high 50s or low 60s F at night and when it’s sunny during the day I’d say it’s in the low 80s. People think it’s so cold though and always ask me if I find it cool. Anyway, yesterday and today at breakfast I was even given warm juice, ha.

This entry is now massive so congratulations to anyone who has read all of this. But so far things have been great overall. I may even be going on a trip to the coast in a week for work, we’ll see! But all is well and I’m having a good time. Hurrah, and ta.