Blogs from Nairobi, Nairobi Province, Kenya, Africa - page 27

Heather said that the road between Kisumu and Bumala would be a great concept for a video game - see how fast you can make the trip while dodging huge sinkholes, speed bumps, police check stops, people walking and on bicycles, matatus, goats and cows, gasoline tanker trucks, etc etc etc. You definitely have to be on your toes to be a driver in this country. One of our students who I’ve mentioned before in the Grandmother day entry, Nicholas, works in the market as a porter on the weekends to support his family. Todd and Charles ran into him yesterday when they were picking up the PA system, and arranged for him to help us haul our luggage from the hotel to the police station, where we would be picked up by the bus. It’s ... read more

A Day of "Relative" Rest I am writing less today, and trying to simply get some rest from work. It has been an exhausting but fulfilling trip so far, but I am concerned that I will play out before it is done if I don’t take one day of rest. I still have a week of projects and business ahead of me. We are up early, at 5:30 am, and down to the front launching area by 6:00am. By 6:30am the sun is just rising and we are already on the trail for our early morning game drive. It is wonderful to be on the Serengetti so early in the morning. We see several balloon safaris drifting helplessly across the horizon and it would have been nice to try that but it is an additional ... read more

We Return to Nairobi After Nine Days of Intense Work in Bumala We are up early and had breakfast at 6:00 am. We checked out and received a number of goodbyes from the friendly staff at the Western Ambience Hotel. It was like leaving family. We were out front of our hotel by 20 minutes to 7:00am and waited for Nicolas. I realized that we had way too many bags for him to carry (6 in total, and some were very heavy), so I went and got a second porter and loaded up three bags for him. We waited, and waited…..and no Nicolas. Five minutes to 7:00…..then 7:00am….then five minutes after 7:00…..ten minutes after 7:00….. I began to realize that Nicolas had either forgotten or was distracted by some other job so early in the morning. ... read more

Mercy Children Centre Officially Becomes the Pride of Bumala Today is the BIG DAY!! It is hard to describe how important this day is, but it has many “political” implications in both the community and with the local government. It is critical that we make a good presentation, and an insult in any form could sink our ship. Charles and I slipped into Bumala to rent a PA system for today’s event. I saw Nicolas, aged 11, there (he and his younger brother Eric were responsible for maintaining the income for their two mentally ill parents, and Nicolas earns the money by porting around luggage with a small hand cart) and because he was working all weekend and had to miss the celebration at the school, I asked him to meet us at the hotel at ... read more

Geo: -1.27975, 36.8126DAY FIFTEEN (Friday, September 18, 2009)Leavin' on a jet planeNo alarm clock this morning … got a full 8 hours of sleep. We packed, had breakfast and relaxed, waiting for our 10 am departure.It was a long travel day:- Transfer to local airport where we shopped the "duty-free shop" set up in a hut.· Air Kenya flight (one hour or so) to Nairobi and transfer to our downtown hotel through some horrific traffic; I gather it's always awful, to the point you have to allow LOTS of extra time to make sure you make your plane· We had rooms at the Nairobi Serena Hotel, one of the top hotels in Nairobi, where security guards checked our car for bombs before we could be dropped off. A bit unsettling.· Tauck had arranged day rooms for ... read more