I’ve spent a few days around Naivasha, curling up by the lodge’s fireplace and staring distantly toward the lake and trying to find a decent Internet connection in a town plagued by power cuts. In the morning the birds are chattering in the trees - trumpeting, trilling, piping their little lustful notes; at night, lured by tales of hippos prowling the lakeside, I stand in the deep, croaking dark, shining my headlamp toward the menacing reeds. There are a few lengths of electric wire roping off the campsite; a small, colorful sign warns: “DANGER! ZAP!” Last spring a Dutc [View Full Entry]

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I’ve rented a tent at Fisherman’s Camp, a popular campsite tucked behind the reeds on the shores of Lake Naivasha. The rain’s already let up as I stake my tent into the mud; there’s a riot of birdsong in the trees above me, squawks and trills and little calls of longing. Black-and-white colobus monkeys - their scrunched-up, Oriental faces taking me in with hostile regard - scratch and nibble at the scraps of fruit others campers have left behind. There’s a massive, thatched-roof restaurant at the far end of the site, music softly piping from the eaves, and a few t [View Full Entry]

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If nothing else, Nairobi’s quickly shown my flair for stasis. I’ve slouched into a days-long stupor of typing away on my laptop, occasionally broken by bootleg DVDs (The Constant Gardener, Blood Diamond, The Last King of Scotland - sticking to a certain sinister theme of Africa run amok) and mutton curries at Annie Oakley’s. Sitting at the end of the dirt road outside my hostel, Oakley’s is a busy hang-out for local pool sharks and prostitutes - girls in mesh shirts and animal-print tunics and enough PVC to outfit a plumbing supply. On the big-screen TV I watch c [View Full Entry]

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I’ve spent a week tramping through the bush and sleeping in a smoky room and sporadically washing from a basin of hot water, so it’s no surprise that the first words I hear when I get back to Nairobi are, “Man, you look like shit.” What’s more surprising is who they’re coming from: an American named Mel, last spotted sharing my dorm room in a Beirut hostel in April. At the time he’d been making his way toward Egypt, from which the real trip - the famous Cairo-to-Cape-Town route - would begin. Three months later, though, beaming, flashing a what-are [View Full Entry]

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The kids are up and clucking about, the animals bleating and braying in the yard. It’s just past eight, and this is my morning ritual with the Maasai. David hands me two slices of white bread, plain and dry and crumbling to the touch. His wife brings us mugs of chai, which we sit and drink in sleepy silence. After we’ve finished his wife brings in a wash basin and a pitcher of water. Some days it’s scorching hot; today it’s so cold it numbs my fingertips. I dip my hands in, splash my face, and wash myself with a chalky [View Full Entry]

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From a sartorial standpoint, there’s a lot that a ragged traveler like me can learn from the developing world. Even here, in this remote Maasai village, where people live in cow-dung manyattas and crap in the bush, I’m woefully underdressed for Sunday service. David is hunched over on the edge of the bed, running a rag over his shoes with great gravity. Little Lanoi - his bald, bright-eyed eight-year-old - has put on a rustling skirt and a red gingham blouse. For my part, I’m wearing a pair of pants that look like they’ve spent the past week wrapped around a [View Full Entry]

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After a few restless nights in an overcrowded dorm room in Nairobi, I was convinced that things would get better before they got worse. Then I learned to sleep like a Maasai. It’s been a sobering introduction into the life of these hardened plains peoples. The fire pit is still smoldering as we tuck ourselves into bed, the air thick and acrid with the smells of roasted cabbage and scorched meat. Our bed - fashioned from a thin foam mattress and a bunch of sticks - creaks and groans each time I shift for comfort. David is sleeping beside me, breathing [View Full Entry]

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Laid low by a cold for much of my first week, I’ve managed to spend a full ten days in Nairobi - an accomplishment that, I’m certain, will warrant a commemorative t-shirt before I go. Back on my feet at last, shaking a metaphorical fist at the gray winter skies, I pack my bags for a week in the bush - a stay with a Maasai chief who, incidentally, has a profile on CouchSurfing. When I tell Khadija, the receptionist at my hostel, that I’m heading to Narok in the afternoon, she shakes her head and says, “You’re going to the [View Full Entry]

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It’s election season in Kenya, with the usual crooks and cronies preparing their battle plans in the run-up to the December balloting. Downtown there are packs of men gathered around smooth, smiling guys in well-pressed suits. A local explains how presidential hopefuls send out their yes-men to offer the usual empty promises; in the small towns and villages, they’ll arrive bearing money and gifts. Food, blankets, new pairs of shoes: a brief spending spree in the weeks leading up to the election is typically all it takes to secure another five-year term - about the only thrift these [View Full Entry]

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When even the locals have come to affectionately call their home “Nairobbery,” you can’t help but arrive in town with your guard up. For weeks I’ve been girding myself against what my guidebook cheerily describes as “the most dangerous city in Africa, beating stiff competition from Johannesburg and Lagos” - a statement that’s probably ruffled a few feathers in Mogadishu, and has certainly done little to calm my nerves. In recent weeks there’s been a thwarted suicide bombing downtown, while a rash of brutal murders have been traced to the mysterio [View Full Entry]

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