Animal Drive Revised

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I’m not really sure who decided we needed to leave at 7 a.m. but someone did. Everyone who showered last night got hot water. Sarah showered this morning and got the same. Apparently the shower had something against me because I was all ready for a hot one and instead got cold once again. Such is life.

Paul arrived early and we hit the road. There were a few necessary errands before leaving town, but we made it eventually. Our 6 hour drive turned into an almost 9 hour drive because of errands, stops, and seeing animals.

The animals were pretty cool, though. Someone apparently saw zebras, but I missed them yet again. A little ways down the road, we saw baboons in trees (think Rafiki); even farther down the road, they were on the road! I got a few pictures, including one sitting on a powerline. One of the baboons came up almost to the car as Spencer was trying to feed it. There were babies too.

Then, Paul directed our attention to a herd of elephants on one side. It was pretty stinkin’ cool! Just farther down the road, there were two more elephants about 15 yards from the car. One of them had HUGE tusks!

Also, there were some camels being herded. I didn’t realize there were camels in this part of Africa, but it makes sense, I guess.

The only other animals we saw were cows. Some were wandering in the distance, and some were dead on the side of the road. At one point, there were about 8 lying in a pile. They had been skinned and left to rot, it seemed.

The most interesting thing about seeing these animals was knowing that we’re on their turf. I’ve seen them all in zoos and things, but those animals aren’t native to there. Where we were seeing them here, that was their home, where they’ve lived for generations.

We finally got here, to the Mombasa area, where we will be working at a school sometimes and playing on the beach sometimes. It’s a fairly well known resort town, and is known for being hot.

The good thing about Mukeu is that it was cold, so it felt nice on my joints. On the ride, I felt my hands and feet gradually swelling. It’s warm and humid here, so I anticipate the swelling lasting for a while. It rained a little as we entered the city, so it added a bit to the mugginess.

We’re staying Mary, who is the director of a school here. Though we had the option of splitting up more, we are again stacked into the room. The 4 girls in one room, with the boys next door, behind the curtain. This will take a little getting used to. Bud and Irene are in the house, while we are above some sort of school store room, in a dorm.

There is another director here named George. He has taken great care of us, and took us to the internet café! The Canadians all went to the beach tonight to go swimming, but I opted to stay and decompose.

Speaking of animals, there are lots where we’re staying. This includes a pair of geese. They are not ordinary geese. They growl. That’s right. Almost every time I walk past them, they growl at me, and sometimes even ruffle their feathers! One of them bit Sarah. I have just gotten in the habit of growling back at them. Once, I had to run away from them because they were trying to bite me.

I also figured out that I don’t have the language skills to be here full-time. English, Luganda, Kiswahili, Kinyarwanda, Kikuyu… that’s a lot! Plus, the only way we could keep the guys at the market off our back was to speak in Spanish so they didn’t know what we were saying. Sarah and I have enough Spanish to do that, but not a lot more, at least on my part.

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