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Potential car crusher
This one got out. Apparently he kicks... Mambo Rafiki! That means 'how's it going, friends'... Mambo is the less formal greeting (compared with Hujambo). Apparently, the replies are 'poa' (which means cool), 'fiti' (fit) or 'freshi' (fresh), but I don't think I could do either of the latter 2 without feeling like I was a 14-year-old boy with my cap on backwards and my pants about a foot too low.
It's a public holiday here today - Labour day - and there aren't many people at work. Seeing as I'm getting paid in Australia, I felt I couldn't really take a day off, but did come in a bit late after Brigid and I went for a swim in the creek. Bit quieter in the mornings, it seems. No boys wanting to learn to swim. The only people round were a heap of women cleaning fish that had been brought back by the dhow fishermen. Went across and back, had to laugh at Brigid's horrible sense of direction when doing backstroke - she'd end up going the wrong way by over 90 degrees, sometimes heading out to sea.... luckily she'd stop every 50m or so to get her bearings. Apparently there's a Kilifi triathlon each year, with
Who's better looking?
For those who wanted a picture of my haircut. the swim held in the creek, so might have to use that as an opportunity to do my first triathlon. That is, if my bike holds up.... snapped my chain in half riding to work this morning, so ended up down at the bike garage (thankfully open) for the second time this week. All fixed now - it's amazing what they can do with so few tools - their workshop is literally a carport with a bike pump, a bucket of water (for checking for punctures in inner tubes), a pair of pliers and a couple of spanners. Not sure what the next bit to fall apart will be....
So, now I'm back at the lab and have run out of stuff to do for the day. Vervet monkeys (small beige coloured things with long tails and fluoro blue genitalia) run up and down the balconies here, often past my window. Just had a snack of ryvita and vegemite. Ryvita were the only dry biscuit I could find and, gee, they are shit. Anyway, topping off that treat with some baobab sweets (little pink sweet things from the baobab tree that you can get at the local stalls). Caused unbelievable
amusement amongst the local women at the stalls when I ordered in swahili. Not quite sure if I said something funny by accident, but they did seem to be saying something about mizungus and swahili, so I think it was just that they were amused that I was trying to speak swahili. No running with the group tonight because of the public holiday, but might duck off a bit early and go for one myself as it's probably the coolest day since we arrived today. My fears that we'd be left behind the other day by speedy kenyans was unfounded - I should have realised that, just because kenyan runners are the best in the world, doesn't mean every kenyan is crazily fast.
Anyway, was going to post some photos of Sunday. We had another trip south on Sunday, primarily to go to Nakumatt, a massive supermarket+Kmart-like shop about 8km north of central Mombasa. There's also a large bookshop in that complex, which was a great find as we'd already exhausted the supply we'd brought with us. Nakumatt is huge, and has a great range of food - both local stuff and imported. Once we start cooking for ourselves, I
Haller Park 1
Lush surrounds... don't think we're going to need to worry about getting sick of meat and rice. Getting some of the stuff back to Kilifi in a state fit to eat might be tough though. Lucky for us there is a good ice cream shop in Kilifi.... After shopping, we thought we'd check out Haller Park, which is across the road. It's a big Healesville Sanctuary-like place created about 50 years ago in what used to be a quarry. The plants are mostly not native, but the park is beautiful (and a few degrees cooler than outside it, which our dripping wet sweaty bodies appreciated!) and there are lots of native animals which you can get quite close to. We were able to feed some giraffes, which was great (although a cause for use of alcohol hand wash gel when we got back home!), and see some massive snakes and get really (almost uncomfortably) close to crocodiles.
Enjoy the photos. I've got to go and get more phone credit so that I can call a couple more people about a place to live. BBQ to go to tonight, which should be fun.... K x
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Sonny
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Nights
Hi Kathy! Working nights in ED. I am learning farsi (persian) from the guys here. I can arrk, huck, ast with the best of them. Couldn't stop laughing re: "what about your boy " story. That is terrible Ridgey. Case of the week: Frank haematuria +++++, post "chinese-massage". Hilarious but scary for the poor bugger. Anyway have fun, say hi to the fish. ps. who was taller standing up bridge or the tortoise? He He.