To City Center we go

Phanice needed to go to city center to take care of a few things. She had to take care of some paperwork to get her driver's license. She had already passed the necessary exams to get one, just needed to pick it up and fill some form out.

We took a Citi Hoppa, which actually costs 20ksh versus 30ksh to ride a matatu. They are quieter and obviously more spacious.

I tried using their internet, which is fairly slow compared to Minneapolis wi-fi. But I had to schedule meetings for my Green Party Meetup and check my e-mail. Getting my American Express payment out of the way also made me feel better!

I was done online around the same time as Phanice. She bought herself and me a pop. Had my first Stony Tangawizi - which is a ginger beer. ( it is nearly as good as Reed's ) It instantly became my favorite drink in Kenya.

Then we traveled to the outskirts of town, not far from the Tea Board of Kenya. I met Phanice's sisters Beatrice and Maureen. Beatrice has a baby daughter named Angel. We stayed over for dinner. They had a TV in their sitting room blasting American rap music. Not my favorite type of music, but I enjoyed the fried cabbage and ugali. Though I tried eating it differently and got a lot of weird glances.

When leaving and crossing the street, a Citi Hoppa nearly ran us over! Another interesting note is that the children in this neighborhood all stared at me. It is likely that whites rarely visit this part of town. It is something I had to get used to while there, but never fully felt comfortable with. I don't think of myself as any better or worse due to the color of my skin. I don't want better or worse service, but people treated me different anyways..

Arrival in Nairobi

I arrived in Nairobi, to find no one waiting at the airport for me. Of course there is no reason for Phanice to wait for me there if she doesn't know exactly when it will be there. And I find out that she moved just a few days prior, so her home wasn't as tidy as she wanted it.

I called her. After being asked by several tourist guides to go on a safari with them, she arrived. I gave her a big hug, but she seemd quite timid.

The air was warm and the sky was sunny. Quite a contrast from a dreary winter in Minnesota. I was skipping to summer early! Or at least the illusion of one - as the rainy season had just ended a week prior in Kenya.

We got to her place via taxi. The roads surrounding her apartment building were unpaved! Just muddy from the rains, and off what is called "outer ring road" in Nairobi. The road is not far from the airport, and just south of downtown. It is busy with foot traffic that I rarely see in the USA. But it was actually slower than most days, as it was Sunday.

After getting baggage situated at her place, Phanice went straight into making me breakfast. She was trying to make me pancakes, and proud that she had practiced several times prior. But when she dropped the batter on the skillet, she smoothed it out with a spoon - thinning it. So I decided to help her out in making true American pancakes. :)

She had never had something as fluffy as our pancakes, and since maple trees are scarce in Kenya, we made do with jelly.

Phanice did not have a refrigerator, so foods like butter and jelly were made to not be.

We also went out for further shopping. She seems to be in a rush all the time, but that is what most people in Nairobi are like. You have to walk fast and aggressive or get run over and stuck at a standstill. Just down the road from her house was a market where we bought vegetables. We even stopped at a place and bought ice cream - not comparable to that in Minnesota ( home of Dairy Queen and Princess Kay of the Milky Way ).

And I also took a matatu for the first time! That was interesting, though I hear it used to be worse when they crammed people in over the van's limit!

We had dinner, and I realized that ugali is not something as desirable in my diet. I prefer rice or pasta - even grits - to ugali. But perhaps there is a way to make it palatable or get used to.

Trip to London - chaotic security rules

I left Minneapolis on Friday,January 5th to find myself in London's Gatwick airport the next day. I didn't know my way around London, though I did check out the whereabouts of the airport which is south of London. I needed to get to the Heathrow airport for my transfer to Nairobi.

Now why was I going to Nairobi? I wanted to meet Phanice and see Africa for the first time. So it was for personal reasons - vacation and relational. Though the fact that the World Social Forum was going to start before I left was icing on the cake.

Second, I have many friends who are from East Africa. Some who had lived in Nairobi before coming to Minnesota as refugees and others who had never touched foot in Kenya. But even those who had never been there sometimes had relatives living there. So, when they heard I was going gave me gifts to bring their relatives or in one case husband. Which ended up going well, except the Oromo husband was bit mean( and the fact he had a female driver and two women in the backseat makes me think he also has 3 additional wives).

I enjoyed who I sat next to on the way to London. It was a gal from South Carolina who turned out to be a Democrat. We had a fun discussion about politics, the Iraq War, and the Presidential Race. She was all for Edwards, too bad he is a hypocrite living fully in Rich America rather than Working Class America. Nonetheless, she is reading Obama's book The Audacity of Hope and will consider him in the primary. So far I like Obama and Kucinich.

I also enjoyed a movie on my way to London - Lage Raho Munnabhai. It was hilarious! It's about this guy who works for a mafia type thug who falls in love with a very nice woman who is a famous radio personality. He has to learn about Gandhi to enter a contest and ends up seeing him! It just gets crazier from there - but the movie is amazing! A must see for any fan of comedies or independent films!

Getting to Gatwick I tried finding a way to get to Heathrow. There were the subways. So I tried that. It cost me £10, or $20 to ride. I ended up going to King's Cross and then walking with all my bags to another linkup that would take me to Heathrow. It would have been okay, except I had a LOT of luggage - max capacity from the US - and was sick. I had a bad cold, and it wasn't getting any better. Not to mention how confusing the map for the transit system was compared to Minneapolis - click on the image to see it clearer!

London was still Green. I wished my layover had been longer for I wished to see more of London. Yet, it would have been very expensive and cost me a day with Phanice - so in retrospect glad it went as it did.

Anywho, it seems that traveling to London one can bring 2 carry ons and 2 luggage. When leaving England, you can only have 2 luggage and ONE CARRY ON. Which leaves Americans struggling to consolidate 2 carry ons into one - not easy. In fact, there were garbage bins FULL of "extra" carry ons. Somehow, we were flying safer from England than the US due to this rule. Whatever, the terrorists are beginning to win is all these rules mean.
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The flight to Nairobi was packed with British students who would be studying at in Nairobi. One thing I noticed about British women - they don't care about their looks or their hair like American girls do. They just wear it however - not even trying to look nice. The guys have long hair too, reminding me of a cross between 80s and 70s styles in America. I actually looked more normal among them than I do in the states! :D