Conserving my Experiences

One of my original aims in coming to Arocha Kenya was to learn a little about conservation and I think I’ve achieved that aim. I have learnt about conservation – a little.

I’ve begun to understand the importance of birds and studying birds in measuring the effects of climate change. I’ve learnt a bit about turtles, the different types – Olive Ridley, Hawksbill, Leatherback and Green. Albert and Aaron were at Malindi harbour conducting the annual waterfowl count over the weekend and Aaron found a dead Leatherback turtle on the beach. It was only the second one to ever be found there, both have been found dead. This one had head injuries consistent with being hit, no doubt fishermen were trying to untangle it from their net. Hawksbill are the most endangered species while Leatherbacks are the largest turtle, this one was 80 cm across and 170cm long. The fishermen kill them because otherwise they’ll damage the nets and their therefore their livelihoods. Watamu Turtle Watch, across the road from us operate a system where they pay each fisherman a small amount if they call Turtle Watch to come and rescue the turtle instead of killing it. I’ve also seen conservation work going hand in hand with poverty alleviation through ASSETS which A Rocha runs. I’ve realised you can’t have one without the other.

I’ve been frustrated by the amount of rubbish I’ve had to throw away because there’s no recycling infrastructure in Kenya. I’ve also been inspired by the culture of re-using there is here and determined not to drop so much into the recycling bin in future and tell myself I’m doing a good deed.

I’ve seen mangroves for the first time, swum over a damaged coral reef, learnt why you shouldn’t feed the monkeys (it’s all to do with seed dispersion) and discovered that Neem and Jacaranda are good woods but you should never buy Mahogany or Ebony (I don’t think there’s much left of either now anyway).

Otherwise I’ve surprised myself by learning new computer skills (it’s normally a fight to get onto the computer here). I’ve learnt about Kenya and East Africa, I’ve picked up Swahili kidogo sana. I’ve learnt more about North American geography and culture than I thought I would. I must find out what a ‘banana pepper’ is. And I guess I can now share a room with someone without going crazy.

I think it’s safe to say my time here hasn’t been wasted. I wish I’d been able to contribute more but the structure and organisation of this place actually make it difficult to leave any lasting improvements with the exception of handing over hard cash. I wish I’d got to know people better, especially the incredibly hardworking and talented field staff there are here and been less involved in tasks and more with people. I wish I could have learnt more Swahili and more about protecting the environment. This is what I’m really interested in back in the UK, although I think I’ll have greater respect for our wildlife now, such as it is. Africa might be officially a poor continent but they have something in abundance that we don’t have so much of in Europe – sun. If someone was to cover East Africa in solar panels surely they’d be making so much energy they could sell it back to us (and when our coal and gas finally runs out they’d be naming the price too…) But it would need someone or some people to provide the infrastructure in the first place, and who would be prepared to do this?


For Those Who Pray

Thank God I've been so blessed while I've been here and had the chance to do so many new and exciting things! And He's kept me well and safe this whole time. Pray I'll have the courage to listen to Him when I get home regarding what I should do next.

Pray for Kenya, the teachers' strike is over I think but not all pay issues yet resolved. There are food shortages in some areas, especially in the North where it's very dry they are having to hand out food parcels.

Pray for continued peace here and no repeats of the post-election violence of last year.

Pray for ARK that they get awarded the much needed grants they've applied for this year, that Colin (the director) and Roni will soon be back and the staff will feel encouraged about a new era at Mwamba.

Pray for safety for me - I'm leaving Mwamba on Tuesday and travelling on my own for a while, always a bit risky but God has kept me safe this far and I'm sure he'll bring me home :)

Trust in Translation

Robin wants to learn more Swahili so despite my time in Kenya getting very short we’ve been learning a little together in the evenings. We normally go to the kitchen to help Lispa finish off the evening meal and then she can correct our grammar and teach us more useful words while we’re there.

The one thing I really neglected to do before leaving the UK was learn any Swahili (apart from some words my Dad taught me just before I flew). I’d chosen to go to Kenya because people speak English here and somewhere in my brain a door shut on me thinking any further about it. With the exception of small children all Kenyans speak English to some degree, the staff here all speak it fluently but they don’t always choose to. Several times I’ve sat in meetings where the language has changed mid-sentence – perhaps a particular concept is better expressed in one language than another – and I’ve lost the thread of the conversation. I’ve felt myself getting angry at the rudeness of people choosing not to speak a language they’re perfectly capable of using and therefore excluding people. I’m also aware that it’s a judgement I can’t make: I don’t know what it’s like to be bilingual and to have to cope with people who aren’t; and perhaps if they had the choice the staff here would only speak Swahili, maybe I should be grateful that they speak to me in English at all, it is after all not a language they have to use anymore.

It requires a certain level of trust to live in a community where you can’t always understand what’s being said although the western volunteers aren’t the only ones in that position. There are actually several languages at Mwamba, Lispa, as a Kikuyu from the central highlands has had to accept that most of the staff will speak to each other in the local language, Giriama when they can and she won’t understand them.

I’ve been getting to know Lispa gradually since spending so much time with Keziah and Chiko at Christmas. I think she felt some affinity with the volunteers as she also had to work over the holidays while the rest of the staff were away. Also as a single woman perhaps it’s easier to talk to her about some things and despite having been here for years she has some understanding of what it’s like to be far from home among people speaking a different language. She’s seen volunteers come and go however, and is quite honest about the fact that she gets close to people, is sad to see them leave but rarely misses them when they’re gone. She’s a friendly person but not someone who trusts easily but the more time I spend with her the more I get to like her. She has a qualification in ornithology and came here 4 years ago to study birds. Then someone discovered she could also cook extremely well and she’s never left. She lives on site and I sometimes wonder if she feels a little isolated, she’s certainly frustrated at not being in the job she wants to be in. I sympathise with her but I can’t help feeling that I’m just another volunteer who will soon disappear and I’m not sure how much my sympathy is really worth. She’s due to take some holiday around the same time as I leave Mwamba and planning to be in Nairobi when I’m there so maybe we’ll get together again then…

Prepared to be Positive

Weds 21st Jan

I was meant to publish Sunday’s entry yesterday but literally didn’t have the energy. Since Monday I’ve been experiencing something like a mild tonsillitis that’s never really developed and seems to be remedied by paracetamol and sitting still. I think all my rushing around in the last few weeks has caught up with me in the form of exhaustion. Also it’s not like I don’t spend plenty of time resting here but I’ve been finding it harder and harder to sleep at night (possibly my malaria medicine?) so I’m more tired than I should be.

It turned out that the power cut was perfectly timed yesterday so that the power came back on in the evening before Obama’s inauguration ceremony in the USA, 8 hours behind us. We ate a quick dinner and then gathered in the Kigens’ upstairs room to watch the only TV there is at Mwamba. NTV had CNN live for most of it except when they cut to scenes of people dancing in the streets in Kisumu (where Obama’s Kenyan family is from).
It’s hard to get across just how much people here have taken on board, ‘the world’s first Kenyan president’. Maybe the best illustration is the ‘Barack Obama’ matatu that I’ve caught a few times from Turtle Bay, not only is his name printed on the outside but there’s a picture of him on every seat (see photo). During Robin’s few days away she was let into the marine park south of Mombassa (Kisiti?) for free! Now is a good time to be an American in Kenya, maybe it is anywhere in the world…

Inside the 'Obama' matatu




Sunday 18th Jan

Robin’s back! Last Monday morning I got a text saying “Is roof still free? Coming back today” She’s really fallen in love with this place and just couldn’t stay away. The roof wasn’t free any longer as we were about to be inundated with students from Finland, 15 of them with 4 professors and a driver. (This is more than we can reasonably accommodate but since when did we start saying no to guests at Mwamba?) Henry and Belinda had never met Robin but they were obviously impressed by how we were all missing her and said she could come back and stay on the balcony of their house for a bit.
The Finish group were meant to arrive around dinner time but they rang to say their bus had broken down and they’d be late. They still hadn’t arrived by 11pm so we went to bed and asked Laurence to wake us up when they arrived. I’d just dropped off to sleep when I heard Laurence’s knocking and had to get dressed again and serve stew and rice to a room full of tired but still hungry students. Then I stood around in a daze waiting to wash up, disorientated by the sound of Scandinavian voices and how they all sat and chatted, enjoying their food like it was 12.00 pm not am. Most of them didn’t even look that tired which was more than could be said for me. They were very polite but obviously a little disappointed when they saw the size of the rooms and the number of them staying in each one. One of them tried to explain to me that they were “Big Scandinavian women” and the mattresses weren’t really large enough for them. I thought she was being a little hard on herself as the students were all pretty slim and anyone would have struggled to fit 5 into a room meant for 3. However, we did eventually manage to squeeze them all in and go back to bed; another triumph of African economy over Western worry.

Aaron and Suzanne surprised us by arriving back the next day as planned despite coming by the infamously unreliable overnight train from Nairobi to Mombassa, once known as the ‘lunatic line’. (I’m hoping to get that train myself going the other way. It’s supposed to be the best way to travel as long as you don’t have to arrive in Nairobi in time for anything in particular). It’s been much easier than I thought it would be living with the two of them so far, though Robin coming back has helped of course. I think I’ve just been so busy I haven’t had time to be a gooseberry. Now that the newspapers have started announcing the power cuts in advance it’s made it a lot easier to plan what you’re doing for the day - I’m inching along with the information display, I’ve finally got a draft copy of the newsletter out and left it around for the staff to comment on - on Tuesday I’m sure the newspapers will be full of Obama Day part 2 and we may have to make sure we read about it in the paper as another power cut is also forecast for the same day. As Aaron put it, “We won’t be able to see the ‘riots’ in Kisumu on TV”. It will make a change from the more sombre articles there’ve been recently on the ‘Communications Bill’, which has increased media censorship and nation wide teachers’ strikes. Life here is hard sometimes but people are always willing to find something to celebrate about.

Robin outside the front of the house

Cutural Confusion

Sunday 11th January

My 3 months with A Rocha have all been clearly different. It’s so quiet at Mwamba now I can hear the snorkelling boats in the bay and our neighbours shouting at each other on the next plot. After I got back from Lamu Aaron and Suzanne went to Kakamega (spelling?!) with Albert – a rainforest in the west of Kenya – to watch birds and won’t be back until Tuesday. Our moderate number of guests from last weekend has dwindled to just 1. Even Robin eventually left on Friday and it was hard to see her go. She’s planning to come back with her daughter in February it will be after I’ve left.

I’ve been keeping myself busy with all sorts – learning some more Swahili, helping Lispa in the kitchen, reading and making travel plans for after 3rd Feb. The peace and quiet is a welcome change but I feel I could lose my mind slightly if the isolation continues. However, the staff are due to start coming back from Monday and the Kigens arrived back as promised last night and seem happy with how this place has been managed in their absence.

I’ve been trying to get back into the projects I was working on before Christmas. I’ve finished the draft of the Volunteers’ Handbook (this was Aaron’s idea in my 2nd week here when I was despairing at the lack of organisation) and plan to send it to our director, Colin. I still really want to create a visitor information display for the front of Mwamba and make the place look a little more professional. I can order information but creating physical displays is not my strong point. With no one to work on it with me I’ve come to a stop and am procrastinating. Using your initiative here is welcomed but there's not always the support you need to go ahead.

On Friday I was invited to Laurence, our night watchman’s house. He and his wife Tina had a baby girl a week ago and Friday was her official “coming out” party after 5 days at home. They live just up the road in a tiny house (I’m hoping the one room I went into isn’t the extent of it) with a fruit shop at the front which Tina runs during the day.
I was unsure of the protocol but Lispa advised me that instead of shopping for a present for the baby it was OK to take some groceries – tea, ugali flour etc. This proved to be a good decision when other women turned up after me with similar gifts. I stayed for tea and a popular snack (I've forgotten the name) which are like sugary doughnuts on the outside and just plain dough on the inside. I left before the rest of the “mamas” all turned up which I hoped wasn’t rude. Laurence said later it was fine as with Kenyan timing I’d have had to wait hours. He said when they’d all arrived they sang and then he said a testimony about how good God had been keeping Tina and the baby well.
They’re obviously struggling for money. One of Laurence’s sons, Issac was home from school, not because it was a special day but because Laurence had withdrawn him after the school had pushed the fees up at the start of term. He talked a lot about it and showed me the letter from the school and it was obvious he was hoping I was going to contribute something.

It frustrates me, like it does a lot of westerners here, that because I’m white therefore I’m expected to be rich. The culture here is different to the UK in that it’s OK to just ask people to give you money outright if you want it, especially if they’re wazungu. It’s refreshing to know that people can ask and to see how people share what they have - if you have a vehicle you watch the road for who you can give lifts to, if someone turns up randomly they stay for lunch without question- I wish the UK was like this.
However I’m constantly fighting my English sense that people are being really rude when there’s an underlying expectation that you must give them something. What I can’t get away from though is that although pressuring people to give you money is wrong it would be just as wrong of me to ignore the poverty that I saw. I could use Laurence’s behaviour as an excuse to give him nothing or I could see that behaviour like that is born out of desperation. And of course he's right, compared to them I am rich.
I can’t afford to pay school fees and I left without offering. That night I gave Laurence about 1,000 KSH (about 8.50 GBP) for his oldest son who’s just left school. He’s been offered a place on a 3 month course in Nairobi all expenses paid but still needs to find the bus fare to get there and 1,000 KSH should cover most of it. Laurence took the money like he’d clearly expected it, thanked me briefly and disappeared. I was left in confusion, not sure if I should have given it to him at all or if I should have written him a cheque for, 10,000 KSH instead.

For Those Who Pray

Pray that I can make the most of my last 3 weeks here and finish the work I've started. I'd like to leave with the feeling that I've contributed something lasting.

Pray for Laurence and Tina that they can find the money for Issac's school fees or another school for him which they can afford. Pray for me that I can use my money wisely and be prepared to sacrifice - especially after people have been so generous to me!

Please pray for Rachel who I think has been searching.

New Year in Lamu

I’ve written such a lot recently that it feels like I should give you a break but I have to say a few words about spending New Year in Lamu.

It used to be a hippy hotspot back in the day, like Goa in India. Now it’s hailed by all the guidebooks as a must see part of Kenya’s coast. “Lamu” the holiday destination is actually 3 islands Lamu, Manda and Pate. Most people only get as far as Lamu, the nearest to the mainland and perhaps most people are a little disappointed to find, instead of the promised paradise island, something like a smaller, dirtier version of Venice. There are amazingly empty beaches but you have to get a dhow out to the more distant islands to see them.

If you had to pinpoint the exact spot where Africa meets Asia I’d say this was it, the culture being genuine Swahili (the rest of Kenya just speak Swahili) is obviously infused with Arabic culture and the fact that it’s a Muslim island enhances its Middle Eastern look. The sandy hills on the beach at Manda made me feel like I could be in Dubai.

To reach the ferry we took a five hour bumpy bus ride north, mostly on dirt roads with some stops to let villagers push their wares through the windows at us. Rachel was very amused at my slight altercation with a woman who seemed insistent on selling me a live chicken and tried to persuade me to buy it by pushing its bottom in my face. Beware if you go the Mangoes sprinkled with Masala. The heat and thirst might persuade you they’re worth a try but unless you like hot peppery fruit don’t buy one. Mine had to go out of the window, why spoil a perfectly good fruit?! (In my opinion)

After a few days in Lamu though, I began to understand its subtler charms. On the surface it’s a little grey and there’s a lot of donkey dung. The streets are too small for cars so donkeys are used everywhere for haulage (there are so many that some people from Cornwall started a donkey sanctuary there to look after them. The British still get everywhere…) It was strange to see a donkey with a traditional pannier across its back filled with Coca Cola bottles (they get everywhere too). This in part illustrates the appeal of the place: it’s a total mix of tourist eateries and touts eager for your business and locals carrying out their daily business by donkey between their old Swahili houses. There are virtually no vehicles but several internet cafes and yet somehow these things sit side by side comfortably without looking crass. Despite the number of western tourists, after a few days you really feel like you’ve left the rest of the planet behind. Add to that the compact size of the place, at least the area where the hotels are based and it doesn’t take long for people to recognise you in the street - those that want your business and those that have already had it and are just happy to stop and chat – and you feel even more sucked in to this alternative world. Rachel certainly made friends fast with her ability to converse a little in Swahili and we got used to people shouting her name as we walked along.

We were only there for a few days so didn’t try to fit too much in. I was still exhausted from Christmas and still not eating much. On the second day of our trip I went the entire day without feeling hungry and I knew something must be wrong (although it did save me some money!) It turned out to be a stomach problem which began to right itself while we were away. The low point of my Lamu holiday has to be some best forgotten toilet experiences. Rachel couldn’t believe my bad luck, I always seemed to come across them first. I’ve learnt that the most expensive café does not automatically equal the cleanest toilet.

The day before New Years Eve we booked our dhow trip across to Manda with Captain Ali and his second in command, Sunflower. (Don’t be fooled by the girly name, Sunflower was no pansy). The trip confirmed what I’ve suspected for a while – I get seasick. It’s ironic with all the sailing I’ve done in my life but then most of that has been inland, and when I look back at each of the few times I’ve been in a boat on the ocean I’ve felt unwell. I’m rubbish at being ill and generally feel very sorry for myself but the others we’d gone with were very polite and didn’t complain when they were fishing over one side of the boat while I was being sick over the other. Captain Ali was also kind (his dad taught him to sail as a child and he was frequently sick). He let me lie down in the boat on his kikoy. I was nearly asleep when Rachel shouted me awake, I had just enough strength to sit up and see the dolphins that were swimming next to us.

I felt better later and when Sunflower and Ali cooked the fish we’d caught on the beach it was like the best meal I’d ever had. Then we lay in the shade on the quiet and thankfully still undeveloped beach at Manda. Later when we docked back in Lamu we found ourselves invited into Ali’s parents’ house which was right on the sea front for a cup of chai.

New Years Eve started at 3pm when we sat on the roof of our guest house and toasted in the Australian New Year for Rachel. She’d insisted on getting us a bottle of Amarula (like an African version of Baileys) despite the fact that it meant a slightly covert search on this Muslim island where no alcohol is sold in the normal shops. We were told there was “someone” who could get it for you and Rachel asked if this was against my “morals”. I wasn’t too uncomfortable until it transpired the only place to buy it was at the ‘Police Canteen’. There’s not enough space now and I’m not sure I understand enough after 2 months to explain quite how the police stand in Kenyan society. Suffice to say that despite coming across what seemed like a perfectly legitimate shop I wasn’t sure we’d done the right thing. In the end Rachel wouldn’t be separated from her Amarula and offered to pay for most of it. We also came across Captain Ali’s dad in the shop who demanded 50 shillings from us as a ‘Christmas present’ to buy a bottle of gin.

We danced the Kenyan New Year in at an open air party on Shella beach. It’s a half hours walk along the coast from Lamu town where a lot of the more expensive hotels are based. We ordered soft drinks at one of these hotels then walked further along the beach to where the music was coming from and the mixture of locals and wazungus was a little more balanced. The DJ didn’t seem too bothered about when midnight actually struck but a group of American students alerted us with their cheering. Then they let fireworks off in Lamu and we walked to the top of the sand dunes to watch them. After a random and fruitless trip across the bay in another dhow (they sail at night there!) and a drink at Petleys with some friends we’d made along the way I found I was still awake at 3am and Rachel and I celebrated the British New Year by listing our resolutions for 2009. Definitely a New Years Eve to remember…

The other interesting thing about being in Lamu was getting to know Rachel better and I’d like to say so much more here but it feels wrong without her consent. I hope the last few entries have given you a feel for the kind of person she is. I also hope she’ll turn up again at some point. She did say she’d try to come back to Mwamba. We went our separate ways on New Years Day, me back to Watamu on the bumpy bus (this one was so full I had a girl sleeping against my legs most of the way). Rachel stayed in Lamu to watch the annual dhow races and left the next day. I think she’s somewhere in Tanzania now and maybe I’ll join her in a couple of weeks.

The photos show:
Rachel sailing
Toasting Australian New Year
Ali & Sunflower

Kenyan Christmas

If I had to sum up Christmas this year I’d say it was exhausting but fun, an absolute mixture of stress, tension and memorably beautiful moments. Maybe that’s how Christmas feels for a lot of people, or so I’ve heard, but I come from a small family – it’s normally quiet

I’ve also been in the 30 degree heat and without the ridiculous annual build up to the season you’ve all been enjoying or enduring in the UK over the last few weeks. Kenyans celebrate but without all the added faff it seems. Instead of a Christmas dinner it’s just “special foods”. I guess those who can afford it slaughter a goat but there’s plenty who can’t afford to. Some people put up decorations but it’s not compulsory. Like the many other bank holidays they have here not everybody bothers to take the day off, certainly the Matatus were running in order to make the most of the tourist season.

My brother Matthew had a great time sightseeing, fixing computers, helping in the kitchen, and getting sunburnt and generally squeezing the most out of his 12 days here. He was my brother at his holiday best and I’m so glad he came to stay I don’t think I could have got through the time without him. (Unfortunately the reason for his spontaneous visit was due to his being made redundant, the 2nd person I know in the UK to have lost their job in the last month. I look forward less and less to having to go home and find a job…) I was still coming across some underlying problems at Mwamba of bad management and miscommunication which were getting me down. I wondered if I should just take off with Rachel in the New Year. I haven’t signed a contract with Arocha, there’s very little accountability and supervision here so the temptation to abandon them was huge. I seemed to have the same song going round my head for 2 weeks non stop and even lost my appetite somewhat, very unusual for me, it seemed like there was never a moment to relax.

Matthew and I have very different temperaments I’ve learnt that he doesn’t fit as much into a day as I do. So for the first two days I thought I’d just let him adjust to the heat while I tried to finish off some work but doing anything on the computer by this time was impossible. If there weren’t guests to book in or out there were children to supervise or endless clearing up to do. At one stage Christmas looked like being quiet and a bit dull this year, now as well as the guests who’d pre-booked, ‘Walk-ins’ were turning up, Mercy had come to house-sit for the Kigens, Rachel had decided to stay a bit longer and Suzanne hadn’t gone home. As Matthew grew more relaxed and into his holiday I felt myself getting tenser by the day with this whirlwind of people and noisy children around me.

Matthew was enthusiastic enough to get up at 5am one morning and the 2 of us went bird watching with Rachel. There were disappointingly few birds that day but I enjoyed, more than I thought I would creeping around the forest on the trail of the few we heard trying to spot them. The next day Rachel achieved an amazing feat of organisation and persuaded the entire centre, guests and staff to come out on a boat and go snorkelling including those who didn’t know how to swim and never went near the water. There must have been 20 of us and the boatmen’s promises about life jackets and equipment for everyone were woefully unfulfilled. As a teenager on Scripture Union holidays I had water safety drummed into me but on this day I had to put aside my horror at seeing Keziah in a life jacket that blatantly didn’t fit her and Chiko without one at all and relying on someone to keep a firm hold of her so she didn’t jump head first into the water in order not to be left out. It was glorious chaos but Rachel’s generosity extended to making sure everyone got a turn in the water including the non-swimmers and we all made it back alive in the end. A few weeks ago we found an old instamatic camera in Henry’s office with a supposedly waterproof case so I used up the film taking pictures of everyone, I’ve yet to find out if they’ll develop but I hope so.

On Christmas Eve we went out snorkelling again with Rachel. It was the calmest most over cast morning I’ve seen in Kenya and with the tide out the sea was absolutely still. We must have been in the water for about 2 hours before I decided to swim back to shore. It was only when I got out that I realised how tired I was but it was well worth it. As well as a Blowfish we saw a black Lionfish which we didn’t even know existed – I could hear Rachel’s screams of delight even with my head in the water. Not what my normal Christmas Eve.

Later that day we found some Christmas decorations in the outhouse and selected a plant from the garden to dress as a tree. Keziah was effective in making paper chains and getting the adults who were milling around to help. Everybody joined in and Aaron even set up his ipod and speakers with some festive music. It even began to feel a bit Christmasy.

In the evening Rachel, who was still in dynamic organising mode suggested the volunteers go across the road to a local midnight mass service. I’ve been to a couple of churches before now in Kenya, mostly organised along similar lines to western ones but this was entirely outside, mostly children and somewhat disorganised with plenty of singing that didn’t seem to have an end point. It was clear they didn’t often have Wazungu visitors and even offered to conduct the service in English for our sake. Of course being westerners we felt suitably embarrassed at this and refused, saying it was important that the children could understand what was being said. To be honest I didn’t get much out of it after this, not being able to follow the preaching but it felt good to be in church at Christmas, not something I thought I’d get to do this year. We stayed until a power cut plunged the whole church into darkness and then left discretely.

On Christmas day Matthew volunteered to stuff the chickens that Lispa had bought on the condition that we would prepare them. He found a recipe on the internet and adapted it so that it could be made with the maize meal flour that Kenyan’s use to make Ugali – their staple dish. It was a total experiment but a success and went down very well with our guests who were mostly Kenyan. After cooking we went to the beach en masse, even Lispa was persuaded to leave the kitchen for a while and I got some more great memories to treasure on my camera. Coming back we found yet more walk-ins who’d just arrived wondering if there was room – on Christmas day?! I was very tired by this time and about to tell them where to get off when Aaron diplomatically suggested there was room to camp. By lunch I’d given up trying to work out who everybody was (I counted yesterday actually and I think there were 30 of us in total including 2 lots of campers and Robin and her friend staying on the roof. There were 5 children aged 4 or under and 6 different nationalities represented) but we had enough food to go round. In the evening Matthew moved one of the computers from the office into the dining room and some of us watched a DVD.

Matthew had to fly home the next day from Mombassa. We’d planned to walk around Fort Jesus during the day but were so tired when we got there we changed our minds. Instead we holed up in an Indian restaurant for a couple of hours, enjoying the lassies and air conditioning and looking at our photos from the last few days. It didn’t feel like Boxing Day. I was worried that I’d feel lonely after I left Matthew at the airport but I think I was too tired to feel anything. Despite the bumpy road and lack of oxygen I fell asleep in the Matatu on the way back. When I got “home” some of the guests had left and new ones had arrived in their place. I considered introducing myself but decided instead to get an early night. It was nice to have my room to myself again. It felt like we'd successfully done Christmas.

The photos you Matthew carving the chickens he stuffed, the 2 of us on the beach and cooking with Keziah.

The people I have known

It’s always difficult to pick up writing again after time away from it. Simply too much has happened in the last 3 weeks for me to give anything more than a flavour of it here; but I do seem to have met some interesting people:

In December, when Albert and I were at Mombassa airport waiting for my brother’s delayed flight to arrive, my voice was overheard and an Englishman came and introduced himself. He turned out to be Richard Trillo, the writer of the Rough Guide to Kenya. He was also waiting for his family to arrive having been travelling for several weeks already putting together the next edition. Of course we gave Arocha and Mwamba a big plug. Although we were already in the listings for accommodation some of the info was out of date so Richard, who was staying at Turtle Bay, said he’d pop by in a few days and get the latest details from us. He turned up a week or so later at the end of a very busy day but Aaron and I managed to make ourselves look professional, I think. My only regret was that he wasn’t the writer for the Lonely Planet (although of course I didn’t tell him that) – they haven’t listed us yet and their website isn’t very helpful. Anyone know how to get listed in the Lonely Planet?

Around the same time as my brother arrived, Robin, another guest came to stay. She amused me by marching in 2 days earlier than she was booked, nearly walking right by us and then double backing with "Where do I pay?" I responded, maybe not very politely with "Who are you?" but I can't have offended her much because she’s still here! A single woman from New Hampshire, USA (it’s difficult to guess her age but I’d say 40’s) she’s loved this place from the moment she got here. She’s been working with Medicine Sans Frontiers the other side of Kenya on the shores of Lake Victoria but although she’s been next to the water no one can swim there as the water is full of…something(?) which makes it unsafe – so living next to the ocean is just what she’s needed. In an effort to save money she moved onto the roof top after a few days where she’s been camping out ever since. She’s one of the most content and grateful people I’ve ever met, she complains about nothing, always loves the food no matter what’s on the menu and is happy just wandering up and down the beach and whiling away the days reading books from our little library. Despite our protests that she’s a guest she’s started to help out around the place and even cleaned the windows yesterday. A testament to how familiar she’s become was Aaron’s declaration when I got back from Lamu on Thursday, “We don’t have any guests at the moment, none at all”. Robin was on the roof at the time and amused to hear this.

My knowledge of Medicine Sans Frontiers was patchy but they always seem to me to be working in the worst disaster zones around the world – I suppose that’s where people need doctors – so I’ve always held them somewhat in awe. Robin is not a medic she’s actually an accountant and worked in the logistics department; and although they do work in difficult places (Robin’s considering another assignment this time in Darfur) they work in peaceful places like Lake Victoria too. Her job was with an AIDS programme which treats in total about 13,000 patients, 9,000 of which they’ve got onto antiretroviral drugs. Not everything Robin said about MSF was positive but these are impressive figures - as she said - more than any other NGO is doing in that area.

Another interesting personality this Christmas was Peter Johnson, a Kenyan who likes to use the English names his parents gave him because he can keep his tribal identity a secret from other Kenyans. At least that’s what he told me. What can I say about Peter? He reminds me of so many other people I’ve met but no one person in particular. He’s a people person, someone who gets things done, he laughs a lot, he’s great with children, he likes to talk about himself but the more he says the less clear you are about who he really is. He has two houses in Nairobi and runs a charity working with boys from the wrong side of the tracks, he’s also on the board of another charity and has fingers in a number of other pies I’m sure – and he makes films. He’s given me his contact details and hopefully when I’m in Nairobi I’ll visit his charity and, he’s promised me, some parts of the city I wouldn’t normally see as a tourist. I’m keeping an open mind.

Then there's Swiss Philip who's working in Nairobi for 6 months and came to Mwamba for the weekend back in November just after I arrived. He liked the place so this time he's come back with his girlfriend. He's an environmental engineer and knowledgeable about all sorts (he was the one who told me the reef here was so damaged). He's involved with a project where they've discovered that you can purify water if you leave it in a plastic bottle in the sun for long enough. Seriously! We didn't believe him either but if you go to www.sodis.ch you can find out more.

The people who’ll I’ll miss the most from the last few weeks though have to be the children – so many of them! There have been times of absolute chaos especially when little Martin and Chiko (earlier referred to as Nalius) were together. Both were only about 4 years old and too young to speak any English (or even Swahili in Chiko’s case) and both were on holiday without their real parents and at times in desperate need of someone to look after them. We took turns taking them to the beach, supervising Chai time (jam and bread all over the place) and laughing with them. Chiko was definitely the toughest, no amount of falling over could reduce her to tears and despite not being able to swim she often went into the water up to her head. The only time she got upset was watching people leave in cars and Tuk Tuks without her. This was not because she missed them but because she was obsessed with cars and wanted to go too!

There have been plenty of others too but no time to mention them now, I haven’t even begun to talk about Rachel, she’ll have to keep for next time. Here’s a few pictures…

Chiko and Martin

Peter and Chiko

Keziah, Chiko and Rachel making a cake on Christmas day...