A City in East Africa

For various reasons, I decided to cut my time at Sadili short. It was good, it was fun, and it was time to go. On an ending note: the people were wonderful and genuine, my shower never became functional, and I saw so much in cultural differences.

When we did finally head into the Kibera slum to lead Girl Power Clubs, I was a bit bummed by the reality of these sessions. However, the girls were so impressed with my hair, coming up behind me to lift, stroke, and pull at it. I soon found out from one of the interns that they were intently trying to determine whether or not my hair was a weave.

Friday night my building-mate and I decided to have one last dinner together, before I departed. There’s a food delivery service in Nairobi, which I had used once before (extremely successfully,) and so we opted to order in for our meal. Searching through the limited restaurants delivering to our area, we finally decided we’d just get pizza. There was a deal running, so we ordered two large pizzas and sat down to await our food. It took four-and-a-half hours to arrive.

Every now and then I have these moments where I remember – with both excitement and incredulity – that I’m in Africa. Sometimes it’s while bouncing along in a Land Rover on ranch land, other times while brushing against moving cars when crossing streets jammed with traffic. Still other moments of mango juice running down my face and hands, or of monkeys with red eyes swinging from laundry on the clothesline.

But then there are moments when I remember, laughing a bit reluctantly, that I’m in Africa. Like when pizza takes four-and-a-half hours to be delivered. Or when rain mists down upon me in my bedroom during a particularly intense thunderstorm. Or when I realize just how much vendors are raising prices on me, due to both my own lack of knowledge, as well as the color of my skin.

Kenya is a fairly developed country, especially in comparison with many of its regional neighbors. Nairobi is a big, bustling city. Traffic is almost always horrendous, with 20-minute trips sometimes taking two hours. There are very upscale malls around the city, and anything I’d want to buy at home is available here. It’s easy to forget that I’m in East Africa.

But then there are those moments, wonderful and real and grounding.

I spent last weekend in town – a change of pace. I bargained and bargained for hours in the market, trying to buy things to bring home. I then treated myself to a (real!) iced mocha, and, coffee in tow, began to crisscross town to find and purchase fabric. There were people everywhere, working and running weekend errands. And then there was I, as usual, the mzungu trying to appear as though she knew where she was going.

It was a great weekend; complete with two Sadili interns showing me around town and the three of us visiting the Kenyatta International Conference Center that is topped by a helipad 33 stories in the air. I was prepared for the view to be fairly low-key  – after all, I’ve seen New York City from the Empire State Building. But it was completely beautiful, providing a 360-degree view of Nairobi, mountains and farms and plains visible in the distance. It was the highest up in the air that either intern had ever been in their lives.

This weekend I’m doing the exact opposite of town. I’m back at a ranch outside of Nairobi – the first ranch I visited in Kenya and wrote about. Here, there is expansive land, and animals number hundreds of times higher than humans.

It’s hard to believe that I’m in Kenya. Not just because Nairobi is so much of a city, but just because I’ve spent so long waiting to come to Africa. Whether it’s teenage girls tugging at my hair, camels being led along park paths, midnight samosa purchases, gazelles bounding across wooded savannah, fresh-squeezed sugarcane juice stands, or children turning backflips in the road, Nairobi is where I am. And it’s like nowhere I’ve been ever before.

I have just over a week left on this continent. I’ll spend next week in the Rift Valley, a part of Kenya new to me, and I’ll be working with the Maasai tribe. I’m counting down the days until home, but I’m also so looking forward to what this last week will bring.