Categories
Amsterdam

A Day and a Night in Amsterdam

Oh right, I forgot about this whole “winter” thing. I did a little sightseeing yesterday, since I missed my connection due to snow-related delays. As someone who doesn’t even have a coat with me, I must say that it’s quite cold. After walking around for a few hours, I took my hands out my pockets when I entered a Mexican (!) restaurant, and I had to rub them against my coffee until they could again open, unclenched.

People here are in Christmas shopping mode, which is a phemomenon that I haven’t seen firsthand for quite some time. Other things that have struck me now that I’m out of Africa (just a short list of the first few things that come to mind):

  • People have pet dogs. Inside. On leashes.
  • Everything is really bright indoors. Lots of lightbulbs everywhere.
  • I can eat lettuce. I don’t have to push it to the side of my plate for fear that I will get sick.
  • There is design everywhere. In Kenya I was impressed if the wall paint and the chairs matched.
  • People understand what I’m saying, even if I say it quickly and with my own American accent.

Well, I should head over to my gate. Hopefully this flight leaves on time!

Categories
Diani Lake Nakuru Lodwar Nairobi

Less Than 48 Hours to Go

I’m in Nairobi, back from Lodwar and the Lake Turkana region.  Our trip was filled with all sorts of cramped transportation and intense, constant bargaining, so in a way it was a nice final Kenyan trip, because it was nice to see how much better we can handle all of it than when we first arrived, but also it made us feel very, very ready to not have to deal with it anymore.

We spent a few nights at a lodge from the 70s that appears to have been abandoned long ago.  If you can get past the lack of any toilet paper there and in the surrounding village, and if you put aside any fear of the long snake that sleeps in the beds, it’s really quite nice.  Here’s a view from it, looking out at Lake Turkana, where the locals spend all day fishing, bathing, and singing songs.  This particular village felt so idyllic that it really challenged my understanding of poverty.  Unlike everywhere else I’ve seen here, people here really seemed quite content.  Maybe it’s just that I wasn’t there long enough, but it left a very different first impression on me.  I think it was the singing that did it.

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In the middle of Lake Turkana is an island, and on the at island are three smaller lakes, if you can believe it.  Here’s “Flamingo Lake,” taken from one of the higher points of our pretty strenuous hike around.  If you look closely there are about five flamingos in the bottom left corner.

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Here we are in front of “Crocodile Lake.”  I saw two crocodiles, but was assured that there were thousands hiding in there.  We did see a tracks of a crocodile that ran across the hiking path in one spot.

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And it’s a little out of order, but here’s a picture from the “blow out party” I mentioned previously.  There was a lot of this—sitting around with the Indian Ocean in view, doing nothing in particular.

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Today was a big day in Kenyan politics—a bunch of high-level politicians got subpoenaed by the International Criminal Court—so I was a little worried that there might be protests and violence, and when they said the announcement would come in the next hour, I skedaddled from the office where I was saying goodbye to my colleague from the Nairobi Project, since it’s about a block from parliament and it seemed best to head to the suburbs.  So far things have been calm, though.

Tomorrow I’ll be doing all my final paperwork, closing my last bank account here, and taking my final Language Proficiency Exam.  I’ll be doing my best not to use any American Sign Language on accident, but we’ll see how it goes.  In the evening I’ll be attending the Ambassador’s Christmas party, and then the following day, I’m stepping onto a plane that will take me out of here.  For the past to years, the farthest I’ve gotten from Kenya has been Rwanda, so I’m bracing myself for the culture shock that everyone tells me I should expect.  Personally it’s hard for me to imagine having difficulty adjusting to a world that has an abundance of Dr. Pepper, but there may be some things I’m overlooking.

Categories
Lodwar Mombasa Nairobi

Leaving Soon

It’s all happening so fast now that I’m so close to the end!  I’ve moved out of my house, and I’ve left Mombasa for good.  It was a sad moment looking back from the bus as it crossed the bridge from the island.  The past month has been full of “Well, this may be the last time I ever…” moments, and with each passing day, that statement ends up being correct more and more often.

The volunteers from my group had a “blow out party” not long ago, and after that I packed my bags and headed to Nairobi.  I helped a bit with training the new group, some of whom will be replacing people from my group, and now I’m taking one last vacation before the official Close of Service paperwork begins and I fly out on the seventeenth.

I’m in Lodwar now, and over the next few days I’ll be boating around Lake Turkana.  It’s interesting to finally be in the opposite corner of the country from Mombasa, and to see which things are different, and which things are the same.  Supposedly the island we’re going to has the highest concentration of crocodiles in all of Africa, so if this ends up being my last blog post, you’ll know what happened to me.

My spare moments, when I have them, are more and more often preoccupied with thoughts of returning home: the anxiety of getting my life its post-Peace Corps track, and also the excitement over that very same prospect.  I’ve also done a lot of reflection on my time here, but because I’m traveling so much, I hasn’t been so apparently from the blog.  Hopefully some more time magically appears at least once before I leave Kenya.

Oh, and because I haven’t included a photo in this post, here’s a blog entry at dogmeetsworld.com that features some photos that I took of my students.