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So much has been going on in the last few months that I haven't had a spare moment to write this update. The challenge now is thus to try to keep it to a manageable length! I'm not optimistic, but here goes...
The most substantial new developments are that I have finally managed to get myself a house and a car, so am feeling considerably more settled and more independent. The house is barely 1km from where I was living before - nothing amazing (I've been getting serious house-envy recently seeing some of the palaces people live in here), but I've got what I was looking for which was simply a place of my own, for a decent price (£230 pcm!) in a good location for work and play, with a garden and a spare room. It is also a 2 minute walk from a really friendly little local shopping centre (Valley Arcade) with supermarket, greengrocer, bakery/patisserie/coffee shop, butcher, laundry (after several items of clothing had been hand-scrubbed to shreds by my former house-mate's cleaner I decided to make an extravagant investment in a washing machine, but haven't quite managed to get it plumbed in yet!) not to mention amazing Italian deli and restaurant. It may sound daft, but it is easy to end up feeling incredibly 'confined' here, and so being able to walk down the road to the shops is a real pleasure.
Needless to say, I have been absolutely snowed under trying to get everything sorted out, including getting the bathroom and kitchen tiled to replace the bright yellow PVC, and getting the upstairs carpeted to cover up the marginally less offensive grey PVC. Downstairs, at least, was already wooden parquet. Then of course I had to furnish it absolutely from scratch. Fortunately a friend who has just moved to Tanzania off-loaded her entire kitchen plus a TV and DVD player on me, and for the rest, I have developed a very close relationship with Nakumatt, the local hypermarket, which really does sell absolutely everything but the kitchen sink. The weekend that I moved in I tried my best to empty the place and came home with a pick-up in tow loaded up with oven, fridge, mattress, pillows, duvet, kettle, kitchenware, lightshades, garden tools, dustbins, doormats and all manner of other household junk. For the remaining major items (bed, table & chairs, sofa, etc) I followed standard procedure and had them made by the 'jua kali' (lit. fierce sun) craftsmen whose wares line all of the major roads out of town - not exactly high quality, but not bad at the price.
The next stage was naturally to have a house-warming party, which was intended to involve drinking Pimms in the garden. Predictably, however, the heavens opened about half an hour before kick-off, and it poured with rain for the rest of the evening. A few power cuts added to the fun - fortunately Rob, my old housemate, had bought me a high-powered rechargeable lantern, which probably goes down as one of the most well-timed presents ever. To top it all off, once the rain had eased off and the power had come back on, we suffered an invasion of flying termites (very common after heavy rain). Somehow we all had fun though, and at least managed to introduce and successfully convert a number of non-Brits to Pimms!
Shortly after the party I also acquired a housemate, by the name of Sophie, who is half-French, half-English, and very tolerant so far of the chaos and lack of basic items such as bedroom curtains! Although I was initially keen to have a place to myself, it is proving nice to have someone around, even if just to sit in the garden with drinking home-made mango smoothies and lamenting the previous nights' wine consumption...
Moving on to the car, it is a 1988 3-door Mitsubishi 4x4. White with some very attractive red and orange go-fast stripes (I've resisted the temptation to peel them off since they are apparently a good deterrent to car-jackers). I did, however, peel off the stick-on window tinting they are so fond of here, after the lack of visibility caused me to come worryingly close to taking out my askari (night watchman) as well as half of a local restaurant's carpark in my first outing at night. It also sports some funky stickers advertising its 'super-off-roader' credentials. I have not put these seriously to the test, but at least ascertained that the 4-wheel drive was working when trying to extricate myself from a muddy verge outside a Moroccan bar the other night. I am still not entirely sure how good a deal it will turn out to be overall - having to buy a new battery on Day 2 didn't bode that well! It rattles and bangs a bit, smells faintly of diesel the whole time (a constant reminder to me of its poor environmental credentials), and is somewhat lacking in acceleration and manoeuvrability, but I am beginning to bond with it nonetheless, particularly after taking it on an inaugural road trip over the bank holiday weekend. This proved to be something of a baptism-by-fire - we covered over 1000km and subjected it to steep hills at high altitudes, high-speed encounters with monster pot-holes and speed-bumps, torrential rain and flooding, and a substantial stretch of near off-road driving when our navigation went a little awry, and yet despite a near over-heating incident and a rather substantial fuel-leak, it somehow got us there and back again safely. There are still a few 'teething problems' to be ironed out, such as making the fuel guauge work (at the moment I'm relying on the mileage counter!), fixing the glow plugs and mending a slow puncture, but I'm confident that with a bit more TLC it will be as good as new(?!) by the time I have to take my family on safari in it at Christmas time!
Oh yes, and in spite of spending almost two full days out of three on the road - rather more than the 6-hours each way that we had anticipated, the trip was great fun. Two friends (Courtney & Jen) came in the car with me and we joined a group of about 12 others from the Mountain Club of Kenya at our destination, the Kakamega Forest Reserve (Kenya's last remaining patch of some particular sort of tropical forest - no mountains though!) where we camped, walked in the forest with lots of monkeys, birds, and butterflies, ate ridiculous amounts, drank the left-over booze from the housewarming party, indulged in the customary (so I was told) Mountain Club practice of attempting to climb rather-less-than-soberly around various items of furniture and architectural structures, and stretched our legs as much as possible in anticipation of the return journey!
Another great weekend organised by the Mountain Club of Kenya was at a place called Lukenya which is a huge escarpment owned by the Club just an hour's drive from town, with some fantastic climbing to suit everyone from hardened pros to muppets like me. The setting is absolutely stunning. As you climb you can look down and spot giraffes strolling past in the distance. The campsite is on the top of the hill and as we drove up there at the end of the day we could see the setting sun and the rising moon low on the horizon opposite one another. Then in the clear early morning light the next day we could see Mt Kenya in one direction and Kili in the other as we sat frying our eggs for breakfast. The Saturday had been organised as a farewell for a long-standing MCK member, and the climbing was accompanied by a string quartet playing at the foot of one of the main crags - very surreal!
Back in Nairobi I have been keeping myself busy. A few weekends ago we headed off to the races for the Nairobi Derby, which was not quite the social event it was trying to be, but was still a fun day out. Needless to say I didn't win anything - not that my paltry bets of c.£2 per race would have earned me much in any case. Then last weekend it was time for another extravaganza organised by the Spanish Speaking Women's Association - this time a 'gala night' at the Intercontinental Hotel which involved a big crowd of us indulging in very good food, rather more than the one permitted welcome glass of champagne courtesy of a friendly barman, the occasional tequila, and non-stop dancing until we were more-or-less thrown off the dance-floor at around 3.30. The Costa Rican contingent led by Carlos & Mario stole the show, but Matt C, Matt M & Dave put on an impressive performance in the face of such competition!
For those of you with Verbier connections, Demelza came to stay with me for a few days in between trips, during which time I felt it my duty to feed her up in nice Italian and Japanese restaurants in readiness for her next 7 weeks slumming it on an overland truck! We had a lot of fun exchanging gossip on the last two seasons - although there was surprisingly, even disconcertingly little difference between our stories - same people, same places, different combinations! It did give me a major dose of powder-envy though - must plan big ski trip for next season...
OK, I've run out of inspiration and energy now, but I hope to add pages in the next few days on my Easter trip to the Ndoto Hills in the North of Kenya, and to Lamu Island last weekend. Check back soon...
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The new baby...
One half of the garden (more pics of home to follow when I get around to taking them)
At the elephant orphanage
Viewpoint over Kakamega Forest - Courtney, Jen, Patrick & I
Breakfast at the campsite
Patrick climbing around the table
Back to Nairobi - around the mountain and between the storms
Kitting up in the bush at Lukenya - Chris & Shalini
Climbing with a string quartet playing below
Shalini & I at the top of the climb
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