Camel Adventures in Central Kenya

We had an amazing weekend in Nanyuki in central Kenya. Thanks to Lonely Planet, we learned of a place called Nanyuki River Camel Camp and decided to check it out. Upon arrival, the staff showed us to our huts. At this point, I was a little worried my friends would insist on getting back in the car and finding someplace else to stay.

The doorway into the hut was so low you almost had to crawl in. The interior of the dirt floor hut housed only a simple bed with a rough-hewn bedside table. There were no lights and the hut let in so little sunlight, you had to use your flashlight inside the hut even during the day.

We put our bags in the huts and walked down to the "river" that ran along the edge of the camp. River was a strong word, since it was more like a stream. When we came back to the camp, the staff had built us a fire, which we gathered around with a bottle of wine. Soon, the owner of the camp joined us. Chris is a Brit who has lived in Kenya since the early 60s. Chris began telling us stories of his years in northeast Kenya, living and working with nomadic communities. This experience inspired him to buy a herd of camel, build the camel camp, and transport authentic Somali huts from northern Kenya as sleeping lodges. Chris seems to have traveled everywhere in Kenya and knows everyone, including Kuki Gallmann, the main character of the "I Dreamed of Africa" movie.

Soon we adjourned to dinner, in the Restaurant of a Thousand Stars, which featured a low table flanked by sitting cushions under the night sky. In this simple environment, with no electricity, we didn't have high expectations for dinner. The meal was simple Kenyan/Somali dishes - pilau, potatoes, kachumbari, camel - but it was delicious! Our friend Keith who eats like a bird went back for thirds!

The huts were surprisingly warm when we crawled back in to go to bed. We fell asleep to the gurgling sounds of the stream and the "dulcet" screams of the tree hyrax.

The following morning, we met the namesakes of the camp - members of the camel herd. We climbed aboard and Chris led us on a 1.5 hour ride out of the camp, along the road, and into a neighboring ranch. Our caravan of camels was quite a sight to the others we encountered - motorists, bicyclists, pedestrians, and a very skittish horse. My camel also enjoyed biting the leg of the camel in front of me, which added to the excitement of the journey. When we finally dismounted, we were as saddle sore as if we had taken a six-hour bike ride!

As we bid farewell to Chris and his camels, we all agreed that we'd had a wonderful adventure and a great escape from our comfortable, predictable, routine lives in Nairobi.

Christmas at Lake Baringo

I had planned to include pictures with this post, but the internet is being so slow I had to abandon that idea. (Seriously, I clicked upload, went downstairs to play with the cats, grab a snack, and read a magazine article, and when I returned, the computer was still working on uploading my five photos.)

We spent Christmas camping on Lake Baringo in the Great Rift Valley. It was a fun trip, but I barely got any sleep. Lake Baringo is home to crocodiles and hippos, with informational memos posted at the camping site reception desk about how to avoid getting eaten by a croc or crushed by a hippo. Despite these warnings, Jeremy and our camping partners wisely chose a camping site right at the water's edge, and I warily eyed the crocs who were watching us as we pitched our tents. No one else seemed bothered by this, and they all slept peacefully. But I spent the night trying to ignore the sounds of grunting hippos and splashing crocs, and hoping dawn would come quickly!

The daylight hours were much better. We took a boat ride on Christmas morning, seeing lots of birds, more crocs and hippos, and throwing fish to fisheagles who swooped down from the trees and scooped the fish right out of the water with their talons. In the afternoon we took a nature walk, giving wide berth along the way to a male ostrich protectively guarding an egg, a venomous snake, and a beehive. Dangerous animals were clearly the theme of this trip!

Kenyan Night Out

For those of you who may not know, Jeremy now has a full-time job at the embassy. Since August, he has been Customer Service Director, head of a new office whose mission is to help embassy staff get the services they need from the other 1200 staff spread across 45 offices. Jeremy's primary customers are new arrivals. As you might imagine, moving your family halfway around the world to start a new job involves a lot of questions, paperwork, and logistics.

Jeremy has a great staff of three Kenyan customer service professionals. On Friday night, they invited us out for Kenyan barbeque (locally called "nyama choma") as an office Christmas party. The party was supposed to get started at 6pm, but due to the legendary Nairobi traffic, none of us got there until after 7pm. We ordered drinks and chatted until the food arrived, which did not occur until 9pm.

First course was goat liver...yum (not really). Next course was goat kidney, which actually was tasty. Only the women are supposed to eat the kidney; the full explanation was unclear, but it seemed to relate to fertility. Then the main course came - roasted goat, roasted chicken, ugali (startchy side dish made from maize flour), and kachumbari (Kenyan-style pica de gallo) - all served family style with no serving or eating utensils allowed, just your fingers!

Full from dinner, the ladies got up to do some dancing. They taught me a couple traditional dances, one of which involved doing the twist for an entire song, which seemed to last FOREVER. When we returned to the table it was time for the final course: a horrendous soup of boiled goat head and hooves (I chocked down only a sip, but Jeremy cheerfully drank a full portion) and Kenyan sausage, which was tasty, but very fatty and chewy.

We finally said our good-byes at midnight, after being informed that a "real" Kenyan night out would involve going clubbing and not getting home until dawn! It was a fun night and we're thankful to Jeremy's staff for being wonderful individuals, cool peeps, and showing us the Kenyan way to have a good time!

Christmas Miracle

This weekend, I sang in the Nairobi Music Society Christmas concert.  I've been singing with the group since October.

As concert week dawned, I woke up on Monday with a sore throat.  My symptoms slowly worsened until I stayed home from work on Thursday with a full-blown cold.  By Friday afternoon, I was able to walk around without totally exhausting myself, so I headed out to dress rehearsal.  

To save my energy and my voice, I sat in the pews during the rehearsal, following along with my music but not singing.  As I listened, I thought "Oh my God, we have to perform this tomorrow!  We are not ready."

But when concert night rolled around, a Christmas miracle occurred.  We actually sounded good!  Really good!  As we finished our last notes, the audience enthusiastically clapped, clearing hoping for an encore.  Sadly, we did not have one prepared, but it was gratifying to receive such praise for our performance.

Marine Corps Ball

Each year on November 10, the United States Marine Corps celebrates its birthday. Since 1949, Marines have been providing protective support to U.S. diplomatic missions around the world. And each November, these diplomatic missions look forward to the Marine Corps Ball - with its speeches, pomp and circumstance, drinking, cake cutting, eating, drinking, dancing with your colleagues and boss, seeing who brings the most outrageous date...and more drinking! Below are a couple photos from our first Marine Corps Ball.

Time to Make the Bread

Those of you in the United States may be surprised to find out that Jeremy has become quite a baker in Nairobi. I believe this newfound baking interest stems from two circumstances: 1) most of the bread available in Nairobi sucks (except for the French bakery and Art Cafe), which is especially sad after the great bread in Portland from places like New Seasons and Great Harvest; 2) he spent his first six months here without a job and with lots of time to be creative in the kitchen.

Many of his breads have been standard French or Italian loaves. He's also dressed them up with parmesan or garlic. To please his "healthy" wife, he even made whole wheat! Jeremy has also branched out to other bread products including pizza dough, Stromboli, and cinnamon rolls. He made cinnamon rolls for a potluck brunch a few months back, and the other guests keep begging him to make more...one person even wanted to hire him to make a batch for a birthday breakfast! Of all his creations his favorite is a beer bread boule (see below photo).

Trick-or-Treating in Nairobi

If you live outside of a kid-saturated surburban housing development in the United States, you've probably had the same experience I've had the last several years on Halloween: you go out and buy a bunch of candy, turn on the porch light, and happily anticipate the doorbell of the first trick-or-treater. Then you proceed to wait...and wait...for the doorbell to ring. By the end of the night, maybe 5 trick-or-treaters have come by, and you're stuck with a huge bowl of candy to eat yourself.

I'm happy to report this was not my experience in Nairobi last night. The Embassy organized trick-or-treating in our compound of 60 houses. The best part was I didn't even have to buy the candy!! The parents of the trick-or-treaters provided candy in advance to our social activities office, who then distributed it to the houses who were giving out candy. So, last night I happily spent an hour giving out Snickers and M&Ms to princesses, goblins, Captain America, jedi knights, werewolves, and other costumed munchkins. And all I have left are a handful of Tootsie Rolls and hard candies. Success at last!