karen goes to kenya

a not-so-happy new year

2008-01-01T21:54:00.000+03:00

in addition, a freelance photog that worked with us in nairobi was out snapping shots of the scene unfolding in one of the slums on the east side of the city center when he saw a minivan full of travelers stopped by an angry mob, emptied of passengers and members of certain tribes hacked with pangas (crude machetes). the vehicle was then torched after a thorough looting of the remaining passengers.

i'm finding it truly hard to believe that this is happening in kenya... and finding it incredible, also, to hear the names of the top players butchered in broadcasts rife with misinformation about the country. Raila is pronounced rye-luh, not rye-lee as the CNN correspondent persists in calling him, Mwai (M-why, not Mwhah - a wet kiss) and the Luos are not the second largest tribe in Kenya, as has been reported, but in fact a distant fourth or fifth.

meanwhile, no word from the government (who deny the widespread violence as minor incidents "here and there") and inflammatory words from the opposition ("genocide") who would rather see people die, apparently, than mediate any kind of temporary solution to calm things down. [the account provided by george karanja in this ap update of the happenings at the church in eldoret are particularly heartbreaking.]

continued bloodshed, with a side of egregiousness

2007-12-31T21:35:00.000+03:00

from what my friends are telling me, this article pretty accurately captures the mood on the ground in kenya.

check out the video footage posted by CNN; pretty horrific.

as a journalist, i wish i were still in nairobi able to report on this. but as someone who called kenya my home for nearly two years - i'm glad i don't have to see this with my own eyes. it's heartbreaking.

in other completely unrelated and lighthearted news: am currently reading Inside Inside, James Lipton's memoir of sorts. I know, I know, but I couldn't resist. It's worth it just for the self-importance contained in the first chapter alone. you can't help but be entertained. seriously.

aftermath, part three

2007-12-31T18:20:00.000+03:00

from an Associated Press update:

"We have been rigged out, we are not going to accept defeat," said 24-year-old James Onyango, who lives in Nairobi's Kibera slum. "We are ready to die and we're ready for serious killings."

aftermath, part two.

2007-12-31T17:31:00.000+03:00

these should give you an idea of what's happening on the ground in nairobi:

this video is decent, although my sources tell me the death toll she reported is much higher - 149 dead, more than 60 in what was formerly a tranquil lakeside town overnight.

amazing to watch this country crumble into chaos. my friends and colleagues tell me it's totally mindboggling to experience such a dramatic turn of events in a mere 24 hours - thursday night's bouyant optimism over a peaceful vote well-exercised, saturday morning's chaos over vote reporting delays and allegations of rigging. and while that has certainly frustrated them and damaged their pride, it was good to hear them in fine spirits, holed up at the office past midnight, making prank phone calls and draining a crate of tusker beer (where they dredged that up is unclear as pretty much everything is closed...) - taking pride instead in a job well done and a story well reported.

at this point, however, everyone seems to be in agreement that the elections were rigged - there was even live footage broadcast of vote stuffing in one of the constituencies and several whistleblowers have come forward.

a media ban on live footage has been lifted somewhat - media must submit their materials to the government to censor them before airing. this is being done, from what i gather and hear, mostly to prevent the radio stations out in the provinces from incitement. these radios typically broadcast in tribal languages and their statements have been highly polemic in the aftermath. the government, apparently, is trying to prevent another rwanda...

overall, it's completely incredible to watch this country deteriorate. what hope there had been for these riots to last for a few days and peter out is fading quickly now that the opposition leader, raila odinga, has scheduled a rally for thursday - so these could last for at least a week, perhaps beyond. the president hasn't come out and said anything, inflammatory in itself, and raila has said that "democracy is expensive and we are prepared to pay the price."

even worse, the us response to this. the state department issued hurried congratulations to kibaki after the rushed and secretive declaration of his victory, while the ambassador on the ground had been hesitant and concerned about rigging allegations. the embassy, however, soon fell in line with the state department and are now saying that the opposition can take its case to court if it is unsatisfied with the results. it takes at least three years to get a petty looting case heard in kenya, that's why the prisons are packed to the gills, and with the entire judicial system packed with kibaki's cronies, i can assure you this matter wouldn't proceed much quicker. even their former colonial masters have been less hedgy about admitting there is a problem.

a number of people are even saying that times were better during moi - he wouldn't have stolen an election this blatantly and certainly tribalism wasn't nearly as heightened as this. can you imagine, pining for a dictatorship? scary stuff.

aftermath

2007-12-31T02:55:00.000+03:00

spoken too soon

2007-12-30T02:08:00.000+03:00

perhaps.

in the midst of my spiel about the glory and integrity of kenyan elections, i might have mentioned it was an overwhelming peaceful process. that distinction, however, has been thrown out of the door.

there's been rioting, looting, machete weilding and underage drinking throughout the country, participated in by both ruling party and opposition supporters. not pretty. the overwhelming lead once held by the opposition has been whittled down to a mere 40,000 votes, and concerns of vote rigging and election racketeering are high and things are pretty tense.

my friends on the ground are sending rather scary and cryptic updates. people are staying indoors and glued to the local news, which i gather is not providing much information and there are allegations of media being in bed with certain politicians and waiting to release "information." the outstanding results are being held hostage, supposedly, by election officials who have turned off their phones. a press briefing with the electoral commission turned into a fracas earlier on saturday and armed police had to infiltrate the site to calm things down.

oh!

elections, elections, elections!

2007-12-28T19:55:00.000+03:00

i know that much attention has been devoted to bhutto's assassination, as it rightly should be, but there's another international story happening right now that deserves a bit more of the limelight. and i'm not just saying so because i'm partial to all things kenyan.

on thursday, 14.2 million voters came out to vote in what's turning out to be an historic election, pitting the incumbent president mwai kibaki against his former ally, political prisoner and now head of a sweeping opposition movement, raila odinga. (his son is named fidel castro and he also drives around in the country's only hummer, apple red).

[as a side note: you should check out both of their websites and consider carefully which one would put you to sleep faster with their monotone and completely uninispired oratory skills. i weigh in with kibaki because i've nodded off during enough of his speeches that even recalling them incites yawning.]

that turnout is double the number of voters that turned out in the previous presidential election in 2002, an election which signaled the end of daniel arap moi's 24-year reign of tyranny, terror and oppression (it was illegal to even internalize bad thoughts about moi). if the stakes were high then...

so, raila and his fellow party members are sweeping the election in the provisional results. if he continues to do so, and all signs seem to favor that outcome, kenya will be the first sub-saharan african country to vote out an incumbent. despite the current ruling party's best intentions to rig ballot boxes or buy votes. crazy what belief in democracy and the notion that vote = voice can do for a country.

voters, who stood in lines for miles and started quequeing at 3 in the morning to participate, were so attuned to what was happening at the polling stations, you might call them vigilante vote observers, that any negligent behavior sparked a riotious scuffle to say the least.

not only is kibaki trailing, but official results so far have found that 12 members of kibaki's 30 member strong cabinet have been ousted in elections. kenyans are taking their politicians to task and making people accountable - it's a great step forward in a country that for decades has been plagued by corruption and a willingness to accept it. even wangari maathai (you know, that nobel peace prize winner who can't keep her mouth shut) couldn't hold on to her seat - too busy touring the world than her own constituency. even the vice president couldn't hold onto his parliament seat.

now that's a call for change.

i'm not sure that much of this makes sense or even interests those of you who are reading this, but i think it's an important story - a positive step in a fledgling democracy. most stories you hear about young democracies are negative, like robert mugabe's ticket to destroy zimbabwe and his country's continued compulsion to vote for him; a year old democratic election in Congo that heralded peace and stability for four months or so before falling to shreds and civil war; civil infighting in iraq, outpost of the world's newest "democracy"; and, obviously, what transpired in pakistan 24 hours ago.

imagine living in a country where voting and participating in the political process was so valued and you truly believed it could bring about real change? where elections are often seen as matters of life and death? truly inspiring, i think.

this about says it all.

2007-10-27T00:11:00.000+03:00

out of the stone ages

2007-10-26T01:52:00.001+03:00

i haven't had internet from home since my pre-kenya chicago days - crazy, no? so i've recently returned to the world of the technologically dependent and adjusted, and i just need to ask, at the risk of sounding like i've been living under a rock, when did the internet get to be so... neat?

in the past, i've generally used the internet for email and research and the occasional look around but i've never been someone who can get lost online for hours. and while i still panic and get restless after a few hours of trolling, i'm amazed by how much things have changed while i've been away. Living in a country where internet at home costs a small fortune and the work line goes in and out on a regular basis doesn't really lend itself to website consumption.

so here are a few things that i've discovered that i think are pretty cool when i'm not pouring through a stack of library books or sending out resumes to acquire meaningful employment:

this blog, strange maps, is pretty rockin'. it doesn't get updated regularly, being a niche blog with a limited amount of content, but browsing through the archives can keep you occupied for a couple of afternoons' worth of wasting time at work.

a clever installation, if a little too much at times...

here's a blog that chronicles the daily goings-on, newswise, newsgathering-wise and otherwise, in khartoum by a freelance journalist. for all you darfurophiles. he's got a really interesting post about blog censorship in sudan and ethiopia, where he was previously based before settling in khartoum.

***

i'm currently reading this quirky book, obit by jim sheeler, a general assignment reporter for the rocky mountain news with a past life as an obit writer for publications in and around denver. sheeler won a pulitzer in 2006 for feature writing about a year in the life of a marine corps casualty notification officer and, perhaps a bit lengthier than necessary, it's pretty damn great. check it out here and the cool audio slide show that accompanies it.

(it does tend to be a bit maudlin at times, and i would have really liked to have seen the 'what would i want someone to do?' section expanded, but overall, as i said, pretty damn great).

***

ah, internet. it can make you feel as dirty as television sometimes, but at least you've got to know how to read (and sometimes even spell) to find your way around, right?

windy days

2007-09-28T22:00:00.001+03:00

greetings from chicago:

where fall has come quickly; where newsroom recruiters aren't as scary as they're touted to be; where moderate consumption of alcohol suddenly seems possible; where overdevelopment, real estate prices and parking troubles are beginning to rival new york; where news continues to be interesting and there is no scarcity of public officials embroiled in corruption scandals; where certain parts of the city actually manage to ethnically and racially integrate; and where driving stick is a big pain in the ass because of all the traffic lights and stop signs but great for parallel parking.

i was only supposed to show up here for a week, but things have been going so well on the job hunt front that i extended my stay. i've had several productive and encouraging meetings and there are even more on tap next week.

wonderful to see friends, most of whom have relocated their homes, some of whom have even purchased them! some of them even have new jobs, and make more money than i could ever dream of making as a journalist - more than a potential spouse and i could hope to make combined!

nothing terribly exciting happening. here are some random observations to fill out the rest of this blog post: cigarettes are unbelievably expensive here - at least seven bucks a pack; gas prices fluctuate for no apparent reason - ranging in price from 3.20 to 3.60 from block to block; the chicago tribune is a better newspaper than i remembered it being but that may be because the quality of other papers has declined so drastically; there's a dog called a "labradoodle" - a combination lab and poodle - that's extremely popular among dog owners in hyde park (are americans so bored they need to invent new dog breeds to occupy their time?); and really, why did we ever drink pabst blue ribbon?

if you weren't able to catch this great article in last sunday's new york times, i really suggest taking a glance. it's one of the more compelling investigative works i've read in quite a while and really well written and sourced. it's apparently part of a larger series that the times is working on, entitled golden opportunities, about the ways in which corporate america is turning aging into a business. as a concept, totally disgusting but one that's been around for a while. i suppose we deserve it to a certain extent if we're hell-bent on artificially extending the natural limit of the human lifespan and the ability of our bodies to continue functioning.

party like it's 1999

2007-09-12T21:40:00.000+03:00

Time to stop whining, I suppose, and posturing as one of those pretentious returned expats who can't comprehend why on earth her fellow countrymen could not only stomach, but even -- god forbid -- enjoy, life in the states. so please forgive the arrogance and the damning remarks about vapid americans. we're all aware of our own shortcomings, i'm sure, and needn't them revisited at every opportunity.

It's been a week since my so-called triumphant return and i'm starting to return to the realm of reality - a daily confrontation of the fact that i'm overeducated, unemployed, financially insolvent and bored shitless by the news here. except for this one article, which i thought was pretty f'ing amazing. aside from my daily half-hour dosage of BBC World on PBS, and the occasional NPR briefing, i can't stomach television news. is brian williams really reporting on stephen colbert's broken wrist? and katie couric, well, i'm beyond words for that one...

check out this interesting article two of my colleagues just filed on a recent trip to somalia. i'm just wondering when the world is going to stop focusing all of its attention on darfur -- yes, an incredibly horrific conflict -- and start remembering that there are other conflicts that are equally as damning for the people that have to survive them. on a lighter note, have you read about the ebola outbreak in DRC?

it's y2-k, ethiopian style. i imagine most people might be aware of this because the Black Eyed Peas headlined the festivities there. in a multi-million dollar stadium commissioned entirely for the event that will probably see minimal use after the festivities, admission prices to which, btw, were absurdly inflated and equal to at the very least two month's wages.

i'll be attempting to make my way to chicago next week to visit some friends, make the rounds at some local news organisations that i'd like to work for and beg some help from the old hacks running that overpriced graduate programme i attended.

kesho, i head into the city to meet up with some journalism friends and it will certainly be interesting to see how i adjust to happenings in an urban setting. it's been relatively peaceful spending time on the beach, fishing out on the boat with my pops, watching dvds i'd borrowed from the library (they obviously do not have the most up-to-date collection, but i'm not complaining compared to what kind of shit i've been forced to digest in nairobi), reading, catching up with people one by one, bike riding and drinking beer in the hammock. sounds totally lazy and ridiculous, right? but i figure i'm entitled after all those 60 plus hour work weeks, no?

i'm also thinking that its about time to change the name of this blog... i'm taking suggestions.

The Return: Day Two

2007-09-12T21:39:00.000+03:00

Slow going. Sleeping at inappropriate hours. Marveling at the exorbitant prices in the grocery store. Lengthy excursion to cell phone shop to acquire means of communication. Harsh cigarettes that burn my throat. Scouring, in vain, the newspapers and cable news for international stories. Readjusting to driving on the left side of the car and the right side of the road. Occasional thirty seconds of tears for friends, equator heat, forsaken cat. Overwhelmed by unemployment, reluctance to be here, challenges of adjusting.

Some thoughts, questions, quandaries –

1. What happened to all the old cars? It is as if every single car on the road these days is shiny, new and huge. Where are all the crumbling Volvos, the dented Trans Ams, the rusting and boxy Cadillacs? Are we dumping them in Springfield Lake? And on a related note, please don’t put bumper stickers on your car reading ‘it’s your planet too bonehead’ when you’re driving a gas inhaling SUV. It is in extremely poor taste.

2. A dozen eggs for two dollars? Milk for a buck fifty? Really? Must be to subsidize the cost of all those hormones they’re pumping into those poor fuckers.

3. Am unfortunately beholden to my body clock, which awakes me at the ungodly (or so it would seem) hour of five. I throw on a pair of flip flops and take a quiet walk around town and I’m struck by a couple of things: One, no walks anywhere (even later on in the morning) and two, people don’t awaken automatically when the sun comes up.

4. Life may seem full of options, but, really, it seems there is even less to do. And what little there is to do involves spending a wad of money. Am ready to start brewing dandelion wine or something equally disgusting in the bathtub to underwrite my liquor costs and occupy my empty hours.

5. Searching for work is so cumbersome, challenging. You can’t just walk into someone’s office, make arrangements for a quick whiskey and informally discuss future employment. All this red tape, convoluted processes of recruiters, human resources, job reference numbers, qualification tests.

Sorry, just need to whinge about all the stuff that’s crowding my brain. Just some minor complaints as life starts to take its course and return to what’s “normal”.

hell in heathrow

2007-09-12T21:32:00.001+03:00

In all the hustle and bustle of leaving Kenya – last minute holidays and their delays; farewell drinks all around the city with friends from various social circles; welcome parties for all of my new and improved colleagues; packing up and doling out and ferrying my belongings all over Nairobi – I forgot one thing: how difficult it is to return to the west after you’ve been living in the developing world.

Sure, there were things that I lacked – access to movies; access to music; access to cheap communication and hi-speed internet – but it’s nothing compared to the excess of everything around me. Hermes, Gucci, Harrod’s, brand names I’ve never even heard of, a Chanel shop selling only sunglasses and perfume! And this alone in the London airport, where I daren’t even buy coffee as it seems ridiculous and incredible to me to spend five bucks on a cup of joe.

I know, they’re the same complaints I had last time around. But I totally forgot, or perhaps even just shrugged it off because I’ve already gone through this before and thought I would adjust more easily this time around. Wrong, apparently. And I haven’t even begun to detail the vapid conversations I’ve had a chance to overhear in this: my first fifteen minutes back to “civilisation.” (i can hear you moaning, dickles, but you get used to using brit-spelling when your job requires it... and frankly, it makes the 'z' look really tacky).

It sounds premature to say it, but as soon as I arrived here, I knew I’d made a dreadful mistake. Obviously a professionally and financially necessary one, but my heart really isn’t in this. I want my cat, my less-than-perfect boyfriend, avocado and flame trees in my backyard, maasai shepherds driving cattle down my murram road, red dust and bus fumes clogging my nostrils and weekend afternoons in the sunshine sipping Tusker beer.

spider pig

2007-08-24T15:23:00.000+03:00

i'm currently trying to pen a quirky headline for this story that i've been labouring over about the increasing chinese influence in east africa. but it's not coming so easily.

i'll be back in the states in less than two weeks time (september fifth in the morning unless flights are delayed, missed, canceled), and frankly, it's scaring the shit out of me. i've been trying to pack up stuff steadily over the past couple of weeks so as to avoid a last minute rush and figuring out how much room i have in my suitcase for the most delicious coffee on earth.

while i've been scouting out employment opportunities, i haven't really started applying in earnest. i'm just collecting contact information for people that i will need to get in touch with eventually and transfering scores of clips from the afp wire to my hard-drive. and cleaning up my desk here in the office and trying to file away the important contacts for later.

my friend tony and his wife, after weeks of hemming and hawing on their part and sheer begging and pleading and bribery on my part, have graciously agreed to adopt my cat. stella should get along right well with their own she-cat, junior. (general aside: these are the same people who have pictures of bob marley all over their house - he's a really big fan - and when her parents come to visit, they get worried because they think that instead of praying to god, tony and gin pray to bob marley.)

spending my last weekend here in mombasa. after several weeks of postponing, there'll be a last minute hurrah. obviously, it has much more to do with deepening my tan so i can make all of you jealous. so despite summer having just drawn to a close in the states, i'll be coming back with equator tan! beat that.

reading a bunch (ever hear of dbc pierre - his latest, ludmilla's broken english, i think is much better than its predecessor, vernon god little, despite the fact that it snatched up the man booker prize). watching crap television shows that finally made it to kenya (via pirated dvds that were shipped on the slowest moving cargo ships from malaysia and thailand)... ugly betty. it's quirky, i suppose, but really?

disclaimer: the title of this post has nothing at all to do with its content, obviously, but i can't get that song out of my head. it's been swimming around there for a month now and while i'm not the biggest simpsons fan on earth and the movie wasn't that great, and frankly below even my meager expectations, i was highly amused for a couple of minutes at least.

diplomacy

2007-07-24T19:27:00.000+03:00

got a new roommate. just for a month.

she's an iranian documentary filmmaker/freelance photographer. i'm conducting us-iranian relations in my flat. we're still working out the kinks - shoddy english, cultural differences, my work schedule and her month-long holiday... but she's extremely cool. and so beautiful she makes my eyes hurt. all my guy friends who chided me for shacking up with someone they were sure would arrive in full burka are chomping at the bit now.

so, i think i'm really leaving. unless a full-time job appears out of the blue, worked out to a tee in the five weeks. if anyone's got any good job leads, please send me an email. i'm thinking that i've got this whole wire thing in my system, so i'll probably try to get a full-time job at a bureau in the states. that being said, please don't email me with an opening in montana!

nothing terribly new to report. the earthquake tremors finally ended with the explosion of a volcano in tanzania - whose swahili name translates into mountain of god. am writing an article about an independent kenyan film that just got optioned for international release by a french film company - malooned. about a pair of attractive kenyans of two different tribes that get trapped in a loo. (see, marooned and loo. clever no?)

just thought i'd throw out some trash on the keyboard.

shakedowns and shootouts

2007-07-18T12:26:00.001+03:00

tremors!

nothing like being thrown off the toilet seat mid-stream as an earthquake of 6.1 magnitude bears down on you. i realise it's not the most damaging on the richter scale, but for an earthquake novice like myself who's been scarred with footage of dead people in rubble piles in third world countries, well, it's not entirely heartening.

we've had four days of earthquakes between 5.5 and 6.1 on the richter. according to the metereological folks, they're starting in tanzania and because nairobi's in the rift valley, obviously they travel.

i've decided never to live again in an earthquake prone area - ruling out south asia, california and mexico, japan and obviously, the rift valley. i'm no geologist, seismologist, what-have-you-ist, but aren't i basically living in the womb of the great continental divide?

and have i mentioned my favorite favorite store in nairobi? guns and cameras. seriously. that's its name. conveniently located next to a branch of western union. it recently removed its window display of assorted smith and wessons, colts and nikons inside - figuring it would be best during this supposed crime wave we're having.

i asked a friend about this surprising combination of wares and he answered, amazed at my inability to logically compute this on my own, "you shoot with both of them, don't you? why wouldn't they be sold together?"

what i do when i'm on duty

2007-06-30T19:24:00.000+03:00

another blackout stellar thursday night. i think the flu i've come down with only aided and abetted my obnoxious behavior (i'm just assuming as i don't recall the details).

but on the occasion of this stuffy saturday (which i've spent imbibing way too much television from the states) "on duty" (sitting around waiting for stories while you watch television), i'll pose a few questions/observations that have been plaguing me.

1. hasn't madonna passed the age when she's reasonably believable in leotards on roller skates? perhaps this video is old news to most, but i caught it for the first time this afternoon (luckily on mute) and had to laugh. and immediately following that? that kanye west video that he rides dirtbikes in and pam anderson frowns in the background... can i get a job conceptualising these things please?

2. did you know that there are automatic servers (a la tennis balls) for ping pong? i was recently on assignment with a friend who's covering kenya's national ping pong team as they prep for olympic trials and discovered this myself. unfortunately - only after one totally spanned me in the head as i was walking by unassumingly...

3. poor james spader! one, why is he on a crappy serialised legal drama? and two, it's only been three or so years since secretary, right? when did he puff up into this bloated version of his once perfect self? i mean, we all remember the feathered-mane of his gloried sex-lies-and-videotape days, no?

that's all i've got to say for the time being. will keep you posted on the job front - there have been a few interesting developments but nothing official so i'm keeping quiet for fear of totally fucking myself out of it...

xo xo

year end accounts

2007-06-25T15:34:00.000+03:00

for those of you that know me at all, by now you must have realised that there's nothing i love more than to celebrate my own birth - as if it were a federal holiday or the biggest religious festival of the year.

not so this year. i'll peg it on the breakup but i think i've been in the throes of a huge emotional purge - trying to sort out my life and future now that there's no one i'm slightly beholden to. i've been on a couple of promising interviews but frankly i'm not so sure it's work that keeps me here for the sake of being here or engages me professionally. is this all just an endless charade to go "expat" as long as financially possible? or do i really want to be a "roving reporter"? and if the latter is true, why have i been more successful? am i really cut out for this?

these annoying inner workings of my besieged brain aside - although they provide a pretty accurate picture of my current, self-absorbed state of mind - when last friday rolled around i was not in a terribly jolly or festive way. i should also mention that several of my closest friends were out of town on assignment or other business and that it being mid-month most everyone was destitute (and when i say that i mean it in a much more real way than a flippant comment between paychecks).

but my friend gin - her husband is my colleague tony, who's a photographer - and my ethiopian companion threw me a surprise party at my favorite ethiopian restaurant (jote's got an in there being ethiopian and all). pretty soon the entire place was packed with friends and acquaintances - all in celebration of me. which really kind of jolted me into perspective.

why slum and mope around over some asshole named after a sitcom character? why have a crisis of confidence when it's readily apparent i'm the only one that doubts me? (i should temper that before anyone thinks my self involvement has reached unprecedented proportions - i'm sure there are many who doubt me but none as much as myself). why feel terrible and depressed over some ridiculously privileged notions of professional advancement or having to pack it in and call my two year adventure quits?

by the time i board a plane in september (whether for keeps, for a visit or en route to a different locale), i'll have kept myself financially afloat for two years (in a ridiculously luxurious way compared to the locals, in abject poverty compared to the other expats) as a journalist - my career of choice. and i'll have had the experience to explore a country and culture much more thoroughly than tourists or most non-journalist residents.

so why complain? why put a damper on the celebrations? if i can light up the entire exiled ethiopian community in nairobi, i'm sure there's more in store.

sorry for the sentimental, pseudo-inspirational crap. i'll be back to my sardonic wise ass self in no time.

by the way - congratulations to my former roommate gerry smith for his first A1 story for the Chicago Tribune. May it be the first of many. Not bad for two weeks on the job - and christ, if he can manage that with a ukulele festival...

breakup

2007-06-16T13:45:00.000+03:00

yep. that's the word. alphie and i are kaput. i'll save the grisly details but it basically boils down to him going back to his ex-girlfriend because he wasn't up to the challenge of dating a non-kenyan. needless to say, he's not my favorite person right now.

trying to work on a feature illustrating that despite the exponential growth in the kenyan economy, poverty is only increasing and slums/informal housing settlements are only expanding. but distracted by obvious emotional upheaval and crappy nickelodeon-esque south african sitcoms...

anyways, later this afternoon have to take stel to the veterinarian because she's come down with some kind of allergy, cold - nothing like feline boogers and constant sneezing. i've never seen a cat with a sinus issue before. ah, the joys of pet ownership.

bombs

2007-06-11T14:39:00.000+03:00

things have certainly been crazy and busy in nairobi this past week or so.

we've had this wave of death and dismemberment by the mungiki sect that i mentioned covering last time. we've had a police crackdown in one of the city's most notorious slums where scores of red-beret wearing paramilitary forces fired indiscriminate shots, terrorised civilians and destroyed houses, leaving at least 35 people dead.

we've had a poorly constructed wall of a compound in a different slum collapse in a torrential rainstorm, trapping dozens of people and killing at least 14 others. buried alive.

and then this morning, we had a bomb rip through a restaurant in the city center at 8 this morning, just two blocks from the office. police are denying that it was a suicide bomber at this time, but it happened just 200 metres from the former US embassy that was bombed by al qaeda in 1998. only one person is confirmed dead so far - the bomber who was carrying the explosive device in a brown paper bag - but we've got 34 people in the hospitals, although none of them are said to be severely injured.

the scary thing - it's a favorite restaurant among my friends and i after a long night of partying and sometimes we're in there after leaving the disco around 7 or 8 in the morning. thank goodness i'm trying to scale back my alcohol intake...

beheadings, barack and bono

2007-06-06T15:58:00.000+03:00

so it's been ages, i know - three months, or so, i suppose. life seemed to be getting a bit too routine to post regularly about anything interesting - which may be the reason for my prolonged silence.

yesterday, took a drive to muranga, a small town about 50 miles northeast of nairobi, which has been the scene of some of the most grisly incidences of violence ascribed to the Mungiki - a shadowy psuedo-religious sect that's been killing cops, hacking people to death with machetes and even going so far as to behead and otherwise dismember their victims. i spoke to a woman the day after she lost her husband of 32 years and she didn't betray a trace of emotion - there are still some things that boggle the mind about life in kenya, like these intricate grieving systems they've established and how horrors often seem routine, a part of life that was bound to happen.

we've been catching dribs and drabs of the presidential candidate debates over CNN and BBC, and for the most part it looks like a high school election campaign with everyone pointing fingers at one another and making unrealistic promises (like free junk food in the cafeteria). i was glad to see richardson enter the race but am not sure that he'll be able to get many people behind him... it's fascinating how much kenyans are engrossed with american politics. i'm sure a great deal of it has to do with someone they perceive as one of their own (obama, of course) standing a decent shot at running the world (so they say).

they're in the midst of some serious politicking over here as well with the general elections due at the end of december. there are a number of candidates and the campaigning, so far as i can tell as much of it is done in swahili or tribal languages, seems to be talking shit about each other without actually outlining how they're going to change the country. it's a bit of a tribal popularity contest. one of the candidates, raila odinga, son of the country's first vice president after independence, is running a great race on the basis of the fact that he's the owner of the first - and only - hummer in the entire country (that may be simplifying it a bit but really the acquisition of such conveys such inordinate powers on the man that people fall at his feet believing he's the next messiah).

work's good, cat's good, alphie's good. visa situation, while just renewed for another three months, is getting to be a trickier and it'd be great to figure out a way to deal with this on a more legal and less frequent basis. things are pretty routine so i'm not sure that there's much exciting to report.

i did go to a rock night recently and was surprised by a number of things: one, i have not heard half of the music that they're playing around here before (hint hint could really use some new cds but not top 40, of course) and two, haven't seen that many white people in one place in a really long time. it was overwhelmingly surreal.

i'll end on this note: a friend sent a link to an article about the july african themed issue of vanity fair and asked what people here thought about it - and whether or not they were excited because of bono's involvement in it. to my knowledge - not a single kenyan i've ever met knows a U2 song off the top of their head and even if you start singing "with or without you" or "where the streets have no name", they're generally clueless (unless they've been stationed or schooled aboad). they've heard of bono but in a purely development context and his status as a rock star seems to be secondary to his work forgiving third world debt. that said, if you put jessica simpson or beyonce at the helm of this issue, i'm sure it'd generate a bit more excitement.

a short brief between files

2007-02-06T17:49:00.000+03:00

in an effort to stem the tides of complaints that have come coursing my way lately about my inability to communicate regularly - even on a mass level - here's a brief post to sate your curiosities and quell your anger.

my boss/editor/protector is leaving nairobi. deserting the company and the country and leaving me at the mercy of the frogs. while i'm no closer to a full-time job than i ever was, i have managed to solidify quite a few freelance contacts and think i should be able to stay afloat financially - not that it's a very difficult endeavour in a country where most folks live on less than a dollar a day. my own habits, of course, are more luxurious what with my three-bottle-of-beer-and-a-pack-of-smokes-a-day habit and the fact that i like to dine on foods a little more substantial than pastey gruel and bananas. but even then, we're not talking millions.

tomorrow he's off and tonight my colleagues and i plan on bidding him farewell in high-style. we'll, of course, start at our local joint (conveniently located directly across the street from the office and where much of our newsgathering occurs) before preceding to a disco of sorts (bound to be throbbing until the wee hours despite it being the middle of the week - kenyans and the expats that call this country home do love their dancing) before finally ending up at a casino (his favorite nightcap - owned primarily by indians, called asians in kenya, and frequented for the most part by the chinese).

despite all this lightheartedness, i'm really sad. i've learned more from this man than any other editor or teacher i've ever had - except for perhaps my greek professor back at oberlin. he's had faith in me when my own faultered, made me dig deep for the lessons i've learned and turned me into the journalist i am today (and while i'm certainly far from writing award winning articles, i've learned to hold my own when i'm interviewing such diverse figures as madeleine albright, gendayi frazier, pascal lamy of the wto, the somali prime minister and a raft of sub-saharan african presidents). so i'm sad to see him go but hopeful that i'll manage to make my mark here without the comforts of a safety net.

otherwise, am fine. stella the cat continues to be as adorable as an apartment dwelling african feline can manage, alph is helping his award winning independent director friend shoot a short this weekend out on the coast and is dragging me along (i'm packing tons of sunscreen for the long days i plan on spending at the beach while he's out on location), bosire just purchased my boss's car and basically bequeathed it to me (but i can't drive it until my replacement driver's license arrives in the mail) and i'm gearing up to get out of the country at the end of the month on some trip - perhaps india to visit dear granito - as my visa's about to expire and i need to get legal again.

hope all is well with everyone. sorry for the long delay between posts. i'd say it won't happen again but i'm more than positive it will.

New Year's Musings

2007-01-08T15:36:00.000+03:00

I have been bitching to some of you about a phenomenon that I’m experiencing in which my judgment of abject poverty and backhanded third world logic have become clouded over by a thick fog of cynicism – most recently in gripes about Somalia, a shitstorm which single-handedly served to put a damper on both Christmas and New Year’s celebrations among my friends and I (everyone having to take four hour shifts on the desk, trying to decode what little you could hear over the satellite phone – not that I should bitch too loudly, my shifts were both early in the day and I did get to enjoy both holidays with the festivity they truly deserved – minus a handful of beloved friends, however, and repeated phone calls about correct grammar and story focus). Despite the fact that it’s been one of the top stories in the world and I’ve gotten to work on it, I’m just tired of lying, manipulative Somali clan leaders feeding misinformation to reporters who are too helpless and scared shitless for their lives to convey much in the way of skepticism…

Despite this, I noticed the other day that the days of childlike wonder and awestruck observation aren’t entirely over…

Just this afternoon, I sat across the aisle on the bus from a woman in labor, screaming and undulating/ululating her tongue in a torrent of ecstasy and agony which I can’t recreate (a fact that I truly envy) and which every other woman on the bus echoed until the chorus reached its crescendo with an inhumane wail – as something ruptured, splashing placental and prenatal juices in a wave across the bus as her husband tossed her over his shoulder, jump off the still moving bus and ran through traffic trying to hail a cab to the nearest hospital. Us remaining passengers gave up a moment of silence, sending her our thoughts/good vibes/prayers, and the hush was only broken when a young boy of ten sitting two rows behind could no longer contain the three live roosters he’d been transporting in a plastic bag and they attempted clumsy flight, squawking and shitting the rest of the way to town. The ticket taker could only shake his head in resignation, exchanging a loud sigh with the driver, as he surveyed the wreck that his previously pristine means of public transport had deteriorated into within the course of five minutes.

I always used to make fun of my friends who said that when they advised against cold beer – preferring instead beer in its warmest, sudsiest and heaviest form – as a means of preventing sore throats and flu. While the matter hasn’t been scientifically proven, I am amazed that a drop in the normally pleasant 80 degree temperatures that mark the aftermath of the rainy season (which hasn’t technically ended because it’s STILL raining nonstop) to 70 degrees or so has thrown my immune system into a bit of a tizzy and I’ve come down with the flu – along with the rest of Nairobi. I can’t imagine how I’d be dealing with the chilly climes back home as I’ve gotten used to live without anything heavier than a jean jacket and a light scarf (I’ve even had to file away my woolen favorites).

Traffic reports on the radio? Well, I imagine you’re already clued into the notion that Kenyans aren’t relying upon Doppler-outfitted helicopters and extensive big-brother type monitoring systems. Instead? When it’s rush hour, or approaching, drivers send a flurry of text messages to the radio stations about the state of traffic. But it’s a terrible, unreliable practice because a single text message can dissuade drivers from using one route – thereby clearing up the road as the deviant, manipulative messenger obviously intended – and clogging up another of the main arteries in and out of town (and might I remind you that there aren’t many – and they all have the strangest names: either fallen independence heroes or the place to which they eventually lead. Can you imagine if New York’s Fifth Avenue led directly to Cincinnati and was therefore named Cincinnati Road? Because that’s the kind of thing we’re talking about here).

I’m sure I’m terribly behind the times here in terms of offering any kind of original cinematic praise, but just have to rave about Half Nelson. If anything can serve as both heartfelt condemnation and praise of the public education system in the States, this movie can. But obviously the movie’s true theme lies much deeper and it’s truly powerful in its understated way. Alright, I’ve done my Peter Travers impersonation (although not with the superfluity of alliterative language that film critics seems so fond of…).

Am dating someone – a cameraman with a rival agency here in Nairobi. He’s Kenyan, named Alph (pronounced exactly like the furry alien creature of 80s sitcom fame) and makes quirky short documentaries on the side. So far, all’s well on Planet Melmac but true to form, he hates my cat Stella and much of their time together is spent antagonizing one another. I hope he’ll be a good influence on me because after three beers, he’s ten sheets to the wind and I can’t imagine subjecting him to hours of endless drunken debate while I attempt to sate my thirst.

That’s the update in these parts. I hope this finds you all in the best of spirits, health and fortune as we enter 2007. Be sure to save some of those vacation days for a trip to the tropical paradises of the Indian Ocean (I’ll throw in some mind-bending poverty along the way just to make it educational – see what I mean about the cynicism?) with me…

Bises,
Karen

sometimes we don't know it's christmas (after all).

2006-12-21T14:39:00.000+03:00

the major problem with blogging around christmas time is that you're afraid you'll blow your whole load and not have anything interesting or newsworthy to write in anyone's holiday cards. not that they'll be seasonally timely anyhow, if i know much about the kenyan postal system.

things here continue to go well. war's on in somalia so am spending quite a bit of time editing copy rife with grammatical errors and variant spellings of the name mohammed. boss is away on holiday and otto, bosire and i are trying to keep the english desk running but it's mostly bosire who manages this - he's got all the contacts and doesn't mind spending fourteen to sixteen hours a day perched at his computer terminal. when he's not running back and forth to the bar across the street.

it's hard to get much accomplished in december in kenya. public and religious holidays basically turn the whole month into thirty-one days of binge drinking. it's not an awful way to spend one's time, with parties at every turn and people in a generally merrier mood than otherwise.

christmas plans are up in the air. it's difficult to even imagine it's christmas time, what with the tropical weather and the flowers all abloom. if it weren't for the folks across the way that blast holiday tunes, reggae style, at six am, i wouldn't have a clue.

i originally intended to join my friend aileen for xmas festivities at her home in eldoret, a village in the kenyan highlands near the ugandan border. but we're still transportationless as all the busses have been booked solid and no one's got an extra car lying around. we're trying to rope one of our friends into driving us but i am getting ever more ready to go place an order for a turkey at the local chopping block.

otherwise, got to cover this really interesting conference on the great lakes region (rwanda, burundi, congo, uganda and tanzania - you know, all those places you read about with genocide, war and rebel factions to keep the central and east african bloodshed quota up to speed). six african presidents were there - including the newly elected joseph kabila and uganda's highly entertaining yoweri museveni. i had a face-to-face interview with the prime minister of somalia. it was pretty cool, high-level stuff. at least here, where it mattered although it didn't really resonate anywhere else.

that's the news for now, i suppose. nothing else striking to report right now.
be well and have a wonderful holiday!

they don't call it the rainy season for nothing

2006-11-27T13:11:00.000+03:00

Computer never recovered but I’ve replaced my old machine with a new laptop – it’s another hp, apparently my favorite brand, but it sure doesn’t hold a candle to my old beast. The only good thing is that it’s about three times lighter, at least, than my former laptop – making carting it all over the damn place a bit easier.

Thanksgiving was less than spectacular here. All my friends that I would have celebrated with were out of town – in Congo or Sudan having quite a worse time of it than me, I imagine. So I cooked up some chicken stir fry (tried to keep to the poultry theme without resorting to wild turkey – tough meat and dry no matter how you cook it) and drank a good three quarters of a liter of whiskey. I’m sure I made the founding fathers proud.

My dad’s due for angioplasty on Tuesday – a bit of a shocker and something that’s had me worked up considerably since I found out. But after a lengthy phone conversation the other day, the duration of which was spent comforting me instead of vice versa, I feel a bit better about the whole thing. It’s a preventative measure and better to have this done now than get sacked with a major coronary some years down the road.

The one thing this has made me consider is how far away and how completely helpless I am halfway across the world. Sure, that’s something I expected before I uprooted myself from the lap of relative luxury I enjoyed in the States. But it’s never something I’ve been confronted with before, aside from the general pangs of homesickness. It really gives me pause to think about what I’m accomplishing here and what I really want out of life.

I’ll put an end to all these vague philosophies for now and promise a triumphant return to colorful blogging and interesting stories – but for the time being, I’m just trying to make it through November without any further calamities raining down on me.

Did I neglect to mention I’ve finally been struck with an inaugural bacterial infection and am suffering a gruesome rash on my neck from some insect referred to as the ‘Nairobi fly?’

Of course, this all seems terribly selfish and relatively inconsequential (except for the dad part, of course) when I consider there are literally millions of people just a few hours upcountry flooded out of their homes, their towns, even refugee camps – all without access to any kind of relief except what little the aid agencies are able to airlift to them. And the rains aren’t due to stop until January.

Love and umbrellas,
K.

roadkill

2006-11-17T15:38:00.000+03:00

i'm back on one of those wacky french keyboards which are such a delight as i'm sure all those of you who have experienced this phenomenon know.

the reason?

my laptop, wallet and ipod got jacked earlier this week on my way home from this crap climate conference that i've been covering without end. i was in the car with the office driver and one of his friends (who was actually driving because earlier that SAME day i got into a car accident with the office driver on my way TO the conference in the SAME TRAFFIC ROUNDABOUT and his own vehicle was in the shop). we were stuck in traffic, creeping into town when a gang of petty thieves, started rapping on the windows - all of which were closed except for the driver's - and one reached in through the driver's window and unlocked the door, grabbed my bag and ran. i must have lived here far too long because i didn't even blink an eye and just directed the driver to take me to the police station after i returned from running fruitlessly after them.

lesson learned? lock your doors and close your windows when you're stuck in traffic in downtown nairobi (let me know if i'm wrong here: but didnt i do that?). there's a remote possibility that my computer may be recovered but i'm not holding my breath - i have my high level police friends working on it.

so, every morning i've been dragging my ass out of bed - hard to do during this gloomy wet season - to make my way to un headquarters for the climate change conference i've been trying to cover. it continues to be complete hell! but finally, this tuesday, relief arrived from paris in the form of a pair of seasoned science reporters who actually know what's going on but i've still been busy. and getting a shitload shitload shitload of clips.

the coolest thing, however, had to have been covering kofi annan who was here on wednesday. i got a couple of excellent, non-climate related stories out of him. it was truly awesome. i don't think i've ever been so starstruck in my life, drooling away in the front row of his press briefing.

also on the roadkill front: it's not much that strikes me as unusual about this place anymore - but i must say that during my commute to the conference - which is in an especially wooded area of town - i've noticed a large number of dead animals on the road. i originally dismissed them as a local species of raccoon or opossum, but upon closer inspection - they're actually monkey carcasses!

glacial meltdown

2006-11-07T22:12:00.000+03:00

man, did today suck.

i was assigned to cover the goings on today at the climate change conference happening here in nairobi - 6,000 delegates, 189 countries, infinite scientific mumbo-jumbo and un bureacratic protocol.

aside from spotty internet connections - making filing any story, or even sending quotes virtually impossible and certainly mind-numbingly frustating - there was the minor problem of sharing quotes with my colleague - who refused to send them to me until she sent her copy to the office.

many phone calls from a maniacal editor later, we finally filed - i think i wrote four separate stories today - and certainly multiple versions of each.

it was certainly a confidence -shattering, ego-crushing afternoon but by the end of the day i think i managed to figure out how to cobble together the kind of copy that met my editor's approval.

the worst? apparently i didn't bomb entirely because i have to go back tomorrow. should be a little easier, i'll have another anglo reporter with me and he can run to all the press briefings while i try to cobble together a story about the midterm election results are going to effect future environmental policy.

good news though - have a stringing assignment for the leading gannett paper tomorrow which i've somehow got to manage to fit in while i'm running up and down the halls of the press center, tearing my hair out and stalking prominent tree-huggers. unfortunately, it's past ten in the evening and i'm still in the office trying to clear a bunch of shit off my desk before the shenanigans begin anew...

it's getting hot in here

2006-11-06T12:08:00.000+03:00

a story that fell into my lap about former street kids who got to meet wolfie.

climate change conference kicks off here today. gotta love the UN. there's nothing like griping about global warming while you're ferrying 6,000 non-nairobians around the city in gas guzzling SUVs. they sure know how to spend their money well, don't they?

so somalia's about to explode, as you might have noticed if you've been reading the news lately. there are concerns that if full scale war were to break out in somalia, it would create a lot of regional conflict. certainly in ethiopia and parts of northern kenya that border that crazy chaos of a country, but nothing serious.

i've been getting a bunch of pictures sent out on the wire, so i'm excited about that. if i could do it all over again, i think, i'd rather be a photojournalist. not to mention it pays much better and takes less time than writing articles. i'm all about consolidating my efforts these days.

am making some progress in terms of freelancing gigs. have a couple of newspapers, newswires interested. its getting easier to network and my seething hatred of expat journalists is on the wane but... i still harbor a lot of resentment, rest assured, of people that take their full time gigs for granted and do as little work as they can get away with.

might be heading to south sudan in the next couple of weeks. it's probably all just blather - there's a lot of talk about sending me here and there but i only ever get to go to refugee camps. luckily juba, the capital in southern sudan, is just like one big refugee camp so maybe it'll work in my favor.

but for now, i've got to wrap my head around carbon levels, gas emissions and environmental treaties and UN protocol. it sounds about as boring as it really is... but if you don't love global warming these days, you might as well invade iraq without any pretense and call yourself george w. bush.

muddy freak out

2006-11-03T15:40:00.000+03:00

I’m covered from neck to knee in goopy red clay mud – despite my persistent efforts to shower it off (it’s hard to withstand cold water after you’ve been in the rain for a solid hour). And why, you ask? Well, I’ve been chasing after Stella*, my cat. She managed to escape this afternoon while my cleaning lady* was working her magic on this mosquito-infested, gecko-invaded, cat hair carpeted apartment Gerry and I call home the few hours a day we inhabit it.

I’ve been tramping around outside, shaking a bowl of food, in the midst of a fucking deluge! No wonder she couldn’t hear the food rattle in her bowl, it was solid mush after a mere minute outside. You may think that I’m incredibly overprotective – but she’s never been outside to fend for herself and there are packs of savage guard dogs that roam around the neighborhood and god only knows what other predators lurk these dirt roads. Not to say that there are lions prowling up and down my street for dinner, but it’s been known to happen.

Finally, an hour later and soaked to the core, located her hiding underneath some of the tropical foliage that peppers the inside of our apartment complex and lured her upstairs with her sodden mush meal and a equally dripping toy that I bought her at the market the other day. I’d been routing around in the mud and the puddles with a piddly flashlight for an hour while the askaris (guards at the gate) looked on, fully convinced – and amusedly so – that I’d finally gone batshit.

So much for that flea dip I gave her. So much for that clean pair of jeans I was hoping to survive in until next week’s laundry. So much for that sparkling clean floor I returned to after work before noticing that the cat was missing. And god help me, I’ve got to tell you – I’ve never seen ring around the tub this bad before.

A real, non-cat related blog is on the way, I promise.

And a couple of shout outs –

To Christy Goodman who is leaving me and all those other suckers who paid for journalism grad school in the dirt by scoring a job at the Washington Post.

To Alison Granito who’s heading back to the third world – Dehli for Christmas if I can’t get an Eritrean visa?

And to Molly Brown who reminds me that I’m not the only one who gets drunk and takes tumbles that result in permanent bodily harm.

*It was the only name I could come up with that didn’t sound ridiculous. Penelope didn’t seem to fit her. I wanted some classical originally but I figure I’ll make my kids suffer that – here I declare that my first born son shall be christened Euripides. Unless I get an aloe plant or another animal in the intervening years and get it out of my system. But back to Stella – it’s not too terrible. I mean, it is a pretty decent beer and it wasn’t like I could realistically call her Heineken, right?

*It had to be done. As much as I despise the idea of hiring help, it’s my small contribution to the local economy. Beatrix washes our laundry and mops the floor while her husband Charles puts new soil in the cat’s litter pan and washes my car when I have it. Besides, there’s not enough time in the world to scrub all the grunge off our clothes.

101 ways to waste time on deadline

2006-10-19T19:04:00.000+03:00

so if you're as blocked and bored as i am - do yourself a favor and pay a visit here.

it's not quite as good as the real thing but somehow satisfying nonetheless.

Brais and bi kidude

2006-10-19T12:20:00.000+03:00

It’s been a weekend of firsts. I saw my first “113-year-old” lady put on an hour long drumming performance (although more reliable estimates put her age at 95). Bi Kidude is a Zanzibari musician – and legend – who is the island’s most reputed taraab musician (think a mixture of middle eastern, indian and african sounds in full orchestral mode and you’re set). I saw her perform onyago music – a type of musical ritual used to instruct young girls in the art of womanhood that is quite out of vogue these days in swahili culture. It’s primarily drumming and scatting (I mean in the musical sense) as a group of dancers illustrates rhythmic sexual positions. The version I saw, obviously performed to a primarily ex-pat crowd with men in the audience was a completely sanitized version of the ritual – but really racy! But this woman! Whatever age she might be – to strap a drum around your waist with a sash and start pounding and bellowing non-stop for an hour! That’s something. I met up her on Saturday morning and she’s crazy – she can drink of a crate of beer in one sitting (that’s 24, fyi) and beat the hell out of her second husband with a dried sting ray tail after she caught him cheating on her – and doing his mistress’ laundry. I think it was the laundry that sent her over the edge.

We (my new roommate, Gerry, and I) had a successful brai last weekend. That’s Swahili for barbecue. I made terribly delicious chicken satay, kofte kebabs and beef pilau – a Swahili rice dish that’s similar to indian biryani – spelling on that, al? everyone was quite amazed that I knew how to cook – according to all the Kenyans I know, I barely look like I can open a beer bottle (proven false soon after my arrival here…) But it was quite a party and I think there may be more in our future. We even purchased a juko – a barbecue grill for easy dinner making – it’s almost summer time. The short rains have started and the flowers are beginning to bloom. The warmer of the mild temperatures will soon be upon us. It’s strange to live in a place where the only thing that passes for a season is the arrival of regular rain (in heavy twenty minute long downpours throughout the day), especially when you mistakenly refer to everything as winter and summer and no one knows what the hell you’re talking about. But hey, at least you don’t find any of those “here’s how to beat the heat” and “stay warm in winter” news stories flooding the local media…

We have internet in my apartment now. So far, okay. It’s almost slower than dial-up – but not quite. Unlimited access for less than 50 bucks a month – split between two people? Who’d have thought? It only took a month to configure it but now we’re up and running. Well, trotting really. If you’re reading this it means that I’ve actually been able to connect and post to my blog. No small feat, here. Honestly.

I went on assignment this morning to a donkey sanctuary here in Nairobi run by the local SPCA. They’ve got all kinds of animals in the shelter – pigs, goats, donkeys, guinea pigs (not quite sure about those), rabbits (not really typical pets around here but were rescued from some street children trying to hawk them in the middle of traffic), camels, even a monkey or two. Certainly the most diverse shelter I’ve ever seen. But anyway, they run this program for abused donkeys – even have a donkey ambulance. I’ll be accompanying the mobile donkey clinic out into the more rural, remote areas in Nairobi’s neighboring districts next week to see the vets and maltreated donkeys in action. Basically, despite being a steady source of income for Kenyans – in terms of transport and rentals – donkeys aren’t given nearly enough respect as cattle or camels, their two other favorite beasts of burden simply because they can’t eat them.

While I was there – I was beguiled. By a cat, of course. After I’d selected which one I liked – come to find out that it’s a girl. I’ve never owned a girl cat before so we’ll see how this proceeds. But she’s sitting here, in an old beer box, trying to acclimate to life in chez Karen. What she really needs (aside from a name because I had my heart set on Oliver and now I don’t that I can use that) is a good scrub to wash all the clay and dirt off her arse. Not to mention whatever god awful mites or pests she’s wearing.

And that I’ve subsequently inherited from all the cuddling.

And yet again I find myself in the midst of mob-mentality anti-americanism

2006-10-06T19:24:00.000+03:00

Just another day at the office, really.

went to a demonstration today sponsored by nairobi’s muslim community to oppose an anti-terrorism police unit that they say is acting unconstitutionally and that unfairly targets and intimidates them.

It all began last week, apparently, when a car full of muslims – two women, one man – were taken into custody after they made an allegedly suspicious u-turn near the Israeli embassy. They held all three for 48 hours without charges before releasing them without charges. I might add that at this point, I wanted nothing more than to burst out in laughter when I thought about their counterparts being held in everyone’s favorite tropical paradise: guantanamo bay.

Most interesting, I thought, were the parallels I saw between this demonstration and many of the anti-war protests I observed back in the states. Basically: that despite having a supposed unifying theme, the protest soon deteriorates into rival factions trying to get their messages heard the loudest. Calls to disband the anti-terrorism police unit were soon overwhelmed by chants of “down with Bush" and "down with Israel.” Young men raced to whoever was standing nearest with a notepad and lodging a list of complaints with western government policies in africa, the middle east, even our own countries (I did hear a few remarks about katrina and the French upheaval about the veil. I mean, really). the placards were the best. “we are not living in the gaza strip – mind your own business, you children of swine and dogs” and “we don’t sell our rights to uncle sam” and “tell bush islam is coming.” and let's not even get started on their feelings about the danish.

it reminded me of the contradictory placards and "anti-war" messages of protestors back home. “smoke Iraqi pot, not people.” “no war for oil.” “tell the Taliban women are people too.”

So who says democracy isn’t alive and well in east africa after all?

On a lighter note:

A joke that’s been circulating on the internet poking fun at the kikuyu, the prominent tribe in Kenya. Kenyan stereotypes of this tribe are that they’re the best business people, but often greedy and cheap when it comes to sharing their power and money.

The local newspaper funeral notice telephone operator received a phone call.

The woman on the other end asked, "How much do funeral notices cost?"

"5 shillings per word, Ma'am," came the response.

"Good, do you have a paper and pencil handy?"

"Yes, Ma'am."

"OK, write this: 'Mwangi died.'"

"I'm sorry, Ma'am; I forgot to tell you there's a five-word minimum."

"Hmmph," came the reply, "You certainly did forget to tell me that."

A moment of silence. "Got your pencil and paper?"

"Yes, Ma'am."

"OK, print this: 'Mwangi died, Toyota for sale .'

Nothing that a little bathwater (and Jesus) won’t cure.

2006-10-03T19:17:00.000+03:00

Just back from Dadaab refugee camp in northeastern Kenya on the border of Somalia where I’ve been meeting with a lot of Somalis who are fleeing because of renewed fighting between the warlords, the “government” and an increasingly powerful union of Islamic courts who have been forcing sharia law upon the masses with guns.

Earlier this year when the Islamists came into power, there was a renewed hope among the Somalis that this movement might actually bring peace to the country despite the restrictive nature of the changes they proposed to implement. But upon trying to exert greater power throughout the major parts of the country, they’ve been having a problem disarming the militias that remain and renewed fighting has broken out – prompting the government to attempt to get involved in ending the conflict.

So even though there are only patches of violence here and there and not the full scale civil war that erupted in the early 90s – provoking, of course, that well-known and ill-fated intervention by the US Marines – people are desperate to get out. More than 2,000 arrived this past weekend while I was visiting – the very people who remained throughout the first conflict and the subsequent reign of the warlords. Now, they say, is worse than before because at least back then you had some indication of who was fighting who and for what reason. These days, when the bullets come flying, it’s kill or be killed.

Dadaab – made up of three separate camps and more than 98 percent Somali – is located in the same area as the drought-plagued regions that I visited earlier this year. So, the same harsh, desert-like conditions and malaria-infected mosquitos are roaming about. This time, however, I was smart enough to pop a mefloquin before I left so I’ll hopefully avoid a repeat performance… In addition, the area is incredibly insecure – prone to roaming militias and local bandits who are jealous of the relief that is being filtered to “outsiders” and not themselves – so you have to travel everywhere with a police escort, which is not only taxing on the finances of the relief operation but also a pain in the ass to arrange.

[We had an opportunity to actually go to the border where we saw a few people walking across and others coming in vans. The convoy I was traveling with actually drove into Somalia to meet a lorry that had broken down with a number of travelers heading for the camp. So, technically, I’ve been to Somalia. But I don’t think a five minute drive into the bush really counts…]

I spoke with a deeply pious sheikh who fled Kismayo, a southern port city, in 1992 during the first eruption of chaos. He’s been living in the camps since then, doing some logistics work with one of the NGOs on the ground there. His thoughts on what’s happening now? He thinks that Somalis need “a little Jesus.” Strange words from a Muslim, no? But he, like many others I spoke with, seemed to be wary of the Islamists now that they’ve basically become a unified militia. “The only difference between a warlord and the courts is that the courts have god on their side.” So his radical solution? A little Christianity to diffuse the tensions.

So this evening, finally, home – where I relished a long bath and washed the layers of dust, goat hair and dead flies off of myself and was able to change into clothing that didn’t smell like an elephant’s underarm. Tomorrow, it’s back to life as usual in this bustling metropolis. But for now, I’ll just sit back and relish my tap water – however cold or sporadic – and thank god (or Jesus) – for the luxury of being born in a country that isn’t like something out of Lord of the Flies.

oh, and, hey:

check this out.

reality unplugged.

2006-09-27T18:17:00.000+03:00

yo.

first things first: my luggage arrived. i've found a lovely apartment. will have own wheels again after transmission is fixed. have even arranged wireless internet in my new pad - my, how things have changed technology-wise here since a mere six months ago! - and have already had several interviews with foreign press agencies here. basically? no one's hiring, but they'd love another freelancer. so it seems i'll have enough people to work for here without even having to resort to looking for contacts back in the states. but i imagine i'll begin doing that soon enough.

wrote a story last week about kenya's new found appreciation for reality television programming. they're even attempting to shoot an east african version of american idol here in nairobi. i went to the open casting call (held, of course, at the local movie theatre - an obvious choice for acoustics?) and was treated to a seemingly endless thread of would-be reality stars singing mostly forgotten early 1990s r&b hits (what they hear on the radio constantly). the judge's response to those whose performances left a lot to be desired was the brisk, "your voice is below average" modified sporadically with the adjectives "slightly," "far," and "extremely." despite its initial entertainment factor, i soon began to feel sorry for the judges who had to sit around for a whole weekend of auditions - especially when i realized the frequency of which several whitney houston, mariah carey and phil collins tunes were performed. needless to say, if anyone sends me a burned cd - please refrain from including "the greatest love of all."

i ended up interviewing this kenyan model/actor who was just featured in survivor africa as the kenyan representative in a pan-african version of the show who said that basically, africans are at a disadvantage when it comes to this television format because they're smart enough to know the consequences of having their words and actions broadcast to a national audience. unlike americans who will debase themselves for whatever lurid reputation their fifteen minutes of fame will afford them. his words, not mine.

later this week or early next am heading up to a refugee camp on the kenya-somalia border to dredge up some details about this massive influx of somalis fleeing the spreading (and warring) islamist presence in what passes for their "country."

speaking of a free-for-all, is it true? the terminator's ahead in the polls and it actually looks like those soggy-brained californians are going to re-elect him?

baggage.

2006-09-09T16:51:00.000+03:00

ahoy! greetings from east africa.

i've arrived, warmly welcomed, back in nairobi - although my luggage hasn't yet. meaning, basically, that i've moved to another country with nothing other than my laptop, three novels, a couple magazines and the clothes on my back (which i've been wearing since tuesday). and yet, i'm still excited to be here.

i'll start working on monday, stringing for the frogs and making the rounds to all the other media organizations in town. i've already a long list of features that i want to work on that i figure i can sell to some unsuspecting american newspaper after i put it out on the wire. that's the beauty of working for the french - they're not in direct competition with any of our own outlets. we'll see how successful i am.

i was able to secure a two-bedroom apartment in my old complex (it's really a three bedroom but the landlord loves me so much he'll rent it to me as a two bedroom if we don't use the third bedroom) for myself and the new grad school intern that's heading over in a couple of weeks. i've already moved what few belongings i have into it this afternoon.

that's the news for now. it will be much more interesting once i get back into the swing of things and then i can post about more exciting things than lost luggage and how i'm going to find work.

love to all.

out of america

2006-08-30T03:01:00.000+03:00

so...

let's just leave it at that and call it an extended leave of absence, okay?

i'm currently in the throes of squeezing my belongings into a backpack and getting ready to head back indian oceanside a week from today. despite not having anything solid lined up - save for a stringing gig at my old stomping grounds - i'm really excited to get back and see what ends up materializing. i've got a few solid leads for freelance (and helpful contacts from a few professors at my pre-2020 alma mater) and will have a better idea of how this is going to work once i'm actually on the ground there.

thanks for your unending patience and tolerance for my much needed respite from society and bear with me as i'm sure i've still a few more adventures left in me.

and let me recommend an incredibly funny take on embedded reporting and foreign correspondence while i've got your attention.

update from the (beach)front

2006-06-16T02:14:00.000+03:00

a resurrection it was not, my friends. but this certainly qualifies as one, no?

i admit it. i've been a hermit. living in a small town. slinging drinks to waspy drunks. cavorting with reference librarians. totaling my car (yes, the soccer mom mobile - recently listed as the least likely vehicle to ever be stolen, but apparently they didn't access the value of ford taurus wagon tires). hustling buck dice at the local dive (i usually come home with about a hundred in winnings each time this delightful game unfolds in my local, but what can i say? i'm just really good at bar yahtzee). spending afternoons swinging in my hammock reading inter-library loan books. listening to a lot of NPR (god help me, did i get suckered by their fundraising drive). gardening (i'm not really good at the weeding part). jogging (this is a painful topic to broach and my hamstrings are reminding me of it currently). yoga-ing (not so painful but much more fruity and certainly unlike me). swimming in the bay (with gaggles of annoying neighbor children who seem to already be on summer vacation). and yeah, avoiding phone calls. going on email strike. you know, like erecting a massive communication barrier with everyone i know.

but it hasn't all been a lost cause. and i did answer a phone call every now and then. but life as a reclusive technology phone (sometimes i even turn off my electricity and plumbing, just for shits and giggles) has been a personal enlightenment - a needed hiatus from reality. it's almost as if it's been a small social experiment of sorts - communing with nature and shutting my brain off for a while and figuring out life.

nairobi still beckons and there are a couple of good job leads there. so i'm gearing up for an august return. andrew's cousin, gerry, will be globaling at afp in the fall and that should be an interesting change of pace. nothing solid's yet about full-time employment or where i'll touch down in east africa but my intentions are still on course for expat living...

that's the news. which isn't really breaking or investigative or anything. but if i've learned anything from this brush with domesticity and seclusion, it doesn't have to be.

love and pebbles. xo, k.

resurrection

2006-04-19T02:24:00.000+03:00

nearly three weeks have passed since my last post and, honestly, not much has changed... until this morning.

i'd submitted my resume to the weekly community newspaper out here to try to scrounge up some freelance copyediting work while i slave away at the country club. it'd be added income and put me in a newsroom - if only for a couple of hours a week.

imagine my surprise this morning when the managing editor calls me to schedule an interview and basically offers me the editorship of the whole shebang. i tentatively asked if she'd read my cover letter, which plainly indicated my intent to return to kenya in due course, and she admitted that she hadn't. but she said that i'm the best candidate they've had for years (which explains the current state of the newspaper) and says that if i'm interested and decide not to return to kenya, the interview would basically be a formality.

so now i'm torn. i know that i have no interest in a/ editing a community newspaper, b/ living on long island (despite my waterfront view and the temptation of spending the approaching summer here) or living in america for that matter and c/ know that this would not help further my career in any way... right?

i mean, the idea of being in control of a newspaper - which, to be honest, is actually a pretty decent local press that wins a lot of community journalism awards - is kind of tempting (just like that long island summer). but in the end, i know it's just not the direction i should be heading. i'd eventually like to be an editor (i think) but for the time being, i'm more committed to getting back to africa and reporting on the ups and downs of the lives of the underreported and, generally, undervalued.

and i did receive word today that one of my kenyan suitors died tragically in a car accident driving home drunk from a late easter dinner. his death is more than slightly ironic, considering he was the country's traffic commissioner in charge of enforcing drunken driving laws...

they call this look library chic

2006-04-07T02:45:00.000+03:00

you're all right. what the fuck is wrong with me? i'm going soft in my quickly onsetting old age. let's dope all the children with crank manufactured in an abandoned oklahoma grainery and lock the seniors up in the government subsidized housing in bed stuy as they watch their social security plummet down the sewer system.

am currently at my parents house listening to my father talk to himself and the dog ( or "you snugglebum, you!" as he affectionately refers to her) before my big evening plans: popping into the library to return a couple of books before heading to the local with my latest selections which i'll peruse while knocking back a few jiggers of whiskey. that's how we roll now, folks.

in my infinite free time (while i'm not dressing up like a middle aged secretary in a nebraskan insurance firm), i've had ample opportunity to catch up on all the reading and films i've missed while i've been away. two thoughts. 1. paradise now. people were talking about this movie in nairobi and i finally had a chance to watch it last week (you know, i can't explain how liberating it is to have access to a movie collection that boasts a wider variety than the entire eddie murphy oeuvre and all the merchant ivory productions). i thought it was pretty powerful but perhaps that's because three months ago a bootleg dvd of mr and mrs smith dubbed in mandarin did the trick if you were drunk enough.

but more imporantly, 2. brokeback mountain. really? people really liked this movie? i don't get it.

and you should read embracing the infidels. i'm sure you can find it at your local library.

speaking of which, gotta run. the old broads running the show down there close the doors at nine.

uniformly

2006-04-05T00:10:00.000+03:00

let's begin with something that i'm curious about - when did television become so awful? i haven't had access to regular television in years and now that i've got some free time on my hands [and free cable], i've been indulging. truth is, i can't watch more than an hour of it at a time before my brain turns to mush and begins sloshing around my head...

i mean, when did children start speaking so disrespectfully to their parents? when did all the programming become low-budget reality television and souped up law and order? and who is allowing the discovery channel or the learning channel to air programs called "my skin fell off" and "the boy who ate himself?"

in other news, i'm living on my own again. my parents have re-inhabited my childhood home after eight months plus in exile while repairs were made to the fire damage. that means that i'm living it up at the beach solo with the former acidhead of a cat my brother rescued from his college dorm, sasha. i've never taken care of a pet by my lonesome before - have a hard enough time remembering to feed myself - but so far, we're both still alive and sasha's even stopped his annoying anorexia habit.

and i'm employed. at a country club. waitressing and bartending.

i know. i know. i couldn't think of anything to top my kenyan adventure, so i decided to take it in the exact opposite direction and spend my days and nights waiting on a bunch of rich, overprivileged white folks.

there are uniforms involved. until now, i'd been able to escape working at an establishment that requires one to wear uniforms or ask permission to smoke a cigarette or clock in. forget the whole part about being nice to people. i've been lucky enough to scrape by with journalism jobs or farm stand jobs or grading ancient greek compositions (scatter in some random clerical work and babysitting gigs and you've pretty much got my employment history).

this experience is certainly a first - something of a step backward after graduate school, perhaps - but i want so badly to get back to nairobi that this is what i'm willing to do. for god's sake, i have to touch dirty plates smeared with ketchup. not to mention that whole being nice to people thing.

(i realize this is sounding like a rant from one of the overprivileged white folk that i'm catering to currently so i'm going to nip it in the bud now and segue to the wonderful amenities i've been taking advantage of in the suburbs).

cue suburbia. not as bad as i first imagined. for one, i'm not in the suburbs - i'm in the boonies. so there aren't many mega malls and hair salons. just lots of vineyards, farmstands, and migrant workers riding bicycles to their jobs (i'm thinking of boning up on my spanish while i'm home).

two, there's a lovely library which i haven't patronized in years and despite severe gaps in their african history section, did you know you can borrow dvds from the library sans charge (see i'm keeping up with my french)? and surprisingly enough, they've got quite a selection.

and three, my local bar - within biking distance so as to avoid drunk driving episodes - is eager to have a steady patron that isn't 65 years old and whose face doesn't look like a rhinocerous' hide from all those years riding tractors without sunscreen. so far its worked out that for every two drinks i buy, i end up with three free. i'm not so good at math but it doesn't seem that the bartender is either.

lastly? my brother's in town. and while i haven't actually had time opportunity to hang out with him yet, i'm really looking forward to spending some time with that silent satanic genius. alright, alright, you got me. he's not really a satanist, he just dresses like one.

all this being said? i'd rather be flopping along in an inflatable raft off the coast of somalia and take my chances with ak-47 toting pirates than spend another minute on american soil.

would love to blather on some more, but i've got a pair of pleated, tapered pants to iron before i head to work this evening.

grounded.

2006-03-28T03:38:00.000+03:00

greetings from my parents' house. charming, no? after three weeks of crashing on friends' couches, air-mattresses and in litter-strewn alleys, i've made my way back home. a big hearty thanks to hawkins, granito, goodman and lulu for bearing the brunt of my drunken (mis)behavior. and many apologies if i made you a/ late to work, wearing the same clothes as the day before b/ worry about my whereabouts or c/ spilled beer all over you.

saw the boss in dc. best news? in addition to anticipating my return, he's also going to let me resume use of his car! i don't care what he does with my copy, he's the best editor ever.

am now in the process of finding temporary job to raise money for my return. am thinking of registering myself as a charitable organization and holding kegger fundraisers to help pay for my plane ticket. but in the interim, am scouring about for bartending/waitressing jobs and LIVING WITH MY PARENTS.

despite their incredible generosity (rent-free housing, heat and internet included!), i've got to admit this living situation is less than ideal. i'm nearing 28 and this constant keeping tabs on my whereabouts is driving me a little insane. the "call when you get to the grocery store" tactic is most amusing, considering when i left for kenya they didn't ask me to let them know i arrived safely...

the depressing reality i'm confronting currently, however, is only compounded by the realization that despite being very expensively educated, i'm not qualified to do anything except scouring for stories on barstools. thus, the bartending option. thing is, i don't know how to make anything that an old man or a lifetime alcoholic wouldn't drink so the formulas for all these fruity, sorority girl drinks are beyond me. hopefully, i'll find a salty sailor's haunt and sink to my element.

i'm buying a plane ticket to return to nairobi on may 1. but in the meantime, you'll find me slinging buttery nipples in the suburbs and getting grounded for breaking curfew.

reunion tour

2006-03-12T18:34:00.000+03:00

so glad to know that i've learned life lessons while i've been away that prevent me from behaving like the same sodden asshole i always was. within 24 hours of arriving in chicago, i managed to have a mental breakdown, stand up two of my professors at a bar and black out drunk from drinking whiskey with domer since 11 a.m.

[self-censorship : i'm declining to include the sordid details about a random run-in with tribune boy but suffice it to say, my priorities are not in order right now.]

i've been here for a week now and i've yet to even go to my storage locker, let alone wade through the shit piled up in it - ostensibly the purpose of this trip to chicago.

truly, it's wonderful to see everyone. i've been wined and dined like a celebrity upon my return and it is much appreciated (considering i'm, for the moment, unemployed). it's been wonderful to see folks from home and folks from school and folks of all stripes in between.

but there have been moments when i've lost my head (more than i'd like to admit) and cease to function because sometimes there's just too much. going to the grocery store, for instance. i wanted to buy some juice. it was the dinner time rush, jam-packed with folks. i couldn't find the juice aisle and asked four different people - not one of whom gave me a second glance or pointed me in the right direction. i started bawling in the parking lot.

or going to restaurants and there being so much on the menu, i'm completely incapable of processing the selections - so i make my companion choose for me. or going to buy gas - apparently it's a faux pas in the states to buy gas with cash!

or the drunk frat boy in nevins when i went out for drinks with oly who told me i looked really tan and he'd love to see how tan i was without clothes on. and asked if i'd been wintering in the florida keys. it took all i had not to beat him to a bloody pulp.

so far, i've had people ask me: if kenya is a city in the middle east? do the people live in trees (a friend said that he'd experienced the same reaction when he returned from west africa and i scoffed at him until i found out, yes, indeed, people can be that ignorant)? do they wear loinskins?

being in chicago has been enlightening about my future because if i can't bring myself to live here, then i don't want to be in the states. and after much discussion with everyone i run into, i think i've decided to return. to string for the frogs, some american newspapers and possibly a weekly news magazine (i'll give you a hint: "when i was at...")

mindfuck

2006-03-07T17:34:00.000+03:00

i want to go back. like, pronto.

nothing here makes any sense at all. the excess, the entitlement to the excess, the ignorance and complacency. grrrr. i think i'm in that really heightened stage of anger in this whole reassimilation process.

there's something really hard, though, about understanding that i've been living in a place for the past six months - where i've never been happier and felt i was doing something important with my life in covering stories that matter - that most people don't even know exists and surely have no idea what's going on anywhere in africa, not just there.

i mean, there are 8 million people suffering from famine right now - i mean, that's the entire population of nyc! what, do we need rock stars to stage a liveAid concert for everyone to care? does angelina jolie need to adopt some starving children with brad pitt in tow so people magazine can tell us like it is?

it's not even like i was living in the african jungle here, drinking water out of dirty rivers and eating grubs for dinner. i was living in a large, well-developed city with electricity and sanitation and the comforts of the west. life wasn't hard there. we had the things that mattered. it's just the difference between what really matters and what we americans think matters.

sorry to be so inarticulate and boring, i'm just feeling a little bit mindfucked.

legendary foolishness

2006-03-02T14:07:00.000+03:00

as some of you might already have discovered, i'm still here.

tried to pull an andrew bossone and show up to the flight late enough to get upgraded to first class and despite leaving my house with two hours to spare before takeoff, traffic jammed so badly that i didn't arrive at the airport until 15 minutes before departure. needless to say, they weren't about to let me on as the plane had already left the gate and was quequeing for liftoff.

good thing, though, because i get to post an appropriate final kenyan blog (for the time being, perhaps?)

this is possibly my favorite kenyan yarn (though i'm told it's completely true by those who live around the shores of lake victoria):

the legend of the jajuok:

out in nyanza province, on the shores of lake victoria, there are reported to live a caste of kenyans called the jajuok. they're certified madmen who are ostracised from their villages and, in return for the inhospitality they have received, they've made it their mission to scare the pants off of all the luo and luaya tribespeople that live in that area.

naked as the day they were born, camoflauged as trees, they prowl alongside the dirt roads off the main tarmac that lead to villages in the bush. at night, this can be especially scary as, if you're in the midst of a drunken stumble home, you're bound to think that the trees are moving along with you.

there are also those that come from the lake itself, riding naked on the backs of hippos to the small villages. upon alighting, they scare up twigs and rap them on the corrugated tin of the huts, causing a fright inside.

but the real stealth of the jajuok, apparently, is terror of another sort. they stealthily fart through keyholes and defecate on doorsteps, suffocating those inside with extremely potent stenches and making a slippery path for those who try to chase them away.

local lore also has it that houseowners are known to leave burning hot coals and fire pokers on the floor behind the door, which remains cracked open, so that when the jajuok come calling, upon leaning against the doorway to release their olfactory assault, they fall backwards and burn their bums.

a fitting end to this installment of my kenyan adventures, no?

out of africa

2006-02-28T17:43:00.000+03:00

by tomorrow morning, i'll be on a plane (sans musical relief as ipod chose to conk out again - that's two transatlantic flights in a row) heading west. i'm no clearer about what lies ahead than i was a month ago. luckily, the past couple of weeks have been so crazed that if, in fact, i'm not returning (or heading to a different part of africa), i haven't had much time to notice or get weepy.

it rained today and it seemed to signify a good omen of what lies ahead. i was getting my car washed out in kangemi - an outer borough of nairobi - and it started pouring (ironic, no?). everyone was so excited and rushed headlong into the downpour, clapping and dancing with joy. strangely beautiful. the trees and grass turned a brilliant shade of green and flowers bloomed, radiating colors all around. seems as if there's hope for a rainy season ahead.

in a half hour, i'm off to stop by my local bar where they're hosting a small farewell gathering for me (free beer and snacks) before the last supper with some friends one of my favorite restaurants before dropping car off at boss's house/nightcap. then home to pack up all of my shit (pray that it fits into my suitcase) and watch the boy clean up my apartment.

i'm truly at a loss for something clever to say but it seems like such a significant turn of events requires a blog post, so here are a few random thoughts:

1. if i never see (or smell) another camel/donkey/cow/goat carcass, i won't be sad.

2. excited to see functioning traffic lights and street lamps.

3. think my lungs are actually going to miss crappy kenyan tobacco. might have to start smoking lucky strike unfiltered to avoid withdrawal.

4. unlimited hot water + non-stop electricity = pure luxury.

5. i'd rather be here than anywhere else.

see you stateside, folks.

life lessons (that you don't want to have) learned

2006-02-24T17:39:00.000+03:00

1. no matter how many exotic animals are roaming around in their backyards, kenyans love themselves some animal planet. we just got dstv installed in our office last week (meaning we can watch bbc and sky news now) and despite the fact that i've been away most of the week, when i returned the muted box was still engaged on that damn station and my colleagues beleaguered me with tales of all the interesting animal television they'd watched that week. wtf?

2. camel milk yoghurt? not so tasty.

3. once your car begins to smell like an elephant's armpit, there's not much that can be done about it.

4. sometimes, age is just a number. and sometimes, it's not.

exhibit a: when asked if he needed anything from the states, boy responded: mad magazines, pez dispensers and an x-box? my response: i was thinking more along the lines of prescription medicine you'd run out of, bug spray or contact lens solution not your christmas wish list.

exhibit b: regarding cottages and flats for possible cohabitation purposes should i return, his major requirement is extra two bedrooms (!) to house former FRAT BROTHERS coming for a MONTH-LONG visit in june.

exhibit c: hates flying, therefore long and smelly road trip to coast, but upon arrival wants to go HANG-GLIDING.

(disclaimer: despite vacation being very illuminating about dark recesses of said boy's personality, can't help but truly like the kid - even if does have checkered past as fraternity member, prizes access to video games above clean bill of health and decent eyesight and has questionable fear of easy transport.)

5. even when you thought you'd seen your last festering camel carcass on the side of the road in some drought-ravaged bush in northern kenya, you haven't. next issue of drought-related death and destruction due Monday.

gotta run. animal planet's showing some amazing footage of three lions totally demolishing a herd of zebra.

road trip

2006-02-22T10:23:00.000+03:00

greetings from malindi. it only took fifteen hours to drive here. but was quite an experience - on the (what passes for) road for a substantial distance through oppressive, tropical, equatorial heat (am i getting through to you about how much i'm sweating right now?). have no plans to get back into the car until the air freshener kicks in.

here on work/holiday with the boy. a couple of germans opened a camel dairy, so i figured i'd check it out. can't wait to taste camel milk yoghurt and ice cream. there's also rumors of a cow that drinks only beer. i'm working my sources and looking for a guide to take me out to his pasture. i'm sure fodder goes down well with all that tusker.

so, today we're off to see some swahili ruins - gede - before snorkeling our way through the country's most vast marine park. tomorrow morning - camels galore - and then on to africa's largest coastal forest before heading back down to mombasa where we'll spend the night before embarking for nairobi on friday.

all this basically means that you'll be even more jealous of my tan than you would have otherwise when i touch down in new york next wednesday - temporarily? for keeps? up in the air - freezing my ass off in my birkenstocks and turtleneck sweater. but at least i'll have a scarf!

i'll be spending the first two weeks and a half weeks of march in ny, illinois and d.c., driving my soccer-mom mobile through miles of overdevelopment, fast food franchises and ignorance. so please let me know if you'll be around, where you'll be and if you have room on your couch and a hot shower (that'll be the real luxury) for me.

politically incorrect

2006-02-15T12:48:00.000+03:00

i'm sure we're all aware of my inability to communicate articulately about politics. but this one deserves some incomprehensible mumblings.

i, like many of you, have been quite amusing by this whole dick cheney hunting fiasco. and unlike dear scott mclellan, it's only getting more amusing now that the veep's hunting partner stands to kick the buckshot.

the nyt (our favorite source of credible reporting) writes today that if whittington dies, our dear old dick will be subject to a grand jury probe.

so, let me get this straight. the man is going to be criminally investigated for his role in accidentally shooting his pal (poor visibility in that foggy texas brush, eh?) but not for issuing orders to scooter to leak plame's name or illegally wiretapping or condoning torture or stuffing the profits of this oil-fueled war into his bursting pockets? i could go on, but i'm sure there's no need. we all get the point.

and while i'm waxing poetic, let me just add that while i'm not condoning this completely inane cartoon violence, i LOVED the photo of the pakistanis taking down ronald mcdonald. that's an anti-western protest i can get behind.

i think this post just added me to the administration hit list. i'm staying here.

islam-o-mania

2006-02-11T19:22:00.000+03:00

let's start with friday's cartoon chaos. went to a prayer meeting sponsored by kenya's leading muslim organization where demonstrators bore placards with slogans like "we are ready for jihad" and "stop these islamophobias" and "death to denmark" and, my personal favorite, "freedom of expression is western terrorism" as local imams ordered a boycott of danish products, travel to denmark and "anything that looks danish."

amusing enough until the demo took to the streets and a few german reporters showed up on the scene where they were roughed up, spat upon and rushed into a getaway car whose windshield was swiftly shattered with large cement blocks because apparently they were "anything that looks danish." when the march finally wound up in front of the city's largest mosque, where danish and american flags were burned, participants kept on approaching my photographer telling him to get me out of there because it wasn't safe and i would be attacked. we exited gracefully -- aka running out of there -- as a group of youth started collecting rocks and pointing at me.

then back to the streets to follow a group who splintered off to march on the embassy. the riot police swiftly moved in, firing shots and teargas cannisters at a group of 300 angry folks. but they dispersed pretty quickly and the rally ended as peacefully as it began - no embassies burned because they never made it that far and only the two germans hurt. its great to be in a place where political expression doesn't turn into an excuse for bloodletting. as kenyans will tell you, they're very peaceful.

the best part of this thing? the danish embassy refused to close - even though they were the target of the protest - but the american embassy shuttered its doors. self-absorbed assholes, aren't we?

so good news! meeting with bureau chief on wednesday and think that i'm going to be able to work this out. aka - stipend and subsidized rent and per story billing! and there are another couple of possibilities that might be available: addis ababa! kigali (i'd love to go to rwanda and i'd actually learn french - even better: if you're posted in kigali, you're also the pointperson for eastern congo)! regardless, i'll be able to swing enough dough to stay in nairobi until something opens up that i'd actually like to consider. if, of course, all goes well on wednesday. but boss doesn't see any reason why it shouldn't and really doesn't want me to leave.

heading up to wajir on monday with american ambassador and british high commissioner to tour the drought-ravaged northeast. barren desert, smelly rotting animal carcasses all over the place and malnourished children a la ethiopian fame 1984 - sally strothers - feed the children. terribly depressing. but kind of exciting - i get to bring the SAT phone!

and kudos to two folks dear to my heart - miss molly brown who starts a kickass job at fantastic music mag on monday and my lil sis, lulu, who is moving to chicago after getting into her top choice grad school - u of c - to study egyptian heiroglyphs.

buttery nipples all around.

mellow yellow

2006-02-08T19:17:00.000+03:00

it's weeks like this that make me remember that i'm not a burnt-out stringer for an under-staffed office in one of the most underreported regions of the world.

have been chasing down people who drink their own urine three times a day and rub it all over their body to cure all sorts of medical maladies, a freaky catholic splinter group that actually conducts mass in latin (gotta love the nearly extinct moments when my undergrad major comes in handy), street boys turned ballerinas doing a dance about flamingo migration, attending a Kenyan version of LiveAid to benefit victims of this severe drought we got going on here, and attending muslim rallies protesting the danish cartoons that leaders here promise will turn violent on friday (good idea to save it up for the most holy day of the week, no?).

i've got to admit, weeks like these that make me want to postpone my return to the states. too bad they happen too regularly for me to sit back and actually enjoy the sheer surreal quality of it all.

also, another confession, i have actually been watching sports. the african cup. can't help but pull for the real africans in this match - cote d'ivoire. don't even know how egypt managed to finagle its way into this tournament, considering its sheer refusal to actually identify as an african country or people.

so there's bird flu in nigeria. confirmed. even better? story about how birds who died from an unknown disease (could be AF or cholera) are being sold at a discount rate in the market. this continent is so totally f*d if it gets hit with another epidemic. i mean, HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis aren't enough?

a couple more words.

2006-02-06T11:53:00.000+03:00

am pissed pissed pissed.

wrote this whole post soliciting career advice the other day and it's disappeared into the internet stratosphere. it was apparently published long enough for a couple of folks to read it and respond with gems of wisdom - so thanks to those who did - but here's the condensed version:

do i move to eritrea in june or do i pick up and string in madagascar? or do i stay in nairobi and wait for a fulltime staff position to open up somewhere? or do i surrender and head home?

eritrea: impending war. i'd be one of two correspondents in entire country. enough news to support myself on a $30/story contract. great art deco architecture, espresso and pasta held over from italian colonial occupation. but... only four ways to get into the country - none of them direct - and it's penultimate on the reporters without borders press freedom list, second only to north korea. and, oh yeah, that whole impending war thing.

madagascar: living on remote tropical island paradise in indian ocean. probably not a lot of news going on there as we've survived without a correspondent for many many years but think of all the features i could write? but... there's an incurable mosquito-borne disease sweeping indian ocean islands which cripples those it effects and it's a remote tropical island.

staying in nairobi and stringing is pretty self-explanatory. but again, it's $30/story with the frogs and i need to be assured of a steady income. currently colluding with media rivals for possible employment opportunities at american and british wire. will keep you posted on details.

retreating to live with my folks, facing looming debt and whoring myself out for a job at a publication i could actually work for after this adventure - well, that speaks for itself, eh?

one word

2006-02-06T11:28:00.000+03:00

pinkeye.

same old shit

2006-01-30T18:20:00.000+03:00

not to harp on the digestive problems... but they're really taking up a lot of my time and attention.

you've been forewarned.

so much so that i had to make my way to the hospital last night after having been on and off the toilet all day (but honestly, mostly on). the doctors, nurses, pharmacists and reception folk all know my name by now - i think it's because i'm one of the only mzungu that patronize the place, and regularly at that...

the doctor says, "hey, i need a stool sample. seems like you'll have no problem with that" and hands me over the plastic, capped equivalent of a dixie cup.

THREE HOURS LATER, having raided the vending machines for the most bowel-movement-inducing items i could purchase, downing cup after cup of nescafe and even after having sent one of the doormen out to scrounge the most foul brand of kenyan cigarettes, i'm still at a loss.

i had to go home. and bring back some morning brew.

so, i suppose it's only fair that if everyone else was allowed to colonize this continent that the amoeba are allowed to set up their own colony in my intestines.

comments from my coworkers: "wow, that's hard to get rid of" and "you know that can kill you, right?" and "man, you're gonna be on the toilet forever."

honestly, they're a real supportive bunch. today's just an off day.

meanwhile, i'm in love with this new antibiotic. it's three hours and counting! maybe i'll even be able to start eating solid food again by the end of the week!

it's raining concrete and family dysfunction

2006-01-27T16:33:00.000+03:00

i was surprisingly numb this week, staring down at this vast expanse of rubble as rescue workers from america, israel and uk descended upon kenya to dig out the four survivors and the mangled body parts of everyone else in the "Nairobi Building Tragedy" - as our local news outlets here coined the collapse of a four-story building during lunch hour in the city center.

this building, by the way, is right around the corner from my office and my colleagues and i often head there for lunch at one of the cafes in the basement. we were even considering heading over there on monday. thank goodness we worked our fingers to the bone chainsmoking and bullshitting in the hallway too long that by the time we were ready to leave, news of the building's collapse hit the newsroom and we were all buried under a ton of bricks, er, work...

one of my newfound egyptian friends wrote me an email, querying "what the fuck are israelis doing in kenya?" i had to explain to him that prior to their arrival, and more importantly, the arrival of their equipment, rescue workers here were literally using shovels, pickaxes and their hands to remove tonnes of rubble and debris and lift survivors to freedom. before, of course, they went haywire with a bulldozer and tried to remove a couple of the large slabs but disturbed the remains so severely that even the oblivious military police ordered them to stop. so yes, it was necessary for some kind of intervention.

spent a good two days shuttling back and forth between the office and the site. got a good sunburn out of it, too. so did my colleagues. stomach was not happy with me for irregular access to working toilet, but i toughed it out.

amazed at the sheer variety of emails that i got about this incident. there were people who i thought would email in a panic, my parents for instance, but no. and then an array of unexpected responses. my favorite, perhaps, from one of my former professors who shall remain nameless who said, "glad to hear you're not eating bricks for lunch." so thanks for keeping interested in my well-being folks, and mom and dad, if you're still out there, want to write me an email sometime?

so my sister, apparently, called andrew up last night and shacked up at his pad before heading back to the states from her dig in luxor today. meanwhile, she hasn't written to me since i left cairo and we're working on two weeks now.

hmmph! ah, family dysfunction. aren't you guys glad i'm putting it all out there today? to be truly fair, i suppose, i should mention that my brother has refused to return a single email that i've written to him the entire time i've been here so i have no idea what he's doing with himself.

well, it's friday evening at the office and we're all getting ready to kick into overdrive because it never fails to get extremely busy here when we're ready to log off/close the bureau. must be some crazy law of physics.

good news: i'm off antibiotics. i think this was my fifth course of cipro but it's not like i'm feeling any better - but fuck it, it's boozing time again!

i'm alive, i'm alive

2006-01-24T10:38:00.000+03:00

but a lot of people aren't. a four story building in the middle of downtown nairobi collapsed yesterday and they're estimating at least 20 people dead, 80 injured and tons more caught in the rubble. it's too much to put my eyes on.

see what happens when you use twigs as scaffolding?

oh, sorry, that was awfully glib. especially since they're still digging people out alive.

on the road again

2006-01-24T10:36:00.000+03:00

There’s quite a bit to catch you up on.

So, Cairo: an experience. I don’t know if I could ever live there, but it was a fascinating place to visit. I had a hard time grasping that I was in a Muslim country (my first) and how that played out socially. The ratio of men to women on the street was jarring and the insular nature of the community there was also disturbing. The men are verbally aggressive and despite not being physically threatening, it wasn’t a pleasant experience to walk down the street subject to constant harassment. And although we were still on the african continent, Egyptians have no african identity whatsoever and are completely removed from everything that’s going on below them. And they aren’t exactly the most welcoming people if your skin is darker than theirs. And you never see anyone drinking in public! Tea, yes, and smoking sheesha from hookahs, but alcohol is reserved for more western-style, hidden places or in people’s homes. I’m certainly not going to maintain that Egypt is dry, because I surely didn’t find that to be the case, but was strange to see such a prominent part of life here in Kenya so hidden away behind closed doors in Egypt.

That being said, there are tons of wonderful things about Cairo – the city doesn’t fully begin to thrive until 10 at night (and this was during a holiday so I can’t imagine what it’s like when the town resumes its normal pace), you can walk safely anywhere, anytime. Andrew’s friends are wonderful people – especially Bahkry, a Sudanese friend, and Mohanned, one of his Egyptian friends. Everything is incredibly affordable, if not outright cheap. And the madness of traffic patterns and the throngs of people on the street, contrary to first appearance, are a calculated chaos that almost becomes understandable after a while. The food is quite tasty – but perhaps that’s because I was thrilled beyond belief about all the vegetarian options that were available to me (I’ve become quite a carnivore living here).

We also traveled to Alexandria – seat of the Greek empire in north Africa. Too bad it was raining the entire time we were there, but did have a chance to eat lots of fresh seafood and visited with his friend Hiatham’s uncle – where we feasted on cakes, fruits, cookies, sandwiches, stuffed grape leaves and tea. I’ve never drank so much tea in my entire life, which is served black (lipton bags), sugared to the max, in tall glass cups.

Had a chance to catch up with my sister, which was lovely, though I think that she was disappointed we weren’t able to do more. But it was just wonderful to be around her. Was quite sad when we parted as I felt that I’d only just had a chance to start spending time with her.

But went to the pyramids (of course), a couple of the more famous mosques and the khalil-al-khan (I know that I’m spelling that wrong) – the giant street bazaar in old Cairo. And just enjoyed walking around the city quite a bit and enjoying the company of Andrew’s friends. When I look back, it doesn’t seem that much cultural enlightenment took place, but just enjoying the freedom that a well-lit and safe city affords you to be spontaneous was more than enough for me.

Reporting went well. Met one man who gave me a two-and-a-half hour interview and sat in a couple of bars that are reputed to be famous gathering places for homosexuals in Cairo. Also had a chance to speak with a man in Alexandria who I’ll communicate with via email for the rest of the information – he didn’t feel comfortable speaking about the subject at his uncle’s apartment and the weather wasn’t exactly amenable for a leisurely stroll by ourselves. But feel that I got a good indication of what gay life is like in Egypt – non-existent for the most part and people are only keyed into what’s going on through networks like the ones that I had established (or were established for me).

Then back to Kenya, with Bossone in tow. We had a lovely trip to Lake Naivasha, where we coasted along the lake before heading to a nearby park for a hike through a dried up riverbed. Enjoyed spending time with my friends, drinking a good deal and eating more, and Andrew was introduced to the Kenya way of life – “hurry up, make plans and then wait for two hours before anything happens.”

We took a trip to Kakuma, in the northeast of Kenya, just miles from Sudan and Uganda – home of the second largest refugee camp in the country and where the Turkana tribe lives. We flew to Lokichoggio in a 19-seater on our way to Kakuma, where we had to be escorted to the camp, an hour away, in an armed convoy because the road is among the most dangerous in Kenya – subject to constant banditry by cattle-rustling tribes, who despite not having livestock or water, do brandish AK-47s. How does this happen?

It was truly interesting. I worked on a story about the drought and did some repatriation interviews with Sudanese refugees. I met this wonderful 16 year old girl named Mary who came to Kenya 4 years ago after watching her father die in fighting. Her mother tried to get them all out of the country on a UN sponsored convoy, but there were only two seats available. So Mary came with her brother while the mother stayed behind. She wants to stay until she finishes school so she can become a pilot – something she’s desired since early childhood while watching planes fly overhead. I cannot imagine possessing a fraction of the courage that she has. As I was leaving to meet another family, she ran up to me and made me a gift out of her earrings – the sole pair in her possession. Kakuma was a deeply touching experience, needless to say.

Many of you might know by now that Kenya is in the midst of a severe drought, alongside its Horn of Africa neighbors. During the daytime flight to Cairo and during our flights up north and back, it was made readily apparent to me. Areas that I had traversed a mere month ago, teeming with green, were now brown and barren. It’s amazing how much this landscape changes, how susceptible it is to the weather and how readily apparent it is that we are destroying our planet. What’s even more amazing is that people that live out in land that is virtually untouched, with little interaction with the trappings of industrialized life, are aware of the ways in which their actions effect the environment and contribute to climate change, yet we who live in so-called civilized countries are completely unaware of how our behavior contributes to the deterioration of the land.

Andrew’s flight was overbooked when we arrived at the airport on Friday morning, so he was rescheduled for a flight on Saturday afternoon. The airline put him up in a five-star hotel (I didn’t even know we had those in Nairobi), where I had the best shower I’ve taken in about five years, seriously.

Was great to have Andrew here. Enjoyed very much seeing someone else discover this place in the same way I did a few months ago. Even impressed him with my left-handed stick driving and got to show him some wildlife (you should have seen how excited he got when a monkey jumped onto his shoulder at the park the other day).

And despite having spent the past two weeks plus joined at the hip, we didn’t get into a single fight (which is more than I can say for my sister with whom I spent three days and quarreled often). It was really comforting to have him around and am glad that we both had a chance to show each other how we have been living for the past couple of months.

Somewhere along the way, however, I’ve managed to pick up another bacteria. Lovely, no? I’m blaming it on Egypt because I think I’ve become immune to everything in this country by now. But, frankly speaking, I’m getting tired of spending most of my time dependent upon access to a working toilet.

In other news: I’ll be staying here for another month. My landlord is being a pain in the ass and I’ll lose my apartment deposit because I failed to give him 30 day’s notice. So I could live here rent free for another month – and get paid by work, finally! They’re going to a cut me a fat check this week!

So there’s more time to arrange for a job here. When I told my boss I was thinking about defecting to rival agency, he was not pleased and asked me to hold out a little longer… so that’s good news. Also good news: did I mention that my employer paid for me to go to Kakuma? All signs are pointing in the right direction, its just making these folks in paris get on the ball. Oh, also, there might be a possibility that I may end up moving in Asmara when our correspondent there leaves. You don’t have to speak French and right now, it’s a hot spot for news (though the possibility of war between Eritrea and Ethiopia is waning and there’s only four ways you can fly into the country – through Dubai, Cairo, Khartuom and some city in Yemen…) So there’s another option that’s available. Never thought I’d be excited about Eritrea but am getting more excited about it as I read this amazing book – “I Didn’t Do It For You” by a woman named Michela Wong which you should all rush out and by as soon as you can. It’s easy to read and thoroughly fascinating and is a good indication of all of the horrors that were perpetrated at one point by colonialists and land-grabbers and oil-magnates all over this continent.

I’m sure that I’ve given short shrift to many things but that’s all I can stand to sit and rehash for the time being.

is this really africa?

2006-01-08T16:45:00.000+03:00

greetings from cairo - which, despite being on the same continent, only shares one thing in common with the rest of us below the sahara: sudanese refugees.

it is wonderful to see andrew. he's built quite a life and community for himself here. am greatly impressed.

i'm finally adjusting. for the last two days i've been completely overwhelmed. a culture shock of sorts. i live in the biggest city in east africa, but it's nothing compared to this, which is huge and european and safe to walk around in. i've been walking outdoors at night (even by myself) and it feels really strange. there's a loose, spontaneous social atmosphere here and even a bit of infrastructure - like labeled public transport!

today we tried to break into some egyptian prisons to see sudanese refugees but no dice. later on today, we go to a sudanese dinner party (i'm looking forward to being a room with more black people than white - it makes me feel more stable and normal here). and then tomorrow - the quest for gay egypt begins.

i'm sure i'll have more interesting things to say after i can wipe this holy-shit-where-am-i grin off my face and adjust to life in a real city again. but right now, i'm just freaking out a little bit more than i expected. it's as if things are much stranger in nairobi than i thought (it's my first time out of the country since i arrived, so hello perspective!) and i've simply adjusted without realizing that hey, life back in kenya isn't that normal after all.

unfortunate sobriety

2006-01-03T10:27:00.000+03:00

step-by-step illustrated photo manual on how to slaughter a sheep (yes, got my farm animals wrong last time).
www.flickr.com/photos/94641153@N00/

happy new year all. i'm fine, a little wear and tear. mainly a severly aching jaw from drunken spree that should i want to account for, cannot even begin to remember. from what i have been told, this is a blessing. not much has changed, eh?

am getting ready to depart on friday for cairo, to see andrew and my sister, off on an epic adventure to find myself some egyptian gays to write about. we'll see how well that turns out. i've been warned not to get my hands cut off or have my sources publicly hung in the town square and all i can say is i'll do my best.

my friend leslie wrote this post http://www.journalscape.com/lrs28/2006-01-02-13:47 (i'm not savvy enough to know how to work html, okay?) about those grass-is-always-greener moments. and i've been having quite a few of those lately. like when i hear about spectacular holiday moments with the family that "i had to have been there" for or being regaled with tales of friends' festive holiday parties or mini j-school reunions. the smallest things are setting me off lately - not into tears, but unfortunate whiskey-filled evenings. it's like leslie said, i just don't like life happening without me.

but when i actually sit down to think about it, i know that i'm right. i should be here. because the work is rewarding, it's the experience that counts and i'm learning so much more about myself than i would in a swank apartment in chicago (or rather, crashing on hawkins' floor - which is not to say that her apartment isn't swank), sending out resume after resume accompanied by poorly written cover letters and burning through what little money i have left. for one thing, it's cheaper to be unemployed in kenya than anywhere else i've lived before.

so i'm here for the time being, trying to make things happen for myself (aka make a job fall into my lap without trying too hard). and even if it ends up lasting just another month, even if it's just postponing the snow another thirty days, then so be it.

alright, enough sentimental sap, it's not my style. at least, certainly not when i'm sober.

slaughterhouse-5

2005-12-29T16:07:00.000+03:00

no, nothing to do with dresden here. but before i get into the details of my christmas feast (and the preparation thereof), i'd just like to say that you are all so lucky to have such a dedicated blogger (also known as the lazy emailer) here behind the dashboard of this here device because you are the sorriest internet interactive crowd i've ever met. i mean, it's been what, weeks? since the last comment? sigh. temper tantrum finis.

so, turns out we didn't even miss the mince pies. at least, not me. a drunken feast with all seven of the tolerable expats in town. my friend jill roasted up a couple of delicious birds, the feathers of which she'd even plucked herself, and there was salad, i think, and some mashed potatoes and a bunch of other bowls full of food that i can hazily remember the color of. but yes, a wonderful drunken evening that ended with everyone jumping into the swimming pool in their knickers at three in the morning.

which brings us to a very hungover xmas morning. was supposed to depart nairobi at half past seven and surprisingly, we made it onto the road at nine thirty. my friend aileen and i drove up to nyeri, in the central highlands, to spend xmas day with my friend peter and his family. nyeri is home to the famous treetops hotel where queen elizabeth became, in fact, queen elizabeth after her father died.

our two hour journey quickly turned into three and a half after an ill-advised trip to a grocery store along the way to pick up alcohol supplies, aka xmas presents, for peter and his family. um, does anyone in this country ever shop for presents or ingredients for that afternoon's feast before that 25th? talk about a last minute rush.

upon arrival in nyeri, we quench our thirst at a local watering hole as we wait for peter to arrive from the village to come and fetch us. they got a flat tire along the way. by the time we arrived at his parents house, it was three in the afternoon, a far cry from our planned nine thirty arrival, which they were anticipating so i could be on hand to slaughter the goat.

we'd just tumbled out of the car, barely greeted his parents, when a long knife with a dull blade was thrust into my hand. i made several attempts at the animal's neck but wasn't able to break the skin so handed over the knife to an expert who quickly sliced through, spurting blood all over. surprisingly, it was relatively tame, not nearly as gruesome as i'm making this sound. did manage to cut its hooves off and cut through the skin on the legs so the slaughterer could skin the beast (a little hard to do because its legs were still pumping blood and lamely kicking all the while). but watched, entranced as the professional skinned, gutted and carved up the creature, removing its internal organs and emptying its intestines. and you can bet your sweet fannies i've got photos of the whole thing just waiting to be posted on my flickr sight.

and while we're sitting there, with the goat carved up and tons of meat to be had, his father turns to me and says, "we also bought a cow for you to slaughter as well." and i turn around to see a calf being led to the slaughtering block before protesting and saying, "don't you think we'll have enough meat already?" which put off the blood-thirsty frenzy for another couple of weeks, i hope.

then a walk through the homestead - acres and acres of tea plants, animals of every stripe, fruit trees and vegetables you'd never seen grown. do you know that pineapples are a root? that bananas are actually strange berries on this crazy red drooping flower? ever taste arrowroot - some crazy cousin of a yam? no? good, don't. did i mention that their farm is in the valley of mount kenya - the country's largest mountain?

villagers flocked for miles to pay a visit with his family. we all feasted on grilled goat ribs and flank meat straight off the fire, while his mother tended to a delicious goat stew in the kitchen. the kitchen is basically a wooden shack with a fire and tons of pots in which every vegetable you have ever heard of simmered away, deliciously seasoned. his mom heaped everything onto overflowing plates, of which you had to eat two of before you were allowed to leave her sight.

we were treated to some delicious muratina - that's kikuyu for local brew - a honey wine of sorts. an extemely potent honey wine of sorts. which we followed up with some vodka mixed with pineapple squash (squash, or cordial, is british for Tang). which we followed up with some beer and whiskey and whatever else in sight was liquid. by the time the evening was over, we may have even been drinking dishwater but no one was sober enough to know the difference.

that's what kenyans do on xmas, folks, in case you were wondering. kill animals with dull knives, eat and drink everything in sight and then afterwards, at the height of drunkness, go out visiting your neighbors in the dark.

i suppose here would be a good time to mention that peter's family is one of the lucky few in the entire village to be able to afford electricity. it should also be mentioned that just because there's electricity there's no such thing as indoor plumbing. i'm talking holes in the ground in a dark outhouse somewhere in the backyard...

on our way to pay visits to his neighbors, we walked to a couple of bars in the village where everyone was agog at the sight of me. xmas 2005 shall forever be known in nyeri as the year that crazy white girl came to town. the villagers were wonderful and welcoming, buying me beer after beer (which i kept on giving to the friends that accompanied us and nursing the same one at each bar we went to - otherwise i wouldn't have been able to stand up).

then onto ndegwa's house, where his mother wouldn't let me leave until i'd eaten another meal in itself and taken a bunch of bananas for the road. she was ready to start a bonfire in the yard so we could slaughter yet another goat by its light, but i assured her that i would be fine with what she'd given me and thanked her repeatedly for her kindness.

after almost needing to roll home in the darkness, stuffed to the gills, we all fell into our beds and slept soundly through the night and i must admit that i was relieved that all the feasting was over...

and...

i woke up the next morning to his mother pushing a huge plate of bread, hardboiled eggs, sausages, fruit and cereal in my face, urging me to eat. now, i'll just let you all know that the amount of food we ate for breakfast i usually intake over the course of an ENTIRE day.

and then, more drinking. boxing day. which i'm sure represents something important but every kenyan i asked told me that it was for unwrapping the boxes you received on xmas. they take things very literal, these kenyans. but hey, maybe i'm wrong [insert completely unrelated aside: this would be great time for someone to POST A COMMENT about what boxing day actually is].
we go to scout out some young bulls at neighbor tom's farm that peter is thinking of purchasing. which, of course, only ends in more feasting. tea, bread and jam, fresh-picked plums, roasted maize. and that was all a precursor to the lunch we were able to escape (only because peter was wise enough to inform us beforehand that we would be required to eat when we returned to his home whether or not we feasted here so we gracefully escaped when tom's mother went out to milk the cow).

and right he was. when we returned home: more goat on the grill, more stew and veggies on mountaneous plates. and buckets of plums, kiwis and bananas awaiting us in the backseat of the car to return with us to nairobi. which we did reluctantly later that afternoon.

but not before i caught his father in the driveway as we were preparing to leave, trying to fit the cow, pushing it by the bum, into my backseat so i could take it with me and slaughter back home in my apartment.

almost as good as jamaican bobsledders

2005-12-24T17:46:00.000+03:00

first, just wanted to thank you all for coming through with those mince pie recipes. i ended up scrapping the cooking anyway. number one, no time. number two, who the hell knows how to convert anything into metric anyway? i bought a much tastier black forest cake from a local bakery.

got to go ice skating today. for five minutes, it almost felt like christmas here. and then i walked outside into the sultry tropical sun and thought, who needs santa claus and a white christmas when you can suntan poolside in december? but maybe that was the near-concussion i got from the fall i took on the rapidly melting ice.

plans for tomorrow have changed. no one wanted to go to magadi, that hellish salt pit, except me. so instead, we're traveling two hours up-country to feast on some spring goats with peter's family and drink the day away. an authentic kenyan xmas.

merry christmas - feliz navidad - bon noel.
love to all.

mince pies and the salt pit

2005-12-22T17:33:00.000+03:00

which is what i've been told/coerced into cooking and bringing along to a strange ex-pat xmas eve party i'll be attending this year.

so does anyone have a recipe? and what exactly is minced? i'm sure it's meat, but can you use goat? perhaps i can convince them that a mango rhubarb pie sounds tastier. because it does, at least to me. and probably the rest of the world with functioning tastebuds.

what is it with these british folk and their complete inability to manufacture anything edible? the worst part about the colonial era here - aside of course from all of the really bad things - is that kenyans have actually adopted this horrific cuisine as their own. unless, of course, you're eating more traditional food like ugali (which tastes like a mix between paste and that really do-it-yourself play-dough your midwestern babysitter made out of elmer's glue and bread, which i guess is essentially more paste) and roast goat (which i'm swearing off because i always end up with more of it stuck in my teeth than makes it into my stomach).

the weirdest part about this whole xmas eve party thing, though, is that no one attending is even british so i don't really get the whole mince pie thing...

i was supposed to go up-country with my colleague. but turns out we both have to work this weekend. so there'll be no chance of actually arriving anywhere we need to be before the holiday is actually over. instead, an expat xmas eve and then xmas day out on lake magadi, the saltiest lake on earth. it's got so much alkaline in it that if you submerge any of your body into it, the water will eat through to the bone. thank god i'm so graceful and not a klutz, eh? but yes, what's interesting about this place (aside from it perhaps being an incarnation of hell on earth) is that because it's so salty, the water evaporates so quickly and leaves a thick crust of salt all over what's left of the surface and around the edges. there's a salt-processing plant nearby and i'm pretty sure that i'm eating the lake anytime i use salt in this country. it might be interesting, right?

i was invited to spend the week after the holidays up in mt. kenya with an older couple and their two daughters. i'm trying to finagle all of my interviews and appointments around so i can accompany them on their post-xmas vacation. i'm beginning to love mountains. i never had much of a taste for them before i came here and i'm not about to up and move to denver just to live around some but i like them much more than i thought.

best news i've heard this week though? i got a plane ticket. to go to egypt. i'm headed there for a week in january to report the hell out of the gay scene there. i'll be in cairo and alexandria. and drinking up a storm with the big A. then back to nairobi, with A. in tow, and we'll head out to the Kenyan countryside before making our up north to see some sudanese refugees living in the northeastern part of the country.

i won't go into all the details because i've got to get some work done at the office before i head out to recommence pedophilia with the way-too-young-for-me radio guy, but i got into two car accidents yesterday. i'm fine. parts of the car are fine. and after a high speed chase around the city after the guy who sideswiped me, my bank account will be fine as he's paying for the damages. the other one? well, let's just say it's good that this woman already had some spinal cord injuries that she was en route to the doctor for because she would have had some whiplash otherwise. kenyans, not so savvy about their insurance fraud, eh?

happy holidays to you and yours (the yours might be unecessary because i think the only three people who are reading this thing are related to each other - and me).

the big m

2005-12-19T19:24:00.000+03:00

a slight touch. of malaria. lrs asked if "a slight touch of malaria" was like being "a little pregnant." i'm glad to inform you all that no, it's an incremental tropical disease. so the fevers, numbness of limbs and hallucinations were minor. nothing that a hard dose of cipro, some super-duper alka-seltzer and a few self-injectable anti-malarials couldn't cure.

the worst part about the hospital? (aside from the nurse that didn't wear gloves when she drew my blood, of course.) it would have to be watching some terrible luke perry sci-fi mini-series on the tube and thinking that it was going to be the last thing i ever saw. i'm prone to dramatics, i admit. but that surely didn't help matters any.

kenyan hospitals are strange systems. it's a pay-as-you-go system. if you can't afford the next step in the treatment, you're out on your ass. there's no such thing as a post-paid hospital visit here. guess the british never instituted that whole socialized health care thing when they were busy ransacking the country.

thanks to my white skin, i breezed in and out of that joint. a typical jaunt to the hospital here can last years - no exaggeration. the staff didn't know what to do with me - i was jittery and energetic (trying to jump around a bunch so my limbs wouldn't go entirely limp). they're not used to such antics. most of the people they see are half-dead (from languishing in the hospital for days on end).

a speedy recovery. yesterday i was paddling around in lake naivasha, the only freshwater lake in kenya's rift valley - steering my way through hippos and pelicans. and to think, less than a week ago i was in a fluorescent-lit cubicle trying to figure out how to use a bedpan.

cheers,
karen

random thoughts

2005-12-12T10:42:00.000+03:00

several things:

1. from a travel brochure i picked up in mombasa advertising the coast - "an African destination to rival first class tourist destinations." (see what i mean about everything being a farce?)

2. dragged the boy to see harry potter and the goblet of fire last night. what a crazy cultural experience. when you purchase tickets, you are assigned a seat and then ushered in (like a real theatrical experience). then, the curtain goes up and you're subjected to the kenyan national anthem (which is seemingly endless). now i know that we suffer through a lot of previews in the theatres back in the states, but dudes, i think i saw a preview for every movie that will end up in nairobi through xmas '06. afterwards, a barrage of commercials and theatre directives which are accompanied by an afro-beat version of "wonderwall." and then... the movie. until intermission. apparently, at the projectionist's discretion. and finally, when the movie is finished, you're expected to applaud long and loudly and stay throughout the entire rolling of the credits. i think the most striking difference, however, is that everybody removes their trash from the movie theatre themselves! quite interesting.

3. in my absence, a colony of lizards has hatched in my apartment. they're incredibly cute right now - they look like minature gumby-like figures. i imagine that will all change, however, once they grow a bit bigger. but they're great pest control - they eat all the insects that invariably make their way inside. and they're fantastic wall hangings for otherwise bare expanses of plaster.

4. it's independence day today. while everybody else celebrates their 42nd year of independence from british rule, i'm just rejoicing that parking is free.

still here

2005-12-11T10:27:00.000+03:00

this might be a long one, folks, so buckle up.

dropped gregory off at the airport this morning and i must admit, i was a bit teary-eyed. Reading everyone's farewell blog posts and watching him disappear into the terminal, it finally hit me - i'm staying here. i'm going to try to make a life for myself in this place. at least until the end of january, if this grant money should ever materialize, but longer if those tightly-knotted purse strings in paris should ever figure out what a good bargain i am. as i drove back from the airport to the office after i sent my canadian friend packing back to the snowy airstrips of chicago and his anxious wife, i was reminded of my first trip into nairobi, in the dead black of a sunday evening - the awe, the excitement, the untold "adventures." it hasn't been what i expected in a lot of ways, but so much more in others. i'm looking forward to starting life here again - as someone who gets paid for her work (as a stringer temporarily). the world seems open, even for someone with an expired visa.

last week, greg and i took a trip to mombasa. i've never been somewhere so beautiful, or tropical, before. we took the overnight train from nairobi to the coast - one of the famous journeys in east africa. the lunatic express, as it's fondly referred to here. we traveled "first class" in a sleeper car with lots of germans, brits and australians who refused to talk to both the kenyans and us but we more than made do without their company. we were scheduled to depart at 7 p.m. but the train didn't start moving until well after 8:30, after we'd already eaten what passed for dinner - a watery broth and rotten fish for starters, undercooked chicken and chips for the main and a rubbery cake to finish. luckily, beer was included. we commented that we'd never seen a staff with lower morale. they were drunk and surly, and for good reason. turns out they haven't been paid since may. but they keep on coming back - in hopes of a paycheck, and because, honestly, they've got nothing better to do. will be a great story.

we awoke at 6:30 for breakfast the next morning, the sun slowly inching its way above the horizon. another delicious meal - half cooked sausages, eggs and stale toast. a real english treat, minus the beans. the train was scheduled to arrive on the coast at 8:30 - a thirteen hour journey at best to cover a mere 300 miles. we didn't pull into mombasa until 1:30 in the afternoon, but luckily the scenery was breathtaking, the beers (what few remained) were flowing, and the locals were chatty. as soon as we began to near the coast, the heat set in. i've south of nairobi before, but never into such sultry heat. ah, equatorial climate. nothing beats it. so, yes, 17 hours to cover 300 miles. do the math yourself. i can't - it'll make me wince.

upon arrival, we haggled until we found a reasonable cab driver, named geofred (gotta love these bastardized versions of british names) who took us off in search of a beachfront hotel. the first one we reached was completely booked, and they referred us to a second, which was also completely booked, but they wouldn't let us leave until they found a room for us. the place was amazing, on the oceanfront, palm trees galore and arabesque architecture. they quoted us a price, then we haggled them down another 15 bucks, and then upon payment, they said they could discount it even more if we paid in cash. they really wanted our business, for some reason. expecting rather drab accomodations, having totally come unprepared at the height of tourist season, we were shocked to find our room had an oceanfront view with a balcony overlooking the surf and palm trees. gotta love it here.

one of the more surreal moments was when we couldn't get our air conditioner to work (totally necessary in such sweltering tropical heat even though i detest the idea of it - also helps sooth suncharred skin...). this hotel employed a guard, a maasai in full dress uniform (ridiculously tacky) for gimmick. anyways, the ac was operated by remote control and ours didn't have batteries. the maasai comes knocking the middle of the night with another remote control and there are greg and the maasai pointing the remote control at the air conditioner. total absurdity. anachronistic, to say the least. another favorite of ours was a guy who looked like he was on permanent shore leave. he was made to dress in this ridiculous sailor's uniform to clean the pool and lay the cushions and beach towels on the lounge chairs. absolutely obscene.

went swimming in the indian ocean (still unbelievable) and snorkeling too - a grand 10 bucks for four hours spent in the water and in a coral park. spent a morning at the local nature preserve, formerly a cement quarry, that is home to none other than owen and mzee, international sensations. they're the tortoise and the baby hippopotamus that you may have read about in the news earlier this year. the hippo was stranded in the tsunami and found a home with this century-plus tortoise. tortoises, apparently, love to be storked and tickled under their chins and i had quite a time cuddling one.

it was slightly surreal to wake up each morning and see dhows (old african sailboats that are basically dugout canoes with masts attached) and camels along the shore. you couldn't walk two feet without encountering someone trying to sell you some incredible piece of crap. i ended up writing a story about beach hawkers. crazy color! we met some men who took walked their camels down the coast from northeastern kenya to mombasa for a month in packs of three in order to make "their fortune" during tourist season along the coast. we just started haggling for the hell of it, brewing competition along the beach to secure the best prices we could for something we had no intention of doing. "swim with the dolphins? sure, twelve hours, five bucks, food included?" hawker: "okay, deal." swimsuits, lobsters, fresh fruit, factory-made sculptures, carved wooden keychains, safaris, memorabilia photos, on and on and on...

slightly disturbing: the number of older german tourists, both men and women, who are there to sample the local sex worker scene. one of the hotel workers told us that some of the old german men, whose rooms she cleaned, were widowers already infected with AIDS who just have rampant casual sex with one girl after another. they travel with blood bags for ready transfusions and a massive supply of medication, intent upon screwing themselves to death. in addition to fueling the local economy, i must admit they did wonders for the fashion industry. i've never seen so many gut-busting speedos in my life. nothing like a red-bellied german hiking up and down the beach in search of fresh meat. would make a great great story. one of the reasons i want to get back.

woke up every morning to watch the sun rise over the indian ocean. palm trees galore, the freshest coconuts and passion fruit juice you'll ever taste, delicious grilled fish (if you could find yourself a restaurant that still had food - we had a couple of interesting run-ins). did manage to fry our backs to a deep crisp, when we were snorkeling, i presume, because it's too hot to sunbathe. instead, you lounge around under the shade of palm trees sipping cocktails and watching the tide come in and out. too amazing for words. i'll post some pictures later today.

(www.flickr.com/photos/94641153@N00/)

took the bus back home - less exciting as the train, and only slightly quicker. we left at 10 in the morning and arrived in nairobi around 8. but we did get door-to-door service (no kidding). 10 hours to go 300 miles? i'm not so good at math, i know, but my calculations put that at 30 MPH. you've got to see these roads.

an adventurous four days on the coast. if i'd gone to mombasa first, i'd never have come to nairobi. greg and i decided that when god had a fit of explosive diarrhoea, he created nairobi. it's the worst city planning exercise on earth. the british just wanted the most bang for their buck and threw everything together in the most craptacular scheme imaginable. and the africans, they love it. they're only adding to the chaos. mombasa has a much older feel to it - you can sense its history as east africa's largest port. life on the coast has a much mellower pace, the swahili is more metered and the people friendlier. it feels safer, which may be a ruse, but there's no employment to speak of (thus the beach hawkers). there are more matatus per square mile than grains of sand -- seriously. there are at least 5 matatus for every private car we saw there. but nairobi, despite all its flaws, is a wonderful place and i've loved calling it home.

went out for drinks with some kenyan friends last night. we sat around the table and listened to a local reporter tell all about his experience with the ULEVI. kenya just discovered the breathalyzer. (ulevi is an offshoot of mlevi, a swahili word meaning drunkard). they started doing road checks a week ago and have already pulled in thousands and thousands across the country. this guy, a government reporter, was hauled in with around 400 folks - all herded from a single checkpoint! they fine them each 10,000 shillings (less than 150 bucks) and release them - it's a petty offence. they're subjected to a barrage of tests, including a tongue twister - they're made to say "british coloniailist" two times to detect whether or not they're slurring. he said that there were such a variety of people there - priests, nuns, and laymen alike. people had even snuck in alcohol into the place that they were herded. sounds like more of a party went on inside the joint than at the places they patronized before they were arrested.

anyways, at this one checkpoint alone on a friday evening the police have pulled in a whopping 400,000 shillings. they've already made millions. we had a discussion about what they would do with all the money that they earned from this new program and i suggested that perhaps it could go into repairing the roads. but i was countered with the argument, if you repair the roads, then you'll put the truck drivers out of business (because they won't need as many if transport becomes more efficient), the mechanics out of business (because they won't have to repair the trucks that kill themselves on the road), the hotels out of business (because people won't need to eat and sleep because it takes a year and a day to get anywhere), etc. can't argue with that, can you?

then the conversation rapidly deteriorated into listening to everyone talk about how much better they drive when they're drunk and that this is just a silly scheme. one of the reporters even suggested that they should revamp the driving test so that you drink 10 beers beforehand and see if you are still a capable driver. as if this weren't absurd enough, the conversation then turned into a debate about whether warm or cold beer made you drunker.

gotta love it here. sometimes i feel as if i'm in the midst of a grand farce.

anyhoo. the prez just named his new cabinet and 21 people have declined to accept their posts. there's one thing that i've discovered about kenyan politics in my time here: people know for sure what they don't want, but they have no idea what they do want. it makes a great story.

that's it for now. i've typed your ears off.

lunching with some tanzanians before i head to the movies to catch the latest installment of harry potter,

karen

tandoori turkey

2005-11-30T09:21:00.000+03:00

okay. so we've still got no government. but that's not really interfering with nothing get accomplished anyway.

so i've been shamefully delinquent (or so i've been told) about updating my blog.

first, let's bring it back to a little election day madness. got to go out to maasai land and talk to some of those who were voting. most were illiterate and had to let the presiding officer know how you wanted to cast your ballot (although, i thought that was why they had oranges "no" and bananas "yes" on the ballot - to distinguish who you were voting for if you were, indeed, illiterate). afterwards, you had to stick your pinky in ink - that's the brilliant way of ensuring that you're not going to vote again (i guess they don't think that turpentine is readily available). but it was really interesting - it's kenya's first ever-referendum. and you've got to remember that a mere three years ago, this country was run by a lunatic dictator who'd been in office for more than a quarter of a century. there was even a law on the books that you could be sentenced to death for treason if you IMAGINED the death of the president. so it's incredibly moving to see kenyans so politically engaged and voting (better turnout here than in the grand old us of a but that's not hard to imagine, right?).

when ballot counting started (they did it by hand and honestly - the results were official the next day at noon - just as fast as our own computerized method), i was witness to a riot in the slums. a man with a lorry full of chairs for all the ballot counters came into the precinct area (where hundreds were peering through windows, watching polling agents count votes by kerosene lamp - very enchanting in an emerging democracy kind of way) but onlookers thought that he was bringing in ballot boxes and trying to rig the vote. they went ballistic -- tore the door right off the truck and began pelting stones every which way. the driver scrambled to safety -- a huge gash in his head, limbs swollen with bruises and cut by barbed wire - which encased the precinct area - which is actually an elementary school. when a red cross ambulance tried to take this man away to get treatment at a hospital before he bled to death, they refused to allow it admittance. i don't know how long he ended up being a prisoner in one of the polling stations. i couldn't stay - had to file.

since then all the drama that i mentioned in the last post has ensued.

so a few people have asked me with thanksgiving was like in kenya - non-existent. i mean, these people have enough genocide on their continent to worry about instead of celebrating our own. but had a nice dinner with a group of ex-pats -- all seven tolerable ones in kenya. we ate indian food - tandoori turkey. actually, there was no turkey, and no tandoori (i hate it, i think it's the corny/lame way to eat indian food, if i'm honest). afterwards went out for drinks with dreamy/hunky radio correspondent from north carolina. he's too young - makes me feel like a pedophile, but i enjoy his company.

this weekend went to a rally -- celebrators were throwing stones at the press because we were standing beneath the stage and they couldn't see through us. always a good time. my friend got cut on the forehead - blood pouring down her face - but we soon scrambled up onto the stage. it kills me how accessible everyone is here -- politico-wise. i was literally five feet away from the opposition leaders - the equivalent of kenya's tom cruise and katie holmes - and they were smiling and joking with me. you can call the vice president on his cell phone and he'll talk to you. i mean, it's unreal. wish politics were this open in the states.

so here's the best news - and then i've got to get out of here for a haircut (where's raven?) and a press conference about ivory poachers - i've got grant money to stay in kenya through the end of january. and money to fund reporting expenses on whatever stories i want to do (pending professorial approval, of course) about migration across borders in africa! i'm trying to get myself over to somalia and eastern Congo and down to South Africa. and of course, i'll be heading to Cairo to see my dear friend andrew and visit my sister who'll be on a dig there in january.

anybody want to find out if they know it's xmas-time at all here?

elections, rejections, ejections

2005-11-24T16:26:00.000+03:00

i've been quite busy this week covering kenya's referendum:

basically, kenyans rejected a proposed draft of the constitution in the first change to the country's charter since the brits magnaminously decided to return the country to the kenyans. the prez was humiliated since he backed the referendum (while it only lost by a million votes, he only carried one of the country's eight provinces) and the results have been interpreted as a vote of no confidence in his ability to rule the country. so yesterday, less than 24 hours after the official results were announced, he sacked his entire cabinet. and today, the leaders of the opposition called for the dissolution of parliament. and he just, as i write this, suspended parliament. i'm living in a country with no functional government. i might as well be in somalia.

duty calls.

going postal

2005-11-17T18:09:00.000+03:00

so i've finally found myself a local.

bar, that is. it's actually at the ethiopian restaurant. i should qualify that by saying that there have been times when i've found myself there and nothing terrible has ensued. but yes, outdoor tables with canopies, bonfires all around, cuddly kittens prowling the premises, and the most delicious food and alcohol -- all for mere pennies. not to mention, the guys that work there have become quite fond of me but i haven't hard to ward off any marriage proposals yet (though, i'm pretty sure i can count on one or two before december 11).

i love apple. well, not the computers. but i-pods. more specifically, the warranty. my i-pod died as soon as i boarded the plane to kenya (very convenient, no?) after i fried the battery futzing with adapters and converters in the whirlwind two weeks of booze that was paris. so i sent it to my parents who sent it back to apple and they sent me a new one - on the house.

actually retrieving it from the post office, however, was another story. the kenyan post office is responsible for the deforestation of many many forests, i'm sure. you go to retrieve your package, which you have to open in front of the postal employees so they can write the contents down on your package notice. afterwards, you approach the customs window, where you pay duty tariffs. then you approach another window, where you pay local handling tariffs. then you go back to retrieve your package and stop at yet another window where they write down all of your information and issue you about three different slips. this should only take 45 minutes if it is all running smoothly. however, most of the time, the postal employee observing what you've received doesn't actually know the correct customs fee and you're sent wandering through a maze of corridors and offices to find a customs officer who will make up a figure on the spot, but only after they've finished their half-hour phone conversation with their mother.

this was, however, not the case with the illustrious, shiny new i-pod. since i sent it out of the country for repairs, they insisted that i must have a receipt before i actually could take it home with me or that i pay some ridiculous tax of more than 10,000 shillings (that's over 100 bucks, folks, and as much as i love my ipod, i sure don't love it that much).

i said to the infamous customs officer after he finally extracted himself from a phone call with his tractor mechanic that i refused to pay such a fee, that i didn't know that i needed to keep the receipt from mailing the damn thing home (i threw it out as soon as i heard it had arrived safely) and that if that was going to be the case they could send it back and pay for the return shipping.

the postal customs officer literally looks at the woman in the international receiving department and said, no joke, "she's been in the country too long. we're not going to be able to get any money out of this one."

this morning, get a frenzied call from my boss. his gardener had called and said that his dog, pasca, was sick and could i go over and see what's wrong with him because he couldn't really understand what moses was trying to tell him. i arrive at his home and find the dog dehydrated, starving and whimpering.

i take pasca to the vet where i'm informed that the poor canine has the african equivalent of lyme's disease. i've got to go and pick up this beast tonight, and here's the kicker: it has to come home with me because i need to be giving it iron injections to boost its appetite and make sure that it doesn't start vomiting up whatever food it's taken (if i can find some damn dog food at the supermarket -- shouldn't be hard: they sell grass seed, patio furniture, pineapples and lawnmowers there too).

and then, some more laundry in the bathtub. did i ever mention that laundry detergent here is actually all-purpose cleaner? on the label, it actually recommends that you mop your floors with the remaining suds after you've scoured your fingers to blistering trying to get this red dirt out of your clothes.

maybe tomorrow i'll get some reporting done.

steve-o and the jackass

2005-11-15T19:29:00.000+03:00

just back from a long weekend jam-packed with wildlife, whiskey and wheeling around the countryside.

began with the ostrich breeders. unfortunately, it was pouring (it is the rainy season after all) so we weren't allowed to ride the ostrich b/c the ground was too slippery (boy, was it -- my first foray down a muddy dirt path behind the wheel. quite fun. especially in a sedan that's quite low to the ground). but saw some ostriches in heat. they're awful ugly to begin with but when they're red and swollen, they're fully grotesque. you've heard of blue balls - well, this was red vulva.

saturday we spent at lake nakuru before having dinner at one of my kenyan friend's homes. lake nakuru is two and a half hours drive - only 180 km but the road is the worst road in all of kenya. steve had a true introduction to african infrastructure. we saw miles and miles of flamingos along the lakeshores and lots of other wildlife. at one point, steve barrelled out of the car to grab a closer look/picture of the flamingos and peter and i were in the car screaming after him to come back before the nearby buffalo started charging him.

dinner that evening was lovely - we supped at a former christian science monitor correspondent's house. he lives in karen south with all the MPs. at one point, i started talking poorly of the country's information minister and he told me to speak quieter because he lived next door. they put out this incredible spread and i reluctantly ate matumbo - goat entrails sausage. it was edible, but a little strong for my taste.

sunday we went to nairobi national park and while we didn't see lions (too late in the day) or hippos, we saw tons else. we had lunch and drinks with my coworkers the rest of the afternoon before heading to carnivore -- literally the finest restaurant in sub-saharan africa. we feasted on ostrich meatballs, camel, crocodile, and other various game meats. they come to your table all evening with various grilled meats until you turn your white flag over in surrender.

yesterday... ah yesterday. started the day at the giraffe center where we fed and frolicked with the creatures before heading across the street to hike a nature trail. where, of course, we got lost. under the midday equatorial sun. i thought i was going to die, either of thirst or heatstroke.

when we finally emerged, we headed to kibera. quite a sobering experience. interesting to see the way the people there reacted to steve and me. they were much friendlier and open to me. we were talking to my friend about it and he basically said that the color of steve's skin trumped his american heritage.

afterwards steve headed to the UN to visit greg - quite a contrast. africa's largest slum compared to africa's greatest excess (no, no, no -- i'll never stop slamming these pompous fucks).

so, i'm driving back on my way from dropping steve off and managed to get into a bit of a fender bender - yes, again. mind you, neither of these incidents has been my fault even if i have only been driving a stick for less than a month.

a matatu literally backed up into me while i'm getting ready to merge into traffic. sigh. the cop was on the scene already -- trying to ease the flow of traffic (HA!) -- and confiscated the matatu driver's keys until we could come to an understanding. and that was the end of the police officer's involvement until he returned twenty minutes later to ask if the driver had accepted responsibility, which he did, and returned his keys. remind me never to buy insurance if i live here. seems like a waste of money.

so i go with my friend to sign the agreement (literally a sheet of paper in my reporter's notebook that will hold up in court) where the matatu owner (who is, in actuality, an incredibly nice man from central province who wants me to come to his home for dinner next week) agrees to pay for the damages -- not that it would have mattered if i'd had to pay out of pocket. To take this massive dent out of the car and get it repainted good as new would have run me about thirty bucks? i got my lights adjusted for a big fat four dollars while i was there today... but i digress.

as we're driving to meet the matatu owner to make the contract and for him to assess the damage, we're driving through the worst part of town. the worst place i've ever been in my life, and i've been to some projects in my time. my friend literally told me to lay down in the backseat and hide because if they saw a mzungu (white person) in the car, they'd swarm around it... we made arrangements to meet today and have the car repaired. the matatu tout -who accompanied me and my friend to meet the matatu owner - turned around in the middle of the ride there and said, "man, you're good. you haven't panicked at all and you're just taking it easy. i like you." sigh. it made the whole experience worthwhile.

(that deserves a whole post - how i spent a whole day at a mechanic in jua kali - the hot sun -- called that because all kinds of metal work go on there and make the place an oven -- getting my car repaired as the first mzungu customer they've ever had.)

after i get back to town in one piece yesterday, i decide to head home. i'm talking on the phone in my car to bosire, my dear colleague, telling him i'm not coming in after this adventure. literally, as i'm on the phone stalled in traffic, some guy reaches through my minimally cracked window (how his hand fit, i'm unclear) and grabs my cell phone while i'm on it - scratching my face (i've got a nice deep long cut running the length of my cheek-but it wasn't intentional on his part - just part of getting the goods).

i scream, go to the office, break into hysterics. not because i'm a baby or scared or want to go home.

but because literally within AN HOUR AND A HALF i'd gotten into a car accident with my boss's car, went to the scariest neighborhood on earth and been wounded in a phone theft. no exaggeration. was not the best afternoon.

but my colleagues were wonderful as usual. they've given me a phone temporarily and are going to buy me a replacement. everyone wanted me to spend the night at their home (they were honest to god arguing over me). and they didn't want me to get back in the car, but when i put my foot down they knew they couldn't stop me. so i drove to where i was meeting greg and steve for dinner (the notorious ethiopian restaurant where i went before the gun-toting mob came after me -- i should have known the day was going to involve some kind of life and death adventure if i had plans to go there) and calmed myself with a lot of red label.

and then i was fine. and when i got home that evening, the monkeys were waiting for me outside my balcony and when i fed them groundnuts, it made the whole day disappear.

still love that ethiopian food,

karen

karen. and no, i don't mean me.

2005-11-10T12:56:00.000+03:00

life has been relatively peaceful in these parts - no car accidents, angry mobs of drunken children, no petrol-bombs - so i wonder what to write about...

steve arrives tomorrow after a week spent touring cairo's nightspots and fighting with the tech guy at andrew's bureau to let him access his email. am so excited for his arrival - will be good to see someone that is familiar. although greg's actually in the same place as i am, we rarely see one another.

i'm finally completing all my reporting on the ostrich racing tomorrow (yes, that was two weeks ago - but folks, it takes FOREVER and a day to get anything reported around here - it takes a mere 6-8 months before they'll even add your name to the waitlist for a landline here...) - i'm dragging steve along with me to an ostrich breeding farm where we'll lunch on big fat ostrich filets before heading back to nairobi. i'm hoping they'll let me ride one of them.

i'm dragging him off to lake nakuru (i should become a safari planner, honestly - the money's much better than journalism) where we'll stand alongside the lake gazing out onto miles and miles of flaming pink flamingos and other various wildlife (which, strangely, don't even phase me anymore).

last weekend i had a very brooklyn experience - the finnish doc and i headed to city park with a bunch of our friends and played frisbee (while everyone around looked at us as if we were completely bonkers) and drank many six-packs of beer -- it reminded me of hanging out on sunny afternoons in prospect park. except there were no monkeys nearby to frolick with back in park slope. they're so tame here - they feed from your hands and jump on your shoulders. but they're quite fond of tusker, the national brew, so you've got to be careful of your beer unless you want a small little monkey to take off with it.

also drove to karen. yes, there's a town here named karen. think isak denisien, aka karen blixen, of out of africa fame. quite strange to be in a place where your name is plastered all over the signs and stores. lush green hills towered over the valleys, peppered with victorian style farmhouses. wooden furniture craftsman lined the sides of the road, awaiting westerners to custom order cheap, expertly made pieces.

i love driving through hills, especially with a stick shift. it makes driving more adventurous (not that it really needs to be). driving has made me feel so empowered, independent. i feel like i've conquered a little bit of something while i'm waiting for my reporting legs to land solidly on the ground for more than a few moments at a time.

back on the desk, back in the driver's seat

2005-11-03T12:37:00.000+03:00

a polio-crippled driver. a matatu full of angry commuters. a truck carrying a bunch of chickens (en route to be tested for avian flu). me.

it wasn't pretty folks. let's just say that all of us saved the government a bunch of money euthanising some of those chickens. luckily, i'm fine. my boss's car is fine. i got back in the driver's seat afterward and drove myself to work. police report, schmolice report. no one even blinked.

boss is on holiday. back on the desk. slightly relieved after yesterday's drama (not to be confused with this morning's drama mentioned above).

went to a referendum rally while political party leaders were meeting to discuss and pledge the end of violent activism (four people died in western kenya last weekend at a rally). so i'm here, throngs of people are shouting at the top of their lungs, hoisting bananas up in the air.

here's a little background: oranges mean no and bananas mean yes. people are voting on november 21 on revisions to the country's constitution and everyone's up in arms about something. it's like an anti-war protest in nyc. kenya's gonna blow up in about two weeks time and i plan to be on assignment somewhere, anywhere.

some thugs come tossing homemade petrol bombs. and no one blinks (i thought i was getting immune to the craziness here, but evidently, not so). apparently, it's normal protocol at these rallies. i scrambled out of there pretty quickly.

let's just say that i'm not eager to continue my career as a political reporter in the third world.

i'd rather camp out on the ethiopia/eritrea border and wait for war to break out there than go back to one of these silly rallies. at least with war, unless it's waged by the us, there's the pretense that you're fighting for something. i mean, christ, these people are campaigning.

ostrich racing

2005-11-01T13:56:00.000+03:00

spent last weekend at the ngong racetrack, located at the base of kenya's glorious ngong hills, reporting the latest fad to hit kenya: ostrich racing. i can't really give this phenomenon its due credit in words (tho i'd better learn quickly as i've got to write a story about it after a trip to the ostrich breeder's tomorrow), but here's a go:

"neck to neck," "longlegs" and "beaky," the three best (only?) trained participants, seemed to be the only ostriches that weren't too ruffled by a troop of grown men chasing after them and trying to hurdle onto their backsides (which were, sadly, shaved and made them look like were saddled with genetically modified chicken skin). the rest of the pack just zig-zagged back and forth over the same three feet of race course, constantly bumping into one another and bucking off the "jockeys." the whole spectacle took much longer than the race director had intended - turning the ten minute show into a long half hour, most of which was spent shepherding the birds off the field back into their pens.

this sport has a long way to go.

i also tried to hang out with some ex-pats, too. it didn't go very well.

seems that most ex-pats hang out in their garden (b/c they're too afraid to leave the confines of their security fence), go to the mall (no, i'm not kidding) or book it out of town. or they play doubles, which was probably the most fun i've had with westerners yet because i got to zing them with tennis balls repeatedly at high speed and blame it on poor aim and lack of practice.

generally, they go to boring bars, which are exclusively ex-pat hangouts with kenyan servers (hello, neocolonialism much?), talk about the "savagery" they've witnessed (not sure whether this refers to living conditions or the people who live in these conditions), and bitch about their rival aid organizations. all the while pretending they're well adjusted and know their way around.

there are people who have been here for years who haven't spent much time with the locals or even been to a bar frequented by locals. i've been here a month and have done the lion's share of both. i just wonder how they're supposed to get to know the people and the culture that they're supposedly here to help and reform?

and let's not talk about the supposed progress i've been making on driving a manual car. it's been interesting, to say the least, and i alone am responsible for some of the worst traffic jams in the city because i still can't figure out how to not stall when i go from a full stop to accelarating...

off to eat yet more meat,
k

datelines

2005-10-25T20:04:00.000+03:00

went on my first reporting mission this weekend. courtesy of an ever-humanitarian relief organization that shall remain nameless, out to save the world via satellite phone while they’re drinking duty-free alcohol by the [Olympic-sized] poolside.

dateline: kibwezi. in kenya’s southern rangelands, the poorest, dustiest part of the county, where desertification is most effectively running its course. even my kenyan coworkers had no idea where i was.

note for future missions: never show up on time – since the bus never leaves until an hour and a half later. do go and buy yourself that coffee instead of waiting to leave. it will ward off the creeping hangover that finally decides to set in as soon as you take off on the worst piece of tarmac in the entire country.

visited a number of farmers who are supposedly implementing land conservation techniques but are actually sitting around watching their goats grow skeletal and their grass disappear. each farm was a solid 45 minute drive off anything resembling a real road, down the most forgotten paths in africa. the baboons that ran alongside our vehicle had more of an idea where they were going. or, at least, they didn’t make as many u-turns.

at one point finagled myself into the un spokesperson’s vehicle after bribing him with cigarettes but he talked so much blather i actually preferred the comforts of a shockless, smelly safari van crammed full of environmentalists from all over the continent and the most disgruntled wire reporter i have ever met (no, not me. a german).

we were promised that we’d return to Nairobi by mid-day. but since we didn’t get to our first destination until noon, we all knew this was going to last far longer. but we had no idea that they’d added three field visits to our original schedule of two. our group of thirty-something delegates, press and aid organization officials was shepherded along the entire way by the “goat herder from hell” (as my new best friend ebba calls him) – a local agriculture officer actually in charge of implementing this colossal waste of money, ahem, relief effort on behalf of our fine friends at said humanitarian organization.

we literally drove hours and a half to farms to stay 15 minutes. luckily i was totally drawn in by the barren countryside and amazing village stores, boasting names like mama junior immaculate hotel and makueni machinery and safari lodge. mama junior’s is neither a hotel or immaculate and while the safari lodge does sell diesel engine parts, it also scoops you up a fine plate ugali with bushmeat for lunch.

i had a seventy-five year old man tell me i should move in with him and his wife and they would raise me as his daughter. this is after we toured his farm, saw the 76 foot well he and his wife dug by hand with a hammer and chisel over the past five years, and heard about how the elephants from the nearby national park trampled his mango trees. i had to politely decline but was not able to escape before he whipped out his cell phone and asked for my digits.

finally, finally, finally we were on our way back to Nairobi after having traveled three quarters of the way to mombasa (no small feat in a country where the roads make a 100 km journey last for three days). and then? it started to rain. let’s just say that prolonged the journey by two and a half additional hours. because if there’s one thing worse than african drivers, its african drivers trying to negotiate roads at night during the rainy season.

when we finally got back to town i collapsed at the nearest bar i could find, where conveniently my boss was also drinking and began a binge with him that didn’t end until work began on monday morning. i did get a chance to eat some delicious indian food in there somewhere. or at least i must have because i found leftovers in my fridge last night when i began to make a healthy dinner of beer and pineapple and opted for that instead.

i love stories with datelines outside of nairobi. and, ps, the article didn’t turn out half bad either.

warlording

2005-10-21T18:00:00.000+03:00

that's right folks. had my first run-in with a former somali warlord the other night. we drank tea together and chewed qat - leaves east africans are quite fond of for the slightly drunken effect they provide. abshir, not sure if that's his real name but that's what he goes by used to be said barre's former chief of police. he's actually a friend of our somali stringer who pops into the bureau off and on throughout the day to read the newspaper, check his email and use the toilets. which pretty much sums up the activities of most of the local reporters in our office.

today, i went to nairobi women's hospital and interviewed rape victims. it was a depressing afternoon. but worse: upon reporting the attacks to the police, these women were scorned as prostitutes and told to go home. not that the situation in the united states is much different, honestly, but at least there's the pretension of due process.

tomorrow i'm off on my first mission out of nairobi. i'm going to check out the effects of desertification and land degradation in the kamba community, southeast of nairobi. i'm so excited. it'll be the first of many now that i've figured out how to fill out the expense sheet!

so i've finally figured out how to report here: talk to all the white people you can and find out what they're doing to "save the natives." they'll let you watch. they want to feel good about neo-colonialism. oops, i meant "aid work."

Hell's Gate

2005-10-18T16:53:00.000+03:00

That’s what they call the most beautiful place I’ve ever put my eyes on. It’s a national park just 150 km outside of Nairobi proper and the drive out of the city is a journey in itself.

You descend from the frantic polluted streets of the capital, down a hillside, and finally settle into highway driving along the scariest road I’ve ever driven on in my life. During the day it’s bad enough – cars throttling crappy manual transmissions at breakneck speed with no accounting for lanes or the cow or goat herds that graze alongside (and in the middle of) the road. And that’s during the daytime; at night, it’s much worse because you’ve got all these obstacles to avoid and NO streetlights or moonlight to speak of – it’s rainy season and gets incredibly dark at six because of all the rain clouds hovering, waiting to flood you.

You’re wide-eyed and just trying to process all of this – and then the road drops off and you’re at a plateau with the most spectacular view of the Rift Valley with the volcanic Mt. Longot sulking in the distance and Lake Naivasha glistening in the bright sun.

No matter how near or far the horizon, whether you’re high on a mountain or in the valley below, there’s no way to explain the magnitude or the vastness of the land. You feel as if you’re being swallowed whole by something that you’ll never comprehend. This continent seems to go on forever, the colors of the land are so deep and rich, your senses so heightened and mutated – that’s why colonialism never worked. You can’t own this place. I don’t know why anyone would even try to fight that battle.

Once you turn off the highway, you’re thrust onto a patch of the most poorly maintained highway you’ve ever seen in your life. Let’s not talk about potholes – let’s talk about what passes for somewhat acceptable two by two foot patches of pavement in a sea of broken asphalt. Cars prefer to take the dirt paths alongside the road proper and those, my friends, aren’t much of an improvement. Still, it doesn’t stop the matatus – Nissan minibuses that shuttle people speedily and precariously from place to place to supplement the world’s most limited public transportation system (that’s another posting altogether) – from leaving half their transmissions on the road as they hurtle themselves forth by sheer force of will alone. A mere five minutes driving in these conditions is enough to exhaust and bruise you for a week.

Hell’s Gate is a never-ending patch of grassland encased by amazing rock formations. You’ll find zebra, antelope, African buffalo, and giraffes grazing lazily in the blistering afternoon. No one pays attention to the fact that they’re there except the Westerners. It’s amazing to be in a place where animals you’ve always considered exotic actually call home. Supposedly, you can see baboons at Hell’s Gate too, but I didn’t mind not sighting any. Their asses are a little spooky and I’d rather take a pass on the feces-tossing.

(Exotic animal aside: I heard this huge ruckus outside my apartment the other day, and when I went out onto my balcony to check out the scene, I’m treated to a pair of monkeys frolicking in the tree two feet in front of me. They ate bananas out of my hand, and I would have kept them as pets if they didn’t look so flea-bitten and I knew how to housetrain them.)

The real reason that folks go to Hell’s Gate isn’t for the wildlife, but for the gorges. You trek for three hours along the bottom of a riverbed that’s coursing a river of hot water from the hot springs that shower down from above. The trek is overgrown with lush vines, the rocks are slippery and precarious (wouldn’t be an “adventure” otherwise, eh, Domer?) and completely breathtaking. Screw those “Ithaca is gorges” tee-shirts. I want an “Africa is gorges” version.

After you’ve sated yourself with the bounty of all this beautiful land, there’s nothing better than finding yourself a nyama choma (roast meat) joint on the shores of Lake Naivasha. There’s no contentment you’ll experience like pulling yourself up to a heaping plate of tender goat flank and washing everything you’ve seen down with a few bottles of Tusker beer while watching hippos splash about in the distance before the refueling the gas tank for the (scarier than children with machine guns) drive home.

poverty

2005-10-14T17:10:00.000+03:00

part of the reason that i've come to this region of the world is that i'm tired of reading news stories about famine, disease, genocide and POVERTY in Africa and nothing else. so it's slightly hypocritical of me to blog on about poverty, right?

i went to kibera last weekend and it's taken me quite some time to wrap my head around that situation. what was really striking was the complete zest and spirit that the slum's inhabitants seemed to possess in the midst of such devastating filth and need.

the slum covers 250 hectares - which translates into some 618 acres - and is home to nearly 1 million people, but who knows how many people live there.

as soon as you enter -- we did off a long dirt road and up a steep incline of slippery rock and dust covered in garbage and feces -- the stench hits. there's no preparing for the smell of human decay and it doesn't leave your nostrils for a long time after you've left the area. it's as if the world has left these people here to rot.

most people don't have more to eat than kale, the swahili word for which is sukumawiki - which literally translates into "push the week" meaning, of course, that it's cheap and filling enough for even the most destitute to feed themselves.

there's one main road, and the rest is a maze of metal sheets slapped haphazardly together to form houses that slip, slide and collapse as soon as there's a rainstorm. the road is lined with ditches of sewage, over which vendors set up stalls where they spend their days hocking vegetables, smoking intestines and rotten fish, and cooking chapati. the road is strewn with debris, which chickens, turkeys, goats, dogs and pigs all feast on throughout the day.

no stall is larger than 8 x 5 feet, houses included, and up to a dozen people sleep inside them at night. there's no running water -- they run hoses of water up from one of the more dismal treatment plants. and sanitation? welcome to the land of "flying toilets." the concept: you do your business inside a plastic bag, and after knotting the ends, toss it over your shoulder. where it lands is not your concern as long as it's out of your hair (and oftentimes quite literally in someone else's).

people here spend their days wandering their neighborhood streets, as sitting inside four bare metal walls isn't a very welcoming prospect. so they're either trying to eke out a living with a small roadside business; theiving what little there is from one another; gossipping with their neighbors or getting high on bhang (marijuana), qat (leaves that you chew to get high) & ch'angaa (traditional brew that's more methanol than alcohol).

there's a railroad track that cuts a swath through the slum, separating the poor from the poorest. it's amazing that there's even some kind of economic heirarchy imposed in a place like kibera, but people will be capitalists everywhere you go.

we walked around for three hours, flip-flopping (of course) through the rankest filth i've ever been around, and when i left, i was completely humbled. it's inspiring to me that people can be so welcoming and full of life while enduring (what i perceive - as a privileged westerner - to be) such hardship. the children run circles around barefoot in the dirt, chanting "how are you? how are you?" with eager gap-toothed smiles and claw at your shirt sleeves for the slightest bit of attention as their parents (often barely old enough to have reached puberty) look on shyly from the sidelines.

there's poverty and then there's poverty, and then there's african poverty and then there's kibera. and there'll aren't words for me to describe the magnitude of the squalor or the complete awe that i'm in (really - i know it sounds trite and all) of the people that live there for their ability to withstand and overcome.

asanti sana

2005-10-11T20:15:00.000+03:00

just a quick post to say: thanks so very much to everyone for all of your concern - i'm fine, really. there's been no residual nightmares, no detrimental effects on my (lackluster) reporting, and certainly no stopping my exploration of the barstools of the (third) world.

xoxo

night commuters.

2005-10-09T13:42:00.000+03:00

us extreme globalites have been having our fair share of troubles this week: dickie's been mugged at gunpoint, granito's battling ecoli and earthquakes, and me, well, last night i was chased by little children armed with machine guns, high on ch'angaa - the traditional brew that can cause blindness and a tendency for homicidal mania, apparently.

after feasting on the tastiest ethiopian food i've ever had and catching up with greg, i returned home around 11 and was completely sick and tired of being confined to my apartment in the evenings. so, i called my local friend, peter, and asked him to accompany me to a bar about 5 km up the road. we decided to walk -- we both thought it would be safe if i was accompanied by a local, especially since i live in one of the posher, more secure areas of town. besides, there's so much security in nairobi, you couldn't even piss in a bush without being watched from six sides.

but on our way home, these high little fuckers saw us and gave chase, firing off three rounds into the trees, squealing with drunken glee and tripping over themselves as they stumbled along the road. i've never run so fast in my entire life. we ended up jumping into a car that was traveling along the road, while it was still moving. we arrived home safely, if a little shaken, thanks to the kindness of kenyan strangers. and then we drank the better part of a bottle of whiskey to stop our hands from trembling.

neither of us thinks that they were actually intending harm. but no one really wants to be around a bunch of hammered twelve year olds with live ammo, do they?

i mean, it's not like i'm living in a fucking war zone here. but i guess i know that it's not just urban legend when they say don't go out at night unless you're in a car with tinted windows or bulletproof glass.

on a far brighter note, i learned how to drive stick yesterday -- i'm still a little shaky on the whole clutch thing and learning how to drive on the other side of the road. it's quite fun but i don't think i'll be proficient enough at it by the time that i leave to balance smoking a cigarette, talking on the cell phone, drinking a cup of coffee and scanning through the radio stations while i'm driving. three maybe, but not all four.

ugali si njema.

2005-10-06T15:18:00.000+03:00

ugali, my friends, is probably the blandest food i've ever eaten. think unseasoned mashed potatoes, but that's being generous. thus the statement above - "ugali, not so good."

it's flour boiled in water until it becomes paste-like. it's served warm, scooped onto your plate with a dish in crescent-shaped servings and accompanies whatever stew you happen to be eating - if you're lucky enough to be eating something with it. farmers in northwestern kenya take tea and cold day-old ugali for breakfast and it sits in their stomachs, undigested, for the rest of the day, thus alleviating the need to eat anything else.

but the real reason i've been introduced to this most scrumptuous element of kenyan cuisine? it's what the locals eat before taking a beer, or two, or ten. not nearly as tasty as a slice at your local pizzeria, i realize, but filling and not awful when you dip it in a spicy lentil stew.

today am having dinner with the wife of a classmate of a friend of mine (that's terribly long-winded for the wife of tim's friend at tufts) which i'm looking forward to very much. i haven't yet had much opportunity to interact with kenyan women and it will be interesting to see how they spend their free time (which is certainly not in the bars that i've been frequenting so far).

during lunch hour(s) yesterday, otto and bosire took me to nairobi city park in an area called parklands. while it's nothing spectacular to put your eyes on, it is home to scads of monkeys which spend their afternoons swinging from tree branches, pulling at your hair and eating bread from your hands. totally enchanting.

so the finn is going to take me for a drive this weekend into the surrounding kenyan countryside up into the rift valley, and perhaps there will be opportunity to swing by the state-administered coffee plantation on the way. i'm excited to see what the kenyan landscape actually looks like, as nairobi's a bit of a hole (regardless of how much there is to put your eyes on here).

it's been an amusing day at work ever since i sent out copy to the wire with the headline: 'burundi FUCKERS kill 2 in an ambush' mistakenly. felt slightly relieved after i received an email from the africa desk that read: from now on, karen, if you must, use 'wanker' instead.

apocalypse

2005-10-04T11:48:00.000+03:00

first there was yesterday's solar eclipse - amazing to behold. but the natural spectacle of it didn't even compare with the reaction on the streets. apparently, there hasn't been one in these parts for 22 years. people were looking through film negatives and green glass fanta bottles so as not to go blind, squawking with delight and jumping around, with little kids crying in fear of the darkness.

then, i was bragging to my friend last night that i didn't have any pestilence in my apartment - save for mosquitos, perhaps the most dangerous insect in africa, but i digress - while he's waging a war against roaches and ants. i jinxed myself. last evening, i flip on my bathroom light and think that i see a rat running across the tile floor. much to my dismay, i was quite mistaken. it was a cockroach half the size of my palm. no exaggeration. i've lived in new york and seen my fair share of vermin, but honestly, i've never seen anything that approached the size of this beast.

and there's the battle that my digestive tract is waging against me. i've probably spent more time in the bathrooms of Kenya than the city streets. things had been progessing nicely for the first couple of days, and then, i don't know what i ate, but, shall we say, it certainly hasn't been agreeing with me. but things are starting to look up (in case you needed the latest details about my BMs).

furthermore, boss is off to zanzibar this afternoon and says to me yesterday, 'while i'm gone, oversee the desk.' huh? does he think i have any idea what i'm doing here?

not to mention, had a, shall we say difficult?, meeting with the pa guy at the us ambassador's this morning in an attempt to seek out information about initiatives being implemented to improve us-east african muslim relations. even getting information from americans here is hard to negotiate.

enough grumbling. these are minor inconveniences and i feel selfish even relating them compared with what other people here go through. besides, as i've said before, the smallest hardships are big adventures and just make this experience so much more genuine. but someone remind me to buy candles, please, b/c i can't face another blackout with only my cigarette lighter. i've become the world's most bruised woman who isn't involved in an abusive relationship (but my late night drunken stumbling, i'm sure, contributes to that).

coffee tonight with the finnish fin after my swahili lesson. tho, i got an email from him yesterday afternoon informing me that he's not allowed to talk about what kind of work he does with MSF, so apparently this is a social call, not a professional one. but i'm kind of excited to meet someone closer in age to most of the westerners (or as they like to refer to themselves round these parts, 'expats') i've been hanging out with thusfar.

but good news on the horizon: lulu is heading to egypt in january for a dig in luxor - she's happier than a pig in the foulest smelling shit. but i can still gloat over getting to egypt before her - courtesy of medill's deep, grant money-filled pockets. i'll make it a priority to scope out all the trekkies before her arrival so she can jump right in...

where the streets have no name

2005-10-03T18:50:00.000+03:00

seriously. it's not just a trite U2 lyric anymore. i was asking my friend what the name of my street was and he told me that there isn't one; upon further inquiry, i found out that my address is simply the name of my apartment complex, with "off Gitanga Road" thrown in for good measure. Good thing it's only 2km off Gitanga Road, otherwise i think the postman would have gotten confused. no wonder there's no mail delivery here.

that's the observation of the day.

i'm totally exhausted and would write more, but it's been a long day of subbing crappy french stringer copy and the thought of typing one more sentence, even if it doesn't contain the words 'rebel' or 'peace treaty' or 'civil war-ravaged' is going to be the end of me.

confinement

2005-10-02T19:34:00.000+03:00

so, i'm currently holed up in the newsroom (yes, that's right folks, news never stops) because there's a demonstration (read: riot) going on in the streets below and if my kenyan colleagues don't want to leave, i'm thinking that i probably shouldn't attempt to leave the building either. if that makes me a pussy, then fine.

finally found an apartment and moved in yesterday afternoon. so exciting! it's lovely, furnished and in a safe area between two major shopping areas. and it's down the road from the best ethiopian restaurant in town.

am feeling slightly overwhelmed still by my inability to get anywhere by myself. public transit is a series of poorly-driven buses and matatus (nissan minivans packed so full that they don't even bother closing the doors) that are more likely to break down before you get to your destination than not. so, yes, am currently weighing transportation options. i was hellbent on getting a motorbike, but everyone i've mentioned that idea to has looked at me like i'm completely batshit. so now, it's back to learning how to drive a stick. my colleague bosire has a car but no driver's license and has kindly offered it up.

oh, and ps, he's in the hospital with malaria right now. we're considering bribing the hospital officials to keep him admitted for two weeks to fully recuperate as he's in and out of the hospital constantly and heads directly to the office once he's been released. i admire his dedication, but lord, take a day off if you've got a tropical disease.

have been treated to quite a bit of the local nightlife. thursday went out for beers with my colleagues and boss, but boss left early and i was treated to a night on the town with the locals. basically, we went to a bar and made fun of malaya -- that's swahili for prostitute.

on friday, i went to my boss's house after work and we sipped cocktails on his veranda in the gated community in which he lives (next door to the british ambassador, for god's sake) before he treated me to dinner and a tour of the local expat hangouts. was quite good fun. he's a truly interesting fellow and has great war stories that he doesn't lord over you.

last night, marco, the photographer, had a 40th birthday party at his house up in another palatial area (yes, that's right. just like the states, folks. all the white people flock north). there were tons of westerners and met a finnish dude, appropriately named Fin (i kid you not), who works with MSF who i'm going to have coffee with next week. i felt really green among all of these established foreign correspondents, but, ah, it'll come with time. they had all these adventures to impart, and i'm just sitting there thinking, going to the grocery store is a big enough adventure for the time being.

i guess the main complaint i have is that i'm so dependent upon everyone else: for transportation, housing suggestions, cultural differences, story ideas, etc. i know i can't fully expect to know my way around or how the city operates after a week, but i'm generally a very autonomous person and haven't been very comfortable with being so reliant upon everyone. but they're incredibly generous and more than happy to help me become acclimated, so it's not as if it's a huge burden on anyone. it's just the realization that being in africa, and being a woman in nairobi after dark is much different than i'd expected and how much that actually effects the way i go about daily life.

on tap this week: a tour of Kibera with my coworker. we're going to take the bus there. it's the largest slum in africa and is home to more than a third of the city's population. and that's just one of the 3 major slums here.

xo xo

apartment shopping

2005-09-29T16:10:00.000+03:00

not nearly as easy as i expected. but have had much help from peter, my driver, though from now on in he shall be referred to as my friend. tomorrow i go to look at guest houses on landed estates and a few more furninshed spaces, but i've got to find something soon or i'll go bonkers living out of my suitcase.

probably the most exciting thing that i learned this afternoon (aside from how to refuse shady landlords without offending them) is that peter likes "tusker and spirits" nearly as much as i do, so i've finally got a drinking partner who doesn't want to woo me with 40 goats and a house on the Indian Ocean.

and yes, dad, i can hear you now - this isn't about drinking my way through all the continents on earth, it's about learning how to be a better reporter. but that's the thing, pops -- most news happens on a bar stool.

had a lovely dinner with greg last evening at the jacaranda hotel, a landmark here in kenya. we ate our weight in kenyan shillings and chatted eagerly about our impressions of nairobi -- though neither one of us could say enough. but his project at the UN seems very interesting and he's going to have a great opportunity to see some amazing things (a malaria conference in cameroon, populations ravaged by infectious, tropical disease) and a great product when he's finished. i'm very excited for him.

had brief opportunity to talk to bossone yesterday in egypt. it was like yelling through two tin cans connected by twine across the sahara before we were cut off. he seems to be doing well aside from night of fevers after bad shwarma.

so i've decided to be a petulant child and go on hiatus until one of you starts commenting - if, in fact, you are reading this like you say that you are.

collecting husbands

2005-09-28T16:52:00.000+03:00

well, i'm 3 for 3. this time via text message. i spent five hours drinking kenyan beer at a bar with a journalist, ostensibly to learn about local kenyan politics, but it ended up being an interesting dialogue about how africans view americans and vice versa. but afterwards, i receive this text message (and i'll quote it word-for-word, just so you know i'm not making this up):

"karen u strike me as a gud woman who can make a gud wife. i like u. b my wife?"

apparently, i need to make friends with some african women fast.

today, filed copy about human rights violations in Uganda. is my bent for social justice that obvious?

one of my colleagues departed for southern sudan today. she had two pairs of underwear, a toothbrush, saltines & sardines, a reporter's notebook, and her lap-top and the SAT phone. and that was considered packing heavily. i really dig her: she's this french chick fresh out of paris 2 months ago, so we've made plans to adventure through nairobi together upon her return (which, btw, is up in the air and she and the accompanying photog are a little unclear how they're going to make it back from remote, barren southern sudan).

in the office, i sit next to a local named bosire. i adore him. we steal each other's cigarettes, answer one another's phones, and just giggle constantly. he's always complaining about something - usually his salary, westerners and how much harder he works than anyone else - but it's so amusing to watch him operate as a reporter. during our "meeting" on tuesday, he was kvetching about how the office was bland and there was no couch for him to nap on or have his lady friends sit when they come to visit - there's an incessant stream of young women that come to pay homage at the court of bosire every day. lo and behold, this afternoon, we had a couch delivered and some beautiful leafy green plant arrangements. i'm sure this will only increase his eligibility and allure to the ladies. i've heard rumors of an infamous expense report he submitted for strippers and champagne, but haven't heard the full story yet. i've got some reporting to do on that one.

last night, i experienced my first (of many to be sure) blackout. i should stop at the store and stock up on candles. random blackouts and a scarcity of hot water are just something i have to get used to here - so far, it's all been adventurous and makes me feel like it's making life more genuine, but i imagine in time the little inconveniences will lose their charm.

am still apartment shopping. everybody i meet refers me to their brother, or their aunt, or their cousin. by the time that you actually get around to talking to the owner of the property, you've made about 6 phone calls - no shit - and then there's the problem of figuring out where it is. there aren't street numbers here - there are barely road signs - so directions go something like this: "up past the market after the big market there's a road. make a left, go up the shallow hill. three gates after the hill, there is man named nguri. ask him for directions."

off to the shallow hill,
karen

habari ya ngioni!

2005-09-27T18:18:00.000+03:00

(that means good evening in kiswahili for those of you that aren't in the know).

today i've been preoccupied with finding an apartment... what i've learned? buses in kenya don't actually stop while passengers are boarding. you jump on and hope your limbs remain intact. there's no such thing as a 3 month lease. and rental agencies are useless. it's much more productive to go searching without an agent. landlords generally tend to take pity on your utter cluelessness.

we had a meeting at work today (translation: all got tipsy at 1300 hours) and had a lovely chat with my boss in which he discussed what he'll have me do while i'm here (report, write, explore different regions of kenya and travel through east africa on assignment). am geeked. i'll be accompanying him to a dinner on friday evening to meet some humanitarian aid workers.

greg has arrived in nairobi and i'll be meeting up with him for dinner later (i don't think i've ever been so excited to see a canadian before in my life). but first, drinks with a local hack who's been texting me repeatedly to meet him since 5. (it's now 7). i hope to practice my swahili and get some dirt on the local news...

and then one tiny complaint: the best cigarettes one can acquire in kenya are BENSON & HEDGES. yes. that's right. i've morphed into an asthmatic 65 year old lady in Florida. but at least they're only 70 cents a pack...

xo xo

jambo!

2005-09-26T17:07:00.000+03:00

greetings from africa.

i'm at the office and just filed my first story this afternoon. seems that W's latest and greatest evangelical friend TD Jakes is in Kenya this week with 300 folks from his mega-church on a missionary trip. most of the participants were actually on my flight yesterday (kenyans refer to any british airways flight as "the missionary express"). but yes, so excited to be here, feel truly welcomed and have been encouraged to jump right into the mix.

nairobi. words cannot explain what it is like here. much different than i had expected, but it's not as if i can articulate those expectations either. i arrived late last evening and am staying at a hotel in the city center, just minutes away from the office. i've set up a kenyan cell phone and am going apartment hunting with peter, my driver, tomorrow. have made friends with two local journalists (at a bar, of course) and have already fielded about 4-5 phone calls from them since exchanging telephone numbers a mere three hours ago. but i've arranged for my first swahili lesson tonight.

am excited to get out of the downtown area and into the suburbs (which make up the bulk of the city, to my understanding) tomorrow. it will be interesting to observe what residential nairobi is like as the downtown area, a mere 100 years old, is a sprawling mess of skyscrapers, colonial structures and permanent market kiosks - a strange combination to behold. drivers are CRAZY, and i am not exaggerating. i've yet to put my eyes on a single traffic light, but i doubt that their presence would make much of a difference. but kenyans are warm, welcoming and friendly and seem incredibly excited by the slightest hint of interest in their country and culture, so i imagine i'll be received well while i'm here.

an non-continental african aside: for those of you closely following the proposal train, add another to the list. yes, that's correct: i wasn't able to avoid the inevitable proposal from the senegalese man - only it was a bit harder to ignore this time, as he asked me in person. and if my experience here to date (and yes, folks, i realize we're a mere 20 hours in) is anything to go by, it's going to be an interesting 3 months.

beginning to get the hang of these crazy french keyboards,
karen

on my way to rehab, er, nairobi...

2005-09-24T16:47:00.000+03:00

today's my last day in paris and the past 24 hours, i must admit, have been a wee-bit weepy. i've had to say goodbye to some folks very dear to me and we all know what a sentimental fool i become when alcohol's involved anyways, so i'm sure you can just imagine.

think that i gained a good ten pounds yesterday alone. my professor took us out for our farewell lunch at a creperie. the crepes were quite delicious, but the wine even more so. not to mention the cognac. afterwards, andrew, marcel and i made our way to the luxembourg gardens. we walked so slowly we might as well have crawled (or been native parisians). when we arrived, we promptly proceeded to pass out on the grass from all the exertion of walking a marathon length two blocks. then two hours later, dinner at the best bistro in our budget range -- braised rabbit, pate, small scallops on the shell with tomato and basil. wine, wine, more wine and then some champagne (and that's before we left the restaurant for the bar...)

is anyone picking up on a theme here? one of the things that i'm most looking forward to about nairobi is hanging my liver out on the clothesline for a good, long detox.

my meeting with AFP went really well. i was there for a solid 2 and a half hours, talking shop, getting tour, reading the wires, versing myself in the stylebook and meeting the british dude in charge of the african desk for the english language service. the gentleman i met with was actually the deputy managing editor of the entire news agency -- when he told me that in the elevator my knees literally gave out -- but i hear from my bureau chief that i made quite an impression. whether or not that's a good thing or a bad thing, i'm unclear, as we are all aware by this point of the range of impressions that i'm capable of making.

so heard from my bureau chief who has arranged for the agency's driver to meet me at the airport tomorrow and take me to the hotel that they've set up for me. i'll be there for a couple of days while i search for an apartment and it's a hop, skip and a jump away (literally 15 seconds i've been told) from the newsroom. there's an editorial meeting on tuesday at lunchtime and i'll be there with bells on. oh, but here's the best part, my boss's girlfriend is returning to the states next week and when she goes, guess who gets to use her car? good thing i spent a lot of time fretting about learning how to drive a stick this summer and then... never actually learning.

in a half-hour or so, i'm off to go and say goodbye to the senegalese man over coffee. then it's on to dinner with the boys and my professor. on tap for my last night in paris? (my flight's at 7:40 a.m. tomorrow so i'm wondering how much sense it actually makes to go to bed) drinking wine and eating cheese under the eiffel tower.

until i touch down on the other side of the equator,

your karen

happy honeymooning

2005-09-20T13:32:00.000+03:00

so, contrary to popular belief, i haven't been off honeymooning with Bocar, my Senegalese friend. tho, thanks for all the kind concerns.

since i last wrote, i split open my lip while trying to smoke a cigarette on the balcony (while completely sober, she said self-righteously). even better, it happened a mere 10 minutes before my date - lucky for me, Bocar is not grossed out by women with bloody mouths and fat lips. before we had senegalese food for dinner (delicious, by the way -- white fish wrapped in spicy ground herbs in a stew), we stopped at the pharmacy and purchased some antiseptic mouthwash. tonight, we're off for more african food and to the market and on friday, we're going out to a west african dance club.

i figure by that point, i'll have figured out the trick to interviewing africans. i always forget that they never respond directly to questions, but rather meander and offer parables and perhaps touch on a topic that might be somewhat related to what you're trying to get at, but...

went to the catacombs this weekend, which were quite different than any catacombs i've ever seen (i consider myself to be a bit of an expert on catacombs at this point, thanks to my training in all cultures dead and useless). the remains of some 5-6 million parisians were removed from the city's cemetaries in the 19th century and thrown underground in a former quarry. soon after (i'm thinking turn of the 20th century, if i remember correctly), some unfortunate soul had the job of going through all the bones, separating them and arranging them in a quite artistic fashion. wouldn't want to be art director of that project, to be sure. i'll post photos once i figure out how to get my computer charged...

also, rented bicycles and went pedalling around paris with a few folks from my program on sunday. so far, it's been my favorite experience in france. went to a lovely park on the west side of paris, the bois du bolougne. beautiful landscape, a lovely lake with boaters, and french people picnicing and being entirely pleastant. we rode along the seine and down the champs elysees. just a really wonderful way to see the city, i think.

my passport's back in hand with my newest visa! i'm ready to get to the southern hemisphere already and can't wait to get out of western europe!

be well.

foreign correspondence

2005-09-14T15:03:00.000+03:00

in between all the vin, cafe and objets d'arte, i've actually been attending lectures in paris given by a slew of amazing foreign correspondents and international immigration experts.

we heard from michel sailhan yesterday, who is the head of AFP's political reporting division at headquarters in Paris, who was formerly posted in Nairobi. i made everybody in class suffer while i grilled him about his three years there. he told this amazing story about a 5-week trek that he made through somali reporting on the rebels that eventually took over the government back in 1989. (it never got picked up because they sent it out on the wires the same day the berlin wall fell, but he loves the work that he did on that series more than any other he's done.) but he was a wealth of information about how to go about finding stories in nairobi and what i can expect from sources.

my bureau chief emailed last night and told me that robert holloway, the man who had to sign off on my internship with AFP (aka the man who is responsible for posting reporters throughout the world) wants to meet me while i'm in paris. am very excited about that news.

have a date with a senegalese man tomorrow evening. i ran into him while walking around my neighborhood. it's amusing: he speaks the best english of anyone i've met in paris. we're going to have dinner together tomorrow evening (and although he doesn't yet know it, he's going to be the immigrant that i have to profile for an assignment in paris).

so, montmartre. beautiful! we live, as you might have already guessed, in the west african section of the neighborhood. it's vibrant and lively. i pop outside early every morning for my daily baguette at the corner boulangerie and grab the international herald tribune (we met the workplace columnist for IHT this morning and had drinks at the former publisher's on sunday evening). then i head home and sit on the balcony overlooking the tree-lined street while i read the paper, sip coffee and smoke fancy european cigarettes.

c'est tres bien, no?

bonjour!

2005-09-11T12:56:00.000+03:00

i finally arrived in paris yesterday afternoon after an uneventful plane ride and 72 hours sans sleep (even the bootleg ambien the spaniard sitting next to me gave me didn't help).

have been eating crepes and croissants and drinking lots of wine. our apartment, while lovely, is slightly schizophrenic - it can't decide whether it's a safari lodge or a bordello (i'm speaking decor-wise, you smart asses).

we had some folks over last night to drink wine on one of our 2x2 foot balconies before heading out to check out the local nightlife. this morning there was a note on the door from our downstairs neighbors asking us to be considerate enough not to flush the toilet after 10 p.m. b/c it's too noisy.

seminars begin this afternoon. nothing like a bunch of americans congregating at the tour eiffel on september 11. i can't help but laugh.

be well all (and i promise a more exciting blog in the future - just bear with me).

off to sacre couer,
your darling karen

going global

2005-09-07T00:10:00.000+03:00

your ambassador to post-colonial africa has signed herself up for a blog.

come early. come often.

i'm off to seedy montmarte in gay paris friday for two weeks before heading off to nairobi where i'll be interning with AFP and warding off malaria.

check in here for all the details of my east african adventure.

love and rockets,
k-funk.