I just got back from the beautiful Mombasa.
The trip out was sooo interesting! It was an adventure, to say the least. Friday, the last day of classes, was a half day. But instead of just having half the periods, we had 22 minutes of all seven periods. Mr. Taylor was driving a bus to the airport, so I covered a few of his geography classes… and Abigail was busy trying to arrange her midterm classes, so I covered her class as well. So, first period, I was in geography, then my study hall – luckily, they ALL asked to go to the computer lab! – third period I covered another geography class, fourth period I covered a general music class, fifth period I had free and used it to plan for my sixth period, which didn’t show up!! And seventh period I was free. It went so fast! Then we had a flag raising service and got out of school at 10:45, I think.
We left RVA in two groups: Ashley, Ru, and Erica left with one family at 11:30; and Jessica, Anita, and I left with the Cooks at 1:30. In Nairobi, we figured out a place where we could leave our luggage since our bus didn’t leave till 10pm. (We had to go into town early, though, because everyone tries to get back to Kijabe before dark for safety reasons). So we hung out in Nairobi for the afternoon/evening… we had ice cream, caught a movie, had dinner, walked around…. Chinese food is a rare delicacy, and was a very special treat! Anyway, at about 9pm, we gathered our luggage and caught a taxi to the bus station. A friend of ours who has lived in Africa all his life called a friend of his that he trusted to drive us into downtown.
I didn’t realize that the bus station was in DOWNTOWN Nairobi—in “a dodgy part of town,” as Aaron told us. As soon as our driver, Paul, pulled up to the station (at 10pm, you’ll remember!!!), I said, “Ru, I’m SO glad you’re here.” If it had been just the five of us girls, I don’t think I would’ve gotten out of the car. There were people everywhere… just EVERYWHERE! And it was dirty and dark and… I don’t know how to explain what it felt like… I just felt very unsafe. And it’s hard being white here. Regardless of what you say, everyone assumes you’re rich – and by their standards, almost all of us are. So pick-pocketing is a danger, and… anyway, we went right in and went up to the waiting area and we were fine. They even had a TV on! So we caught some Kenyan news. The bathrooms were something special… what a smell! And the “toilet” is something not-so-affectionately known as a “long drop.” That’s all I’ll say about that. I couldn’t do it.
The bus was wonderful. Most of us had swollen ankles when we arrived from being seated for 8 hours, but other than that, it was really nice. It wasn’t air conditioned, of course… and I think the two men seated in front of Jess n’ I were cold-natured. It was HOT! And we kept opening the window, and they kept shutting it. Personally, I was more concerned about the lack of bathroom on the bus… but we stopped I think 4 times. And we had been warned that the ride was really bumpy, but it wasn’t bad at all. I took some Dramamine and slept pretty well. When we got there, we got a taxi that we crammed into (Ru was actually in the trunk) and got on the ferry and got to the coast.
Mombasa is SOOO beautiful! We got to our hotel at about 5:30 or 6am, and they served us breakfast and even got our rooms ready early. The only problem with the rooms was that you couldn’t leave the air conditioner on unless you had the key in it… which means if you’re not in the room, the AC is not on. But Ryan bent a coat hanger a bit and made it work… because we’d come back to the room and it would be oppressively hot in there.
The mosquito net on the big bed made it look kinda princessy. I was in a triple room with Ashley and Jess; Anita and Erica were in another room; and Ryan and Ru were in a third room. The rooms were quite nice.
In Mombasa, buildings aren’t actually closed in with four walls…. And windows don’t generally have glass. Buildings all have a roof, but are as open as possible, and walls are up where necessary. It keeps things cooler. Air conditioning is not normal in Kenya. And even were refrigeration exists (and where it does, it’s advertised!), sometimes things aren’t cold. Anyway, the dining room was beautiful, with a perfect view of the ocean!
The first evening, as we were waiting for dinner, I felt that I needed some time by myself, so I told the group I was going for a walk. I went down to the beach and started walking. Now… during the day, the beach is kind of an obnoxious place because “hawkers” (salespeople, essentially) will bug you to no end! They’ll follow you and walk with you and just keep talking and talking to you, trying to get you to buy something or come to their shop. Well, I figured now that it was dark (the sun goes down every day about 6:45), I’d have some peace. I was wrong. I started walking, and a Kenyan man started walking with me. I was about to politely tell him I wanted to be alone – all weekend I was told I was too nice and so was continually bugged – but then I thought… maybe he’s been ignored and turned down all day, and maybe he needs someone to listen to him for a minute… so I talked to him. He wanted to know where I was from. I told him I live in Kenya – that always shocks them (and gets me a better price). Anyway, he told me all about his family: his brothers in Germany, his parents nearby, his sister-in-law… he talked about losing his travel documents and his studies in computers… and I listened and asked questions and we walked for awhile. We didn’t go far from the hotel.
After awhile, he started asking me to come to a discotech. I told him I couldn’t dance, and he said it’s ok, we’ll just talk for an hour and then I could come back. I said I wouldn’t go anywhere alone. He assured me (repeatedly) that it’s safe. I said even if it is, I’m getting married soon and I’m not going to spend time alone with another man. He asked if I didn’t trust him, if I didn’t believe him… anyway, he just kinda kept pushing it… that we’d just talk for a lil while and maybe have a drink. I told him I needed to go for dinner.
When I walked back up to the hotel, my friends were looking for me. I had worried them. Apparently, if Ashley had heard me say I was going for a walk, she would’ve stopped me. And… apparently… “Thomas” was probably a male prostitute, and I had likely just been “propositioned.” I felt so, soooo, SOOOOO violated… and eventually mad.
During my time in Mombasa, I got a lot of sun… which caused a lot of confusion as to my country of origin. I had a lot of interesting guesses. One man spoke to me in Italian for five minutes or so before I finally told him I don’t speak Italian. What a beautiful language! One of the hawkers asked me if I was “Rastafarian.” Hahahaha! He told me I was very beautiful. Someone else – I think a worker at the hotel – asked if I was Brazilian. I think that one was my favorite guess. It reminded me of Spring Break and the picture Jess took that she said made me look like a “Brazilian goddess.” Or maybe Mere said that…
I was told a lot that I was beautiful. Lots of the hotel worker men told me that. At first I thought maybe they hadn’t seen hair like mine ever… but Ashley said that they know if they can sweet talk a white woman enough, they can get her pregnant… and if they can get a mzungu (white) girl pregnant, they have everything. So… that was a big kick in my ego. One time though, when we went to get ice cream down the beach a lil ways, I saw a woman in the bathroom. She asked me my name, and I told her. Her name was Sicilia, and she told me I was very beautiful. Her saying it meant a lot more to me, though, cuz I knew she didn’t want anything.
One night at the hotel, the workers did different dances from all over East Africa. They even had the traditional clothes… and a few people playing the music. It was such complex music! I watched the dancers’ feet and listened to the different drums and tried to figure out how they were following. One of the songs was in 5/8, I finally realized. Anyway, for one song, they went into the crowd and pulled people up to dance. Erica and I got pulled… it was such fun! It was hard, though! I had to watch the feet of the woman next to me. Ashley took some pictures. Hahaha!
On the way out of Mombasa, we took a different road to get to the airport (as opposed to the bus station). We drove straight through downtown Mombasa, but it was during the late morning. Driving in Kenya is such an experience… even more so than in Nairobi, in Mombasa, the road clears just barely ahead of a car. There are men pulling hand carts full of all kinds of things, people on bikes, and people walking. SOOOO many people walking. And there are little shops all over the place… more like stands than shops, I guess. We saw fresh fish just laying out… no ice. Hahaha! Flies everywhere! That’s something else about Kenya… it smells very different. African body odor is very different from US body odor. Anyway, so driving is TERRIFYING. While waiting for the ferry, though, Erica and I got out to look around. It was so fun! We didn’t buy anything there… but it was nice to just like… shop where regular Africans shop rather than being in a shop aimed specifically at mzungus. And the salespeople were a lot less aggressive.
So we got on the ferry and then to the airport. We took a very small plane from Mombasa to Nairobi, waited in Nairobi for a few hours, and caught the school bus back to Kijabe. So here I am! And I didn’t get nearly as much reading done as I had planned.
The trip out was sooo interesting! It was an adventure, to say the least. Friday, the last day of classes, was a half day. But instead of just having half the periods, we had 22 minutes of all seven periods. Mr. Taylor was driving a bus to the airport, so I covered a few of his geography classes… and Abigail was busy trying to arrange her midterm classes, so I covered her class as well. So, first period, I was in geography, then my study hall – luckily, they ALL asked to go to the computer lab! – third period I covered another geography class, fourth period I covered a general music class, fifth period I had free and used it to plan for my sixth period, which didn’t show up!! And seventh period I was free. It went so fast! Then we had a flag raising service and got out of school at 10:45, I think.
We left RVA in two groups: Ashley, Ru, and Erica left with one family at 11:30; and Jessica, Anita, and I left with the Cooks at 1:30. In Nairobi, we figured out a place where we could leave our luggage since our bus didn’t leave till 10pm. (We had to go into town early, though, because everyone tries to get back to Kijabe before dark for safety reasons). So we hung out in Nairobi for the afternoon/evening… we had ice cream, caught a movie, had dinner, walked around…. Chinese food is a rare delicacy, and was a very special treat! Anyway, at about 9pm, we gathered our luggage and caught a taxi to the bus station. A friend of ours who has lived in Africa all his life called a friend of his that he trusted to drive us into downtown.
I didn’t realize that the bus station was in DOWNTOWN Nairobi—in “a dodgy part of town,” as Aaron told us. As soon as our driver, Paul, pulled up to the station (at 10pm, you’ll remember!!!), I said, “Ru, I’m SO glad you’re here.” If it had been just the five of us girls, I don’t think I would’ve gotten out of the car. There were people everywhere… just EVERYWHERE! And it was dirty and dark and… I don’t know how to explain what it felt like… I just felt very unsafe. And it’s hard being white here. Regardless of what you say, everyone assumes you’re rich – and by their standards, almost all of us are. So pick-pocketing is a danger, and… anyway, we went right in and went up to the waiting area and we were fine. They even had a TV on! So we caught some Kenyan news. The bathrooms were something special… what a smell! And the “toilet” is something not-so-affectionately known as a “long drop.” That’s all I’ll say about that. I couldn’t do it.
The bus was wonderful. Most of us had swollen ankles when we arrived from being seated for 8 hours, but other than that, it was really nice. It wasn’t air conditioned, of course… and I think the two men seated in front of Jess n’ I were cold-natured. It was HOT! And we kept opening the window, and they kept shutting it. Personally, I was more concerned about the lack of bathroom on the bus… but we stopped I think 4 times. And we had been warned that the ride was really bumpy, but it wasn’t bad at all. I took some Dramamine and slept pretty well. When we got there, we got a taxi that we crammed into (Ru was actually in the trunk) and got on the ferry and got to the coast.
Mombasa is SOOO beautiful! We got to our hotel at about 5:30 or 6am, and they served us breakfast and even got our rooms ready early. The only problem with the rooms was that you couldn’t leave the air conditioner on unless you had the key in it… which means if you’re not in the room, the AC is not on. But Ryan bent a coat hanger a bit and made it work… because we’d come back to the room and it would be oppressively hot in there.
The mosquito net on the big bed made it look kinda princessy. I was in a triple room with Ashley and Jess; Anita and Erica were in another room; and Ryan and Ru were in a third room. The rooms were quite nice.
In Mombasa, buildings aren’t actually closed in with four walls…. And windows don’t generally have glass. Buildings all have a roof, but are as open as possible, and walls are up where necessary. It keeps things cooler. Air conditioning is not normal in Kenya. And even were refrigeration exists (and where it does, it’s advertised!), sometimes things aren’t cold. Anyway, the dining room was beautiful, with a perfect view of the ocean!
The first evening, as we were waiting for dinner, I felt that I needed some time by myself, so I told the group I was going for a walk. I went down to the beach and started walking. Now… during the day, the beach is kind of an obnoxious place because “hawkers” (salespeople, essentially) will bug you to no end! They’ll follow you and walk with you and just keep talking and talking to you, trying to get you to buy something or come to their shop. Well, I figured now that it was dark (the sun goes down every day about 6:45), I’d have some peace. I was wrong. I started walking, and a Kenyan man started walking with me. I was about to politely tell him I wanted to be alone – all weekend I was told I was too nice and so was continually bugged – but then I thought… maybe he’s been ignored and turned down all day, and maybe he needs someone to listen to him for a minute… so I talked to him. He wanted to know where I was from. I told him I live in Kenya – that always shocks them (and gets me a better price). Anyway, he told me all about his family: his brothers in Germany, his parents nearby, his sister-in-law… he talked about losing his travel documents and his studies in computers… and I listened and asked questions and we walked for awhile. We didn’t go far from the hotel.
After awhile, he started asking me to come to a discotech. I told him I couldn’t dance, and he said it’s ok, we’ll just talk for an hour and then I could come back. I said I wouldn’t go anywhere alone. He assured me (repeatedly) that it’s safe. I said even if it is, I’m getting married soon and I’m not going to spend time alone with another man. He asked if I didn’t trust him, if I didn’t believe him… anyway, he just kinda kept pushing it… that we’d just talk for a lil while and maybe have a drink. I told him I needed to go for dinner.
When I walked back up to the hotel, my friends were looking for me. I had worried them. Apparently, if Ashley had heard me say I was going for a walk, she would’ve stopped me. And… apparently… “Thomas” was probably a male prostitute, and I had likely just been “propositioned.” I felt so, soooo, SOOOOO violated… and eventually mad.
During my time in Mombasa, I got a lot of sun… which caused a lot of confusion as to my country of origin. I had a lot of interesting guesses. One man spoke to me in Italian for five minutes or so before I finally told him I don’t speak Italian. What a beautiful language! One of the hawkers asked me if I was “Rastafarian.” Hahahaha! He told me I was very beautiful. Someone else – I think a worker at the hotel – asked if I was Brazilian. I think that one was my favorite guess. It reminded me of Spring Break and the picture Jess took that she said made me look like a “Brazilian goddess.” Or maybe Mere said that…
I was told a lot that I was beautiful. Lots of the hotel worker men told me that. At first I thought maybe they hadn’t seen hair like mine ever… but Ashley said that they know if they can sweet talk a white woman enough, they can get her pregnant… and if they can get a mzungu (white) girl pregnant, they have everything. So… that was a big kick in my ego. One time though, when we went to get ice cream down the beach a lil ways, I saw a woman in the bathroom. She asked me my name, and I told her. Her name was Sicilia, and she told me I was very beautiful. Her saying it meant a lot more to me, though, cuz I knew she didn’t want anything.
One night at the hotel, the workers did different dances from all over East Africa. They even had the traditional clothes… and a few people playing the music. It was such complex music! I watched the dancers’ feet and listened to the different drums and tried to figure out how they were following. One of the songs was in 5/8, I finally realized. Anyway, for one song, they went into the crowd and pulled people up to dance. Erica and I got pulled… it was such fun! It was hard, though! I had to watch the feet of the woman next to me. Ashley took some pictures. Hahaha!
On the way out of Mombasa, we took a different road to get to the airport (as opposed to the bus station). We drove straight through downtown Mombasa, but it was during the late morning. Driving in Kenya is such an experience… even more so than in Nairobi, in Mombasa, the road clears just barely ahead of a car. There are men pulling hand carts full of all kinds of things, people on bikes, and people walking. SOOOO many people walking. And there are little shops all over the place… more like stands than shops, I guess. We saw fresh fish just laying out… no ice. Hahaha! Flies everywhere! That’s something else about Kenya… it smells very different. African body odor is very different from US body odor. Anyway, so driving is TERRIFYING. While waiting for the ferry, though, Erica and I got out to look around. It was so fun! We didn’t buy anything there… but it was nice to just like… shop where regular Africans shop rather than being in a shop aimed specifically at mzungus. And the salespeople were a lot less aggressive.
So we got on the ferry and then to the airport. We took a very small plane from Mombasa to Nairobi, waited in Nairobi for a few hours, and caught the school bus back to Kijabe. So here I am! And I didn’t get nearly as much reading done as I had planned.
2 comments:
OH MY GOSH, AMBER! You were hit on by a male prostitute?!?!?! How horrible! Did you tell him about Jesus??? I feel so bad for him!
Also, I have ALWAYS thought you looked like a Brazilian goddess. It's your lovely hair and beautifully tanned skin! :)
I miss you so much. I was laughing so hard when I read your post.
I love you!
P.S. That picture is GORGEOUS! Camels on the beach! AMAZING!
I am glad you wouldn't go anywhere with the strange man on the beach! lol. I am glad you are smarter than that! The words "Natalie Holloway" kept flashing in my head as I read that part of your blog!
I am glad I finally can read your posts again! I feel so disconnected from you life (I know I am halfway across the world though). I am sitting in the TFC computer lab right now. Weird huH?
Are there camels on the beach in your picture? First of all, the beach is beautiful! It reminds me of the Philippines. there were always goats, cows, you name it on the beach. lol. Kind of ruins your tanning experience when you get a cow overshadowing you. lol.
I wish I could see all of this!
Sounds like you are doing good. All I can say is it is a plus that you wear skirts all the time. There is less of a chance for pickpocketing when you don't have any pockets! Lol
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