Kenya...Next Day!

Ok, so I'm a decent person, I try to be nice, really! But sometimes, my tendency for impatience leads my head! Justus was bugging me so much today! And it’s just cus things didn’t work out how I expected them to. How can it? I’m in a different fricking country! Sigh, ok, Ayanna time to realize that traveling is fun and a great experience again!

I had a plan today; go get our sim cards and go shopping for much needed household items after the worst night sleep ever! So Caroline was here this morning, Justus called her about 8am and she got up and washed the dishes for us. He came and got her and they left. Oh, but first, I asked him about money. I was really wondering what amount did he expect. The conversation was confusing to say the least. English, it seems like it is a universal language but it really isn’t. So, after about 10 minutes, it boiled down to he wants 5 euro a day, for me and the kid 10 euros, just like he said in his email, but he wanted it all up front, which I was not comfortable with. What if I don’t stay? I told him I needed to think and I would give him money later. He left.

He said that he really needed the money. That he had some things he wanted to do with the school like a “feeding” program for the kids. I asked him if the money would be going to pay rent on this apartment, because I wouldn’t feel comfortable with that. He had assured me I would be living with a family, and I was fine paying for my upkeep with a family, but not just rent on a random apartment. He assured me this was not the case. I have my suspicions that this is in fact, Justus’s apartment. He told me he is really trying to do important things with the school and that the money he can get from volunteers is really important to this effort. So, like a bleeding heart liberal…I caved. But I still told him I would have to think about it. He left.

He came back a couple of times within the next hour, for no real reason and it was kind of creepy because we weren't up or dressed yet. And all he said was if someone asks me for money, don’t give it to them. Even if they said Justus said give me money. What, was I born yesterday? Then he said ummm. And just continued to stand there. I have no idea what he wanted. Then he said ok and left and then he came back. I did not open the door. I just said, “Justus, I’m not dressed” and he said oh, ok see you at 1pm. Then he didn't come back til almost 2 to get us, when the phone place, Safaricom, closed at 2pm! 

I did end up giving him the entire 10 Euros a day for the kid and myself. And I told him that I couldn't wait to see the "feeding" (I hate that term! It makes the kids sound like livestock!) program he started.

The fun part was we took a bus to Nairobi. And it was just like the tv show, Sense8! First, it took us about 50 minutes to walk to the small town of Githiryi, all on a dirt road and the railroad tracks. It was really neat just looking at the different scenery. 

The road in front of our apartment building.

Walking to town!

For those of you who don't watch Sense8, I'll tell you about the buses! First of all, the buses are privately owned and they are painted all over, like the one in Sense8 is called "Van Dam" and it has painted pictures of Jean Claude all over it. Although I didn't see a Van Dam bus, I did see Biggy Smalls, Tupac, Rhianna, and a bunch more! So  the buses are painted from top to bottom, they are covered in bells and flashing lights, and their is a man, I guess I'll call him the barker, who stands outside the bus, yelling for people to get on this bus. Yelling really loud and they bang on the bus and basically try to make as much noise as they can. Once the bus takes off, they are the ones who take the money and let the driver know if he needs to stop. They don't take off until every seat is full. And when people get off at a stop, they still try to get new people on and will wait! So you could be waiting quite a while to get to your destination! Me and the kid were so excited! 

The kid and our "sponsor", Justus boarding the bus to Nairobi.

Unfortunately, once we arrived in the city, the phone place was closed. This was only a big deal because I had wanted to save my cash and use my credit card for big purchases. Just frustrating when we were ready to go with plenty of time, but Justus was why we were late.

We walked all over looking for another phone place so we got to see some of the city. We passed by a square, I forgot the name of it, but there were tons of people there...skating! They had all kinds of skates for rent and all kinds of people would come for a Sunday afternoon skate!

We also passed some news stands, and it was so shocking and amazing to see all kinds of magazines; exercise magazines, parenting magazines, news magazines....all with black people on the cover. As an African-American, I'm just not used to that. We get so used to the reflection in the world just being white people all over, that it really took me a second looking at these magazines. I never really thought it would be that big a deal seeing a reflection of myself, in ads and magazines and stuff, but it really is! Seeing black people advertised just everywhere, really gave me a sense of...like, pride. I was like, hey, look at us! It really just gave me an unexpectedly good feeling! 

Did I mention that Obama came while I was there?!

Black people were even on products!

After the cell phone bust, we went to two restaurants that were cash only.  I ended up spending all my cash on feeding the 3 of us (yes, I paid for Justus too!), So by the time we got off the bus back in Githurai, I needed money before we could go shopping. Here is another instance of English being a subjective language. I told Justus I wanted to take a tuk-tuk back to our house, run in the apartment and get money and jump back in the tuk-tuk to go shopping. He said you want to come back here? I was like yes, even though I had told him this already. Anyway, he went off to find a tuk-tuk. Literally, forever later, we still had no tuk-tuk! I asked him what was going on cus there were like a million tuk-tuk's on the street, and he said the drivers didn’t want to wait for us at the store! I just looked at him like he was insane. Then explained. Oh, oh, he said. Still took awhile but we finally got a tuk-tuk.

Worse ride ever! More on that later. We finally made it to store, purchased everything, including fluffy pillows! What a luxury! I paid cash. Then I asked him to checkout prices for refrigarator’s (cus I couldn't live for a month in a place with no fridge!) and we waited. And I looked at a sign…the visa/mastercard logo. This place took cards!!! 3 nightmare tuk-tuk rides could have been avoided, so easily!

I’m tired. Tomorrow we meet the kids! I’m excited! Pray I don't get harassed by mosquito's tonight! I promise not to gripe so much in future posts!

Ciao for now!

On our way.... to Nairobi, Kenya!

We have arrived in Kenya! What a journey!

So, how did me and the kid end up in Nairobi, Kenya? I've been thinking a lot about giving back in gratitude for all that I have. I'm a teacher, and I love to travel, so I decided to volunteer somewhere teaching. I found this organization just outside Nairobi, Kenya, one man really, who said he teaches photography to some street kids in this town. I started emailing with him and he said that he teaches about 50 kids, some of whom are homeless, through a local school he works with. He said I could teach English and the kid could teach drama or read them stories. It sounded perfect for us both so.... here we are!

The plane ride wasn't that bad, only 5 hours on Emirates Airways. I actually did good picking seats but I forgot and was distressed. Then we arrived on the plane and had bulk head seats! Score! And I have to say, I love when airlines provide you with a menu for lunch, even if they are out of option 1 by the time they reach you!

Immigration was quick and painless, even though we were told to step to the right for bag check. The lady did not go thru our bags, luckily. Then I noticed that only people of color were over in the bag check, whites were just passed thru with a “good day”. Hmmmm. I can’t get into it. 

We've arrived! Nairobi, Kenya

Once outside, there were a million people holding signs up. I was frantically scanning for my name, then I decided to exchange money. As we were walking towards the money exchange, someone approached me and said, “Ayanna?” and I said “Justus!” He knew me on sight, how cool was that?! We were leaving the airport via taxi and that really took forever. He had to go get the taxi guy. We were standing there with a million people, going on safari, and 1 by 1, they all disappeared til it was just us. Justus kept disappearing to go search for the taxi guy; all in all I’ll say we waited well over an hour. Finally, taxi guy came. Justus remembered everything I had asked him about in my emails and was like, ok, lets go get your water and mosquito netting and phone, right? We didn’t manage to get the phone, so I am dying without facebook (pathetic, I know!)! but I’m all set for water and and lovely mosquito netting, which we already totally need, thank goodness we got it! I’m slightly freaking out without internet and hope my mom isn’t having a conniption, but we will definitely get a phone first thing tomorrow!

We went to Justus’ parents home in a suburb of Nairobi called Githurai, and met his sister, mother, and father. I thought we were staying there. He said how the house wasn’t finished and it was still being worked on. I said fine, I just need a bathroom. Justus and his sister looked at each other, and it was a few minutes before they answered me. Then Caroline (his sister) told me she’d take me. I finally understood the silence when I asked about the bathroom. She lead me down a pitch black hallway that had a drop of 2 feet blocked by cement bricks, (where I cut my finger on a nail sticking out of the wall, ouch!) then to an open stall that had a pit dug in it with 2 more cement bricks for my feet placement.  Hmmm, I knew I was coming to a 3^rd world country but…ok, just something to wrap my head around!

You can imagine how happy I was to learn that we weren’t going to be staying there! Whew.

Then Justus left to go find a taxi. He arrived 20 minutes later with a tuk-tuk in tow. This is fine, I love tuk-tuk’s having used them a lot in Thailand. However, 5 people plus 4 humongous bags in 1 little tuk-tuk was quite a stretch! It was now night time and of course there are no street lights, we really weren’t even on what could be called a street. Just a rutted and pocked dirt road that was littered with huge pieces of cement and deep potholes that canted sideways rather alarmingly. We had to hold on to our bags so they wouldn’t fly out the back. I told Ajenai to hold on to me in case the flimsy metal door decided to fly open and spill me onto the road. I kept asking if she was ok and she said yea. I said, it won’t be long til we are driving on a real road so hold on. I was mistaken, this was the road! For the entire 20 minute very harrowing ride. I was fine, even with the bumps and dips, until we went up one hugely canted road and I thought, “hmmm, I wonder if we are going to tip over?” Why did I think that?! Once that thought was in my head, I couldn’t get rid of it! After that, every bump and dip and sideways shuffle I was just praying!

Another harrowing tuk-tuk ride!

Just regular traffic in Nairobi!

The view from the tuk-tuk!

And I guess it worked because we made it! And we pulled up to an actual 5 story building, not a shack. Justus carried our bags up to the 3^rd floor, I felt really bad because each one was heavy and he had to make 4 trips! 

We finally alighted in our home for the next month for me, and 2 weeks for the kid.

1 room, 1 maybe full size bed with an alarming dip in the center (which turned out to be an inch thick foam mattress wrapped in several ratty blankets!), a sofa, a bathroom with a toilet with no seat, a small sink in the corner and 2 water spigots that turned out to be our shower. No hot water tho, I’m afraid!  A little tank of gas that turned out to be the stove, a small sink next to the front metal door, … what more could 2 intrepid adventurers ask for?! Oh, I almost forgot, of course there was a tv!

The great thing about the bed was that it had space underneath so we could shove our bags under there.

Our apartment building....Keiriki Apartments 

Our bathroom complete with shower spigot

Our front door, closes with a padlock...from the inside!

Our kitchen, those dishes are clean!

Our wonderful sofa...where the kid ended up sleeping.

And our wonderful, lumpy, bed...

The four of us were sitting there chatting in various small nooks and grannies in the room, when I finally told Justus that we were in fact, quite hungry! He said oh yes, I will go get you some beans and rice. Wonderful. Of course I was thinking he would bring back food that was cooked, and that’s what I get for making assumptions again! When he returned, (40 minutes and 2 phone calls later!) he just had a bag of uncooked rice and beans! We had to cook them! Thank goodness Caroline was there and cooked for us. Justus showed me how to turn on the gas tank, with pliers and a match, and then Caroline proceeded to pour a gallon of tap water on the rice to start cooking it. Ajenai was like, oh no, please use the bottled water! That is the fastest I have ever seen the kid speak! The one thing I drilled into her about this trip was DO NOT DRINK THE WATER! She listened! So, after a little assertion that of course the water was fine, Caroline used our bottled water. And after another 20 minutes, after 10pm, we finally had our second meal of the day!

Justus sat and talked a little bit until I made it very obvious that we wanted to go to bed, and Caroline stayed the night with us. At first I was freaked cus I thought they meant she was staying with us the whole time! But she just stayed the one night because they didn’t want to abandon us on our first evening. Wasn’t that nice?

I made the grave mistake of sleeping with the window open after the fan broke. We were assaulted by mosqitos! Even Caroline had to get off the sofa and wrap the mosquito netting around herself. We quickly closed the window, but of course it was too late. Once in the night, the kid woke up literally screaming about “the bees! The bees! Buzzing!” and she was swatting at her head. I had to calm her down and say, no, in fact, that would be the mosquito’s and I’m so sorry!

But we all survivied the night and I’m excited to start my first whole day in Kenya!  I’ve got a list of items to buy including a pillow that isn’t as lumpy and hard as the road outside!

This trip turned out to be good .....and very bad, you will hear all my thoughts, uncensored! Which, if you know me means you will be hearing a lot! Hope you stay for the journey of our Kenyan adventure!

Ciao....

My First Iftar!

     Ramadan Kareem!

That is the official greeting of Ramadan! We have reached the holy month here in the UAE and I was excited to experience my first Iftar.

A little background: Ramadan is the 6^th month of the year from new moon to new moon. It is a holy time of fasting and prayer for those of the Muslim faith. Muslims will fast from sunrise to sunset, letting no food or beverage pass their lips during that time. Once the sun has set, they can have a meal that is to be shared with family called Iftar. They can also eat before sunrise, usually at 4:30am, and that meal is called Suhuor.

So, I definitely wanted to experience Iftar and, of course, there is no shortage of places to eat here so I just had to decide which Iftar to go to. Every hotel restaurant here has an Iftar and most of the regular restaurants as well. There are budget iftars, expensive iftars, and really expensive iftars. You can go to iftar at the food court in the malls or nice mall restaurants or really nice mall restaurants. So I had a major decision on my hands! My coworker, who has been here for 5 years, said if I was going to do iftar, I should do iftar! Which means go big or go home of course so I decided to go big! I went to my first iftar at Emirates Palace here in Abu Dhabi! Can I just say it was amazing!

Emirates Palace is itself amazing. It is huge and gorgeous. Every time I am there I cannot believe the immense size of the palace. Can you imagine a place with 7000 doors?!  Inside the palace houses a number of restaurants, art galleries and shops, a night club, and a theater where I have seen many stunning live shows. The kid said that you would not have to see another person for a year if you lived there, and it is totally true! Every thing is all gold and marble and shiny in the palace. And inside is one of the places where there is the gold atm machine! Yes, you can get gold out of an atm!

Iftar traditional tent at the Emirates Palace

Gold, gold everywhere!

At this point, I do have to admit that the photos of the Emirates Palace above are not ones I took myself (as if you can't tell!). Sigh, it’s very hard to get a good shot with people in the way! And my photos were too dark. Also, you have to be careful here as you cannot photograph Emirati women. But I swear, the palace looked exactly like this in real life! 

So, back to iftar. The Emirates Palace is a traditional iftar with all the traditional Emirati iftar foods. I’ve seen them around and tried a few, and I’ll explain them here.

Malfoof – which the locals here will say is a traditional food, but it is exactly like the Greek food of dolma! Rice and spices wrapped in a marinated grape leaf. Me and the kid used to always pick this great finger food up at Whole Foods in San Francisco.

Harees- A traditional Emirati dish of boiled wheat and tender, slow-cooked lamb. I have to admit I haven’t tasted this because it looks like really soupy oatmeal (which I hate!).

Arseeyah – which is a simple and hearty rice and chicken dish. Which also is blended into the consistency of oatmeal. Not my bag of tea, but most people love it!

Samboosa – which is very similar to the Indian samosa’s but without the chutney! Still, very yummy!

Thareed –which is a crispy flat bread layered with a meat soup.

Lamb ouzi – a whole lamb that is roasted and then laid out on a platter surrounded by rice, raisins, and nuts. It is totally tender and succulent and yummy!

Chicken Briyani – which is a marinated chicken and saffron rice dish. Now, I know you are thinking, hey, isn’t that an Indian dish?! And you would be right, it is an Indian dish! Which the Emirati’s love and have fully incorporated into their authentic cuisine. Briyani is always my go to dish at events at our school, I love it!

Dessert baklava & Umm Ali – yummy! Baklava, the Russian sticky sweet treat, can be found in abundance here, in many different shapes and sizes. And Umm Ali is a sort of bread pudding.

Greeted at the door with traditional Arabic music

Our beautiful reserved table.

The spread!

The food table was massive! And there was a whole separate table for the lamb ouzi!

Traditional Emirati tea

Yummy! Desserts!

Gold dust on top of the cakes! 

A little before 10pm, a waiter came over to our table and told us that Iftar would be over soon. We said thank you and he left. In the next few minutes, he came to our table twice more to tell us they were closing. Looking around, we could see that the place was packed with Emiratis. We noticed that the waiter did not approach other tables with his closing message so we were wondering what was up. When he approached our table yet again, my friend asked him “is there a reason, you are telling us this?” And he said yes, that at 10:30 Suhuor would start and we were welcome to stay, but he would have to charge us an additional 195dirhams! We said, ohhh, thank you for the warning, we will definitely be out! I asked him what were the hours of suhuor and he said 10:30 to 4:30am. I said, but no one   will stay til 4:30am?!  And he said that they would! That all the people there would stay and they would bring more food out at least 4 more times before 4:30am! I guess it’s nice to be in the Emirates during Ramadan!

Happy with full tummy's!

Eating Gold!

Of course we had to taste the gold dusted dessert cakes! Really, I couldn't taste it at all! But the kid said it tasted, ummm, not good. But who is complaining when you're eating gold?!

All in all, not a bad meal! I would recommend Emirate's Palace for a visit for everyone of course, and  having ramadan there was just an extra bonus! 

Ciao for now!

Here's Looking at You, Kid!

Yay! Morocco! I've always wanted to visit Morocco and I am so excited that me and the kid finally made it! Even though the airfare was a tad on the expensive side for spring and there could have been a chance of cheaper tickets at a later date, I really really wanted to go NOW! So, like the spoiled child my momma tried not to make me, I spent the money and here we are!

*Just FYI, this blog is a scrapbook of sorts for me. So I can keep track of everything I'm doing and what has happened. I can look back in a few years and be like, yea, look where I've been. So this trip is chock full of photos! Hope you enjoy them. And you can always just page down quickly until something catches your eye!

2 happy campers headed to Morocco!

We flew with Qatar airlines which was quite nice except we had a 7 hour layover in Doha!! Once we arrived in Doha, we went to the transfer desk, and there was some sign about hotels which I didn't understand. The lady took our tickets and clacked away on the computer for awhile then said, "I'm sorry but we don't seem to have a hotel reservation for you." I told her that we didn't have a hotel booked and she said, "but ma'am, your flight doesn't leave til 2am!" Luckily, we were able to purchase visa's for about $55 and we headed into town. The taxi dropped us at this huge square building and said go inside. We went in, and there were all these little shops and cafes.

Blurry but shows the air before the sandstorm.

A fountain inside the artists studio building.

The side of a building.

So we looked around, bought some souvenirs and then, suddenly while we were eating, a sandstorm hit! And I mean it came out of nowhere! Suddenly people were running all over, a bunch of folks came into our restaurant, employees took masks out from somewhere. The sand was hitting the windows so hard you could hear them cracking.

Folks disappeared quick! 

Had to wrap up just to breathe!

Taxi ride in a sandstorm!

Because of this, of course, our flight was delayed! I don't know if it was better or worse that they boarded the flight, but then had us sitting there at the jetway for forever!

But, at last, we arrived in Casablanca!! Where I rented a car (the answer to your question is, yes! I am crazy! Driving in Morocco!!) and, ask me if I knew the car was a stick shift, which I haven't driven in a million years! And we drove off to explore! I didn't even stall out, thank you very much!

Renting the car!

 So, apparently, they rent you a car with an empty gas tank, so you can return it empty, too! We barely made it to the gas station! Literally, the car was sputtering because it took forever to find a gas station. We kept stopping and asking people who only spoke french and they didn't understand the word "petrol". I thought that's how they said it in French but I guess not!

So, I guess you wait for the green light in the middle of the round about here!

We went to Hassan II Mosque and then to a restaurant to eat before leaving Casablanca for Rabat.

This close to the ocean it was really foggy, but not too cold. Ajenai said it reminded her of San Francisco. We miss fog! I think my hair was also happy to see the fog as it drank it up like a sponge!

I love the architecture here! It is amazing, especially the beautiful mosque's.

I was fascinated by the building. The architecture was completely beautiful of course. I loved all the doors!

I was told that you could see all the way across to the other side! On a clear day of course! There was this guy in the water swimming, of all things! I know his butt was freezing!

Oh yea, so this happened. So it turns out, for some reason, my google maps is really terrible. Like the kid has to move the map with her finger or else it won't move, terrible! It doesn't show landmarks or speak or even have written instructions! I don't know what that's about but we're having a bit of trouble with navigation! We found a good restaurant on TripAdvisor that was near us and set out to find it. Couldn't find it! Map said we were there but we obviously were not. We decided to park and walk around to see if we could find the spot. After 10 minutes, the kid said lets just forget it and drive to Rabat. We go back to our car, and there's a hideous, yellow boot on it! I was like, WTF?! This guy comes out of nowhere and is like, "didn't pay park". And I said where? He pointed vaguely down the block which showed no sign of any sort of parking meter contraption. He said, " you call." and then he started to write down something on his hand. I am not gonna lie, I almost started crying at this point! I haven't even been in the country 24 hours yet! And this! I took out my phone and asked him to dial the number. He puts a 50 into the phone. I just stare at him like, call this? And he says, "you give me". Ahhhhh, I got it... it's a shakedown! And luckily for me, 50 Moroccan dirham is about $5 bucks! So this ended with a win! I am going to be totally paranoid about parking this car the rest of the trip now!

Luckily, we found a restaurant and the food was delicious! And it had an attached bakery that was to die for! So of course I bought way more sweets then we could actually eat!

One of the main reasons I wanted to drive was to see the beautiful country side of Morocco! All along the way we kept seeing herds of sheep,with sheep herders too! I've seen lots of sheep on roads in different countries, but I've never seen people with the herds! And most of these sheep herders were women.

Finally made it to Rabat! Again, I'm amazed by the architecture. I love all the doors here! The buildings look old and kind of run down (probably because I am coming from brand new Abu Dhabi!) but the doors are so beautiful!

In Rabat we stayed in the heart of the Medina. Medina's are like huge outdoor shopping areas, but they also are full of houses. So you could have your shop right below your home. And the Medina's are the heart of every city!

Our next stop was the jewel city of Chefchaouen. I was dying to get to this town even if it was waaaay up north in Morocco. It is known as the "blue city". And it is a place where people of Jewish, Muslim, and Christian faiths resided in peace as exiles from Spain. The architecture is reminiscent of all 3 faiths; the blue paint from Judaism, the open interior courtyards from the European Christians, and the domes and minarets from the Muslims.

The drive was not that long and surprisingly easy; "first on the left and straight on until morning"! (Peter Pan for those who couldn't figure it out! lol)

When my leg got a cramp I pulled over to the side of the road. We saw this beautiful overgrown grave site and a road that curved into nowhere.

And we drove around the curve in the road, and the town of Chefchaouen opened up before us! It was an incredible sight!

Welcome to Chefchaouen! The door into the town.

Of course, even with a paper map and a bad google map app, I got lost! So we called the couple we were staying with and said "help!" And the lovely Ricardo offered to come and get us!

Watching some lovely boys play futball while we wait for Ricardo to pick us up!

Our room is so cute! The bottom floor of the house has 4 rooms which are rented out to Air B n B. There is a shared bathroom and WC. Their is an open air dining room on the roof and the tippy top level is the owners apartment.

Love this view!

This is the open dining area.

The stairs leading down to our room.

The view outside my window!

The sign to look for to find our home!

Ok, so, this was a loooong time coming! Of course I have 100's more photos and commentary and I will get those out as soon as I can!

Ciao for now!