Safaris: are they really like “The Lion King”?

Long before I arrived in Kenya, I knew I wanted to partake in the quintessential safari experience. I would have even tried it whilst in Zanzibar but the prices that were being quoted out there were far too outrageous. So of course, I was going to hop and skip at a reasonably priced option once I got here. Now, we were having a discussion at the house the other day, since some of the housemates that were here before me had already been on safari trips (I really ought to stop calling it that as “safari” is Kiswahili for “long journey” so adding the word “trip” is rather redundant). According to some of them, going on safari was like being in “The Lion King”; now that’s a comparison I hadn’t heard before. For you Disney lovers out there, you have to agree with me when I say that Lion King has to be an all time favourite. So that comparison just cemented the fact that I had to experience this adventure firsthand and decide whether or not it was a fair one. So, brimming with excitement and bright-eyed with expectation, I embarked on this adventure last weekend. I will now attempt to relay my experience to you and let you decide if it really is like “The Lion King”.
Day 1 – Friday 10th July
I left the house bright and early to head to the Fadhili office where I was to meet other enthusiastic safari chums and get on a bus to head towards Maasai Mara (essentially the safari district). By way of background, Fadhili has a safari service, which is what I signed up for. Each weekend, volunteers are driven out to the Kenyan countryside to see animals of all kinds in their natural habitat (those who sign up for it obviously). I signed up for the 4-day safari, which included a day trip to the infamous Lake Nakuru and a 3-day stay at the Maasai Mara National Reserve.
Soon after I arrived, two American ladies (also volunteers) turned up and announced that they were going on the same trip as me. We soon found out that the group going out on safari that day was going to be just the three of us; I was abit apprehensive about this as well as it turned out that they were sisters in law who were volunteering out in a remote village in Maasai-land (though we did end up getting along fairly well). The next are of concern fact was that Fadhili had outsourced our trip to another safari company as it was only 3 of us and since there is a big group going out next week, they’d decided to give the safari team a weekend off. Now, as we understood it, half the fun of the safari experience was having a fun, charismatic guide and the Fadhili guy is that and more. We had no idea who this new guide was, so we just prayed that things would work out. In any case, it was just the three of us so we planned on just telling him what we wanted to see if we thought he wasn’t delivering the goods. It turned out that not only was he uncharismatic but he also appeared stoned and soon enough started to make inappropriate comments. It was still three against one so we were not that perturbed. We commenced our drive to the countryside; the plan was to go to Lake Nakuru first, spend the night at a hotel there and head out to Maasai Mara the next day. The drive was uneventful save a stop to stretch our legs at a spot that had a splendid view of the Rift Valley. It’s possibly the largest valley view I’ve ever seen and the road we were driving on was close to the cliff below which the valley lay. We got to Lake Nakuru around late afternoon and soon made our way to the animal reserve. It wasn’t long after we drove into the park, with the roof of our van partly open that started spotting baboons (which have the most grotesque looking rears, a stark contrast to their cute faces), warthogs (with me screaming “pumbaa” in the background which of course scared them away), zebras, impalas and gazelles (both of the antelope family), giraffes, water buffalos, some lionesses with their cubs (who were so very cute; we were no more than 5 metres away from them) and white rhinos. We made our way to the lake itself where we saw far more flamingos across the water than I have ever seen in my life. It was truly picturesque; there were also some very huge pelicans amongst them (I hadn’t actually seen pelicans before) and a few other birds whose names escape me now. Dusk soon came upon us and we retired to our hotel where I had a room to myself (for the first time in 6 weeks; abit eerie actually). There was a hot shower as well, woohoo! Dinner was not particularly exciting but I hit the sheets with a smile on my face cause all in all it was a good day
Day 2 – Saturday 11th July
We had a reasonable lie-in and didn’t leave the hotel till about 9.30am. The drive to Maasai Mara was fairly long although Kenya’s countryside is beautiful so at least we had good scenery to go with it. We drove through fields and fields of acacia trees, saw several hills; villages and settlements cropped up sporadically; we drove through some small towns which were usually a cluster of shops and houses. The roads were a mixture of tarred ones and dirt (very dusty) ones. We did a stopover for lunch in a town called Narok, which was halfway to Maasai Mara from Nakuru. We arrived at our campsite in Maasai Mara around late afternoon. The tents were semi permanent, had comfortable beds and even hot showers (again! yay!); it was all very exciting. We threw our bags down and headed for the National Reserve (which was very nearby). That afternoon we saw ostriches, more water buffalos, more impalas and gazelles, hartebeests (also of the antelope family but a lot bigger than the rest), wildebeests (strange-looking things; they have faces like cows, horns like deer, manes like horses and bodies shaped like those of donkeys; they are quite unattractive. Once a year, around late June/early July they migrate from Tanzania into Kenya, where the grass is apparently greener and head back to Tanzania around September/October; we saw flocks of them throughout our time at the Mara and even though the migration is complete they still move in large groups), birds of all sorts, elephants, more zebras, more giraffes, more lionesses resting and a leopard (which our guide pronounced “layoopard”; we were quite excited about this as one hardly sees them in the Mara. Tired and in much need of grub and some rest, we headed back to campsite. We caught a great view of the sunset juxtaposed against some hills. Dinner was excellent: rice, chapatti (hurray! You guys must be sick of my chapatti rave by now), nyama choma (Kiswahili for roast meat; goat meat in this instance), vegetables and lots of tea. We retired to bed (after nice, long, hot showers) around 8.30pm but it was so worth it as we were quite tired and had a rather early start the next morning
Day 3 – 12th July
The day started with breakfast at 6.30am: sausage, toast, pancakes, eggs and lots of tea. We were hoping to see a hunt of sorts today, as we’d pretty much seen most, if not all the animals that inhabit the Mara. After driving around for about an hour, we saw a bunch of lionesses, think there were six of them in total, feasting on what used to be a wildebeest. Right next them, a lion lay majestically (he was quite a sight to behold; flawless coat and a huge, glorious mane; I was thinking this simba (Kiswahili for lion) does look the part of “king of the jungle”. Once the lionesses were done eating, he ate the leftovers (only fair as the lionesses usually do the hunting and with wildebeest aplenty after the migration, its now feasting season for them). When he was done, the vultures took over the remnants of the feast, fighting amongst themselves for the leftovers; feisty, greedy things they are! The stench of the dead beast and stale blood became strong and we headed to another part of the Mara. We soon saw some cheetahs resting in the fields, good-looking animals they are; closer to cats than lions; if only they were not so menacing! Of course with a van of women, we had to stop right in the middle of the wild for a loo break, very alert and on the lookout for lions and such; needless to say it was a hurried affair for each of us . We had lunch at a safe spot and some frisky monkeys nearby offered some amusement. Another source of amusement for me, and it had started to build up since the start of the journey, were the sisters in law who were now very comfortable around me and were taking to bickering and taking shots at each other in the way that only people with familial ties can. It did get a little nasty at times but I did well to stay out of it. They were two grown women after all. Anyway, once we were done with lunch, we were off to see the Mara river, which serves as home to some hippos (boy do they smell bad) and crocodiles (very big ones I might add). We then went over to see the border between Tanzania and Kenya; on the Tanzania side was the Serengeti and of course we were in the Mara on the Kenya side. Near the border we saw a black rhino (if only its rear; they usually live in the forest as they feed on shrubs and roots of trees). We saw more of some of the animals that we’d seen over the last few days during our drive to exit the Mara. On the way out, our guide announced that we had the option to go see a Maasai village where a donation would be required of us (we understood this to mean that we could give any amount out of the goodness of our hearts but soon found out that there was actually a “fixed” fee for seeing the village – we paid far more than any other volunteers, certainly the ones I live with, had paid before). Seeing the village was quite the experience for me: the Maasai people are very simple and live in houses (well huts really) made of mud and sticks. The men are usually cattle herdsmen (we soon found out that in families, the father decides, rather randomly, who gets to go to school and who gets to herd cattle when the boys are still young). The village grounds was covered in cow dung, which meant that there were flies everywhere, more flies than I’ve ever seen in one place. They are so used to the flies that the children’s faces and bodies are covered with them and at any one point there are at least thirty flies hovering around one person. The children traipse around in dishabille while the mothers cook, etc. Apparently the Maasai choose to live this way as it’s the way their forefathers lived many years before them and its one of the few cultures that has remained unchanged for centuries. We were welcomed into the village with song and dance, which was nice; shown around and soon ushered to the curio stand where we made some purchases. After that, there was quite an embarrassing exchange, which highlighted that the “donation” was actually fee; we made the payment and were on our way. Frankly the experience was quite disturbing for me; I couldn’t get over the kids with flies! I mean all they have to do is clear up the cow dung on the ground, burn a few leaves from the forest, which act as insect repellent and that would take care of it; why would they choose not to?? With that rather morbid end to our day and a cold and flu creeping up on me (I wasn’t sure if my new friends, who admitted that they were recovering from an infection, or excessive inhalation of dust was to blame for this), I hit the sheets soon. I didn’t sleep well cause the flu got pretty bad that night

Day 4 – 13th July
Yet another early start today: 6.30am with no breakfast, we headed straight to the reserve. I did well to take more medication before heading out as what was a sore throat last night was now turning into a cough that came with a nice headache. Anyway, not long after we drove through the gates of the reserve, we spotted a lion and lioness that seemed hungry. We (and a host of other people) hovered in our vans waiting for them to attack a bunch of wildebeest, which they appeared to have been eyeing for a while. After about a 20-minute wait, they charged at the wildebeest (it was really exciting to watch) though they did not get there in time to attack any of them. It was worth it though. Now after seeing some of the animals umpteen times, we were over it! So we drove back to the campsite, had some breakfast and got in the van to drive home. I was pleased at what I’d seen during the 4 days; the illness kind of put a dent on things towards the end but at least I got to sleep most of the way back home. By mid afternoon we were back in Nairobi. I had enough energy to run a few errands but soon found my bed and called it a day

All in all, safari was fun for me! I will leave you to decide if it was deserving of the comparison my housemates made to “The Lion King”

Getting busy

As promised, I want to give some colour on the work I’m involved in out here in Nairobi. It is worth clarifying that I signed up for volunteer work in Nairobi via an organisation called International Volunteers Headquarters (IVHQ). This organisation affiliates with NGOs and charities on the ground in several countries. One of such NGOs is the Fadhili organisation, which I may have already mentioned in previous posts. Fadhili runs its own projects in Nairobi but also affiliates with sister NGOs who do not have direct links to organisations such as IVHQ, usually because they are too small. IVHQ essentially recruits the volunteers and Fadhili places them on various projects in the city and provides accommodation and other services.
Transform a person Africa (TAPA) is one of the Fadhili-affiliated NGOs and the main one I’m working with during my time in Nairobi. As the name suggests, its broad aim is to transform the lives of some of the folks who live in good old Kibera by providing education for disadvantaged children (some of whose parents are living with HIV and AIDS), sustainable sources of income for disadvantaged adults (mostly women) and for said sources of income to simultaneously help the NGO become self-sufficient

The TAPA educational centre is where most of our work is done. It’s situated right on the outskirts of Kibera and consists of a couple of offices (with the necessary mod cons) and a school building. The school is a nursery for 1 – 5 year olds who have been orphaned or considered vulnerable by virtue of their living circumstances (orphaned and vulnerable children – OVC, they’ve been labelled). Extensive research is done to ascertain whether or not one qualifies to be classified as an OVC. The school has about 40 kids attending for now, with plans to expand. Expansion is most likely going to happen through a combination of recruiting more OVCs and opening the school up to non OVCs who will be charged higher fees (apparently this is a model that has worked well for other NGOs but which can only be successful if the school maintains a high quality of education and cleanliness to attract the non-OVCs; for now there are only a couple of non OVC kids at TAPA). The children are taught basic Maths and English to a level where they will be considered fit to join the mainstream education system when they turn 6. They are fed 2 meals, have a couple of hours of sleep and have ample time for playing each day. For some of the children, the food eaten at the educational centre is all they will have for the day and they usually don’t take home any homework. The day starts for them at 8.30am and ends at 4.30pm. The children are an absolutely delightful bunch and I thoroughly enjoy working with them; most of them understand when spoken to in English though they don’t speak very much of it. The teachers teach in Swahili and English and for all intents and purposes, the volunteers act as teaching assistants so don’t usually have to control the class (vastly different from my experience in Zanzibar). Most of the kids are reasonably bright for their age and pretty much pick up whatever they are taught straight away; so as teaching assistants, we (the volunteers) try to spend a reasonable amount of time with those that require more attention, which hopefully means that each kid gets more out of their classroom experience. We also help to feed them at meal times, play with them and help in keeping the school surroundings clean. I have spent the bulk of my first week here working with the children

The project manager and founder of TAPA is a Kenyan chap who has spent most of his life working in the private sector and gave up that life to set up this NGO. He has an ebullient disposition, is passionate about the work and is very open to ideas and constructive criticism. His income generating ideas under implementation (and in some cases still work-in-progress) so far include the following:
1.Hand-made cards designed with authentic Kenyan curios, which get sold at hotels, churches and any other retail outlet that is willing to sell them. They are of reasonably high quality and produced by young women (mostly aged late teens to early twenties) from the slum. We (the volunteers) assist with the card production process, a process which taps our creative abilities to an extent
2.Sewing and hawking children’s school uniforms in and around Kibera – this idea is still yet to be fully launched though as I understand it, most of the equipment needed is being purchased and it should be rolled out fairly soon. The plan would be to train a handful of women in the sewing trade and start them off.
3.Subsistence farming for vegetables and other basic foods – this is a good way to help some of the families to afford a decent, well-balanced diet. TAPA provides the seedlings and other required farming gear. In fact some of the food prepared at the school for the kids come from this farming initiative
4.A micro-finance initiative to help some of the women with small businesses; essentially, they each have to contribute a small amount of money on a weekly basis from the earnings they make. They then have access to these funds should they need short term loans for their business ventures (said loans are given at reasonable interest rates). The businesses in question include: street food vending, hawking second-hand clothes, providing cleaning services (mostly for homes), hairdressing salons, etc

Most of these initiatives seem to be working very well and the families that are involved are seeing some improvement in their living conditions – at the very least most of them can now afford decent meals and are not looking to be kicked out of their homes any time soon. With adequate funding, perhaps more ideas could be implemented and some of these initiatives expanded to touch more lives. Of course, having self-sufficiency as one of its aims, TAPA should be able to get there either way

TAPA also affiliates with other organisations that do other forms of direct work regarding HIV and AIDS patients. As one can imagine, the disease is pretty rampant in the slum and one sad aspect of things is that given the lack of education and pervasive ignorance, HIV and AIDS patients are often stigmatised and even ostracised. They have to grapple with that in addition to poverty, mal-nutrition, unhygienic environs and the plethora of misfortunes that come with slum life. Some of these organisations therefore set out to help by providing counselling to those individuals who have been tested and have come forward to seek help. Unfortunately the stigma aspect of HIV and AIDS, as mentioned above, is one of the biggest factors why some people don’t even get tested. Not nearly enough people get tested, not to mention those that opt to seek help once they find out. Its even more sad to note that HIV testing AND anti-retroviral drugs are free in Kenya so there is actually nothing standing in one’s way of getting full medical assistance when afflicted with the disease. One obvious next step is to start widespread education on the disease in the slums so that these negative perceptions fall away and hopefully this will mean that less people will contract the disease henceforth

Nairobi: First Impressions

The two-hour flight to Kenya was uneventful, save the breathtaking view of Mount Kenya from the skies. I even arrived at the Jomo Kenyatta airport in Nairobi ahead of schedule and breezed through immigration and customs. I sauntered out of the airport, all smiles, expecting to be met by a representative of the organisation I was going to be working for – Fadhili (email traffic from the previous week assured me that this would be the case) and after a careful scan of the crowd at the airport, I was sure that there was no one there to meet me. Unpanicked and pushing my trolley full of suit cases (those of you who know me well know that travelling light is just not my style; I mean I try but just end up packing a lot of stuff; well this trip is no different though I do have every intention of, and I’ve already started, giving most of the stuff away before returning to the UK), I equipped myself with the necessary phone gear and made some phone calls which thankfully, revealed the fact that the rep was running late. I took the opportunity to check out some of the shops at the airport; it’s a medium sized airport and there were a few book and curio shops to keep me occupied in the 45 minutes I ended up waiting for. The rep arrives and announces that we have to wait another 3 hours or so for the other 16 volunteers that are due to arrive the same day before dropping us all off at different host homes (just for the one night as we had a day of orientation the next day). I wasn’t particularly tired from the trip and though I didn’t mind the wait, it would have been nice to be told beforehand that this was to be the sequence of events on arrival.
Anyway, everyone shows up and we finally leave the airport nearly 4 hours after I touched down. We left the airport and must say, that I was very unprepared for the cold weather outside. It must have been no more than 10 degrees Celsius and there I was in a polyester blouse still coasting off the lovely warm weather in Zanzibar. My wardrobe is not equipped with very much for this sort of weather and I’m told July is the coldest month of the year; shame I didn’t find out before. Driving through the city, we got to see a bit of it in the night-light; it was pretty late at night at this stage, close to 11 I think. We drove through what must be the industrial section of Nairobi; it had a lot of factories and warehouses, so not particularly exciting. It was interesting to note that most of the petrol stations had fast food joints, mini markets and pharmacies attached to them (things are not this fancy in Accra, I’m thinking). All in all, it looked pretty well developed. Some of the other volunteers had been on long flights from North America, Europe and New Zealand and after my 4-hour wait at the airport I was beginning to feel some of their tiredness. I was placed with another girl in a host home for the night. Now, remember my Nungwi cockroach encounter? Well I think that happened to stand me in good stead for my experience on this night for as soon as I was shown my bed, there was one cheeky little cockroach in the middle of it staring me in the face. Of course I killed it and got on with my sleep but it was not a nice way to end my first evening
The next day proved better. Orientation was geared at getting us all familiar with the dos and don’ts in this hectic city; introducing us to some of the work/ projects we’d be working on and also providing an opportunity to meet the Fadhili staff and other volunteers. There are 48 volunteers in total (apparently the largest number to arrive in one month) mostly aged 18 – 21, majority of who are female. The project manager was quite entertaining and fed us with one anecdote after the other as we went through the agenda for the day. The rest of the staff was very friendly too, making us all feel right at home. Lunch was pretty good: chapatti/roti (yay! :)), beef stew, rice and vegetables. We also did a short walk around the vicinity, visited a rather fancy mall called Nakumatt (I’m told there’s a couple of these around town) and got to see a bit more of the city. Like any other busy metropolis, it was buzzing with traffic and pedestrians. There were different kinds of buses that one could take to various places. In the centre most part of the Nairobi dwells the Central Business District (CBD) where all the corporates and state houses live; its quite impressive: high rise buildings, good roads and the infamous Uhuru Park (a large public park). There are special buses that take you to and from the CBD, think they are called Citi Hoppas; they basically look like coach buses. Then there are the Matatus (equivalent of dala-dalas in Zanzibar), which look like mini buses but are fully blinged out: painted with flamboyant colours and covered with pictures of celebrities from across the world; they have no respect for traffic rules and whizz across the streets of Nairobi serving also as offices for pick-pockets. I’m yet to enjoy a ride on one of them and look forward to it :)
That evening, we were all driven to what will be our permanent homes for our stay in Nairobi. Mine was a house in a suburb of Nairobi called Jamhuri (pronounced: jamhuuree) and a stone throw away from Kibera (pronounced: keebayrah). Kibera, as some of you may know, is Africa’s biggest slum; those of you that have seen the film “the constant gardener” would have seen it in all its glory; I will have to furnish the rest of you with photos at some point. Anyway, I digress, there will be more talk of the work I’m involved in here and Kibera in general in my next post. So about the house: it has 5 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, a living and dining area and a kitchen. There are 10 volunteers in total living there as well as our lovely host, her 10 mth old son, her 12 yr old nephew and a lovely young lady who cooks and cleans the house and does laundry. As was the case in Zanzibar, we sleep in bunk beds and share bathrooms but get to have 2 warm showers a week (to keep our host’s electricity bill at a reasonable level). Remember what I said about the cold weather? Well, you can guess what that means for the cold showers! Its no wonder then that some of the volunteers don’t shower often, I’m convinced that one girl hasn’t showered since I got here; I plan on showering once a day at least and I’m keeping to that schedule so far but lets see how long that lasts! We also have to hand wash our clothes, something I spent a good chunk of my years growing up doing and so am comfortable taking it up again; most of the other volunteers pay a small price for someone to do it for them as doing it themselves proves to be quite the challenge. I watched one girl give it a try and she gave up after washing one pair of pants; granted, its pretty hard work!
The project I’ve been assigned to work on is based just on the outskirts of Kibera and my first impressions of it have been good and I’m looking forward to the next 5.5 weeks for that reason. I’ll be in touch soon with more details on the project.