Nutin Much- Really

So, I know most of you are at least somewhat peeved at me for not writing anything in almost a month, but really since Mombasa I haven't had much to say that was blogworthy. On the other hand I'm sorry I didn't actually post anything from my Mombasa trip, but I have an excuse. I actually wrote at least four paragraphs about Mombasa, then blogger ate my post before I could post it, at that point I didn't much feel like starting over again, and since then there hasn't been internet access at the house anymore. I'm actually writing this on a mobile broadband connection, interestingly, it's about as fast as any land lines in America... who would've thunk?

I guess I'll give you all the abridged version of my Mombasa trip here, before I leave for Kisumu tomorrow (the second excursion planned by the school /out of a total three). The bus, I should probably say van actually, as what we drove in amounted to a super basic utility van in America, but with some distinctly Kenyan extras. Despite having maybe 18 inch wheels, our van had four wheel drive, no stereo or hvac other than the windows, and those were operated by sliding them, one didn't actually latch closed so there was always a chance that someone might get into the vehicle, and the others were almost impossible to get un-latched. The trunk of the van opened not with a key, but with a square peg that was shoved into the hole where a lock might-used-to have been. The drive was eight (kenyan) hours (longer really) each way. Mombasa road is "probably the best road in the country" but is only two lanes, one each way, with somewhat frequent speed bumps and constant passing through oncoming traffic.

In Mombasa, we spoke a lot of Kiswahili, we went to Shimba Hills Nature preserve, where we went on a nature walk and saw wild elephants out in a valley from one of the most amazing overlooks I've ever seen. The next day we snorkeled on a coral reef and saw "coral gardens" ancient coral that had come out of the water millenia ago, and was now just huge rocks on a mangrove/coral island. We also visited fort Jesus, built by the Portuguese in the 1600s, and had an amazing lunch of local fare. Somehow, dinner managed to be even better though... For dinner, we went on the Tamarind Dhow, an authentic Swahili sailing ship that had been retrofitted to serve 5star food to Wazungu (foreigners). We had five courses and drinks, and listened to the rather talented live muzak/reggae band. I had prawns, many of us had lobster, or the seafood jumble. Other than lunch earlier in the day, I have to go back probably to Fulton's crabhouse for a comparable meal, and this probably has it beat.

Then we came home, again, a very long car ride, wherein we were all laughably first world, with our iPods almost the whole time.

Since then, I've also spent a day rock climbing, at Lukenya, some cliffs about a half hour out of town on mombasa road. It was incredible, I essentially had never climbed anywhere but a gym before, but adding this to the fun that I had this spring in the gym, I think I might have a new long term love.

In other not really news, Kenyans love Reggae, I'm totally o.k. with that- it makes for a lot of fun clubbing. Perhaps no-one I've met likes reggae as much as my host brother Kimathi, who runs a private car service and had outfitted literally all of his vehicles with at least one sub-woofer, and the luxury vehicles with x-boxes.

In summary, Kenya is a lot of fun, Mombasa was a lot of fun, classes are good, and the real revelation is probably just that life here isn't all that different from life at K, although that's largely a function of being in the same socio-economic class as at home, probably a bit higher relatively speaking. About the biggest difference between here and home is that at K I can get to class in literally two miniutes if I run, from anywhere on campus, and here it takes me the better part of two hours, more sometimes, each way to get to class from home.