Last week in Mombasa

So the month of July has turned out to be by far the busiest abroad, and I apologize for not having posted earlier. As a result, I'll update you all on what happened after our little coastal party, and dedicate Rwanda to a seperate post.

4 new volunteers had arrived on the coast when I got back from Malindi, but two of them had to leave the very next day because of some sort of flight confusion which forced them to return to Nairobi for the remaining week of their stay. I was left with Venkatesh and Ivana, as well as a group of 4 girls that came down for a vacation on the weekend of the 10th. The two volunteers were placed at mama hope's baby centre while I remained at Chanukeni on my own. The thursday and friday before the weekend, I managed to get a good bit done at the centre, and fertilized some of my fledgeling plants, as well as helped to cook for the children again. There was also a little girl named Mwanalilu, who I'd noticed hadn't been wearing a uniform for the past couple of weeks. She had actually been absent from the centre for most of my time there, but recently came back from a visit to one of her parents in Zanzibar, Tanzania. Mama Uji (the woman running the centre if I haven't clarified that before) told me that her mother simply did not have the 500ksh to pay for the uniform. The new uniform was sitting in the school waiting for her, so I found it easy to rectify this problem and bought her the uniform. It put quite a smile on the face of this little girl who's big brown eyes and intense gaze gave a hint of the many hardships she's been through.

The weekend arrived far too quickly, as the previous 7 have, and it was time to make some plans to give a little taste of the coast to the new volunteers. We organized a trip to Shimoni for Saturday, similar to the previous one that I took with my host dad to see Wasini Island and the slave caves. This one, however, was organized as a safari and we intended to visit the marine park to do some snorkelling among the corals in Kisite Marine Park. We arrived in beautiful Shimoni village to board our dhow (like a 30 foot arabian sea vessel, which has sails but also a motor if needed) On the way to the marine park, we all decided we would pay a little bit extra to do the fun dive, which is a choice I am thankful I made every day since. There were four of us along with the guides and boat crew, so we split up into two groups of two. The one hour snorkelling tour was great, and we got so see some stunning marine and coral life, but it was the 30-45 minute dive that took my breath away. We got to dive down 8 metres(24 feet) and swim around at the base of the coral reef. The utter silence and the plethora of colourful fish and plant life at this depth is hard to accurately describe unless you've done something similar. It was like being on another planet. We swam up to some enormous eels, almost touched manta rays, glided along strange looking corals and saw an old underwater research marker that resembled an eerie totem long forgotten. The next day, we did a city tour of Mombasa, and I took the same three volunteers to Fort Jesus and Old Town. We had a very good guide for this particular tour named Mr Thoya, who was very patient with us, and was with us for the entire day. He showed us around Old Town and pointed out some of the older, more noteworthy landmakrs, then led us to a restaurant with great local Swahili food..and at the end he took us to a cheap souvenir shop with incredibly good prices. For all this, he only charged us 200ksh each (not even 4 dollars) so we gave him a nice tip, took his phone number, and promised to send future volunteers his way. I find that tourism really is another great way to give to the community. If you find a guide that performs a quality tour at an affordable price, you have the power to send more tourists (volunteers in our case) their way and ensure that they continue to find business and are able to support their families.

I spent a few more days at Chanukeni before I moved to Nairobi on the 16th of July. Some more volunteers from Camp Kenya were working at the centre for the few remaining days that I was there. They were finally putting up the additional classroom, office, and kitchen beside the existing school building. They also finished most of the fence while I was there, but I'm not sure if that particular group was planning on finishing the buildings...I have a feeling those would remain incomplete for at least another few months since the groups typically only came once a month for 3 or 4 days because they had commitments to other villages. I collected a bunch of contact information for Mama Uji and her the committee who oversaw the school. I found out from Cosmas, my NGO's program coordinator for the coast, that she already had a CBO (community based organisation) formed and it would be fairly easy to set up a sponsor relationship for the school. So I will bring this up with the lovely people at TD and see if anything can be done to provide support in the form of meals and/or teachers for the wonderful children at this school :)

I moved back to Nairobi for a couple of days before leaving for Rwanda, and met up with my friends that visited Diani just a couple weeks prior. We were all in the same homestay at Rachel's which was awesome. It was a nice change to be living in a house full of volunteers, especially ones that I already knew so well. I tagged along with a couple of volunteers to their placement in the Kawangware slum nearby. After about a 30 minute walk, we arrived at Wema Nursery and Maternity Ward. I got to mix some antibiotic injections at this small medical clinic, and hear a few of the patient's stories. We did a home visit to one man named Johnston, who had cut his foot three months ago, and instead of seeking medical care, had been recommended a tribal cure which involved placing cow dung in the wound. He let it fester for 3 months before making it to the clinic. By that time, the back of his foot had been eaten away, and his ACL was useless and had to be cut off. So he no longer had a tendon at the back of his foot and would have to be submitted to daily wound dressings with antibiotics...he could barely afford any of this treatment and certainly could not afford to buy any painkillers. Another man, Gershon I believe, had been living with HIV/AIDS for the past 20 years, and had a huge medical bill racked up that he couldn't pay. The doctor and nurses at the centre were understanding, however, and continued to treat him. For the past two years, he had terrible ulcers on his penis, which must have been terribly hard to bear...I was really amazed at how calm and friendly his demeanor always seemed to be. I've noticed just how tough Kenyans can be while working at this clinic, and they put to shame the petty qualms we tend to overexaggerate back at home.

We also got to go out for a bit of fun in Nairobi at night, and caught the new Harry Potter movie at the theatre in Nakumatt Junction. Nakumatt is like the Walmart of East Africa; it's an extremely successful supermarket. I also got to go to a proper gym for the first time since I've come to Kenya, which was very refreshing. I also went to a restaurant called Java for some great smoothies and a brownie fudge sundae. Next post coming up will include my weekend journey to Kisumu and then Rwanda :)