Nairobi to Masaai ... unbelievable

Bright and early the ST and I were up with the wakeup call. We chowed down at the WTER (Way Too Expensive Restaurant) then started looking for our guide. There were a handful of safari vehicles queued at the hotel and ours was the white Hiace. Our driver is named William and we set out about 8. The vehicle is all ours so naturally there is lots of room. It did not take long to get out of Nairobi and the first site was the start of the Rift valley. I believe we were told that the mountains and the valleys go all the way down to Mozambique. It was chilly and there were huge grey clouds in the sky with no blue peaking through. The view was breathtaking (somewhat like an ugly baby in Seinfeld, or Elaine ... do not lobster poach unless you want to wear an orange outfit and garbage pick). We started to descend into the valley as the weather improved but it never really got sunny. We drove for about 4 hours or so and saw very fertile and green countryside which eventually "deteriorated" into some very harsh terrain indeed. We saw gazelles, impala, donkey, goat, lamb, cow, and baboon. We took lots of pics and on many occasions were on some very rough road. Our "luck" ran out about an hour before we arrived as we were informed the good road was about to end. From time-to-time, William would stray from the dirt road to follow obviously what he had learned to be a smoother track in the dirt. All along the way we saw locals who were most happy to wave and smile as we passed. We did our best to make out what William was saying but often were unable to decipher due to the noise of the vehicle and terrain. We finally got to the masaai gates and while waiting to enter, we were swarmed by 2 then 4 native women peddling their wares. Once they saw the green, the necklaces as well as the bracelets came out, ST gave them $10 for 2 strings of bracelets and a ring. They were so hot to sell something and I eventually had to start closing the window on their arms to get them to let us proceed. A mere 15 minutes into masaai and we got to our lodge, a very nice tent-based hardwood floor development called the Sarova Mara. The tent (number 35 to boot ... nothing but double chai [minus 1] for the Jewish couple) is about 10 by 3 metres and quite spacious. It has a king bed, a private bath, a table for me to put on my face, and a balcony. It is very nice. We are here for 2 nights. We chowed down in the mess hall at a nice buffet and quaffed 2 local beers called Tusker. They were nice with no after-taste ... yippeee! I am by the pool and ST is walking. At 3:30 we are due to hit the trails for our first of at least 8 other journeys this week to see the wildlife. If we are lucky we may even see the wild Borgies. A mere 6 months ago we could have only dreamed about a safari. Lo and behold, here we are, about 225 kilomtres south of Nairobi and bound to be out and about in some very new surroundings over the next 5 days. By the way, how many times have you been traveling and regardless of where you end up staying, there are never enough electrical outlets. This is even more possible the older the hotel. Guess how many outlets we have in Kenya (night one)? Eight ... count-em EIGHT!!!! This is beyond. I spoke too soon; please sit down before reading this ... I have a very sad announcement to make about the electrical outlets ... the power bar fried itself. I had both batteries charging for the cameras and when I tried to plug in the computer there was smoke and the smell of electricity. We will be having a service and sitting shiva for the 8 outlets. We sat in the bar after dinner and listened to a singer to 4 songs on the guitar then take a break. That is a far cry from what Melaku and I saw at Club Alize in Addis a few weeks ago when the band played the whole 2 hours we were there and there was no sign of their stopping. AGain no whirlpool in the toilets at Sarova Mara ... if I cannot confirm the counter-clockwise whirlpool rumour while I am here, I may no be able to come south of the equator again.

Addis to Nairobi

So the day of the trip to Kenya started early. I could not keep my eyes open l last night, so crashed about 9. No wonder I was wide awake at 6AM. The church started broadcasting about 5AM just like it does every Saturday morning. The churches here do this each morning about 6 except for Saturdays. I put the last few things in their respective bags, some stuff coming to Kenya other stuff staying behind at Deker Inn. Dereje picked me up about 8 and off we went to the airport. There was a guy at the bottom of the ramp that asked to see my passport. Dereje was able to carry my bags inside the terminal. Then there was the first x-ray machine at which point the bags were handed off to a porter of sorts. I approached the empty checkin counter at Ethiopian airlines, and the attendant asked me if I had a doctor's certificate to travel. Say what? I have a bruised ligament in my left foot not a set of 12 stitches in my chest as the result of a gunshot wound!! I was told if one asks for a wheelchair, it is company policy that they must ask for this certificate. They told me it was up to the captain if I was allowed to fly without the proper certificate. I politely but firmly voiced my disapproval, and declined the wheelchair. I figured ... no wheelchair, no need for letter from their doctor. I waddled through immigration whom you have to see as well on the way out of the country. I then went upstairs, sharing the elevator with a few guys from Egypt Air who thought my story as ridiculous as I did. We were bussed to the jet about 30 minutes late and off we went. They had back-of-seat screens with movies and the like. The flight was only 100 minutes so it would have been impossible to watch a full movie anyways. I decided to poke around, and everything I tried was "not available for the moment". I settled on watching some of the Taking of Pelham 13 but after selecting that flick, I found myself in the middle of something with Adrian Brody. Never mind, I must have pushed the wrong button on my remote, so selected something else. I ended up in the same Brody movie so gave up. I browsed to one of the online surveys they offered, and decided to see what an Ethiopian survey looks like. It was on checkin and boarding. There were 5 questions and they looked like this: E5 E5 E5 E5 E5 I guess it was not working very well. That's actually a good way to ensure that no negative results are tabulated ... make sure it doesn't work. During the pre-flight announcements I thought I heard something that needed clarification (keep in mind this was a flight less than 2 hours). The attendant said they would be serving lunch ... lunch!!! On such a short flight in North America they stopped serving meals over a decade ago. Air Canada ... you listening? We landed in Nairobi on time then I was wheeled to the immigration area where I bought a visa for $25 USD. There were 2 people who helped me and they were very nice. I dropped a nice tip on them. The car from the Fairmont never showed so I took a $20/20 minute cab ride to the hotel, Guess what ... she is (BIG TIME). We had a too expensive lunch and ST is napping for a short time. She loves her onesie and the silver earrings/necklace set I got her. She also loves the Ethiopian flag shawl as we anticipate it may be cool at night on safari. Initial impressions of Kenya are that it is not as poor as Ethiopia, the people are nice, and they are not as religious. I see lots of women on the street in Addis who keep their heads covered (orthodox Christianity) and have seen none of that here. I saw the Nairobi version of the Addis blue bus ... it's white. They drive on the British side of the road here which I did not know. As of tomorrow at 7:30AM we will be on safari; do not pass go, do not collect $200. By the way the Kenyan schilling is 72 to the US dollar. Also, the "e" in Kenya is short. My next post may be with a giraffe or elephant (zebra or wildebeest EVEN) less than a few hundred metres away. The parks we are going to insist that safari vehicles are docked by sundown so we will not be out much past 8PM if even that late. Thank-you in Swahili is "asante". Asante for reading this out there in BLOG land, and this is both of our first trip south of the equator. There is no whirlpool in the toilet here so I could not verify that it goes counter-clockwise as opposed to clockwise in the northern hemisphere.

Sayonara soon for 7 days

While we are in Kenya, I will not be able to post to the blog. I will batch all the posts since I am taking my EeePC with me. I hope all yaz there out in BLOG land will manage without me :)

The countdown continues

Just over 24 hours until she arrives. She mentioned they messed up her names on the ticket. I guess they thought she was Mrs. Sandy :) That is exactly what happened to me when I first flew to Addis and back. But that ticket was purchased in Addis and her ticket to Nairobi was purchased on Orbitz; not only that, when I bought it I picked her name from the registered list of travelers in my account.For me it was a mess since the first time the Aeroplan computer tried to give me credit, it could not find a hit on Mr. Abbey Michael. I had 4 flight segments that trip and have successfully received credit for 2 of them. My trip from Addis to Frankfurt to Ottawa on September 18 is still missing. I am just about packed for the safari. I will put together a few last minute things after work. There is still a huge amount of interest amongst the locals when ferenge waddles around using the crutches. It has been nothing but sunny and windy here for many many days; the mercury rises to low 20's by noon and the breeze is very refreshing. In the sun it's probably more like 25'ish. What ideal weather.

Hobbling around Addis

Well, it's been different. I was lying on my bed last night watching Gandolfini play the sort of role he was born for. I am now almost done season 5 and can't wait to see ____________. Those underscores are for the sake of people still viewing season 5. For those of you who know, there is quite a turn in one character towards the end of season five. I realized while reclining at Deker that at least for the next 3.5 weeks, I will be spending at least 2.5 of them in my room most of the time. The other week I will be in Kenya with the wife on safari. Beauty, eh? She leaves Ottawa late today and will be in Nairobi Saturday about 7AM local time. She is spending 12 hours on a layover in London so going into town for 8-9 hours of those I expect. Good old Helena gave her an itinerary to follow as ST has never really been to London before. Helena is an old school chum of Sandy's from Montreal (she's not that old really :)), and they are a very bad influence on one another and therefore get along great! I got sign-off for another deliverable at work today, and anticipate getting another one tomorrow. If all goes well, there will be a third next Tuesday. I am away next week, so will prepare the paper work and leave with Tagel for execution. The cast is a nuisance but with properly sized crutches it is not as much of a pain. Four days down and 24 more to go :) People are VERY very nice to ferenge on crutches and very accommodating; not to detract from the way they treat non-crutched ferenge. I have done some packing for my trip with the help of someone at Deker and will finish up tomorrow when I get home from work. I am getting picked up at the guest house Saturday about 8 for a 10AM flight. I am too excited ...

Poor timing, but WTF?

So here we are 6 days away from the safari, and ferenge has a cast on his left foot and is walking with crutches. Only for 4 weeks too :) I went to Yordanos for my regular appointment  today at 2PM. The technician Friday mentioned I would see the doctor today as well which I did. He was not happy with the way the foot was healing (or in this case not healing). He ordered the cast and I managed to score some crutches to rent for 150 birr for however long I need them. Usually the plaster team in emergency puts on casts, but the doctor did mine and one other person's arm. What poor timing but, heh, what can I do? I spoke to Ato Taye who owns the guest house, and he spoke to the woman that works days here. I am going to get up in the AM and get dressed, then she is going to assist "getting stuff ready for work". As well, she will be staying for all the time required Friday after work (she gets off at 6:30 PM) and help me pack for my trip. I have notified both the safari company and the hotel we are staying in about my "condition". The crutches I rented from Yordanos are not the right size, so Tagel will take me in the morning to get some proper sized ones, interestingly enough, at a building supply store ... they specialize in aluminum goods and we know what modern crutches are made of :) This cast is going to put a huge cramp on my activities but "dem dere's da breaks". Melaku came up tonight and we visited after working on his resume for a bit. I told him he could have the guitar while I was away next week if he wanted but he should let me know so he can get it Friday. Metasabya will help me pack up everything I am not taking to Kenya and 2 suitcases, my CPAP machine, and maybe my guitar will stay here during the trip.

Safari preamble

The excitement builds ... everyone who knows what the Sweet Thing and I are up to next week is pumped. I prepared a list of stuff I am taking to Kenya. I will pack my EeePc in my knapsack to offload pictures from the cameras and to pump text into files to upload to the BLOG when we return.

We are bringing very little cash and were told by the safari outfit that US currency dated earlier than 2001 is next to impossible to use in Kenya. I just emailed the form to Nairobi to make the second payment for the trip. I keep hearing as well how unsafe Nairobi is and naturally we will only go to places "approved" by the Fairmont.

I did miss seeing my ST in person October 12 (our 6th anniversary), though we did speak/email/text a gazillion times. I still cannot figure out what to get her to commemorate that magic day, so will probably just get her two oranges and a banana :)

I spoke to Naddy/Lindsay and Ben Abbey yesterday; Annabelle was napping and unable to come to the phone. Ben was on his way back to Toronto and Naddy has been very busy at school. The trip to Toronto for Lindsay for Xerox training was draining but productive. We all must wish her all the best in her new employ :)