New adventures in the rift valley...

Hey!! Check this out, I’m actually updating while I’m away! Although I think I’ve still missed out on the last week few weeks, but I’ve not done much, at least not that I can remember. I have drunk quite a lot of wine though....

So, onto the write up:
Well, it’s the end of my second day out in the field (as it were). We’ve actually not done a whole lot yet. Yesterday we left the institute at about 8.30am. We drove up and had an early lunch in Nakuru, before carrying on up to Kitale. Then we stopped in Kitale to have coffee at this amazing coffee shop run by an English woman and a Kenyan man. The guy used to be a chef at the Sheraton Hotel in Nairobi (v.v. posh) and cooks amazing food. They own a guest house, and now they have a coffee shop. It’s really good, cyber cafe and a ‘cinema’ (??) and downstairs a library. And you can tell it’s run by an English woman as the toilets (apart from being gender specific) are sit down ones with toilet roll and a mirror, and even soap! Amazing. So anyway, we had coffee there and then continued up to Kapenguria. We’re staying in the hotel we stayed in last time, which overlooks the church and even has hot showers, although I will be testing whether my water has actually got hot in a few minutes. We arrived and then unpacked the landrover, and negotiated use of the kitchen, which is brilliant. Not only that but we have someone who is cooking for us. But last night we had to go out for food. So we got into our rooms at about 5.45, and then I spoke to Sarah on the phone for a while who just wanted to have a rant to another mzungu really. Bless. She’s in Eldoret at the moment and I was hoping to visit on my way back but I’m not sure I’ll be able to now. We had dinner at a place down the road, which was very good even though it was only beef stew and chapatti. Then I had a fairly early night. I think it was about 9ish. I was very tired.

Then we were up and out at 7.15 this morning. We went to another place down the road for chai and mandazi (tea and a puffy doughnutty/croissantey thing), and then went to briefly see the lady at the museum whose name I have forgotten again. It was a very quick chat in which we just said that I would be coming back, probably on Friday as that is when she will be back from her meeting, to start recording the displays, and we’d be having a meeting on Friday with someone else (her boss from NMK from elsewhere) and possibly be there on Monday for something as well I think. Something was happening on Monday but I can’t remember what.
So then we drove, and drove, and drove, and I clung to the rails in the back of the landrover and feared for my life as Matua rally drove us around twisty mountain roads all the way past Morpus (where the rockshelter is), through Marrich and turned back to go down to Sigor which was where the DC is now based. The meeting with him went quick, I think Matt was out by about 10 or just after, but then he was going to have a talk with the local chief who was heading to his office ‘in about 10 minutes’... 10 kenyan minutes that is. Matt finally found him and went for his chat at 12.30! By this point I had already finished my book (Eclipse, third in the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer – wasn’t so keen at the beginning but once Jacob came into it more and Edward stopped being such a twat, and all the action started happening, then it got much better) and then sat people watching for a while. I took a couple of notes to remind myself about them. There were lots of quite young girls very brightly dressed with pleated knee length skirts and luminous lime green or orange kangas wrapped around them with varying degrees of beaded jewellery. Apparently one of the girls who was stood near our car was wearing a necklace which only married women are supposed to wear, but it could have just been something similar and not really the same thing, she looked way too young to be married! Also as we were driving out (Matt let me sit in the front after my fear-ridden ride up there) Matua said it was their uniform, which I suppose it could have been, although all the other school kids were wearing yellow shirts with blue shorts or skirt. These were definitely more traditional Pokot (maybe pastoral from the outskirts rather than kids belonging to town families..?) The boys were the best, they wore brimmed hats which were all varying shades of red, and most had feathers in them (to show they’ve been circumcised? As I asked Emmanuel and why there was a woman with a biiig feather attached to a band around her head, and he said it’s because her sons are circumcised, so perhaps that is why the Pokot boys, and men, wear them as well. Also circumcision might be a possibility with the girls’ jewellery maybe) with a normally brightly coloured shirt, and a skirt. I don’t know what the skirt is technically called, but it appears to be a Maasai blanket or similar, which they have wrapped around as a skirt. Only they are shoooort! It reminded me of the schoolgirls at schools in Britain who roll their school skirts up so that they are very very short, because they were doing the same! One of the guys had a huuuge roll of fabric at the top of his! And damn they have good legs! Talking about legs, there was also a really old man sat under the shade of a tree next to us who got up at one point and I thought his legs looked as though they might snap! They were so thin with knees knobbling out of the middle. Heh, also as we were going to take lunch a police car rolled up, a pick-up type thing, with the back absolutely heaving with people. All passengers! I wonder if the police were getting some money in or just doing their good deed for the day. The latter doesn’t really seem to fit with Kenyan police but they looked like fairly nice guys actually.

So anyway, then we went for lunch. We had chai, maragwe (beans) and chapatti. Yums, Although the beans were rather hard. I also had the pleasure of wandering off to find a toilet and ended up at the back of the market which was the only one in the area. I really wanted to have a wander around the market and pick up a bargain or two. I could easily fill my bags with brightly coloured kangas to bring home with me. But then I forget, being amongst all these brightly dressed people, that people in the UK tend to wear black. And grey. And maybe some dark reds or purples as well. It’s bad enough wearing my red monsoon skirt – I usually stick out a mile. But no, I went back to the hoteli for lunch instead. But when we left we were running a bit late, and I got to sit in the front so I didn’t mind anyway. We also picked up the lady who runs the Marrich Pass campsite and gave her and all her food a lift back. She’s very lovely. So friendly and sweet, waving at everyone she recognised, and even those she didn’t. There was a police post on the road to the campsite and the policeman had to move the road block to let us past, and she smiled and asked him how he was (habari yako?) and he just blanked her. She huffed a little and said ‘well, i always feel I have to say something!’ Heh.
Then we went to Morpus and had a look at the rock shelter that we’ll be excavating. I’m actually looking forward to it a bit more. The stratigraphy as seen from the gully cutting through it is very interesting. Although it’s a lot smaller than I envisaged. But yeah, it looks good. We’ll see how I get on anyway. He went down to layers about 180 years BP last time (for the uninitiated –mum- that’s Before Present, which technically stands at 1950 so it’s actually 180 years before 1950) but hopes that one of them that he was pointing out in the strat which wasn’t too far down, will be about 500 bp. You can see where the old trench was still, and because the small area that is left is eroding away still we’re going to extend it out to the gully so we can try find the interesting layers seen in the strat. Marvellous.
So, tomorrow we start on that. But then it was getting on for 5pm so we came back to Kapenguria. I was immediately sent out on a shopping trip (yay! Oh, not that kind of shopping) to buy supplies for the coming week. Finally got back at about 6.30 but no one was around, although Leila had arrived, so I went back out with Emmanuel, Chris (guy from NMK) and Matua to try to find Matua some cigarettes. Matua was being nervous about going up to ask at a shop as he thought it was embarrassing to ask if they didn’t have any, so I said I would do it, but he came up with me and asked himself. I think he found it easier with someone else there so he could pretend that maybe they were for me! They didn’t have but he go directions, so him and Emmanuel went off to find them while Chris and I walked back to the hotel as it was getting close to dinner time. Just after I got back Leila came up looking for her bag, so I accompanied her downstairs with it on the way to dinner. The lady had cooked really good food for us. The meat was really yummy, proper good stuff and only chewy in a couple of places, and in a really amazing sauce. Mmmm. And sakuma wiki (a greens a bit like cabbage but takes longer to cook) and ugali. I even went back for seconds of ugali! Well of everything really. But I would usually have avoided the ugali,. I found that dipping it in salt and mushing it around in my fingers really improved the flavour.

Anyway, now I have come back to my room, found that I have no hot water and am just about ready to drop off completely. I’ll get online quick to send this and then sleep. So tired and we’re having breakfast at 6.30 tomorrow morning. Ah, don’t you just love excavations.

Night folks!