Sunday, after a week without internets, some exciting developments

Blog 28/02/10

Well, I haven’t updated for a while. Mainly because we have not had internet at the Guest house since about Tuesday I think, possibly Monday. Anyway, I’ve had to go to Java and places like that to check emails, and as I’m been uber busy with trying to do museum stuff I haven’t had the chance to update. Not that there has been much to update about really.
I’m staying longer, that I think we knew already. Well, technically coming back anyway. I have to pay for my flight as I’m coming home, because they can only pay for one return flight. So I’m thinking end of March or beginning of April I’ll be coming back over here. I’ll have a lot to do to get ready for the opening of the museum, so I’ll need a couple of weeks. As for going back to the UK afterwards, well, that’s anyone’s guess! :) I’m going to be an attachee until the end of May, after which I will go off and do my own research for a couple of weeks. Quite looking forward to planning that. Then I’m not sure really. I’m trying to see if I can stay to do fieldwork. Ignacio is going to Olduvai in July, and if he can get money to fund me then I’ll be going there. I think if that happens then I’ll go back to the UK when that finishes, be around for August, and then go off to Spain if I can afford it. Otherwise, I met Daryl Stump last week, and he’s digging in Engaruka (Tanzania) in July/Aug and might have money for supervisors, so I just have to send him my CV and hope that I come across as supervisor material. And then Ceri Ashley is excavating in August, so I might be able to go and work on that. It all depends really. Hopefully I should have a better idea of what I might be doing and be able to book a flight before I go back to the UK this time.

Right now I am in Makutano again. I caught the bus up to Kitale yesterday and was so glad I had decided to stay in Kitale for the night already. Otherwise I would have had to find somewhere to stay with no preparation as we arrived near enough to 7pm. For a start we were meant to leave Nairobi at 8.30 and we didn’t leave until nearly 9am. Then we seemed to be going really slow a lot of the time, and we ended up sat in traffic, I think because the road was closed, and as it had been raining there was a huuuge puddle on the dirt diversion road which meant only single file traffic, and I wouldn’t be surprised if someone had been stuck at some point as well, making it an even longer queue. Then we stopped in Nakuru and Eldoret along the way. We didn’t arrive at Eldoret until quite late so I figured it might still be a while, and then at about 4.30 we stopped on the side of the road. I didn’t know what was going on for a while, but in the end my legs needed stretching and we’d been sat there for a while so I got off the bus (quite a few people had already). It seems that we had somehow hit a car. Well, there was a car parked in front of the bus, with a large red paint smeared dent in the side at the back (the bus was red & white). It seemed that the car passengers were rather angry, and neither party wanted to admit it was their fault. Finally they exchanged details and we got on the road again sometime after 5.15pm! I was contemplating catching a matatu, and one had stopped and picked up one guy and still had space so was waiting around to see if anyone else was going to join him when it was all sorted and we were being ushered back onto the bus.

So that was a fun journey. When I arrived in Kitale I was offered a taxi, and I didn’t even haggle on the price. Probably should have done, it was about right by Nairobi standards but I believe it probably should have been cheaper up here. Anyway, it got me to the Karibuni Lodge, which is a charming backpackers place run by an English lady and a Kenyan guy. Oh arse, low battery and now the power has gone. Anyway, as I was saying, lovely place. I had a single room which was 1300ksh including breakfast. Fairly pricey, but it was beautiful. They do have dorms and I think camping too so next time if I’m on a tight budgie I might stay in the dorm or camp. My room was off down a little dirt track. It was like a banda, but made from a wooden frame with woven matting walls, and I think bamboo or something like that for the roof, but I can’t really remember. It was lovely, really nicely decorated with lots of calabashes and lanterns and stuff. The bed was a double and had lovely cushions and a really nice warm looking blanket over the duvet (it did get a bit nippy at night). It had lamps on either side, and a light switch for the overhead lights dangling above the bed so you didn’t have to go all the way to the door to turn it off. It had a decent mirror and a hanging space with hangers for clothes, and this was all cordoned off in the bedroom compartment through a door. The main door to the room led into a little area with tea & coffee making facilities (if I’d stayed longer and had milk I would have taken advantage) as well as drinking water, all on a little desk with a plug socket which already had an adapter there in case of different plugs! It had a chair, big open windows which you closed with blinds made from matting as well as curtains, and a nice wicker sofa which was small but could probably still have sat 2 people. Then outside was an adjoining bathroom with composting toilet, large bucket of sawdust, magazines (awesome) and shower area with electric shower and huge soft towels. There was also a shower block just across from my room, with 3 wood fired hot showers, more eco-friendly that electric I presume, which was where I showered this morning. Apologies if I am gushing, but you just don’t get this in Kenya. Not for that price anyway!!! Then I was shown into the main building. There was a kitchen where they would cook pretty much anything you liked, a dining room, a large living room with tv and huge bookshelves (containing all but New Moon of the Twilight books – I might bring my copy up and donate it when I come back – as well as the Dark Towers series by Stephen King which Leila, Dave, James and I had been talking about on Friday night, as well as loads of other interesting titles) and a gorgeous veranda with a large dining table as well as a comfy seating area which overlooked the garden and is where you take breakfast. They have an assortment of animals, dogs, cats, and three pet sheep which I think are in addition to some sheep they keep for eating, and countless creatures, and birds, that made scritching scratching noises all through the night.
Anyway, it was a lovely place to stay, and I will definitely be going back, even if I did have to tie up a hole in the mossie net, and even though there were spider webs in the composting toilet (sit down and hope that the spiders don’t feel like crawling up onto your bum!) and at the corner of the mattress (tuck mossie net between me and web). Theresa made me soup when I arrived, which was delicious, and apparently Ibrahim was a chef for the Sheraton in Nairobi or somewhere equally as impressive, and his food is delicious.

Sadly I had to leave the lodge this morning. Ibrahim called me a boda boda, although I was tempted to walk but it’s 2kms and my bag was feeling heavy and the boda boda was only 50bob. So I did that instead. He was very good actually, I was a little nervous as it had obviously rained during the night and the majority of the roads were dirt roads, but he drove so slowly and carefully so I tipped him an extra 10 when I got off. I was also wearing a skirt (I hadn’t planned for the boda boda) so trying to get on and keep as much of my legs covered as possible was interesting! So anyway, I went to a supermarket and bought some toothpaste – the tiniest tube I’ve ever seen. Then I wandered back down the road to the Kitale Museum. I was meant to be looking at the Pokot display, but there was actually only about 2 pokot items there, which was a little disappointing. Leila had seemed sure I should go and have a look! But the crocodile pit and the snakes outside were fun. And I took photos of the early man part of the museum for my future interest. The dinosaur part was funny as well, I’ll have to wait until I get back to the UK to put the photos up tho as I didn’t have the memory card with me so had to put them on the camera memory, and I don’t have the cables with me.
Then I walked back up to the matatu stand, thinking I’d seen all the market there was, and then as the matatu left I realised there was a whole other section the other side of the stand. Darn. I might see if I can check it out some other time. I caught the matatu to Kapenguria and got off at Makutano. I suppose I could have gone on to Kap and had a look at the museum, but I didn’t. I came to the hotel instead and got given 106 which has a nice hot shower, which would be great except there doesn’t seem to be water. Ha, inside at least. So I went for a wander around Makutano market and bought a couple of gifty things, and then walked along to the gift shop I had seen on the way into town on the matatu. It had started to rain rather a lot by this point, so I reached a gift shop, although it wasn’t the one I saw from the matatu, and went in and bought up a load of stuff to give as presents. I really liked the stuff I bought actually, but I don’t think I can carry much more with me so I might just wait and get more things for me when I come back. Look! How selfless, presents for other people first. :)
I came back to the hotel and have been meandering around the room ever since. The power went, and the laptop battery died, but the power is back now so now I can get some work done. The rain is quite constant though, and it’s a bit colder than I expected! When it’s not raining it’s quite warm, when it’s sunny it’s blimmin hot, but it just seems to be raining at the moment. And I didn’t bring my raincoat. And I’m getting peckish and really fancy some tea. Brr. Ah well, I shall eat my last little packet of biscuits and hope that Matt arrives back soon.

As for the rest of last week, well, not really much happened. I rushed around trying to get things done, getting frustrated! I made macaroni cheese weds evening when Sarah came round for dinner, which everyone (apart from Leila who thinks she has a wheat allergy) ate, including ‘Dave-Ugh no not macaroni cheese, can’t stand the stuff, tastes and looks like vomit –Conway’. Ha. [on a separate and rather off topic note, when I first realised Dave’s surname was Conway after knowing he went to uni in Oxford, I had a brief thought process whereby I thought that Leo also had a brother called David (I think) and wondered if they were related, until I realised that Dave actually from Oop North. Silly Jessica]
We also had a rather good night on Friday night. Dave, James & I went to Upper Hill campsite for dinner and a few beers, and had a rather good evening. Met some really nice people :) and a crazy American lady who was really just rather annoying. Heh. But yes, very good evening. :)

Now, I suppose I should get something work related done as there is power and I have nowt else to do. I won’t connect to the internet now though. Maybe later, but I’ll probably just post this in a couple of days time. I have a dongle, but to connect to the internet I have to put my phone sim card into it, and it’s such a palaver. Also I want to preserve my credit for the moment. Gosh, I don’t half ramble don’t I!

Update 28/2/10
In a fascinating development.... or possibly not, we moved hotels. I had a call from Matt at about 5.45 as the car had broken down just outside makutano, asking if the water was back yet. It wasn’t, so he asked me to check out the lodge down the road next to the place we have dinner. Very convenient. Turns out they had 6 free rooms, all with hot showers and running water, and some with interesting interior design (the woman who is taking core samples whose name I can’t remember, has a room with an animal print blanket and a fancy multi-coloured crystally lightshade. Mine just has a bare bulb!). So we moved all our stuff from one hotel to the other, and then I waited around while the others had showers and a plumber tried to fix my toilet, flooding my room in the process. Then we went for dinner (such a long way to walk, all of two paces between the doors) and then took a random short-cut and tried out a new pub which had very loud music.
Anyway, long boring story, cut slightly shorter. I spoke to Matt about Nacho’s question about funding applications. He said it isn’t too late, but that he wouldn’t be at the top of the list for funding a second time around for the same thing because he got it last year, but that the likelihood of the other applications not being very good and so his being picked anyway was quite good. And then when I said it was so I could go Matt said, well, first he said that he would block the application if it was for me. And then he said that actually he could probably push it through on the grounds that it is a good investment and a continuing investment in one of their attachees. So yay! I might be going to excavate at Olduvai Gorge this summer! Oooh, the possibilities.

Right, I should probably send an email now, and then get to bed. I am so so tired. Not too early a start in the morning though. I only need to get up at 7.30. Oh, and then after our meeting at the museum, or, well, my day at the museum. I’m going to get up mega early on Tuesday morning to catch a matatu to Kitale to get me there in time to get a ticket and get the bus to Nairobi. Although part of me thinks it might actually be quicker to catch matatus. Lets just hope I don’t have a crappy slow bus like last time, although I think the rain may have slowed things down a bit. Which, by the way, it is still doing. Raining that is, not slowing things down. Although it might be doing that too.

times they are a changing

Well, looks like I may have time to travel around East Africa after all. I emailed DA (Dave Anderson) about whether it would be possible to come back to Kenya so that I can do more 'stuff' and do my own research. I was trying to meet up with Matt on Thursday but he disappeared off to Kakamega forest with Laura (his wife laura, not palaeolithic laura) which incidentally is one place I would love to go. And then today I wasn't around in the morning, and by the time I got into the office he was locked in Dave's office with James and Humphrey doing interviews for the new IT post. Been a hectic day for them I think. I remember having a full day of interviews, can be quite tiring, especially when the majority are, well, lets just say 'not right for the job'. So anyway, I saw DA before I had the chance to speak to Matt. And then DA ended up whisking Matt off before I had a chance and he mentioned it to him instead. Argh! So then Matt seemed a little hurt that I hadn't come to him first. Anyway, I still only managed to talk to him in passing. But he did say he would be have me stay all year if he could *blush*. I think we may get a chance to talk about it tomorrow morning. But then he's going off on a mega trip up to Turkana (wanna go there too) so I had better corner him first thing. So ANYWAY, I just have to come up with the flight back out here, which could be tricky, but then I do have credit cards. erk. Not ideal really, and they're way more expensive now than they were. But they're really only allowed to pay for one flight per attachee. So, dis da plan. I just have to come up with money and sort out dates. Anyone know of any temp jobs going for a few weeks in March I could do?

Other than that excitement, last night James, Leila and I went to meet Jacob at Nibs down the road, and then because there was football on (amazed at how transfixed I was by Man city vs Liverpool) James and I decided to stay for food instead of coming back here to cook macaroni cheese. Which I may do tomorrow night now. Anyway, we all had fish, but lei & james had it with Ugali, whereas I had it with rice. It may have been slightly reheated rice or something, because I had a mild case of food poisoning from something. I woke up at about 5am. Poor Leila, she'd only got to bed at 1.30 and then I woke her up again. She did not want to get up this morning. But then I wasn't getting up at all, still trying to lie motionless when my alarm went off. I soon felt better though, and got up at about 9am. I felt quite rough until after lunch, and then felt loads better again until I finally finished work and then I suddenly felt rather feak and weeble again. James bought me some ginger anyway, so I might go have some ginger tea.

Oh, and this morning I managed to get my ahrc application put into a word doc altogether and sent off to the right place. So that is all sorted.

Now, gonna go help James make dinner. And make sure he doesn't put too much chilli or curry powder in my portion!

weekends almost over

I can't believe I have yet again not done any of the things I wanted to do this weekend. The most adventurous I've gotten was a walk to the Sarit centre, but because I've been going nowhere apart from the office all week it damn near killed me walking at James pace. It's very humid here at the moment as well, which really doesn't help.

My ahrc funding application is done, and I just need to send it to Lisa tomorrow morning. James is going to put it together as a pdf for me on his supercool mac. Then I just have one other funding application to do and all will be well. The other one can wait until I get home though, as the deadline isn't until the 15th March.

I'm going to have to have a talk to Matt tomorrow though, about the Kap Museum stuff. I don't think I'm going to be able to get all the information together in time, partly as I am having trouble getting people to get back to me with whether they have the info and photos I need, or if I'm going to have to search for them myself, which is not the easiest thing to accomplish. I have figured out the basics of how to use indesign though, which is great, only actually using it on the computer in the computer room is a pain in the arse as it is slow slow, a lot of the time it just makes it crash because it seems incapable of running it properly.

I'm also going to talk to Matt about if there would be the opportunity to come back. Partly to finish the Kap stuff before the 'Grand' re-opening. Also to do any other arch stuff that comes along, as well as to do a bit of my own research.

I've spoken to Sarah again. She'd texted Leila a couple of times but I don't think got a response, so she called me. She'd had a crap day up in Eldoret, with 5 hours in the company of people speaking nothing but Nubian, and waweru asking her for money again, which she refused thank god. She really needs to learn to say no more. She's hoping to be back in Nairobi on Tuesday, so hopefully she'll be around before I go to Kapenguria. Otherwise hopefully I can convince her to come for a girly day before I go back to the UK.

Dave is coming back from Nanyuki tomorrow with Kerry, and kimeu who only went up there today. Hopefully he'll be back in time to come with us to the cinema, although it wouldn't surprise me if we don't make it AGAIN, because everyone always has too much to do.

I'm probably going to make a macaroni cheese for dinner this evening, although I'm slightly concerned about what I am going to make it in, as the casserole dishes are all huuuge, but I might just make a huge one and then have it for lunch for days.

Aaanyway, I should probably get some work done. Seeing as that is why I am not off doing exciting things this weekend. Or shopping. I quite fancy a nap though. *yawn*

Weds, Thurs & Fri....

I think it was Tuesday that I wrote my last proper update. I couldn't really tell you anything interesting that has happened between now and then. On Weds I met up with Michelle and someone she met at the backpackers place she was staying. She couldn't remember his name, and I was useless in finding out for her, but he was from the UK and had only been here a couple of days. They went to the coast on Weds evening, so I took some time out of my busy & frustrating work to go and see her for a java in town. I accounted for my time by buying a laminater on my way home. Great fun.
The Kapenguria stuff isn't going so great really. I can't find it in myself to be bothered any more. It's just annoying and everything I try and do works against me. So I am trying to decide whether to do as much as I can this morning and a bit of the afternoon, and then catch a matatu to Nanyuki for the weekend. I could even just stay the night and come back tomorrow with James & Matua. But I would like to have a nice weekend away. The question is how much of my money do I want to spend on it. I really want to go to Lamu, but I don't think I can afford that! I would have to fly, and I haven't even looked but I think it would be too much. And then next weekend, my last weekend, I am likely to be up in Pokot. Which just annoys me, especially as I've had an idea of what I want to do for my own research. I might talk to Dave Anderson about that today.

My main piece of news is that I had my interview with Tim & Gabe for the Public MA yesterday evening, and I got a place. Tim said at the beginning that my application and references were excellent (thanks Karen, for help with the App, and Matt, Norah & Nacho for the refs!) and that he was really only interviewing me because I was applying for funding. So that's cool. He also said that I needed to get my funding application in as soon as possible. So yesterday evening I decided not to go for the 'quick' drink with Leila & Reynolds, because I knew it wouldn't just be an hour and I wanted to get stuff done. Leila eventually came back at about 11.30. I hadn't got as much done as I had wanted, but I did have a lovely chat with the lovely Ceilidh. I did the statement, but I had also wanted to apply for a job that has a deadline of today. The deadline is 12pm tho, which gives me the whole of my lunchtime to do it in. I love the 3hr time difference sometimes. Now all I have to do is try and make Indesign work. I now pretty much know how to use it (love online how-to guides) but it's not actually working properly on this computer. It's just taking forever. I've been trying to create a new document for about half an hour. But the screen has just completely frozen now. *sigh* I'm never gonna get this done.

Leila was really sweet last night tho, I was a little pissed off, for reasons I won't go into, and she gave me a huge hug and apologised for not coming back sooner. Bless.

Right, in the absence of constructive things to do I shall go and look for the funding form I filled in a couple of months ago. And I might go update my other journal. Something to do. :)

food and interviews

Haha! I am currently listening to my iPod while typing up biographies. I was happily rocking away to Korn, when the track suddenly ended and Billie Piper came on. Made me laugh. Anyway, this will become a proper update later when I have time to write it and we have power and internet back to post it! Love Africa. :)

Mmm, I'm hungry, and it's not lunchtime yet. I've been thinking about foods that I'm craving.... Baked potato with bacon and avocado, which I could technically have here as we figured out how to get the oven working again last night. Same with a bacon sarnie, but it'll never be the same as at home. Macaroni cheese, also could be made here now!
Roast chicken (or any roast beast - except goat, I've had enough goat) with all the trimmings (including pigs in blankets. mmmm)
Nachos, which I could make but would cost a small fortune to do so.
Twix - I saw one on Kampala and foolishly didn't buy it. How I want one now!
Houmous, this is a recent one, I was thinking of snacking on the carrot I have leftover, but it just wouldn't be the same without houmous. I must be able to find it somewhere tho.... Hmmm. *tummy rumbles* gah.

I have an interview this afternoon btw. With Tim & Gabe for the Public MA. 5pm here, which is after the office shuts. I've given the office landline though, as my mobile reception can sometimes not be very good, although with the weather as it is any phone line probably won't be very good. (it's quite rainy atm) So, I should probably get finishing with my bios so I can do some swotting up to be at least a little bit prepared. Any tips anyone? What kind of things might they ask?

xxx

mouses, Sunday night and the start of the week

And here is the second part of my update, but I missed some stuff out about me and Hannah going on travel related missions and finding a yummy organic cafe where we had funky smoothies.


right, so in case my update about the weekend has survived on the other computer, I shall just do a brief update about yesterday and today. So, Sunday night Hannah was packing her bags for Kampala until about 1am, so I was still awake as well. And then at 3am we were both woken up by a very loud scratching noise. I was most perturbed as I felt like I had barely closed my eyes when I was being rudely awoken by... well, what? It was coming from somewhere near the bathroom, so Hannah got up and checked behind the mattress & cot bed which are still standing in the corner of the room. She couldn't see anything and the sound had stopped, so she got back into bed. Then it started again. So this time it was my turn, so I found my glasses and torch and scrambled out of bed. I had a brief look in the corner but I thought it was coming more from the dressing table which sits inbetween the bathroom door and the main bedroom door. So I went and shone my torch all around it, and behind the mirror, but I couldn't see anything. So I got back into bed. A few minutes passed, all the time I was tense waiting for it to start again. And start again it did. Slowly this time. There was a little 'scritch', a pause, and then again 'scritch scratch'. Another pause, then 'scratch scratch scratch scratch...' So I very slowly put my foot on the floor, but it stopped, so I paused and shone my torch over the dressing table trying to figure out where it came from. Hannah said something, and then all of a sudden this medium sized brown rodent dashed from one column of dressing table drawers to the other. Hannah squeeled quietly while I gasped and automatically pulled my feet up off the floor as the mouse, not finding a way out, dashed back across to the drawers it had come from, and then back again to the other ones, and there was a slight pause and then is dashed from the dressing table over towards the wall and across the door, at which point my sight was obscured as there is another big bureau thing in the way, against which was leaning Hannah's bag packed and ready for Kampala. Neither of us were willing to step out of bed to go and investigate where it might have got to. Hannah joked about waking James up next door, but I said (and he agreed the next day) that he probably would have been up on the chair and no help whatsoever. Anyway, we eventually decided it was gone and so settled back down, but at 4.30 we were both still awake. I finally managed to get to sleep, probably around 5am, and Hannah's alarm went off at 5.30am so that she could get ready to catch her bus. I was still awake while she was bustling around getting things together, and then at about 6am she took her stuff out of the room so I sat up to say goodbye. We won't see each other again in Kenya! I go back to England just a couple of days before she returns from Kampala, but she's back the week after me so we'll see each other again in London. We joked on the way home from town at the weekend, that if we all get to our preferred universities (me UCL, Han & Lei at SOAS) then we should move in together and it would be just like Kenya only with our own rooms and without someone having to sleep on a mattress on the floor!

So anyway, I probably managed another hour, maybe hour and a half of sleep before I dragged myself out of bed and got ready for work. I wasn't really capable of much that involved thinking yesterday so I didn't get much done in the morning. Dave arrived at the offices, having returned to Kenya Sunday evening and stayed the night at Matt's. He was quite jet-lagged still. So in the afternoon James, Dave & I drove to Westlands to buy some stuff. They were going to get things for Laikipia and I needed a laminater and print cartridge, but nowhere in westlands had them so we went on a tour to Nakumatt UKAY and the big one in Westgate. No luck on any front for me. But it was an interesting afternoon out anyway, and it was good to catch up with dave along the way. I am very jealous of the two of them going up to Nanyuki together, they're gonna have a great time.

So I didn't get a whole lot done after that. I installed In-Design on a computer in the computer room which I will use to design the boards for the Kapenguria Museum. And then gave up when it got to about 5.30 and it was insisting on installing updates after going to a blue screen following the main program installation. Dave went back to Matt's to do some stuff and get an early night, and James and I went to Upper Hill campsite and had a drink (mmm, wine) and the biggest burger I have seen for a long time. Delicious but I could only eat half of it.We came back on a matatu at about 8pm, and then I relaxed on the sofa with my book for the rest of the evening before getting an early night. No mouse disturbances during the night, thank goodness.

Today I came into the office to check on the computers and check my emails, gave dave a hand with a few bits for Laikipia, then said farewell to him and James, got distracted by tea.... oooh, it's teatime again! *sits back down with a nice cup of tea* erm, oh, and I borrowed James's speakers, and said hello to the girl who was here a while ago, but whose name I've forgotten so I may have to go back and see if I mentioned her here!
I went to the archives, but didn't have much luck. The guy I need to speak to about photos wasn't there, and basically it could take forever to do a comprehensive search for all the info I need. So I'm gonna go back tomorrow with a list of photos & newspaper articles I need. If I can ever get anything done today. It might have to wait until Thursday if the internet doesn't come back. On the plus side, on my way back from the archives I found several places that sell laminators. So I'm gonna go back when I go back into town, to buy one. Fun. Then this afternoon seems to have been taken up with not getting much done!

James & Dave have gone to Nanyuki, with Joe and the new research assistant, Kerry. Hugo has gone off somewhere for a few days. Jacob has also gone away with his parents until tomorrow. But Leila arrives back today, and there is also the other girl whose name I can't remember. So I'm going to find pancake recipes and ingredients and at least I can make pancakes with people tonight! I'm gonna have to work this evening as well though, especially if I want to justify being able to go and do things I want to do next week. Hmph.
Ah, and the computer is now ready for me. Fab.
I'll hopefully post this later then! When the internet comes back.
xxx

Sudan photos & yesterday's update

Here is the link to my Sudan photos, which are finally up just two weeks before I return to England.
Southern Sudan Oct-Nov 09

And here follows a post I started on this computer yesterday. I finished it on my laptop, which I will post later, and there may be some stuff missingfrom the middle that I need to write about. But here you go...


How frustrating. I can’t actually do anything at the moment. I have to wait until my hard drive is scanned and cleaned before I can open anything, and there is no internet to do research on. Humph.
So I shall write up instead. Now where did I get to? I think I had updated on Laikipia, so this weekend then. Gosh, it’s Tuesday already.
Saturday was obviously incredibly interesting. I don’t actually remember any of it. I think mostly over the weekend I just chilled out, planned to do things but never got round to them, sat in the sun, read books, browsed the internet and cooked lovely meals with Hannah & James and had some great evenings. So days pretty quiet and not done a lot, and then in the evening we would all cook together, open a bottle of wine, and then sit down to dinner and conversation. It has been really really nice. Hannah & I went into town on Saturday. We met up with Ruth, a Kenyan girl who we met in Tot when we went before Christmas. She is the sweetest girl ever. Tiny and with a high but not annoyingly so voice. She’s studying banking and investments at uni, i think in her last year. And she’s also one of Henrietta’s research assistants on FGM (female genital mutilation) in Tot during the circumcision ceremonies. So we had tea with Ruth and her friend from uni, then Hannah and I went off on a wander to find the Akamba bus station so she could buy a ticket for her bus on Monday...........