Camping In Naivasha

Camping in Naivasha was a blast. I was worried about rain, but the weather was beautiful the entire time. I joined a small group retreat from Nairobi Chapel, of while I have never participated in the group before, I did know most of the members. It was a rather diverse group: Philip (The Gambia), Dennis (Uganda), David Fugoyo (Sudan), Edwin (Kenya), and Esayas and his family (Ethiopia). There were some other Kenyan ladies as well who are not NEGST students.


This was the road from our campsite to the lake. It was about a half hour walk, and we could see an outline at the end, which did not move the entire time. We couldn't figure out if it was alive, but it was, and turned out to be some zebras enjoying the shade.

The lake was really dry, as you can see.

We found what we believed to be hippo tracks.

This was our central cooking and fellowship area. We camped in four tents, but I figured you'd probably seen a tent before so I didn't bother to upload a picture. Next post: slaughtering and roasting a sheep...

Hiking in Karen

The week before I headed off on my travels, I went hiking with Njeri at this little-known nature area she knew of that's only a few minutes from campus. It was quite a nice place.

This bridge was a tad rickety but we made it over.

Along the way there was this rather small cave. Reminded me of spring break sophomore year...on a much smaller scale.


There was also a waterfall. Overall, quite a good hike.

Back from Vacation

I've actually been back over a week now, but I'm still getting fully adjusted back to school work and email and all those sorts of non-vacation things. My various journeys were quite awesome and eventful, and thus will take a bit of time to document and upload here. I had hoped to post some pictures of when I had gone hiking actually not for from campus, here in Karen, but the internet is not cooperating and the library is almost closed. I have over 500 pictures, and when I get time to brave the time-consuming process of putting them on here, you all can see a bit of what I was up to. If you haven't heard from me in a while, there's a decent chance I've been meaning to write you, and I hope to get around to that within the next several days. Although my course load is lighter this term, it has been quite a bit of work already. Ah, I see one picture has loaded. That was the entrance to the park, so I'll leave that as a taste of what's to come.

Off on Vacation...

So I hope the rains will hold off for just another few days, but I will be camping at Naivasha for the weekend, so I'm looking forward to that. Naivasha is on the Rift Valley, and I've heard its beautiful. I'm going with an ecclesia group from Nairobi Chapel, and we'll be there until mid Sunday, and then we'll be going to stay at Kinyua's house (another student here, a former leader of the singles group), not far from Nakuru. On Monday night I'll take the overnight bus from Nairobi to Mwanza, which goes through Nakuru. The whole ride is about 11 hours, and I'm cutting off 2 by picking it up in Nakuru, but that's still a bit of time! Then I'll be in Mwanza until Easter, and then we'll come back Monday. There's a professor here who lived there for many years before coming to NEGST, and he's going back with his family for a visit, and I'm staying with them. I imagine I'll have some updates when I return...

Kenyan Initiation

I have now been inducted as a full Kenyan: robbed on a matatu. This has been quite a weekend. On Saturday, I went down to Nairobi to meet with Pastor Emmanuel to discuss my future church involvement. As I got out of the matatu once we had arrived downtown, I realized my phone and iPod were no longer in my pocket. I was the last to leave the matatu, and I assumed it had fallen out of my pocket, so I went back to check, but it was gone. I had been reading during most of the ride down Ngong road into town, ideal for maximizing my time, not quite so good for guarding against thieves. Thinking back, I remember when the guy next to me sat down, he stumbled, slipped against my leg, and apologized. At the time I thought nothing of it, but I’m sure that’s when he picked my pocket. Losing the iPod is pretty lame, but my phone is quite cheap, and I’m really glad they didn’t get my wallet. That would have been not cool. I have always been skeptical of the possibility of someone reaching into my jeans pocket and removing something without me noticing. These pockets are not loose! Half the time I can't even get something like an iPod out without the headphones getting all tangled in everything. But he was good, and I have a certain respect for someone who can do that without me noticing.

I waited for Emmanuel for an hour and a half, and was just about to leave when I walked into him. Our meeting place is “bomb blast,” the location of the American Embassy bombing in the 90s, and we had met there several times before. We had both been there the entire time, and I don’t know how we missed each other, but when he called me and I didn’t answer, he assumed I wasn’t there and waited in a restaurant. Frustrating. We went to Safaricom customer care, and were finally able to transfer my old number to a new sim card, although I didn’t have my passport with me, didn’t know the serial number of my phone (seriously!!), couldn’t come up with three numbers I normally call, and didn’t even know what my tariff was (the rate you’re charged for a call). Emmanuel provided his number, which I had called, otherwise I would have had nothing. I also found out that the guy who had stolen my phone transferred 980 shillings of credit to another account, which is traceable. I had put on 1000 shillings worth of credit half an hour before it was stolen, something I do about once every six weeks…

I filed a police report, which required going to the front desk, the waiting room next to it, room 5, then being told to go to room 4, going to get an abstract from this sketchy café place behind the police station, then having to go upstairs to room 6, finding there was no one in room 6, and then going back to 4, and waiting for a stamp. I finally got it. I went back to Safaricom to track down my things, but was told I had to go to CID HQ, the Criminal Investigation Department. It’s like the Kenyan FBI. So on Monday, I went back to Nairobi, and after at least an hour of wandering around, finally found the bus station and a matatu on route # 100, and went to CID. I went in and was told at the front desk they could do nothing unless they have an official letter from the police station where I made the report. I was not pleased, and said that I had been told to go there, and was not returning with nothing. This eventually brought me to the next person, who explained the same thing, but I just sat there and kept looking at him, and refused to accept that. That brought to an agent, and she seemed pretty on top of things. She was from somewhere in the Middle East, and I don’t think I would want her tracing me. She took all my information, and called Safaricom, but they didn’t want to tell her anything without an official letter. While I was waiting in the waiting room, the other guys waiting with me pointed out that however transferred my credit must have known my pin number. I had not thought of that, so they said it must be an inside job, someone who knows me very very well, most likely my girlfriend. I told them that was actually rather unlikely. Another guy waiting next to me was this clearly rich business man, and he had received a death threat a few days ago. After threatening him, this person wanted to meet to arrange for a higher payment than whoever had hired him. The businessman decided to go to the police instead, and was trying to figure out who was trying to kill him. Since both him and his wife had been called, he thought it was someone close, and was suspicious of his driver.

I finally accepted that I would need to go back to the police station and have them send CID an official letter. So if I had known that, it would have taken about 5 more minutes on Saturday, to have them send that letter. Instead, it took me 8 hours to figure that out on Monday, but that’s Kenya. I figured I had the time and was curious to see how the Kenyan police system worked. We'll see if anything happens.

In other news, I finally took all my exams and finished all my papers, so I am now free. It's quite nice. I'm either going camping at Naivasha Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday, and then taking a bus from Nakuru to Tanzania on Monday, or riding with Dr. Rasmussen to Tanzania on Saturday. The rains have started, so I'm a little skeptical about camping. We'll see how it works out.

Kibera Praise

This is the church I've been involved with in the Kibera slum of Nairobi, the second largest slum in Africa. I like to describe it as "carnival music." It is high energy and they love it.



I love the dancing! They really get into it.

Cultural Insights from Sociology of Language

In every culture, there is significance in how you greet someone. For cultures, this is more defined than for others. In Japanese, you use entirely different forms to address someone who is considered a member of the “outside group” than you would in addressing a member of the “in group.” In many African languages, there are different ways to address someone depending on whether they are the same age as you, older than you, or younger than you.

How you address your father is also very important. I learned that in many cultures you can never use your father's first name. If someone else has the same first name, this can become tricky, since you can't say it and have to find other ways around it. In some ways, America is the same: it would be very strange to call your dad by his first name. However, in Africa it certainly seems a bigger deal. In Nigeria, the wife does not even call her husband by his first name. She calls him another word, maigida, which means literally “the owner of the house.” If there are children present, then you address the father with the name of the son: father of so and so. I hear this all the time: Mama Hannah, Mama Ada, etc. It seems to work well.

I just finished a history exam, and I think it went well. We had to write an essay on revivals from the 18th to the 20th century. I know a bit about that. Now I'm off home to finish editing someone's paper, maybe work a bit more on my sermon for Sunday, take a shower, and make some rice for taco night. Then I'm off to taco night, and tomorrow the work continues. 3 papers left, 2 finals, 2 weeks. Manageable.