Meru and Beyond

Even after all the wonders of the previous days, the true highlights of our trip came at the end when we were able to travel to Meru and connect with friends and contacts from Peace X Peace.

Mercy Chidi, my colleague for the past few years at PXP, is our Kenya liaison, based in Meru. Mercy and her husband had been living in Nairobi and working for Catholic Relief Services and the UN for many years when they decided to leave their jobs and return to Mercy's home town of Meru to develop the community there. They founded Ripples International as a way to care for those who needed it: abandoned babies, people affected by HIV-AIDS, girls and women who had suffered because of domestic violence, and more. Ripples is an umbrella organization under which there are many programs that focus on specific needs. Peacebuilding and the role of women connecting across cultures to build peace is one of those programs, and in that way, Peace X Peace has been partnering with Ripples through Mercy since 2005.

Mercy arranged for us to tour all of the Ripples facilities around Meru. We visited her administrative offices, the dispensary and connectivity center for Peace X Peace, the Brenda Boone Hope Center for girls who have been affected by domestic violence, a new complex with a pediatric hospital, chapel, sustainable agricultural programs, and plans to centralize the other centers from around the city, and New Start, the baby rescue center. We were amazed and inspired by what they have accomplished in just eight years.

Mercy also arranged for several of the PXP members from the area to come and have a meeting with me at the center. They greeted me with songs and dance, and of course I had to join in! E was a good sport during all of these women's activities, and of course, he took all the great photos. We got to tour the hostel that the PXP Circle in Summit County has co-invested with their Sister Circle in Meru to found and run, and we got to hang out with Mercy and her family.
Meru is a bit of a rougher town than Nairobi, although to us it still felt like a paradise. There are some eleven different kinds of bananas that grow in the lush forests and valleys of the region. Still, they have a new Nakomat hypermarket, and a reasonable hotel and restaurants. Anyone looking for an extended volunteer position could do well at one of the Ripples' programs, and I'm sure you would be appreciated.

So our trip to Kenya ended on a high note. I continue to be energized by the experience of getting to know people (especially, in my case, women) in other countries, collaborating with them on peacebuilding projects online, and then traveling to visit those places and meeting those friends in person--to see them working in their local environments. It is powerful to feel that connected to people in so many places in the world.

See more photos from Meru here: http://www.shutterfly.com/share/singleshare/invite.sfly?fid=3f0e48cabd1cab02d33ce936de451066

In the evening we returned to our friends' place in Nairobi, had one last delicious meal at a fancy, but not overly expensive gourmet restaurant, and then crashed. We treated ourselves to visit a baby elephant and rhino sanctuary on the last day before catching our plane north to Khartoum. Many wonderful memories--and thanks to E's amazing photos and videos, fun experiences to share.

Safari's End: Lions, and Cheetahs, and Cubs - Oh my!

After Lake Naivasha we spent the rest of the safari at the incomparable Massai Mara national park. We had been feeling self-satisfied with all the great hippo spotting we had done at the lake, so you can imagine our surprise when we discovered that right behind our lodge in the middle of the park was another watering hole . . . and it was filled with hippopotami! But our previous enthusiasm wasn't too deflated because this meant that we actually got to see them at all times of day, getting into and out of the water, sleeping, waking, eating, etc. At the watering hole, we also found our first crocodile, some buffalo, zebras, and gazelles. Oh, and did we mention that there was a bar on an elevated platform out there? At the end of the day we could relax and be refreshed just like all the other animals that were looking for a drink.

Massai Mara was bigger and better than we could have imagined. After the previous day's game drives, we were blown away at the variety and abundance of wildlife that just went on for miles and miles.

The stars of our last days on safari were definitely the lions and cheetahs. On our way into the park we found a lioness sleeping just a few feet from the road! The next morning we found a female on the hunt. She was injured and looked hungry. We stayed around to watch her for almost an hour. Later that day we heard there was a fresh kill and went out to check it out. That was when we saw our first male lion, there were two grown males in this pride, and then three large females, and three babies. We watched the whole patriarchal feeding cycle unfold:

• females hunt and kill the zebra
• alpha male eats his fill
• other males eat their fill
• then the females get to eat
• and then the babies

We sat and watched this scene for much longer than I could really take. . . I think E enjoyed that part much more than I did . . .

We also found a serval that afternoon. He was hanging down by a stream, and when we spotted him and pulled up close, he just hunkered down and seemed to pray that we would go away. Closing his eyes like "if I don't see you, then you can't see me." We left him be after a bit.

Later we found another pride of lions lounging in the shade after eating. Right next to them was a big family of elephants, but neither seemed bothered by the other's presence. That was cool to see.

The cheetahs stole the show, though. We were out looking for them when we spotted a male cheetah coming up the road in front of us. We had just passed a trail of wildebeest completing their migration, so we figured where he was headed and turned to follow him. We pulled up near the end of the wildebeest group and watched this scene unfold:

Yeah! Mama power!

Then we left the cheetah to try his luck with some other game and continued on our way. A bit farther down the road we found the mama cheetah and her three cubs. They were sooooo cute. They had like fully body mohawks. I couldn't get enough of them, and they kept posing for our camera.

The rest of the time in the Mara we cruised for elephants, found another serval cat, did some giraffe spotting, and were just generally blown away by the vast expanses of savanna. Everywhere we turned it was just . . . beautiful. We never did see a leopard, but as we drove away, we said that that would just give us a good excuse to come back some day. Amazing.

Safari Journal: Day of the Hippopotamus

"Did you know that the hippopotamus is the most dangerous animal in Africa?!"

That's not a line a child easily forgets when her parents have recently returned from their first excursion to the continent--and barely escaped to tell about it!

But seriously, hippos are supposed to be very dangerous (I hear they can outrun humans!), and, I thought, difficult to catch a glimpse of. So I was nearly beside myself when we decided the next morning to leave Lake Nakuru for the next lake down the road, Naivasha, where our guide told us we could take a boat ride and would very likely find us some river horses!

For those of us living in Sudan, Naivasha has different associations than just idyllic water wildlife, Out of Africa-type backdrops, and fresh water--it's the location where the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) was signed, officially ending the north-south war. Some sources, in fact, refer to the CPA as the Naivasha Accord. We were interested to arrive at our next stop for many reasons.

E chatted up our boat guide, James, while he got everything ready and then we were off. Asking whether we would see hippos, James told E we could have our money back if we didn't see them. E said he might close his eyes then, but that sounded like a pretty good deal. So James oriented us to the area and said, "First let's go see the hippos and then we can talk about the birds."

"OK!" I said, "Great. Where are they?"

James pointed to a bumpy mound right in front of us in the water, "They're right there."

"Oh!" Yeah. There was no way we could have missed these guys. Hippos sleep during the day, so this being mid-morning, they were already in dreamland, resting their heads on each other's necks and backsides for comfort. I just loved that! We cruised the lake finding family after family of hippos. I never thought we would have seen so many (shows what I knew). It was so much fun.

I think that's where E first started getting out of control with the photos. Some of you have heard that we ended up with an extraordinary 970-some photos from the safari. Well, some 700 of those might have been of the hippos. We got them in all kinds of funny positions. James got them up and running for us once. We got the signature yawn shots. We just couldn't stop! It was like a photo binge.

The birds and other wildlife at Naivasha were also impressive, and its pristine Crescent Island was actually the site where much of Out of Africa was filmed, but for us, it was really all about the hippos.

Little did we know what would be waiting for us that night at the lodge in Massai Mara.

Safari Journal Day Three: Flamingos

So after reading all kinds of travel literature and guides on Kenya, I fully expected that our night in the tent on safari would be filled with animal sounds from a disturbingly close distance.

In my mind I'd been imagining how a lion would sound, waking up from a long day sleeping in the sun and off to enjoy a fresh kill that the diligent females in his pride provided him. Or leopards--I'd heard that they cough. That you could hear them marking their territory and warning other leopards to steer clear by making a sound that resonated deep in the backs of their throats. In my mind the leopard cough sounded rather like my husband with one of his allergic attacks . . .

But after all that active imagining, in the night I heard . . . nothing! I slept like a log! I think E did too. Must have been the hot water bottles . . .

The next day after the ugliest creature I have ever seen (we learned later it was a Marabou Stork) joined us for breakfast, we were on the road to Lake Nakuru.

Nakuru is supposed to be the fourth largest city in Kenya. It was also the site of some significant uprisings during the political unrest of January earlier this year. All seemed safe, sound, and pretty much returned to normal, though--except for the paucity of tourists this season. We hope the tourism will bounce back and we are happy to report that the show at Nakuru is well worth the journey.

By show, I mean the flamingos.

After searching high and low for leopards, but finding mostly baboons, our driver took us right down to the rim of the lake. The first thing that struck me as we stepped out onto the shore was the sound! Altogether in such huge numbers, the flamingos were making this honk-honk-honk-honk-honk drone that, when combined with the ebb and flow of massive waves of the birds walking in different directions, becomes quite hypnotic. And then you look more closely at the breathtaking pink birds--all milling about with their high-heeled stride in groups like cliques of adolescent girls--this way, and that way, and "we're too cool for you, go hang out with another gang"--it's fully mesmerizing.

Wearing my bright pink Gore-tex that day, I wanted to be one of them. Surrounded on all sides, I felt like I could have been. I even ran with a wave of them for a while before they took flight. It was a little like snorkeling with a school of fish, but not quite as smooth . . .

That night we perched in our lodge and looked down at the great lake rimmed in pink. Lulled into an after-dinner stupor by a local musician doing earnest renditions of 80s and early 90s hits on his acoustic guitar, we thought to ourselves that safari life was not such a bad way to travel after all.

Our Elephant Neighbor in the News

How many of you also saw this story break yesterday?

http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/10/12/elephant.text.message.ap/index.html

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/World-News/Elephant-Text-Messages-Scheme-To-Preserve-Endangered-Bull-Elephants-In-Kenya/Article/200810215118621?f=rss

Well that was the very same elephant I mentioned in the Day 2 blog post about the elephant busting down the electric wire. We saw that she had a collar on, but we weren't sure what it was for. Now we know!

And here's the proof:

We've got other pictures right from our tent, but they'll have to wait to be posted until E gets back from Darfur.

Kenya Slideshow

Safari Journal: Day Two, Land of Water

Nairobi - "land of water"

Early the next day our safari guide and driver, Albert, arrived to birdsongs in the soft, grey morning light. He was right on time, which we took to be a good omen for the week ahead.

We headed north toward Mt Kenya, the second highest peak on the continent, to our first destination, the Ol Pejeta game reserve and Sweetwaters tented camp. Albert, a Kikuyu from the Mt Kenya region gave us his commentary along the way.

The lushness of Nairobi continued through the surrounding hills for many miles. We passed plantation after plantation of coffee and tea, banana groves, papaya, mango, pineapple. As we continued north the landscape opened up into a vast savanna, sheltered and shadowed by the great Mt Kenya. Mt Kenya provides something like 50% of the country's water: through snow pack, 6 (formerly 12) permanent glaciers, and the winds and water vapor that combine at the top of the peak to form a regular blanket of rainclouds.

From the patio of our tent, we had a completely unobstructed view of the mountain--that is not including the occasional elephant, giraffe, or herd of zebras or water buck that came through and distracted our attention.

We were so enthralled that we sat on the veranda and filmed from our tent for a good hour before we could pull ourselves away to go explore. There was no visible fence, just a ditch with an electric wire in it that kept most of the animals out of the camp. Baboons were a problem, though, and we did see an elephant just tromp right on through a section of the electric wire--getting shocked repeatedly--so that she could get through to some delicious greenery on the other side.

That afternoon we had our first game drive. We headed first to a chimpanzee reserve started by Jane Goodall. They're not indigenous to the area, but it was still pretty cool to see them being cared for and protected--especially since we found the newest member of the community, a six-month old, who posed for some funny pictures for us. Then we went cruising for rhino. We spotted lots of zebras, impala, warthogs, baboons, giraffes, water buck, cape buffalo, gazelle, hartebeest, and lots of birds, until finally, we found a group of white rhinos with one young one. We learned that to differentiate between white and black rhinos, we could check for:

1. wide mouth? - if yes, it's a white one ("wide" is actually the cause of the white rhino's name)
2. head down? - if she's grazing, it's a white one (black rhinos are "browsers" and eat from bushes, keeping their heads at the level of their shoulders)
3. young walking alongside? - white rhinos protect their babies and always have them walking parallel to the parents, black rhinos have been called the worst animal mothers because they let their young walk behind and therefore risk having them taken out more easily by predators

In the evening we returned to our tent to find hot water bottles pre-warming the sheets. It was a great first day in the field.

I almost forgot to mention - just before dinner we had a downpour of rain! Not surprising, considering our surroundings, but it had been a while since we'd been in a rainstorm and it felt so good. We just stood there and let it come down . . . and then we made a run for the tent, but not before getting foolishly drenched.

Safari Journal: Day One in Paradise

Our flight touched down just as the sun was coming up. Nairobi is a paradise of green, crinkled with lush ravines and flowers of every color. Even so, 5:45am is still a painful time to arrive. We went straight to our dear friends' place, woke them to get in, and then crashed in their guest suite.

Later that morning we ventured back out to find perfect 20-something degrees (Celsius) weather, and delicious restaurants in abundance. Our first day in Kenya was all about friends and good food and freedom! We could do exactly as we pleased, without the hassle of umpteen rounds of permissions and security procedures. We were so happy for the break!

Of all the amazing things, my favorite natural site from that first day was the jacaranda trees. Delicate feathery purplely clouds against the dark green, orange, red, and yellow canopy. Apparently Harare and Pretoria are the best cities for jacaranda, so perhaps they'll have to get on our list?!

The other memorable image from the first day has to do with erections. Our local driver, as he slalomed us through the streets of Nairobi, was talking about how the country was recovering from the conflicts and violent unrest that had made headlines last January. He said, "Oh, the erections. Every time we have the erections, they cause problems. The opposition, yes. They thought they were going to win, and when they didn't there was a tellible confrict."

"OH!" E and I said together, "The ELECTIONS!" Right. Have to work on that.