Mahindi choma

Means roast corn. Which is what I'm eating right now. I'm sitting in the MSID office. Abdul Aziz, on of the on-site staff, brought it--it's delicious!

This weekend I went on my first adventure outside of Nairobi. On Friday morning, four friends and I took a matatu into town. We walked to the River Road district to pick up another matatu to Nyeri. The staff here told us never to go east of Moi Avenue into the River Road district. There are two problems with this. First, if you want to leave Nairobi at all, you have to. Second, the River Road area is the coolest place in Nairobi. Hectic, loud music--very different from the rest of downtown Nairobi, which is mostly boring and very clean.

So we picked up a matatu to Nyeri. It took us about two hours to get up there, passing farms along the way. The Rift Valley is the most fertile place in Kenya, and we passed through it on the way up. The land on the left side of the road is steep, so we passed tons of terraced farms.

In Nyeri, we picked up a taxi to Aberdares National Park. The taxi driver wanted us to pay 2000 ksh, but I got him to 500. He was pretty cool, told me about Kikuyu food and his children. We got to Aberdares and it turns out that we'd have to pay a ton of money to get where we wanted to go. So we took the cab back to Nyeri town, about 10 km back. On the way back, we were stopped by the police. The cab driver got out, and I watched him hand the police officer some money. When he got back in, I asked him, Something kidogo? He laughed, and I said that the police were just robbers. He laughed again and said that now he is good to drive for a week.

In Nyeri, we picked up a hotel room, ate, got some beers at the bar. Some old men taught us how to dance to real Kikuyu music, and we went to bed.

Next morning, bright and early, we took a bus to Nyahururu, or Thompson's Falls. We set up camp, walked to the falls, which were beautiful. Back at camp, we talked with two Bulgarians who are traveling Kenya and Tanzania by bike, and two Brits whose Mt Kenya trek had just been interrupted by some nasty altitude sickness. We went to see some hippos in a pond. They're huge! Back at camp, we had dinner, sat around the fire and slept.

And so on Sunday, back to Nairobi.

What else? The government is corrupt. People are starving in the north, and the First Lady is on the board of a company that's been illegally buying grain from emergency supplies. In town the other day, I saw two policemen kicking a man in the mouth. When everyone watches, I get out of there quick. I'm getting good at taking matatus, and I'm navigating the city well.

Tonight, I'm cooking real American spaghetti with my host family. I've got to go to Nakumatt to buy some supplies, and then the produce market on my way home to pick up some tomatoes and onions.

This is one of the most boring blog entries ever. I'm sorry! The next one will be filled with poetry, I swear.