Super Stupid Bowl

Well some first things first. If you want to send me some snail mail, I'm this:

Gillian Goldberg
c/o MSID Kenya
PO Box 66731-00800
Westlands, Nairobi, Kenya

If you want to call me, I'm 254716392311

Second things second.

The internet situation here is truly abysmal.

Another situation that is terrible--last night, I headed to the 24-hour bar in Prestige Plaza on Ngong Road to watch the superbowl. This really awful shopping mall with a 24 hour Nakumatt--think Wal-Mart but with merchandise that looks gently used and things you only find in the third world, like giant jugs for storing water on the days it isn't rationed.

My mom dropped me off at the mall at 9:00. The game was meant to start at 2 am local time. My friend Kat and I wandered around, met a Canadian and an American. At 1, after worrying about whether the bar carried ESPN, the highlights show came on. At 1:50, ten minutes before kick off, all the tvs went dead. The cable channel had gone down.

So we waited and waited. By 5 am, we realized nothing was going to happen. So we took a drunk walk through Nakumatt, tried on wigs.

There was a fire in a Nakumatt downtown a few days ago. The fire hydrants didn't work, the emergency exits were blocked, the security kept the people inside from leaving because they were afraid the customers inside would steal merchandise. Something like 30 people are dead so far. On the news, I watched people from the Red Cross in a line, tossing cases of Fanta from the burning store into guarded piles outside. They turned their hoses away from the fire and toward the people trying to get the food they were rescuing.

And two days ago, a gas tanker rolled outside of Molo. The police who were supposed to be guarding it were charging people to fill their jerry cans. Some guy lit a cigarette, and 111 people are dead.

But I guess these are just things from the news. In church on Sunday, the preacher warned about Kenya being consumed by fire. I don't know.

I guess that since I've been here, I've seen a few lions, a few rhinos, some zebras, giraffes.

Today's not a great day, but we'll see how tomorrow goes.