jess's voice

Since Jess has been such a big fixture in my life here, I thought you might enjoy reading some of her voice! Here is an excerpt from an email she sent family and friends about our trip to Zanzibar. We just got back today and there are more travel-related stories to share (i.e. how I elbowed my way through a lawless crowd for an hour to buy our return ferry tickets home), but hopefully I will share many more of those to share in person.

Jess on the dhow. You can add a sail, but wrong winds.

Zanzibar is BEAUTIFUL and I'm thankful to have this last bit of time outside of Dar. Despite it's could-be-anywhere-tropical appearance, I've had a real "oh, i'm really in Tanzania" kind of day where you're sort of doing things that you'd do anywhere on vacation but then the inevitable twist arises that reminds you EXACTLY where you are. I'll provide some examples:

You hire a cab to meet you at a ferry and bring you to your hotel--Anywhere
Your cab driver decides to stop at an ice cream store, a liquor store and a gas station all before having an asthma attack and hiring his "brother" to bring you the rest of the way--Zanzibar

Rya and I thought it would be nice to go sailing and our b&b offered a very lovely sounding tour--Anywhere
Instead of a sailboat, you are picked up in a handmade canoe with side balancers (think handmade catamaran) that two men push using long sticks while standing--Zanzibar

You are getting your tan on--Anywhere
You are getting so tan that a Masai tells you you are starting to look like him--Zanzibar

You go for a snorkel--Anywhere
During your pristine snorkel your guide gets in the water to show you an octopus (this still is a bit universal) and then uses the stick that he is using to point to the octopus to stab it repeatedly, kill it, and take it home for dinner--Zanzibar
Side note: i proceeded to scream, get water up my snorkel, and choke all at the same time. I also decided that, instead of Farm to table, this is Dow (the kind of boat) to table. no carbon footprint (or footprint at all, really).

I think that should give you a sense of my vacation thus far but to be clear, i'm having the MOST amazing time. The water is turquoise, the sand is so powdery, and our romantic king sized bed with a beautifully draped mosquito net is big enough to sprawl out without touching. Tomorrow we go on a spice tour and to stonetown before returning to Dar on friday and then heading HOME. I cannot wait.

And then we ate Swahili octopus for dinner!

Ball of fire

This morning's sunrise in Paje. Last full day in Tanzania.

Where we ate dinner last night

So lovely!

Zanzibar!!!

We are in Zanzibar for the final days of our stay here in Tanzania. The island is extraordinary.

We arrived very late Monday night in Stone Town just as the sun was setting. The ferry ride over had been another exercise in intra-Africa travel where we literally had to beg our way on the boat. As we kept saying, at least we got out--we both needed to be away from the stresses of Dar for a bit.

Zanzibar was an Arab state for quite a long time with its own sultan and everything and Stone Town is all Arab architecture. It's really beautiful and unlike anything we've seen here. I'm assuming most of the buildings are at the very least 200-300 years old (some easy internet searching or guidebook reading could cure this ignorance but my computer problems, which have only increased, make me just want to write quickly, and accept some guesstimates) and are varying states of restoration and dilapidation. The lovely taxi driver sent by the hotel--Mohammed--had to make some stops on the way to the east side of the island, including picking up ice cream, beer, and diet coke (a failure on the last attempt). We then drove through the outskirts of the town, skirting villages.

Electricity in Zanzibar is a problem as it is all over Tanzania, but more acutely so here. There is a single power line that runs to the island, built by the Norwegians in the 1970s. But even more than the fact that there are frequent blackouts and power failures, it was amazing to see just how dark the island is. As we drove through these little neighborhoods, probably fewer than half the homes had light and if they did it was a single bulb on a string. Instead, the children played in the darken street, the adolescents sat along the edges of half-built houses, and the adults walked along the sides of the roads, sometimes riding their almost invisible bikes perilously close to traffic.I've known about the lack of electricity even in fairly developed parts of the country, of course, but to see this in such proximity was really striking. As we drove east, the island got more and more dark until we were essentially along country roads (where the bikes were even more invisible).

We arrived at our lovely hotel late and hungry after one more stop at a gas station, where Mohammed had switched us into his "brother"'s cab because he felt his asthma coming on. Again, what a shock to see asthma so debilitating, especially to someone who is more likely than not middle class. We arrived in our lovely hotel, Kilima Kidogo (Little Hill) where the proprietor and staff were probably among the most welcoming and awesome people we had met.

The hotel is really lovely--a very small guest house right on the beach. To the left is a picture of our room, with a huge king size bed with romantic (truly) mosquito nets hanging off the rustic four posters.

When we woke up the first morning, the sky was clear and the sea shone turquoise--clear turquoise in all its shades. Our first night and day were mostly spent relaxing, taking long walks on the beach, and finishing up a little work.

Today, we got up to watch the sunrise (extraordinary--so much more gentle than sunsets, in pastels) and are going on a sailing trip with the requisite snorkeling (supposed to be very good). Tomorrow on our way back to Stone Town, we'll do the spice tour.

Lots more to tell and share, but my computer is running out of juice and won't take a charge or run of AC with any consistency and more recently not at all. Technical problems!

Hopefully I'll be able to get enough to post again, but if not, I come home on Saturday and can't wait to share more of what an incredible trip this has been. 

kenya airways is my enemy

So I alluded before that Kenya Airways was my enemy. Let me give you a little better idea of exactly what I mean.

I booked my ticket online for the Kenya Airways flights to Nairobi and back and got a confirmation email. Now, I did not read this confirmation email too closely because, well, sometimes I'm careless. Also, because it was a CONFIRMATION email that said CONFIRMATION and had a reservation number. Legit, right?

Jess and I leave about 3 hours early to avoid the infamous Dar traffic. We arrive at the airport, which is essentially an open air room and we wait in line for 45 minutes. This is after the initial x-ray machine attendant tells me he loves me and wants to marry me--a first in Dar!

Jess checks in without problem and I step up to the counter. Mind you, all the desk staff are dressed in the greatest outfits for Precision Air, Tanzania's airline. Observe:

Those are gazelles on their ties!

Anyway, when I checked in the lovely man behind the counter was like, well...I see your name but you don't have a ticket number, so I recommend you go and buy a new ticket outside. I was needless to say incredulous. I had a confirmation! With a reservation number! Of course, Jess and I hadn't been particularly organized when we left the house. Neither of us knew our flight numbers, the exact time of the plane, or had printed out the confirmation emails. We arrived at the airport and both of us were like, isn't one of us supposed to be the responsible one here? Guess not.

Needless to say, I spent the next hour running from the information booth to the Kenya Airways  office to the Precision Air ticketing booth, in and out of security, trying to figure out what was going on. A lovely woman in the ticketing agency let me use her computer to access said confirmation email and with that I went out of the airport altogether to the Kenya Airways office. Where they essentially sat on the phone for 20 minutes talking to someone else, then told me to return to the check in desk where they then again said they couldn't help me. It was beyond frustrating. At the last minute, I just said screw this, and bought a new ticket from the lovely ticket booth lady, which turned out to be less expensive than my original one since she got me the promotional fare. I literally then had to run through the airport to make it on the flight. And all the while poor Jess is standing at the front desk waiting for me.

The funniest moment was when we were rushing to gate, took the escalator, and the escalator literally broke, grinding to a halt while we were on it. It was a comedy of errors and we both just burst out laughing.

I sort of blame this one on myself because it's possible I did not read closely enough or that my credit card did not go through (it didn't), but it was really a terrible way to start a trip. Needless to say, when I booked my return trip once I got to Nairobi, I made sure to be very clear that the payment went through, that I got a confirmation email again and read it this time, and I truly believed everything was going to be ok...

Except, when I arrived at Nairobi airport at 6am on Monday morning, waited in line for an hour, feared for missing my flight and had no way to contact Jess cause our phones weren't working (we were flying the Dar--Nairobi legs together; she then had gone on to Addis Ababa for the weekend), the same thing happened again. I finally get to the ticket counter, only to be told I had no ticket number. I literally started crying. And then had to run in and out of security, cry again at the Kenya Airways ticketing office in another terminal, and run back, cut everyone and get a boarding pass for the wrong flight since apparently my originally flight gate was closed (it was boarding while I was crying at the Kenya Airways office). Only when I got upstairs through security and saw my original flight gate still did a lovely miracle occur. I asked if they'd let me on and they did! They literally crossed off the info on my boarding card, rewrote a new flight and seat number and ran me out to the gate. Thank goodness for that--the later flight would have gotten me back to the office hours later with no way of contacting Jess or anyone else. Needless to say, I will not be flying Kenya Airways again.

When I finally settled in (I had about 40 pounds of extra weight from the things I was bringing home from Nairobi), I saw I was sitting next to a lovely older Kenyan businessman who was an investor and adviser to young entrepreneurs in Nairobi. It was a great conversation and this is what we saw out the window:

Mt. Kilimanjaro in the foreground and Mt. Meru behind. My flying companion told me that Kili used to have a permanent ice cap that has all but disappeared in the last 10 years due to climate change.

And here's coming into to the peninsula in Dar:

plans

So this weekend was the weekend we were supposed to go on safari. But we blew it! We had decided going north really wasn't worth it for the short amount of time and that we'd stay around here. Only problem was the fact that the part we thought we'd go to was essentially just as far as the northern ones. Oops, when we figured it out, all recommended tour operators to the closest park (Mikumi) weren't available. We could take a bus out there and essentially hire a guide who really doesn't know much, but neither of us were into that idea. I think Jess actually had doubts about the whole safari thing to begin with, but I'm a little bummed cause I did want to see some of the landscape. More, I think I really wanted to stay in one of those lodges! No matter, I know I'll be back here--don't know how or when but I'm pretty sure I'll be back and able to see the parks that are really spectacular. At least I got a day in the parks in Nairobi.

Instead, we're spending a lovely weekend here in Dar, doing some of the things we haven't been able to do yet. Last night we had dinner at this amazing hotel and restaurant right on the ocean call Mediterraneo. We literally ate grilled vegetables as we listened to the surf about 15 feet from our chairs. Another power outage drove us out of the house and sadly (and perhaps with a little concern) the generator did not seem to work. We were supposed to meet up with a bunch of other people but nowhere else had wifi and almost all of our communications had been through the computer...so we were a little lost. No matter, we still had a great time on our own. Someone even affectionately named us the husbands and I think we are potentially becoming life partners. I'm going to have to break the news to David, Jess's lovely boyfriend.

So instead of sitting in a car looking at animals today, Jess and I are going to get a massage, go to the market to see our friend Caroline and maybe buy some fabrics, go to the gym, and just generally relax. We might even see a movie tonight. Novel! Tomorrow we may head back to Mediterraneo for breakfast, go to the village museum in the afternoon, get ourselves ready for Zanzibar, and eat Ethiopian at night. This also works a little better cause now we can be in the office on Monday and have lunch with the rest of the office, which somehow we managed not to do yet. It will be a much nicer send off to the people who have hosted us over the last few weeks.

lights out!

My computer has been all sorts of wonky recently so I haven't been able to post as regularly. It seems to only accept power from a single outlet downstairs. I mean, I know particular, but this is quite out of the ordinary, even for me. Anyway, the power is totally off in our neighborhood and for some reason, apparently the generator's wires also got crossed so needless to say, we're going out! Right after Jess takes a French shower with our drinking water.

A brief update:
 Today was fascinating--we had a site visit to the Round Table clinic in Bagara this morning, where D-tree staff met with community health workers (CHWs) to monitor their progress with the new phone systems they've been using. Of course we didn't understand anything since it was in Swahili but Joachim translated about some of the key problems these women (and men!!) face:

• Their clients want help--supplies, treatment, money--that the CHWs are neither equipped nor in some cases allowed to give. It is not so much that the NGOs need to monitor the CHWs work with the phones; the CHWs are just limited in what they can do without referring to a clinic and this is incredibly frustrating.
• The phones are both a blessing and a curse in terms of interaction and stigma. In some ways, they are great because they reinforce the status of the CHWs and are less obvious than the books they carried before, which made some clients and villagers uneasy (a show of sickness, so to speak). At the same time they are not really able to be used during the visits, when the real purpose is to counsel, educate, and talk to clients to make sure they are doing ok, taking their medications, etc. So the real time data entry and protocol stuff is sometimes barely used.
• These CHWs are passionate about their clients and their work--they really want to help and value their position in society. It's just not totally clear to me that we're best helping them do their jobs right now. Still, they like the phones and seem to want to keep using them.

We then had 4 hour+ interviews back to back in the sweatiest of sweaty no aircon/fan Dar. I think we deserve to go out to the Sweet Eazy!!

More photos and Kenya stories tomorrow, when hopefully power is restored.

back to the grind

I have so much more to post from my trip to Naorobi, including a bunch of great photos, but I've been recuperating the last few days. Sunday night through Monday morning were among my worst travel experiences ever and I'll give some details later, but suffice it to say, Kenya Airways is not my friend.

Jess also had a rough Sunday night, when she slept in the Naorobi airport whilst a group of Sierra Leoneon men took over the transfer desk. Apparently we not only work and live attached at the hip now, we also suffer in solidarity.

Below is a picture from the start of our journey. Dar's airport is totally open to the elements--but no worries!--air conditioning work in progress...since 1962.

updates and reading!

More on Nairobi trip soon, but first two updates:

1. I was misinformed about world's poorest countries. Note to self: check references (oops). Apparently, by GDP, Tanzania is 24 or 25th poorest and Kenya is ranked 30th. How then is the disparity between each, particularly in each comparing the countries' most prominent cities? Interestingly however, in the UN's list of 50 least developed countries, Tanzania is named, but Kenya is not. It leads me to believe that the gap between the rich and the poor is much bigger here in Kenya, which would make sense and is in line with what some of my driver-informants told me. Another factor is that the population in Tanzania exceeds the population in Kenya, so while the total country GDP may not be significantly different (in 2010, the IMF lists Kenya's total GDP in PPP international dollars at about $66B, Tanzania at $58.4B (apparently US$ equivalent is something like $23B); World Bank has slightly different but correlated numbers--btw, these are nowhere near the poorest countries in terms of total GDP), there is somewhat increased difference in per capita income (population is Tanzania is 44 million with the vast majority rural; population in Kenya is just shy of 40 million with 8 million in Nairobi alone).

In some very very quick internet research, it seems that things are looking up for Tanzania, however: they received the biggest Millennium Challenge Grant and also weathered the economic meltdown better than Kenya. From 2000-08, they achieved 7% GDP growth (wow!!) and a very respectable 6% in 2009, compared to Kenya 1.5%, not even keeping up with inflation. Tanzania has recently had bank reforms and other sorts of policies to incentivize investment so let's see what happens in that decade or two!

2. Speaking of interesting models, please please please read this article from yesterday's NY Times. It's fascinating--a new model of poverty support based on creating a framework and system for success and achievement rather than focus on need, led by the organization Family Independence Initiative (FII) which was by a young entrepreneur who saw things differently.

3. Finally, I'm making a list of books I should read about development and that are relevant to this project, just for my own knowledge. Suggestions are very welcome. So far the list includes: Poor Economics, Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo (MIT's Poverty Action Lab--if you don't know about this find and read a fascinating New Yorker article about Duflo and her work); The End of Poverty, Jeffrey Sachs; The Innovator's Prescription, Clay Christiansen (really health care in developed world but maybe some interesting parallels). I'm sure there are some Africa-specific books I must read as well. Anyone have any ideas?(Oooh even looking those up on Amazon gave lots of ideas! The Bottom Billion, Paul Collier; Dear Aid: Why Aid is Not Working, Dambiso Moyo; various by Amartya Sen; which reminds me, someone just recommended Cornel West's recent memoir Brother West: Loving and Living Out Loud--any thoughts?)

a decade ahead

Life in and around Nairobi is like nothing I've seen in Dar. I have heard Nairobi is at least two decades ahead of Dar, and this can be broken out into various things--roads (10 years ahead), infrastructure (20 years), education, etc. etc. Nairobi is a truly modern city.

During my weekend there, I took two trips northwest of the city, one to Lake Nakuru and the out to Mount Longolot. Both were out along the same highway and I was amazed by the number of schools, stores, domestic hotels (as opposed to the huge fancy ones in the city), etc. there were. There was still poverty--clearly--but compared to Tanzania, this is a country doing extremely well (I also learned on this trip that Tanzania is the third poorest country in the world; I don't exactly know how the level is calculated, but that says something about the neighboring countries).

Kenyans also have a very different attitude than Tanzanians. While Tanzanians can be reserved, Kenyans are known to be aggressive, and are characterized as such by all their neighbors in Rwanda, Uganda, etc. You learn a tremendous amount from taxi drivers and I spoke intently with the ones we used here, many of whom we spent significant time with on repeat trips or long journeys.

From these very welcoming drivers--Douglas, Charles, and Peter, I learned a lot about this country and the differences with Tanzania (that's where the two decades information came from, too). Here's essentially what they told me:

• The economic structure is the core difference between the development of the two countries--Kenya is capitalist and Tanzania is socialist
• Because of Tanzania's socialism, people with money in the country will not invest in the country, but instead do so outside of it; if they invested in the country, they would not own their investment
• While Tanzania focused on unity post-independence, Kenya focused on business
• Because of the lack of focus on unity, Kenya has experienced inter-tribal violence, such as the post-election violence in 2008--all the drivers spoke openly of this and felt passionately that it could not happen again
• Though, like in Tanzania, Kenyans do not want to be openly critical, our drivers were honest about the previous government corruption, the tribal favoritism, and how this bred ill will and the violence that was experienced; they also felt hopeful in the current direction of the government in continuing to build the country
• Kenyans I spoke to hold themselves and the country to a very high standard; I told them how amazing the roads, the cleanliness, the language, etc., all seemed--and they all said we should be doing better; Charles got lost at some point and was clearly very flustered, apologetic, and embarrassed, even as we assured him it had merely given us a scenic detour of Limuru
• Kenyans actively make fun of Tanzanians as sleepy and a little bit backward
• In Tanzania, everyone really only speaks Swahili and there are no native tongue languages; school is taught in Swahili with English as a subject
• In Kenya, where, like Tanzania, English and Swahili are both official languages, school is taught in English, with Swahili as a subject; most children outside of the cities learn their mother tongue (tribal dialect) first; English and Swahili are in school
• There are three main tribal groups in Kenya--the Bantu, Cushites, and Nilotes (though I believe there are slightly different names for the latter two here in Kenya that I can't seem to find online). The Kikuyus, who are primarily in power here are originally from the Nairobi region and all the drivers we had were Kikuyu. So is the president. The famous Maasai are Nilotes (pastoralists). Unlike Tanzania, there seem to be no Maasai living in this city, at least none that are immediately visible from their clothing.
• Speaking of clothing, nearly everyone in Nairobi dresses in modern clothes. I barely even saw any traditional cloth. 
• Kenya is incredibly security focused. Some is for good reason--there is more violence here than in Tanzania, quite a lot of mugging, robbery, sexual violence in some areas--other is that this is how the culture works. Everything--houses, hotels, restaurants, etc., is behind a gate with 24-hour askaris, sometimes two. And the questioning before gates are open is quite intense, that is, of course, until you show your mzungu face. 
• Kenyans are proud of their national heritage and the government has made an active effort to make parks accessible to residents, with entrance fees a fraction of the non-national price (think $20 USD vs. $3). And there has been an increase in public transportation to park areas (some which are very close to, or even inside of Nairobi), especially school groups. At both parks we visited, there were a number of school groups (more about this later--some of these trips deserve individual postings!)
• Schools are everywhere. On the drive out of town, we were on a highway where literally there seemed to be a school every 100 meters. And there were also the school children, among the cutest children I've ever seen, walking to school in their uniforms. Children as young as 3 (accompanied by older children) and 5 without any adults. Children here are incredibly friendly, proficient in English, and excited to talk to you. Apparently the biggest problem though is teachers not arriving to teach, or arriving but sitting and listening to the radio all day.
• Security is also a major concern when there are unstable states on your northern boundaries. There are expected to be some 500,000 refugees from Somalia in camps in the north, fleeing the broken state that has exacerbated the terrible famine brought on by worst drought in 50 years. When the aid organizations left Somalia last year when the Islamists took over, it left the country without a safety net. Now Kenya is that safety net for those who can make it into the country. People we talked to (albeit a small samples size) were acutely aware of the situation and compassionate in wanting to help, but also wary of the potential security problem it meant for the country.
• The recent independence of South Sudan is a great thing for Kenya. The oil resources will likely now be piped through Kenya, helping both countries' economies.
• It is COLD in Nairobi. The city is inland and about 1700m above sea level. All the Kenyans are bundled in sweaters, jackets, hats, etc. I mean, I wouldn't go that far, but I definitely was in pants, sweaters, and scarves in the evening. It is also much much drier. Whereas I haven't had to apply moisturizer once in Dar, my face, lips, and body all feel dry here. 
• Colonialist influence is still strong in some ways and there is a lot of politics about the land, businesses, etc.--i.e., who owns what (there's a large Indian population here, too, which adds to the complexity; I was told that a Kenyan is far more likely to get along with a mzungu and that most in the Indian community stay largely to to themselves). However, many British-isms are still obvious--bathrooms are cloakrooms, much of the architecture is colonial, school uniforms, etc., etc. 
• Kenyans have turned away from the US and the UK, and though still some seem to be excited, others are hugely disappointed by Obama. I wonder whether he will visit in his second term, if he wins one. Instead, China, Japan, and Singapore have become the new allies (and investors) of favor. China, in fact, is building the huge new superhighway inland.

More thoughts later, along with photos from the mini-safari, hike, and where I was staying. Nairobi is definitely someplace I can imagine coming and living for awhile.