african dream

for those of you that don't know, both of my parents were born and raised in kenya (my dad in mombasa and my mom in nairobi). they were there till around they were 18 before moving to goa. they spent almost twice as much time in kenya as they did in goa. neither has been back since they left in around 1969, but my dad has been wanting to come back for years now. my mom's fears about the safety of the country has held him back, but she finally gave in. terence and i decided to tag along.

getting there:
getting to kenya and meeting with my parents and brother, who had already been there almost a week, wasn't as easy as you would think. to start things off my flight from brussels to nairobi was delayed two hours, which made me miss my flight from nairobi to mombasa ... and of course, that flight was the last one of the night. after an hour or two of talking with airline officials, they booked me on a flight the next morning and put me up in a pretty nice hotel for the night. when i got to the airport the next morning, the excitement of the trip was really starting to hit me. plus, when i got to the airport and was looking for breakfast, i found some mondazis. mondazis are basically african donuts. i love them ... but get them only rarely when my aunts will make them. the flight to mombasa was uneventful ... though i did get a beautiful view of mt. kilimanjaro from the plane. growing up, my dad used to tell my brother and me tall tales of his adventures climbing mt. kilimanjaro, which i believed for a long time. once i touched down in mombasa (which i didn't know was an island till i got there), there was a driver waiting for me with instructions to take me to my parents and brother who were on a city tour of mombasa. the chase was on. to make a long story short, the driver decided to pick up someone else too, and, instead of dropping me off first even though i was on the way, dropped off the other guy first. by that time, my parents and terence had left where they were and now we had to meet them somewhere else. after a lotta driving through mombasa, i eventually met up with the rest of my family.

mombasa city tour:
the first part of the tour (or at least the first part of the tour for me) took us through the old spice market. throughout the tour, it was fun hearing my dad tell stories of how things were "back when [he] was [there]." next we went to fort jesus, an old portuguese fort that constantly fought over. it was only relatively recently made a national monument. before then, it served as a playground for my dad and his childhood friends. they used to play soccer outside its walls, throw stones down its well, and swim to and from its banks. after the fort, it was time for lunch. lunch was aboard the tamarind dhow while it floated through crisp blue waters. we ended the city tour at hallers park, basically a zoo. there we saw hippos and crocodiles eating, giant tortoises, monkeys, and even got to feed some giraffes.

mombasa night life:
terence told me we had plans to hang out with some of my mom's friend effie's kids that night. neither terence and i had met any of them before. effie, who used to be my mom's neighbor in nairobi back in the day, has two kids, marissa and jeremy, and jeremy was celebrating his 21st birthday (not a big deal since the drinking age is 18 and even that isn't enforced much). the plan was to pre-party at their house and then head out to some bar. i guess you could say they sticked to that plan, but things definitely weren't what i expected. effie's husband mike, who used to go to school with my dad, picked up the four of us from our hotel. my parents were going to some other party with effie and mike. we got to the house around 9. as soon as my parents left with mike and effie, as if on cue, car after car starting pulling into the driveway. in the end there were around 25 (mostly goan) kids between 20 and 30 years old. after a few drinks and a few hours, we get word that the plan is to leave the house around midnight. i'm looking forward to a change of scenery, mostly because my energy level is DROPPING (keep in mind that i flew into mombasa this morning). 1am rolls around and we're still at the house, and fortunately, i start to catch my second wind. it wasn't till around 2 that we ended up getting out of there and heading out to a local bar. after a couple hours of some drinking and dancing there, the fun begins. our group gets kicked out of that bar because one of the guys with us started puking at one of the tables. being kicked out and the way the bouncers treated us in doing so really pissed off jeremy and his friends. they were regulars at this place and knew some of the management. after some strong words with the people working there and some effort to get everyone in our party out, especially ryan (recently returned to mombasa after graduating from college in australia), we decided to move the fun. this time we went to pirates, a bigger place with more of a tourist appeal (though it was 4am now and not much of anyone was still there). we were at pirates till they closed around 6. this is when the real comedy starts. ryan is drunk and acting a fool, tripping over things, falling in the sand, peeing in public, peeing in public while falling in the sand, jumping on cars, talking random nonsense about rapunzel and the devil. STRAIGHT COMEDY! though it's probably one of those you had to be there things. eventually around 630am, we were dropped back at our hotel and i hit the sack. my first full day in the country was over.

the next day, my dad gave us his version of the mombasa city tour. he showed us the church he was baptised in and went to growing up. then he took us to his old neighborhood. the house he used to live in is still there but completely uninhabitable. the thing was RUN DOWN and falling apart ... literally. that night we had dinner with effie, mike, marissa, jeremy, and some of my dad's other friends. we called it a day early ...

... because we had to wake up early the next day to start our seven day safari. we were picked up by robert ... our guide and driver for the next seven days. we got into our nissan van, which was to be our home for the next few days ... and the safari was on!

the safari in general was an amazing experience. i didn't really know what to expect going in. our lodges throughout the safari were a pleasant surprise. great service, (mostly) good food, and nice accomodations. our safari consisted of four different game parks: tsavo west, amboseli, lake nakuru, and masai mara. each park was different from all the others, and each park had different things that made it special. the safari also made me realize that my sense of sight is MUCH better than my brother's or my parents'.

tsavo west:
we had an AWESOME view of a man-made watering hole from our patio and the dining terrace. unfortunately, aside from that, it was hard to see much else because the brush in this park was high and thick. since this park was the beginning of our safari, a sighting of any kind was exciting for us. later on, seeing a gazelle or a dik dik would not have been a big deal but now seeing them still brought out "oohs" and "aahs." we did get a beautiful view of a group of giraffes in a clearing and a brief glimpse of a hyena before it was scared off by a herd of elephants. on our way out of the park, we stopped at a natural hot springs where we were able to see a bunch of hippos, and since the hippos were still wild, we were required to go with an armed escort. that armed escort was not the only one we'd need that day. apparently the drive between tsavo and amboseli isn't the safest one around, and there have been reports of armed bandits roaming the area. we had to travel in a caravan with each vehicle having a person with an assault rifle inside.

amboseli:
amboseli was flat and open. for miles and miles, all you'd see is animals, all kinds of animals: zebras, wildebeest, elephants, warthogs, giraffes, gazelles, etc. seeing all those animals side by side, peacefully coexisting, was incredible. here was also the first place we were able to see some predators. other highlights here include seeing:
- a cheetah chase (but not catch) a gazelle
- a lion eating a zebra by the side of the road
- a baby gazelle and since it could barely walk, it had to have been less than two hours old
- a traditional masai tribe and village
- a herd of elephants up close

lake nakuru:
getting to lake nakuru was not the most pleasant experience ever. the trip was a seven hour drive, but this wasn't your sf-to-la seven hour drive. our driver was constantly swerving left and right to avoid potholes and other vehicles. to make thing worse, it was pouring rain the whole time too. eventually we got there. lake nakuru is famous for the flocks of flamingos that call it home. the sheer magnitude of them was amazing. robert even let us get out of the van at the shore. highlights:
- rhinos for the first time, including a black rhino, which is one of africa's most endangered species.
- a breathtaking view from baboon cliff
- of course, the flamingos

masai mara:
masai mara is kenya's most famous national park, and you could easily spend 6 or 7 days here alone. long rolling hills and vast stretches of grassland. we also happened to be there at the tail end of the great wildebeest migration, and there were wildebeest everywhere. my mom wanted to "rough it" a bit here and had us booked in tents but really these tents were really the best rooms we had. they were basically nice hotel rooms but with canvas walls. we even later found out that the place was owned by gujaratis. highlights:
- a hyena eating something while a bunch of vultures waited their turn
- finally seeing a lion with a large mane
and of course, the highlight of the entire safari:
throughout the safari, we had seen all the different animals that we had expected/wanted to see, except for a leopard. after a long search, we find a leopard. at first we didn't have a very good view and could only see spots. after robert did some maneuvering to get us a better, we could see that the leopard was eating an antelope of some kind. as more and more cars approached, the leopard was becoming noticealbly more nervous. eventually it bites down on the antelope around the neck and climbs up a tree. yeah, it climbed up a tree while carrying the antelope in its mouth. once it felt the body was secure up in the tree, it jumped down and took off in the brush, leaving its food for later, safe in the tree where lions and hyenas couldn't get to it.
what a great way to end our safari.



after our safari, we had lunch in nairobi with my dad's old neighbor (who used to be a jetfighter pilot ... even trained at top gun) and then flew back to mombasa. we spent monday lounging at the beach with ryan. that night we had dinner at "the club." "the club," actually called the mombasa institute, formerly called the goan institute, is goan owned and has its own tennis courts, soccer field, bar, etc. it's basically the hangout spot for all the goans in the area, young and old alike. that night we ended up going out and what we thought would be an early night (since it was monday) didn't end till 3am. the next day was more tame with only happy hour and dinner. then terence and i said our goodbyes to mombasa and flew to nairobi.

while in nairobi, we stayed with shashank, who lives in nairobi working as a journalist. terence and i wandered around the city some while shashank worked, though there wasn't much to see. friday, the three of us went to hell's gate and biked through the park. though we'd been close to the animals before, being close with nothing separating you from them was a completely different experience. terence and i even almost got arrested on the way there. the policeman kept telling shashank "i want to arrest these two" because we didn't have our passports with us. he was even nice about, saying "i want to arrest these two ... let me arrest them ... please." when he realized we wouldn't offer him a bribe, he simply let us go. during the rest of our time in nairobi, shashank showed us around, taking us to good restaurants and bars. we ended our trip on saturday, hour from our flight, at a casino playing blackjack. all three of us started with 2000 Ksh (~$30). i ended with 8000 Ksh, shashank with 12000 Ksh, and terence with 18000 Ksh. you read that correctly ... i quadrupled my money, which was nothing compared to the 9x that terence did with his money! why can't we do that in vegas?!!?

and with that, our trip was over ...

... but i wasn't home yet. i spent most of the next week in new york. unfortunately, since archana was working a lot of that time, i wandered around the city by myself a lot and was able to meet up with both noopur and ramneek.

three and a half weeks and 31ooo AAdvantage miles (and platinum status) later, i made it back to sd. home again.

you can check out all my pictures here.