In ole Nairobi

- Rose Av. Compound -

Jambo! I thought I would give you all Swahili lessons and then realized that you already know Swahili, you just don’t know you know it. So if you have ever seen The Lion King then I will show you that you know Swahili but didn’t know you knew it.

Simba: lion (yep!)
Hakuna matata: (we all echo Pumba saying: It means) no worries (for the rest of your daaays)
Asante sana: thank you very much. Asante = thankyou, sana = many/much
Rafiki: friend

Masai Market
Saturday found us going to the Masai Market (reminded me of the Indian markets in Lima but nooo). They set up in different areas (that day in the centre of town) and have their rugs with all the beautiful African crafts, scarfs, pictures and so on and on and on. Very compact and busy. The sellers are wandering near their “stall” and call you over as soon as you are looking or make eye contact, oh sister, sister! Friend, friend! And I make you good offer and then try to rip you off really badly (muzungo muzungo) and you get the price down and they say i have never sold this for so little so yeah, it is an exhausting process.

Tips for buying when they are clearly trying to rip you off (always true):
- Walk away. They will follow and say they will sell it for less. Do this many times. Even if you give up and want to go away, they will keep turning up beside you.
- Hold out the money you are will to spend for what you want, some will take it and you won!
- Ask for non-muzungo prices.
- Be prepared to haggle DOOOOWN. I.e. they will say 7,000 and you can get it down to 3,000.

Church
On Sunday I went to church with Amelie and Lianne (two German SIMPacters) and it is international but aimed at the Asians (they call them Asians but are really people from India) so we sang in English, Swahili and Hindu.!. Very interesting, and on every Hindu song, either one person or a whole group of Hindus came to the front and just danced, spontaneous, random worship. It was really lovely! Interesting church experience but I have still not experienced the TRUE Kenyan church experience. Less than a week before I do!

Giraffe kissing
OK, so the title gave it away. We went to the giraffe sanctuary and we could feed and pet the giraffes (!) and if you put the food in your mouth (tiny pellets), the giraffe would selfishly give you a kiss to get the food. =). Lots of saliva but also had some antiseptic (used for their tongue cause it constantly gets cut on the trees) so hopefully it was bacteria free!















(Maybe it was not true love's first kiss)

I am hanging out with the SIMPacters that are leaving today (Katie, Lyndsay, Austin and Adam) and seeing all they are suffering to pack everything so hopefully when my time comes to go I will not buy TOO much stuff to bring back! I leave for Kisumu on the 2nd of May =).
Kwaheri!