Culture, Then and Now

I’m not a big fan of ‘tourist attractions’ but… We visit Boma’s of Kenya in Nairobi, a museum offering ‘traditional dance” performances, a restaurant and a number of recreated family clusters from many of the traditional tribal groups. Multiple wives need multiple residences, at least in this country. They also have multiple granaries and some have an inner wall to keep the livestock out of their bed. All made of mud with thatched roofs. The granaries were mostly very large baskets, some also plastered with mud and all belonging to the women.Visiting these little groupings was almost like a trip around the country, somewhere around 30 of them; although by the end there were not so much groupings as examples of slightly different construction.
Speedily walking past the inevitable venders we continued on into the main hall to watch the dancing. Many of the seats in the large circular auditorium were lined with school children in uniform. Rows of red, yellow, brown, green and blue with tourists in groups breaking up the random colour schemes. That was worth a picture and I spotted a few tourists filming the audience although I chose not to.
The dancing was fairly vigorous  and entertaining. I cannot speak to it’s authenticity although the costumes were well made and dancers enthusiastic. A couple of the males would pull individuals out of the stands (mostly female) to the immense appreciation of the rest of us and in some cases embarrassment of the ‘volunteers’. After a number of these performances we made our way off the site walking  towards a nearby shopping centre, passing by a group of baboons nonchalantly checking out the garbage bins around the perimeter.
Another entertaining environment! I hadn’t seen so many white people since Europe, once we got past the security check and into the mall. I scored big, finding a number of packages of my favourite chocolate… no longer available back home, I bought all  they had assuming it was the end of the stock. (Days later in another mall I saw more but I restrained myself).
We sat and had a hot drink  watching the parade of blondes and men in shorts, the occasional Africans with higher status and money hanging out with the colonials and tourists. Yes extremely judgemental but there we were and thats what I saw, or at least make up about what I saw. Your experience may be, no, will be different. It was quite pleasant, civil and enlightening and after looking through the arts and crafts market (where the vendors made complimentary comments about my Tanzanian shirt) we called ‘Little’ an Uber/taxi service and made our way through the traffic back to our friends’ residence for sundowners, conversation and dinner.

Back into Kenya

Arriving early afternoon in Nairobi on the bus from Arusha after dropping  a few folks at the airport, we trundled, dragged and pushed our luggage down the street past the taxi drivers and across to a slightly more upscale hotel. This one has a lift! The previous hotel, kiddy/kitty? corner  to this one had a spiral, tile covered staircase which was narrow and dizzy making.
Once settled, showered and refreshed we enjoyed a beer in the lounge below, then went walkabout looking for sustenance and found Bridges Organic Health Restaurant where we had a lovely meal. I’m a big fan of TripAdvisor where I left a review, along with numerous others on most of the eating establishments and hotels we’ve visited.
The street scene is alive with pedestrians, beggars and touts pushing safaris into the game parks and ‘wilderness’. They can be persistent, following us for blocks sure that eventually we’ll succumb to their amazing offer.  The beggars laying on the heavy eyes and stories of woe and misfortune seem to target anyone looking like tourist. I don’t feel good ignoring them, my best strategy is to carry no cash, telling them amna, I have none, although strictly speaking that is not true. I take my cues from the rest of the populace since they ignore them and walk on by.
I haven’t spent too many nights in posh places, especially in Africa and what’s been consistent has been the tiles in the hallways. Keys in the lock, doors opening and closing all echoing very well. Insulation is not big here if existing at all. It all boils down to interrupted sleep, apparently the trade off I’m making by staying in low budget accommodation. So it’s  a real pleasure to be invited to stay with a friend from a previous visit, off the main road, away from the bars and nightclubs in the city.
Instead we have a BBQ, catch up on all that has passed in the last few years, family and common friends, politics and the state of the world. And a relatively uninterrupted sleep inside the mosquito net.