Nairobi to Nakuru.......

Saturday 22nd

I'm here............ But let's rewind a few hours and I will try my best to describe the journey from Nairobi to Nakuru, if words fail me it's because it truly was like nothing I've ever seen or experienced and to be honest I had a "few oh my gosh" moments.

The flight from Abu Dhabi was fairly in eventful all bar the fact that we had a fairly bumpy approach into Nairobi.. Jomo Kenyatta airport is a dated but a seemingly efficient place with low wooden panel ceilings and brown and orange swirl carpets.. The only choo (toilet) I could find was a two toilet room, up three concrete stairs with plywood doors that didn't lock but it was clean and serviced, though if I had the need to avoid customs a quick jump out the wide open window to the car park would have been my best option :o) After waiting about forty minutes in a line for my entry visa to be issued, by a sullen faced man who obviously had dropped out of charm school on his first day, I headed down the stairs to the baggage hall, to find both my bags trundling around on the carousel.. I picked em up and headed out , no customs, no stops...nobody to care I was carrying 1700 condoms... Sorry to disappoint all of you who were looking forward to seeing me on Boarder Patrol kenya style, I headed out and quickly found Nick, the friendly volunteer coordinator from So They Can (to the Pomarians reading this, no word of a lie, looking at Nick is like looking at Benny in twenty years time)

Within minutes we are headed out into the intense heat of Nairobi, Nick informs me he hopes we miss the rush hour traffic... Well I'm not sure if we missed the worst of it, but I will tell you this for nothing people, don't let me hear a single one of you ever complain about New Zealand drivers or how busy the north western is at 3:00pm, this traffic and experience took congestion and crazy to a whole new level... Nicks small white beat up Toyota was dwarfed by the enormous trucks that surrounded us, each belching out copious plumes of black smoke at window level, with the heat making it impossible to close our windows.. No cars stays in their lanes each pushes and shoves until they found a "better" way through, dozens of white vans are crammed full of, in excess of 14 people, along with their bags, sacks of vegetables and the odd chicken, Nick informs me this is the most convenient and cheapest form of public transport...

But what I found the most alarming is the dozens and dozens of street hawkers plying their wares in amongst this chaotic traffic, men dressed in ill fitting tan suites with beanies carrying anything from; car safety kits with first aid kits and reflective signs for drivers to purchase to sunglasses and car chargers for a cell phone or the latest Bond movie on DVD...all walking past offering their product, Nick bought himself a new set of reflective safety triangles, he explained he had left his on the side of the road yesterday when he had to fix a flat tyre.  As we moved through the city what I found so amazing is the people exiting the vehicle they were passenger in and crossing this six lane highway, the pedestrians that dodge in and out of this chaos called rush hour.. With many of the central barricades crumbling they use these gaps to get to the other side of the highway......

Nick is a chattering away and quickly the conversation has turned to some of the many differences in the Kenyan culture, including the Kenyan ways of dealing with marital guidance.. And as he's explaining this in great detail, a pair of hawkers, most likely father and son appear alongside his window, but this pair were different to all the others, the son possible only twelve years old is guiding the older man through the traffic, all the while the old man shakes a small metal dish of coins, as they get closer, it became obvious this elderly gentleman man was blind, both his eyes were stitched clothes and from the weathering of the skin on his face around them he had been that way for many years....
I could prattle on for ages about the drive between Nairobi and Nakuru, the hundreds, no thousands of people walking and crossing this main highway, the enormous pothole and kilometres of wheel worn ridges from thousands of trucks traveling it everyday. I could tell you about the ancient enormous bus broken down on the side of the road with three wheels off, rocks behind the remaining wheel and jacked up on bits of wood and the half a dozen men laying underneath it.. Or the ambulance that fought its way through the random chaos to go to the aide of somebody, then only a few kilometres later the remains of an obvious pedestrian versus car accident, the victims shoes, and bag still on the road surrounded by broken glass... Nick nonchalantly tells me 33,000 people each year loose their lives on this highway....

It was a journey I will never forget, it was dark as we approached Nakuru, when yet another truck was blocking the road, so knowing a diversion Nick dropped of the main highway and started driving through a township, of like nothing I'd never seen before, the road was completely dirt and massive potholes, homes were little more than huts of corrugated iron and plywood. Candles burned outside some homes, there were people everywhere, to be honest I was a little scared, my heart was in my mouth, "was this what my home stay was to be like?" I hadn't quite prepared for this, but no after a few minutes we turned onto another highway, this one quieter and in much better state of repair, and shortly we turned onto a dirt track and pulled up alongside two homes both with a very large wall surrounding them (topped with broken glass) and out came Mary, this beautiful Kenyan woman in her thirty's she shook my hand we went into what will be my home for the next five and half weeks.....

Not to sure if I can upload photos but will try next time.....