last weekend (november 12/13) was a lazy weekend. on saturday, i went to diani beach to soak up some sun. sunday, i wasn't feeling well, so i laid around doing nothing all day. don't worry, it wasn't anything serious and i felt better by midday.
this past week i went to the pediatric ward (although i did not spend much time there). monday was my first day. i was showed around, and followed one of the doctors around the rest of the day. the ward is full of crying, screaming kids, and similar conditions are seen over and over again-- malaria, anemia (caused by the malaria), pneumonia, and malnutrition. many of the children with pneumonia need careful supervision, as they often contracted HIV through their mother. for many of the patients, blood samples need to be taken. this seems to be the most tedious part of the pediatric ward, as their veins are so hard to find and they kick, scream, and squirm the entire time. on thursday, i also went to the pediatric ward, and saw similar cases.
tuesday, i headed to ramisi, a small village just south of msambweni. there was a four-day polio vaccination outreach going on, and i went with my host father for the day. all children under five years old should get the vaccine. it's just two drops taken orally, and then a mark is put on their finger nail to show they got the vaccine. first we went to the primary school, then the nursery, and then door to door, looking for kids. i was the designated "marker", so that is what i did for a few hours. it was nice to get out of the hospital and see an even more rural area than msambweni (think of an entire village of mud huts).
wednesday and friday i went to theatre (surgery). the cases varied, but i saw a few cyst removals, a c-section, and a man that needed the wound in his foot cleaned, but eventually he will just have to have it amputated, because it is not healing.
the weekend was spent at malindi, a large tourist area about two hours north of mombasa. historical significance: after portuguese explorer vasco da gama sailed around the cape of good hope, malindi is where he erected a coral pillar and turned east to head towards india.
i left msambweni friday afternoon, with plans of staying with an msid friend in bamburi, a town just north of mombasa for the night. it took 2 1/2 hours to get there-- a 1 1/2 hour matatu ride to likoni, a ride on the ferry, and another 45 minutes out of mombasa to bamburi. i made it around 4:30. we went to the beach for awhile, where we met up with a couple other msid students, and then went to her house for the night.
saturday morning we met up with two other msid students to find a matatu to malindi. after being hassled by the matatu conductors (as usual), we found one and were on our way. we stopped in gedi to visit the gedi ruins, which is a 14th-17th century swahili village.
afterwards, we ate lunch and headed to malindi. we got to our hotel, and decided to explore the town/beach the rest of the day. we ate supper at a restaurant called "i love pizza", as malindi has a large italian influence, and most of the tourists are from italy. i got a calzone, hands down the best thing i've eaten in four weeks since moving to msambweni.
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| the view of the ocean from our hotel balcony. |
that night, we decided to go out and see what the nightlife is like in malindi. prostitution is a huge problem on the coast, and mainly what we saw was old (50-70 years old) white men, with young kenyan prostitutes. it's so sad to see how many women exploit themselves for little money, and to see men who think what they're doing is acceptable.
sunday, we ate breakfast and headed to marafa depression, aka hell's kitchen. after an hour's drive on a bumpy, noisy, gravel road, we finally made it to our destination. marafa depression is sometimes called "the grand canyon of kenya"-- it's a large canyon as a result of wind erosion. it was very neat to see, although there's really no comparison to the actual grand canyon. ;)
after making it back to malindi, we went to malindi marine park to go snorkeling. malindi is supposed to have some of the best snorkeling along the coast, and we couldn't pass up hiring a boat for two hours and having snorkeling gear provided for us, all for six dollars. the snorkeling was absolutely amazing-- so much coral, so many cool colored fish, it is indescribable.
we left malindi around 5:00, and i still had a 4 1/2 hours journey home. i knew i was in for a long evening. we found an "express" matatu to mombasa-- one that doesn't make any stops, so it was much quicker. we ran into some traffic issues near mombasa which slowed us down, but i made it across the ferry to likoni around 8:15. i knew i might run into problems if matatus stopped running, but i thought it was still early enough.
this is where my weekend went sour. me and an msid student that lives in likoni walked off the ferry, and we tried to find a matatu to msambweni. we were told by another matatui'd have to take a taxi, around $15. just great. so he told us he'd ask his taxi driver "friend" to take us. we were told to stand on the opposite side of the street while they talked. they both came over to us, we tried to negotiate a price, but the taxi driver wanted more money. the taxi driver walked back to his car with the matatu driver. the matatu driver came back to us, and told me to give him 1500 ($15), so i assumed they had agreed on a price. about five minutes later, the matatu driver came back and asked for 200 more ($2), and that would be final. i only had a 1000Ksh bill, so he said he'd find change for me. he walked off, with 2500 ($25) of my money, and was never seen again! i still needed to get home, so i ended up paying 2000 ($20) to the taxi driver to get me home. on the way home, the taxi driver said that he wasn't friends with the matatu driver and had never seen him before in his life.
this event is one of the hardest things to deal with in kenya. you want to trust people, as most kenyans are sincere, friendly people, that just want to help you. but this is an example of the "rotten eggs" you can sometimes find. the matatu driver seemed friendly, and in no way led us to believe otherwise. it is hard because if i am skeptical of all kenyans, my experience with them won't be very good, but at the same time, if i trust them, i could end up in bad situations, like i was.
overall though, i still had a great weekend. there is no point in "crying over spilled milk"-- this experience is just about living and learning, life will go on and i learned my lesson (and i guess it makes for a good story, too).
i hope everyone enjoys their thanksgiving holiday. :)
emma
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