victoriainkenya: October 28, 2007

Today was a fun day. Joyce invited Mama E and me to her house for afternoon tea. There we met her husband, her daughter Evelyn, and two of her husband’s friends who “wanted to see the Americans.” We had a great time – Evelyn’s a sweet and very quiet girl and Joyce is an excellent cook. Joyce was also kind enough to give farewell gifts to the entire traveling party.

We wouldn’t visit the YWCA again, so I left Joyce most of the clothes that I had brought to Kenya to donate to the Y, as well as the items I bought for the Enlightened Support Group. Even though Joyce lives in the outskirts of Mombasa, she came with us downtown to help me with my last bit of shopping. I had told her the day before that I loved the dress she had on and wondered where to buy fabric. The only place she knew of was in a “locals only” market (i.e. too dangerous for foreigners), so I gave her $3000KSH to use her own discretion with what patters to buy.

To elaborate on the “dangerous for foreigners” part. Said parked in the alley near the store while Joyce shopped. I use the word “store” loosely. It was on a dirt side street straight out of a Christian Children’s Fund commercial. Actually the area was a thriving community of restaurants, shops and homes – just with tin roofs, tag board walls and no plumbing and, if any electricity, supplied by gasoline-powered generators. All of this floating in about one inch of dirty water and ankle deep trash. None of this is their fault; instead of paying to properly dump their waste at a landfill, many hotels and large businesses simply dump their trash for free in little shantytowns. Shame. (The constant dumping-in-communities issue was all over the local news – probably because it was nearing presidential elections.) After about 15 minutes, Joyce returned, with the perfect batch of fabric (I forgot what the Swahili word is for it.)

The other thing I was in town to shop for was a new converter to replace the one I broke. We looked all over town; however, it being Sunday, no one was open.

Notes:

* In the shops, nothing has an actual price. Everything is determined by bargaining. Joyce said, “I was speaking all the Swahili I know.”

* Yet another photo on the road and self-photo.

Photos: