“Could someone please spare patients at the Western Provincial Hospital the agony of having to watch coffins being made at the hospital entrance? This is quite depressing for patients, their relatives and well-wishers. These carpenters should be made to move as their continued presence at the hospital gates negates the will to live.”
Contributor to Daily Nation 22.11.07
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The Sheldrick Elephant Sanctuary has orphaned elephants from 9 weeks to 9 years in their care. The elephants, who have green-coated keepers with them all the time including when sleeping at night, came in two groups for their milk and for a play in the mud pools. The costs of seeing them have rocketed in the last month (it’s now only worthwhile if you are seeing the national park on the same day) and the visitors have dropped considerably so we were able to touch the elephants. Did you know that the under-surface of their ears is like polished leather? The animals can get sunburn (damaging their ears) and also get cold and suffer pneumonia. They are therefore wrapped in blankets and their keepers sometimes use umbrellas to protect them. They need milk (SMA Gold; cow’s milk doesn’t work) for 5 years and are then weaned off onto a maize porridge mix. They continue to need the family environment for another 4 years before they can be released to a Park in the East (Tsavo).
Here is a coated youngster, some others having a friendly rumble, and two intermediates racing from out of the bush to get their milk.
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A few pictures from Nairobi National Park. Despite being only 20 miles by 5 miles it has masses of wildlife and more bird species than the UK.
The giraffe welcomed us to the park proper while the ostrich looked embarrassed at being caught in flagrante (picture censored).
The tiny malachite kingfisher and red-cheeked cordon bleu are not great photos but show how colourful the real things are.
The eland is chewing a prickly pear while the zebra sticks to grass. The lioness sticks to zebra (more graphic pictures censored).
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Sometimes it seems easier to get things made here than to buy them ready-made.
Three examples illustrate this:
I wanted a white coat for work (unlike UK, one can’t be a professional without here) and the first one found for me advertised a chemical company! I didn’t use it, I borrowed a plain one for a while, but then to my surprise I was told a tailor would be coming at 10 o’clock to measure me for a new one. This being Nairobi, he didn’t come at 10 but he did arrive the next day. I await the product.
My office was a bit grubby when I arrived and I had no writing paper or other office goods. The window had some filthy and ripped net curtains. Within one day I had some very nicely made curtains in blue and gold, but I‘ve had to go and buy scissors, paper, stapler etc.
I have been looking for more comfortable chairs in my lounge. The shops and second-hand sales had big suites for lots of money but I didn’t need such a suite and I didn’t want to spend the money! I therefore headed for the Ngong Road where there is a kilometre of furniture stores; not stores where they sell furniture but shacks where they make it. There are welders and carpenters making anything you want in wood or metal. They do it on the rough ground between the shacks and the road. I sat on a number of chairs and eventually found a two-seater that was nearly right but not quite. With 2” off the seat, 3” on the back and a different material.... I paid a deposit on Tuesday night and on Saturday morning picked up the finished product, made to my size and ready to go for about £50.
The maker offered to show me a catalogue of other chairs. I expected a few sketches or photos but instead he produced an Argos catalogue (there is no Argos in Kenya) and offered to make anything in it. I might just take him up on the offer.
Please see pics of the coat, the shack and the settee.
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The Media here, TV, radio and papers, all use an interesting style of English, mostly a very proper form of English but, in the case of the audible forms, with unusual intonation and emphasis. The newspapers, however, are prone to odd headlines and stories. One recently printed a big section on the fact that it had sold out in some provincial town the day before.
Other headlines raise interesting ideas:
“Eldoret Airport finally lifts off ground as flights grow”
“Fiery Archbishop retires after four decade service” (that’s a long service, even for here.)
“Foreigners are sought for murder” reminds me of the three Irishmen looking for work in London...
There was an advert in which HRH Prince Ernst of Hanover announced that “he has appealed against a German court verdict and will seek to show that he only slapped the face of a German citizen without causing any injuries whatsoever and not as maintained by the citizen that such injuries required hospitalisation.” (I have no idea why this ad was placed.)
You’d find these in any country:
Teacher: Why are you late?
Pupil: There was a man who lost 1,000 shilling note at the bus stop.
Teacher: That’s nice, were you helping him look for it?
Pupil: No, I was standing on it and waiting for him to go.
On a crowded bus one man noticed another had his eyes shut. “What’s the matter, are you sick?”
“No, I’m OK, I just hate to see old ladies standing.”
This bakery does very nice scones but are better bakers than sign-writers.
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Here is my den, before I got curtains and a coat hook, and before I unpacked the box of books. It’s not posh, but it works.
It used to be a ward side-room when the building was part of the King George Hospital.
It’s a cool building, with high ceilings and solid concrete walls. Sound echoes massively and many rooms have iron bars/doors although that’s probably not necessary.
The classroom (same curtain material as my office) is also basic but works. The student group is my final year MPharm class.
The colleagues are Wambui (a young American-trained Kenyan who is due to join the staff soon) and Karimi who has been overworked running the course single-handed for some time.
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