ALCATEL ESCAPADES

                My phone fell in tea, actually coffee to be precise. Yes, and that’s no lie. I happen to like tea because as you well know am a villager and no meal is complete without a cuppa. I take coffee just before I sleep because it helps me sleep. Yeah, you heard me. That stimulant it supposedly has, that’s a lie too. That shit only works for uppity folks! So am curled up on my mattress on the mat on the floor, with ‘The Poison wood Bible’ by Barbara Kingsolver. I was re-reading since I had not been to the flea market in days. Flea markets are great finds for buying books on a budget. I bought this particular best seller for twenty shillings! I digress, back to my phone. My phone fell in this huge night cap I had so generously poured myself. That’s the same evening I just came in from the funeral service of Kevin, a classmate of mine who passed away of acute leukaemia. Suffice is to say, I was a little pre-occupied and after receiving a call ans then trying to settle back down, somehow my beloved Nokia 1110 decided to swim with the fishes(sic). The next day was a horrible one. Can’t call, won’t call. Won’t pick up, can’t pick up. So I end up at the Safaricom shop at the Sarit Centre and bag this Alcatel phone which really is a brand of a phone I wouldn’t have dreamt of buying. I prefer Nokias. They are safe, the cheap ones are not fancy but they’ll get you there. You call, you text. Communication’s necessities. Period. For the first time in a decade (ok, 8 years) of using mobiles, I switched alliances and bought an Alcatel phone. It has a camera and a radio so it was kinda a move up the ladder for me, hahahah! Ya ryt. Every time am nervous, my twiddling thumbs take silly pictures. When am trying to snob an irritating passenger in the matatu or on the bus, I put on the headphones and listen to crap on radio. It’s a great excuse. That was the last week of December. When we went to Groove party with my sister Ciru and my friend Paul, I took this picture to remind me of the first moment in the dark as we ushered in a new year.

The fireworks were awesome, but my camera phone does not have the resolution to show you that but it will get you there. When the year properly dawned, I was reassigned to Mombasa so fast and all I have to show you are my crappy pictures taken by nervous fingers on a weird brand of a camera.

My first week in Mombasa, one of our colleagues got a baby son so we trooped there to see the baby but really, twas just an excuse to eat biriani at someone else’s expense. He was so cute, I felt the tug on my womb right there. I swear I would have had one there and then if God had offered. Behind the house was this small mabati church. I guessed that one of their chief problems was the neighbours hanging their clothes on their barbed wire fence from the notice in the picture below.

Uswahilini kuna vituko. Enough about decency. I went to Tsavo West this past Sunday with friends and wound up at the watering hole. They have this tunnel where you go down to peep like a thief close to the animals as they drink. I am an African. You see one big one once, that’s enough. You quickly move on to nyamachoma, pictures and mchongoano. Here’s a view of the watering hole from the tunnel.

 

I think my Alcatel outdid itself on this one. Here is another for good measure.

As we came up from the tunnel, we decided to go to the lounge for lunch. Yes, I bought myself lunch there and then proceeded to eat every single bite. Scrumptious! There is this rock outside the lounge where they have somehow curved out the rock and put in a teeny-weeny fish pond. Innovation! I took this picture because Christine loves aquariums. She sold them for a while. But she and I aren’t rich enough to buy one so we ogle whenever we have the chance.

Beautiful. So of course, I had to take a picture of me to say ‘I was here’ which I did a pretty good job of considering how dark I am against the sun with the rolling plains in the background.

The view of the Voi Safari lodge from this rock is amazing. The baboons will not give you rest if you decide to eat on the terrace.

After lunch, we asked the nice young man at the reception to show us one of the rooms. Hidaya, a female colleague and I had to see the bathrooms first. And the mirrors of course! My Alcatel decided to show up in there as well as it took the picture.

 On our way out, we were kindly requested to write in the ’animals seen’ guest book. I had a laugh at some of the comments there in. Here is a sample.

Really?? That’s what you saw? Which animal is that? On the other hand, this fellow had no problem identifying the animals he had seen. His atrocity was in his spelling!

The one that killed me, especially because I felt his sentiments was this one.

As we drove out, we happened to see this old baboon which had a hole in its chest that some bugger had decided to shoot. He sat, staring at us as we drove by. He was even kind enough to pose for my Alcatel.

I hate poachers. I wish someday when we are asked about it, that whether there are any poachers in Kenya, we shall say ‘a doughnut’.