Update week 8/9 Nairobi

Hello everyone,

Last week we skipped the blog. For some reason the internet wasn’t working in our apartment and we also hadn’t experienced anything extraordinary. Last week we discussed with our supervisor how to continue the project. He liked our interview questions and he advised us to conduct focus groups as well. We tried to do questionnaires in the class, but the teachers wanted to have a confirmation from our supervisor. Our supervisor said to do the questionnaire after the classes, so we wouldn’t use their in-class time. We had to notify the student president about the questionnaires and focus groups, as she is able to arrange participants for our interviews. The student president said that the class representatives didn’t show up at the meeting so the student president couldn’t do much either. Till now we managed to do one questionnaire, but we are determined to do other classes as well.

On Wednesday we had an interview at the Dutch embassy. it was very interesting and helpful for our research. Our contact person at the Dutch embassy also have brought us in contract with other organizations that might be  interesting for our project.  The employee of the embassy found that we had interesting questions and we compared a lot from back home to Ethiopia.

On Thursday we went to Nairobi. It was stressful to get at the airport on time. The driver suggested to leave early, but the overslept and arrived a half hour too late. Traffic was completely and it wasn’t’ making any progress. Some people drove on the other side of the road, but our driver refused to do that. Eventually he took another road and forced the car through the crowd. We eventually  arrived at the airport on time. On Thursday when we arrived at the house of Mary’s family member, we rested and went to the KFC, which Addis Abba doesn’t have.

On Friday we went sightseeing  for the entire day, so Mary’s aunt arranged a driver for us which we only had to pay €45 for the entire day. We first went to Kenyatta market where Mary braided her hair. Kenyatta market has a lot of stands with people who do hair. These people are always sitting at the entrance trying to lure people to their stands. Mary ended up paying a lot less than when she would’ve done it in the Netherlands. They are also very good. We also bough nice souvenirs at the Kenyatta market, as it’s not just a market where you can get your hair done but you can also buy clothing, jewellery, food etc. At first we arrived at a stand where we wanted to buy clothing, but we thankfully decided to walk a bit further and we arrived at a different stand where they sold the same clothes but way cheaper. After the Kenyatta market we went to the National park, where they have a safari, safari walk and an orphanage. We decided to partake the safari walk. We had very nice and good tour guide who was really passionate about his job. The park is very beautiful and well maintained and the animals have a lot more space than in a regular zoo. We didn’t do the safari walk at the right time, as it was very hot and many of the animals were hiding from the sun. The tour guide and keeper thankfully took us to places where guests are normally not allowed to go. We were therefore able to see the lions and we came close to the hippo’s.  The Baboons aren’t kept in captivity, they just walk freely around the park making a lot of noise and they are really bold. The guide said when people have food they like to attack, good for us that didn’t have any on us.                                                                                                                                                     

Our initial plan was to go to an animal orphanage  but they said the safari is nicer and we would see more of the  nature. The animal orphanage is located next to national park. We could see some of that as well. Also the keeper said it was better to do the safari walk instead of the doing the big safari with the car, because it was too late and there was a big chance that in all the 3 hours of the safari we wouldn’t see any animal. After that we went to a big mall where we bought more souvenirs and ate at the KFC again.

Saturday we went to a baby elephant orphanage. We were able to  see how the baby elephants are fed with big bottles. Although it was only for one hour, it was really interesting. While the elephants were fed a keeper was giving information on the names of the elephants, their age and how they arrived at the orphanage. Many of the elephant arrived at the orphanage, because their mothers were killed for the ivory or because they were found in a well. When the elephants are big enough they are sent back to their natural habit.  The baby elephants drink about 24 L of milk a day and it Is the same formula that human babies drink. Taking care of an animal costs about 900  US dollar a month. There were moments where the animals came close to where we were standing, which allowed us to touch them and feel their skin. Christi thought that their skin felt like paper.

Afterwards we were planning of going to the giraffe centre, but we skipped that and went to the Masai market instead. The Masai market is a very big market with a lot vendors who sell stuff such as, clothing, jewellery , shoes, statues, paintings etc. In the evening we did some shopping in the Nakumatt supermarket which is very big and also sells clothing, shoes and electronics. The supermarket reminded Mary of American supermarkets. We bought a lot of stuff that are more expensive or that we are not able to find in Addis Ababa.

We bought a lot of stuff, but luckily we both have big suitcases. Christi even brought an empty suitcase. We are almost heading off to the airport at this moment to go back to Addis Ababa.

Thank you for reading next time it will be from Addis Ababa.