It is the Saturday of my second week here, which places me right around the halfway mark of my time on the farm. I had a really good week and tbh it zoomed by bc of the extracurricular activities I got into.
Monday I spent commuting out of Nairobi back to the farm. It took me forever to leave my hostel in Nairobi bc 1. I wanted to sleep in after staying up late bouncing around bars & clubs with my hostel friends on Sunday night and 2. I did not want to say goodbye to my newfound friends, one in particular who I became quite close with, walking, talking and cooking with for hours and hours throughout the weekend. Eventually I did finally leave the hostel. I got a boda (motorbike… they have Uber boda as a transit option which is great bc the bodas can fit between cars and get you to your destination faster, but you’re likely in for a wild ride where you won’t want to blink 😅). Anyway I took a boda to the nearby grocery store to pick up some supplies like spare toothpaste, soap, hand towels and contact solution. After that it took fooooorever to get to the shuttle station in the Central Business District. No Uber would take me there, so I took the local bus which was an interesting experience. There’s a man who hangs out the side of the bus yelling in Kiswahili, I guess advertising the bus lol. Every stop was around 2 mins sitting, waiting letting this marketing man do his thing to convince people to get on the bus. Everyone got on and rode all the way into the CBD. Unlike the buses I’m used to riding, there weren’t people hopping on and off at every stop. The ride cost 40 shillings ($0.31). I finally made it to the CBD after about an hour of crawling the 5 miles. CBD was crazy and I had my big backpack (I didn’t bring a weekend pack and decided since I was bringing my big backpack I might as well bring all my dirty laundry so I could get it washed at the hostel). I stopped in a second grocery store and pharmacy to see if they had contact solution -I guess no one in Kenya wears contacts because I have yet to find any solution. Eventually I made it to the bus and had a long but effortless ride back to Naivasha. I grabbed a quick smokey snack (hot dog with tomato salsa, a popular street food here) and then had an easy motorbike ride to the farm. I wanted to get back earlier, but with my procrastination and all the traffic, I didn’t get back until around 9pm. The night motorbike ride was really cool out in the countryside, I was able to see so many stars. Once I got back, I went straight to bed, I was so tired.
Tuesday was a great day. We mainly focused on sewing projects, so minimal manual labor and very chill vibes. Someone harvested a bunch of blackberries, so we made some thumbprint cookies which turned out surprisingly good with the rudimentary kitchen setup. I had to eyeball all the measurements and the charcoal oven didn’t have a temperature gauge, so truly baked from the heart.
Wednesday, I got back to farm work. We distributed cow dung slurry around some rows as fertilizer. The process was really manual- dipping the containers into the slurry pool (the thick liquid runs from a vessel near the cow shed to a collection pool via underground piping), loading up the wheelbarrows with these sloshing containers, hauling the wheelbarrows over to the right area, then carrying and emptying the containers onto the soil. It was a lot of work and, as you can imagine, pretty messy, so no pics. I stopped early because my knee has been bothering me and I refuse to push myself to injury. I was too glad to take a bucket bath when we were done. I also did my first farm laundry, handwashing all my dirty clothes and leaving them to dry in the sun. One of the local volunteers helped me I think because she knew I’d never done it before.
Wednesday afternoon, I headed into town to meet my Nairobi hostel friend who traveled over to Naivasha to sight-see. His journey was a CHAOTIC one because that day, a former Prime Minister died. People were in the streets going wild celebrating and mourning (he was a divisive leader). On the motorbike ride to the shuttle in Nairobi, someone almost snatched his phone out of his hand when he was recording a video. From the motorbike! People are ruthless smh… Thankfully, things were peaceful in Naivasha and we spent the evening walking around, practicing motorbike driving (him, not me 😅), and trying nyama choma, a grilled meat. We chose goat meat and it was delicious, but very fatty which made it harder to really enjoy. Thankfully, the next morning we had a meal that fully redeemed the Naivasha dining experience- rice pilau, a seasoned rice dish served with grilled meat (we both chose beef this time) and poured over with beef broth. Our taxi driver recommended this spot called Mother’s Kitchen and it did not disappoint. The servings were huge and delicious. Neither of us could finish our plates, so we packed up the leftovers and shared with some guys on the street. There were a lot of backpackers in there too which was kind of strange because I didn’t notice any backpackers on the streets, just in that restaurant.
That afternoon we spent more time walking around Naivasha town. My friend is from Lagos and was saying that Naivasha is very very similar which surprised me- I expected Lagos to be more developed. The roads are dirt and at one point we walked right into a little dust tornado. It’s funny, walking around everyone thinks we speak Kiswahili because we look African. I thought I got videos walking around town, but I didnt 😫. I will try to share pics/ videos at some point before I leave, but tbh I really don’t like walking around with my phone out, recording videos while in town. It puts a target on your back as a tourist and I prefer for people to just believe I’m Kenyan. Also I don’t like filming random people. After walking around for some time, we stopped at a cafe so I could have some tea (the tea at the farm is WAY better) then we took a taxi to Karagita Beach at Lake Naivasha which we were told by fellow travelers was a great spot for a picnic. We must have been in the wrong place, because I don’t know where one would picnic there. It was kind of like a mini village and it wasn’t a beach with sand, just a dock that we stood out on and enjoyed the view of the lake from for a while. Thankfully we had already eaten, but if we were hungry there were plenty of spots to eat the fresh fish caught right from the lake. There was also an option to take a boat ride out onto the lake, but neither of us was interested. It was raining on and off and I didn’t want to be stuck on a rainy boat. Also there are hippos in the lake which I’m not so excited about encountering up-close.
After that, we went back to town and he got on a bus back to Nairobi while I took a motorbike back to the farm. I so appreciate this friend’s effortless company and thoughtful nature. I’m really glad we met and were able to spend that extra day together after Nairobi. We talked about modifying our travel plans when I’ve finished my time at the farm and I hope it works out. If it does, I’ll be swapping Mt Kilimanjaro for Uganda and Rwanda, where I would loooove to spot some mountain gorillas. When I got back to the farm Thursday night, we had a dance party and it was so fun. Even the kids on the farm were hype 🤣.
Friday I spent most of the day working on computer projects for the farm, organizing files and such. Its different being in a place where few people know how to use a computer. Experience has taught me that no matter how perfectly I organize things and leave detailed instructions on how to maintain, things will likely fall back into disarray within a few months of me leaving. I won’t let that deter me from giving the work an honest effort, though. Friday night we watched a movie on a laptop. We also had a movie night at the hostel last weekend and this experience was much the same, with the video stopping and web page experiencing loading errors like every 20 minutes. Reloading the page fixed it, so patience was the way. Btw I ended up using Kanopy, a free service you can use to watch movies. Sign up with your library card. The movie selection wasn’t the best, but it was better than trying to watch bootleg movies on YouTube 😂.
As much as I enjoy being here, I have to be honest that the past week has left me really missing the conveniences of life in the West. I miss having reliable infrastructure and being able to understand how things work. So many random things are confusing to me and I can go with the flow, but it adds up and just makes me want to go to sleep. Its Saturday morning 10:30am and I’m still in my hut typing away on my phone and trying to figure out my plans for my next 2 weekends here. I think today I’ll go into town and get some ingredients so we can bake or cook something new. Tomorrow, I’d like to visit a tea farm where they give tours and serve lunch. Its just far away, so I’m not sure it’s worth it. I do want to explore though and not just sit on the farm. I’d like to do a biking safari at Hell’s Gate National Park too, but thunderstorms are in the forecast pretty much every day so I’ll probably wait and hope next weekend’s weather is better.
Anyway, I’m really hungry so I better get up and start my day! One of the staff here just came to check on me because staying in bed this late is concerning behavior here 😂. I’ll get up and have a great day now!