Nairobi, Kenya

I have done my first bit of travel in East Africa; this past weekend I traveled to Nairobi, Kenya to visit my friend Patrick.  He and I worked together my first summer with PASSPORTkids! in the United States.  Nairobi is a 5 hour bus ride from Arusha, and it cost only about 25,000 TSH which is less than $15 dollars.  I left at 8:00 am on Friday morning and made it to Nairobi at around 1:30 pm (traffic in Nairobi, especially on a Friday is pretty terrible).  Patrick was there waiting for me, and I got the grand tour of Nairobi.  On Friday, we went and got hamburgers, fries, and milkshakes which was something I had been craving since I arrived in Africa.  Nairobi is a much bigger city than Arusha, so American-style options are a little safer and closer to what home "taste" like.  It was a delicious burger!  We also went to a supermarket.  I had been searching for floss since I arrived in Arusha, and it was nowhere to be found.  I found some in the supermarket, and bought a few spools to last the next few months.  The Arusha supermarkets are very limited in random things like that, so I was glad to finally find some in the "big-city."  Patrick and I just hung out at his apartment on Friday night.  We went to a local bar, had a drink, and watched some kind of Kenyan running meet on TV.  It was pretty fun to watch.  I was so exhausted, so I went to bed fairly early on Friday; I also knew we had a big day of exploring on Saturday, so I wanted to be well-rested.

On Saturday, we were the ultimate tourists.  First, we went to The David Sheldrick Foundation in Nairobi National Park.  It is a foundation created to take care of baby elephants whose parents have been killed by poachers.  These elephants are still milk-dependent; therefore, without the care of the Foundation, they would not have survived in the wild.  The elephants are taken care of by a wonderful, dedicated staff who literally do everything with the babies.  They feed them (special milk formula) from a bottle, play soccer with them, exercise with them, bathe them, and even sleep in the stalls with them every night.  Baby elephants need constant love and attention; it is definitely a full-time job for these dedicated staff members.  The elephants love these guys too.  While we were watching the elephants, a few of the staff were trying to explain what happens at the Foundation.  As they were speaking, the babies would come up and take their trunks and sort of "pet" the staff member.  They were hilarious to watch.  The baby elephants had so much personality.  They would blow bubbles in their water, play with the staff, play with each other.  It was a lot of fun to watch them.  I was most excited about visit this place!  Earlier this year, while visiting Eric in Omaha, we went to the Omaha Zoo and watched an IMAX movie called "Born Free" about the work the Foundation does as well as another Foundation working in Asia that does similar work with orangutans.  Eric and I both loved the movie; however, I had forgotten the Foundation was located in Nairobi until I started researching about activities I wanted to do on my visit.  It was my favorite thing I did all weekend! I was so excited to be so close and be able to pet a baby elephant, it was a pretty neat experience.

Bottle Feeding the Baby

So exciting!!!!! I was freaking out!

Heading back inside, following their leaders.

After the elephant orphanage, we went to the Giraffe Center.  It is an educational center set up to teach children in Kenya about the wildlife in their country.  While there, we got to feed giraffes and learn a little bit about the giraffe population of Kenya and East Africa.  We also made a stop at the animal orphanage (basically a zoo) at the Nairobi National Park.  We were there right at meal-time!  We then went into the city.  I had to climb to the second-highest building in Nairobi to see the view of the city.  I was pretty scared and stayed towards the middle of the building, but it was a fantastic place to see a great view of the city and beyond the city into the national park and mountains.  On the building, I spotted a huge market, so we decided to make a little stop there on our way back to the car.  It was souvenir central.  While there, I purchased two skirts made from traditional African kangas (what women wear, basically big pieces of fabric they tie into skirts, etc).  I purchased a purple print skirt, and a black and white zebra one.  They have actually been made into skirts, so they aren't just one big piece of fabric.  I am excited for it to warm up a little in Arusha, so I can wear them around.  I also purchased a woven bag; it is dyed blue and has some beautiful beads on it.  I forgot to bring a small bag to carry my gym clothes in, so I have been carrying an obnoxious "ShopRite" (local supermarket) bag, which is super huge and not comfortable to carry.  I love my souvenirs, and am glad we made a stop.

So much slobber....yuck.

...And visiting more animals, it was the theme of the day...

Second highest building in Nairobi...wasn't thrilled about being so high up, but I comfortably sat in the middle far from the edge....so I was pretty happy taking in the view.

After spending the day running around, we met up with two other interns who had traveled to Nairobi for the weekend.  One of the boys is Ethiopian, and had friends who lived in Nairobi; these family friends wanted to throw him a party so we were invited to stop by.  It was very fun; we got to mingle with Nairobi elite-including a celebrity who is very famous for being in music videos in Kenya and a few models.  They had lots of food, including some wonderful grilled meat.  It was a good time.  I went to bed very early on Saturday, I was exhausted and needed rest.

On Sunday, I ate a huge breakfast of eggs, potatoes, pancakes, toast, and fresh Passion fruit juice.  We went to Central Park (downtown Nairobi) and walked around for about an hour.  Then it was time for me to leave, so I was dropped off at the hotel where my bus departs.  I was early so I sent some postcards to some people back in the US, and then finished my book (entitled "Room", I recommend it, it's really good, but very weird).  After a 5 hour bus ride back home, the other two interns and I were starving so we ate at a fabulous Indian restaurant in a hotel in Arusha.  I finally made it back to the white house around 8:30-ish.  It felt like home, I was very relieved to be back in Arusha.  I was exhausted, and basically went straight to bed.  Very long weekend, but I did get to see a lot.  I doubt I will make it back to Nairobi again, but I was glad to see it!

In other news, last week was pretty great at work.  I finally got my own assignment which kept me very busy for the week.  I really love the work I am doing at the Tribunal.  I also am really enjoying the people I am meeting.  It has been a really great experience thus far.  I also started my Swahili class last week.  As an intern/UN staff, there are free language classes available to take here at the Tribunal.  I thought it would be a shame to not take advantage of such an awesome opportunity.  I decided to try Swahili; I figured I might be the most successful at it because I will be able to use it everyday here. 

My mom also booked her flight to come and visit.  She will be arriving the last weekend of October and staying through November 8th!  I cannot wait.  I am planning lots of fun stuff to do while she visits, specifically we are going to do a safari.  I think she will love seeing the National Parks here in Tanzania.  The wildlife is unbelieveable!  I am counting down the days till she gets here, it will be nice to have a little bit of home here in Africa. 

This weekend we girls at the white house are planning our first party!  We will be hosting a ton of people on Saturday night in our big, nice house.  We are excited about having people over and enjoying the company of our colleagues.  My roommates and I are also planning a dinner/movie night this week; the local movie theatre is playing "Bridemaids" in English, so we are excited to have a girls night out and enjoy a funny movie.  Overall, everything is going great.  I am slowly becoming comfortable with my new life here; however, I do miss people back home and will be excited to come home after this adventure!  Much love from Tanzania!

Settling In

So this weekend was my second weekend in Arusha, and things are finally starting to feel a little easier and more like home.  I met my supervisor and was assigned to a case.  I have been assigned to the Bernard Munyagishari case.  .  You can google him or check out the little info on the ICTR website.  I cannot discuss him too much, but there is some info about him online if you want to check out the news a bit.

I did some fun things this week, so I'll fill you in on that...

1. I met up with Wilfred who was my safari guide the last time I was in Tanzania.  He is still working at the safari company, and is super busy this time of the year with many tourist flocking to Tanzania to witness one of the true wonders of the world, the wildabeast migration.  He picked me up earlier this week, and we grabbed at bite to eat at the popular Cinema Complex.  It is a fun little area with a cinema playing Bali-wood and Hollywood movies, and has an awesome patio-courtyard area where you can order and eat from any of the the surrounded four or five restaurants.  It was a lot of fun to catch up with him and feel like I actually had a local friend here in Tanzania.

2.  I experienced the cultural nightclub sweeping the town of Arusha known as Via Via.  We went at around 11:00 p.m. and watched people dance to a live band and had a drink.  At around 12, the real party started.  There is a type of outdoor theatre which is the dance floor.  They also have a huge bonfire, multiple bars, karaoke, and just a lot of fun.  On each Thursday night, around 500+ people, both local and tourist, go to Via Via to dance, drink, and party.  It was fun to be with all the interns, and dance all night.  It was a fun place to dance too because many of the locals participate in "dance-offs" so it was fun to be in the middle of the action and watch the people showcase their dance skills.  We (my roommates and I) ended up leaving around 1:30-2 a.m.  We couldn't stay too late because we had work early the next morning. 

3. A group of interns have made a connection with an orphanage about 30 minutes outside of Arusha.  This has been going on long before I ever arrived, and the responsibility shifts to someone in the new group of interns in order to continue.  We rent a daladala (local bus) and go visit children every Saturday for a few hours.  I decided to go, thought it would be fun to hang out with kids and some other interns from other offices.  It was really great.  You could definitely tell its a bright spot in the orphans week to have so many visitors and play-mates.  We split the group into two smaller groups: one who stays at the house and colors, and the other goes to the field to play games and soccer.  I decided to go to the field and run around with some cute little boys who ended up just wanting to be chased for about two hours.  Needless to say, I was pretty exhausted and filthy when I got home that afternoon.  They were such show-offs.  It was fun to play with them for a few hours.  I hope to return most Saturdays during the remainder of my time here in Arusha.  Here are some pictures I took of them.  They are such sweeties. 

Ali, my little buddy for the day.  After all that running, he was super tired and almost fell asleep.

Loving the daladala we arrived in, they are little monkeys!  Such show-offs.

4.  On Sunday, a group of interns did a Cultural Tourism Program to a local village to visit a coffee plantation.  The idea of these Cultural Tourism Programs is to enable a local village to get some income by showing tourists their villages, agriculture, schools, hospital, and way of life in general.  We were picked up at the ICTR at around 9:00 a.m. and taken to a village at the base of Mt. Meru.  While there we were met by Samuel, a twenty year old local boy with great English.  He showed us the primary school, orphanage, hospital, local church, and we walked miles and miles on the dusty paths between homes on the hills.  We also shown the local "court" which was a shelter-like building. We were told about the torture chamber in the basement (which we did not see), but apparently if you fight, smoke pot, beat you wife, etc, you are placed in water up to your neck.  You have to stay there for two days, eat in the water, use the bathroom in the water, do everything in the water.  And after you come out, most are never bad again.  It was interesting to be UN interns, very much against torture, hearing about this local custom!  We went to a coffee plantation and met a local coffee farmer.  He showed us the entire coffee growing and harvesting process.  I liked learning about the natural pesticides and poisons they plant around the trees to keep the bugs away, it was very interesting! After the coffee farmer, we went to a local house and had the absolute best meal.  It was hands-down the best meal I have had thus-far in Tanzania.  I was so full after we left, which was completely my fault because I kept eating and eating and eating, I just couldn't stop!  After that, we went to the roasting and packaging "factory".  We received one free bag of coffee, and had the opportunity to purchase extra bags for $4.  Having already tasting it at lunch, and appreciating the taste.  I figured my friends and family who actually love/drink coffee regularly would also enjoy the coffee.  I bought 3 extra bags for gifts.  I appreciate that the coffee is organic, and provide income and sustainability to the community, and it's great coffee that is super inexpensive!  Below are some pictures from my day.






Banana Wine--using local bananas.  Still have yet to try it, but I'll let you know how tasty or gross it ends up being.



At the orphanage, they loved trying on everyone's sunglasses.

Our fabulous, incredible, super-delicious lunch.

The fresh fruit, I could have made a meal out of just this, it's so good.

With the coffee farmer, learning about the coffee growing process.  Very interesting.

Here are some of my roommates and I with out loot from the day.  Left to right: Faith, Jane, and Katariina.

I was a bit homesick this weekend.  One of my best friends in the world, Blair Owens now HECKER, got married on Saturday night.  I was so bummed to miss the wedding of one of my favorite couples.  However, I was excited to get to talk to Blair hours before her big day.  I caught her as she was having brunch with some girlfriends.  We talked for a while, she sounded so excited and so happy.  I wish I could have been there to see it, but I have been looking at all the pictures from the big day.  It looked so beautiful.  I am so happy that she has found such a wonderful guy in Shane and I am excited about the exciting future they have ahead of them.  So, Blair and Shane, congrats, I love both of you and I will be searching for the perfect (late) wedding gift to bring home to you from Tanzania.  Also, I got to Skype with some loved ones from home this weekend.  I was able to video Skype with Jesse Hines (another best friend) for a little while.  We caught up on our lives, and it was so good to hear her voice and see her face!  On Sunday nights, I go to Mt. Meru Hotel, a big fancy touristy hotel in Arusha which has the best wi-fi in town.  I am about to video Skype without interruptions there.  While there I got to talk to Eric for a really long time, which was great.  I also got to Skype with my entire family.  I kid you not, on the screen was my mom, dad, oldest brother, two nieces, and Kole (our 3 year old German Shepard) even made an appearance and barked at me.  It was great to see all of them, although it made me miss them even more.  I feel so blessed to be surrounded by such a great family and friends. 

Anyways, I think that is all I have to update.  I miss home a lot, but am settling in and having a great time here in Arusha.  I am excited to get a visit from my Mom, she is planning on coming at the end of October and staying through November 8th.  I cannot wait, I'm so excited to show her around Africa and go on a safari with her.  Much love from Tanzania!

Living in Arusha, Tanzania

It's Sunday, and I think I am finally all settled in Arusha. Time to recap the last few days of moving to Arusha.

I left the states on Tuesday afternoon.  I flew from Lexington to Detroit to Amsterdam to Kilimanjaro.  It was actually the smoothest travel I have ever done, even smoother than most domestic traveling.  I left at 3:30 on Tuesday afternoon and arrived in Tanzania on Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. (my new time) and about 12:30 p.m. (my old KY time).  It was two very long flights, but luckily I slept a lot of the trip so I felt pretty good upon arrival.  It took only about a half hour to get through customs since I had valid visa from my last trip to Tanzania.  I went to the baggage claim, and my bags were there which was a huge relief.  I went outside the airport, and I found my driver from the UN.  We had a few stops before I arrived at my temporary housing.  I finally arrived at the temporary house where two other female interns were also staying.  We had Internet at the house so I was able to call my family and Eric and let them know that I arrived safely.  It was good to hear their voices, but it also started to sink in that I was going to be away from loved ones for four months.  I have definitely been homesick for the past few days, but I finally am starting to get in a routine, make some friends, and am excited about what's going to happen over the next four months. 

Thursday, September 1, I started my internship at the Tribunal.  It was pretty surreal driving back up to the gate, checking through security, and looking at the buildings knowing this would be my second home for the next few months.  Thursday was a really long day because we had to go in small group to get our badges made which allow us to get into the tribunal every day, so most of the day was spent sitting around,  So far I have met other interns from: other parts of the US, Australia, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Israel, France, Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda.  I was shown to the Office of the Prosecutor section within the tribunal.  Within that section, there are two divisions: trial and appeals.  I am working in the trial division, and will be working in a room with nine other interns.  I am going to try and post a picture of that later once we all get assignments so you can get a picture of the chaos and excitement in the room. 

On Friday, September 2, I moved into a house which I think looks like a mansion.  It is called "The White House."  It was one of the options for interns and apparently there is a lot of responsibility with living in the house as historically it is the hangout/party house.  It is huge!  I am living with four other female interns: Faith from Australia, Jane from California, Kris from North Carolina, and Katariina from Finland.  So far everyone is great, we have so much space so I am doubting there will be much conflict as we have lots of room to spread out and live.  Yesterday, we walked around the city and did some errands.  Today, I slept late which was nice.  After I woke up, Faith, Katariina, Jane, and I went to the local market to buy groceries.  I ended up with a nice selection.  Here's what I got: 4 avocados, grapes, 3 passion fruits, 2 limes, about 15 bananas and 1 green pepper for about $8.  Then I purchased bread, peanuts, and some banana chips for about the same from a corner shop.  I am hoping to take my camera next week and take some pictures.  I wanted to get comfortable in the market before taking my camera, so hopefully pictures will come soon.  We just got back and fixed some lunch.  Tonight we are going to have dinner with an intern who just arrived and legal officer we know at the ICTR.  It should be fun.  I also contacted Wilfred, my safari driver from my study abroad trip, and I am hoping to see him in the next day or two. 

Here are some pictures of the house

 We have a giant turtle as a pet...

 The White House in all its glory

My bedroom

Didn't want to get too close, but this is my UN badge

Closet

 Trying to "nest" a bit, pictures of friends and family

                                                                      Bathroom

Living Room with TV

Dining Room (connected to the Living Room)

                                                
                                                                         Kitchen

Well that is about all that I have to update today.  Next week, I will get assignments at the UNICTR, meet my supervisor, and will get an "official" orientation.  More to update next week!  Lots of love from Tanzania.