Blog 5: African Trip
Saturday, September 27, 2014
On long journeys some days are devoted to travel. The day began at 5:30 with distribution of
the gifts to the orphans. When I last
visited Pastor’s orphanage in 2012 he had 13 orphans, mostly abandoned
girls. When he told me he now had 40
orphans, I presumed the majority gender remained female. Wrong.
Most of the new charges, 21 of them, were street boys, homeless waifs
now housed in a loving spiritual community.
The gifts I brought, though, were for female children, though one of the
Gulfport Memorial Hospital nurses gave me two backpacks of boys clothing, so we
had at least one item for each of them.
We also had some sunglasses from a big box of toys another nurse
provided. (Thank you for your
generosity, my medical colleagues!). We
distributed the toys and female clothes as well.
Pastor and I left the orphanage at 6:45am, the car’s shock
absorbers doing their best to absorb the shocks of the rutted, potholed
road. Our wheels spun repeatedly,
sliding dizzily up the four-kilometer road, muddy from the welcomed rains. Through Keumbu, west up the road to Kisii,
then north again towards Kisumu, the countryside of rolling hills offered a
flat savanna look, red muddy fields with little vegetation, interspersed by
villages, these a run of a dozen concrete buildings, each grouping having one
store brightly painted in lime by Wrigley’s Spearmint Gum, their logo
prominently displayed. Whenever plant greenery strived to survive
near the roadside, a wiry teenage boy rested under a tree watching the handful
of cows or goats he’d staked near the shoulder.
Roads had stretches of pavement, two lanes of black concrete, patched
here and there, though more often spotted with treacherous potholes requiring
traffic to swerve like drunkards. The
multi-passenger matatus raced past
us, only to pull up a hundred yards ahead to eject a rider, pick up a new
charge, and zoom ahead again.
We arrived in Kisumu about ten for my noon flight, and
Pastor drove all the way to the Lake, that is, Lake Victoria, the largest in
Africa. When I visited in 2011 the
lake’s level had fallen dramatically in the previous decade, a dozen feet I
think. However, this problem seems to
have slowed, for today the level appeared unchanged, based on the docks of the
surrounding buildings. He hired a man
who backed the car right into the lake, up to the level of the mid-hubcaps, and
proceeded to hand wash the vehicle as Pastor and I climbed to a second level
restaurant to relax and refresh. Only a
half dozen customers sat in the hundred-seating open-air platform, visited
every ten minutes by vendors selling CDs, soapstone souvenirs, or electrical
do-dads. I gave the waitress 70 cents to
have someone fetch me a paper as we waited on our fried tilapia. We shared one, pulling off chunks of sweet
meat and crisp skin with our hands, finishing it down to the skeleton and head
in mere minutes.
He dropped me at the airport in plenty of time for the
flight and I settled into my window seat.
Next to me sat down Janet, an American Burkitt Lymphoma researcher from
Maryland. She’d been at a 7a-7p all-week
conference, tired and excited by the work she was doing and the joy of returning
home. I have no hesitation in starting
up conversations with seatmates, often making new friends, like Janet, an added
delight of travel. In Nairobi I changed
from Kenyan airlines to South African, with a clearly substantial upgrade. Repeatedly voted the best African airline, I
relaxed in cushioned seats savoring their tasty meal on this four-hour
flight. In a middle seat this time, I made
acquaintance with both of my row-mates, introducing Lydia, a twenty-four year
old Nairobian on her first ever air flight, to New York lawyer Steven Levin and
his family on safari, so that the latter could lead the former through customs
and on to their shared connections to Capetown.
After disembarking, in line waiting for Passport Control, I befriended a
beautiful Persian lady who sells nutritional supplements for milk. We exchanged cards and I’ll add her to my
email list. All over the world one can
make friends and gain new perspectives of life.
My hostess for this part of my travels is Marilyn Bassin, a
vibrant South African civil rights champion.
Her husband, Julian, a gynecologist, died unexpectedly last year, and
with one twenty-year-old out of the house, she’s raising her other two
teenagers as she pushes N.G.O.s to root out corruption and bring help to the
incredibly poor and especially medically needy.
There will be much more of that in a later blog as I spend Monday
traveling with her on her adventures in Soweta.
Accompanying her to retrieve me from the airport was her friend Dennis
Tabakin, a septuagenarian with roots in the revolution, citing the people he
worked with, famous names from those days, many dead, and some still living,
such as Minnie Mandela (whose 78th birthday was yesterday). The three of us traveled to downtown, through
well-mannered streets, smoothly paved and brightly lit, a huge contrast from the
dark and dirty wildness of Kenya’s. At
a huge three-storied mall, the stores all closed, each level hosted several
diner-packed fancy restaurants in the vast central hallways, Marilyn leading us
down the escalators and around the bends to the one she’d selected, ignoring
Dennis’ recurring suggestions of alternatives.
“Morrows” offered fish, and Marilyn chose for me the sole, good for my
soul, and provided by my waiter who claimed to be the sole-provider. Delectable, served with fries, I picked up
the tab for the table, at a price, including bottle of heady South African
chardonnay, of only $60. It turns out
the South African rand has been losing value against the U.S. dollar lately,
and everything here is about 30% cheaper than it would be in America. Look out souvenirs!
We picked up her fifteen-year-old son and three of his friends
at another shopping center, at ten-thirty pm done with their movie-going, and
took them to the Jewish section where they all lived. Each home and subdivision is surrounded by
high electrical wired, spike-topped, stone walls, with metal gated
watch-guarded entries. Violent crime,
and not-so violent crime, runs vibrant, so much so that on our next morning
walk Marilyn wouldn’t let me bring my camera.
Dennis told a tale of a New York photographer who went into a bad
neighborhood to take pictures and came out stripped to his underwear (Marilyn
later told me the story was probably apocryphal).
The quiet elegance of Marilyn’s home unfolded in tastefully
decorated abstract art, unique African wired sculptures, soft colors and
comfortable furniture, including a dining table with seating for twelve. The three happy dogs she’s rescued from abuse
greeted us with doggy passion, and soon Marilyn had me settled into an upstairs
bedroom, the patio door and window opened to the singing birds and cooling
night air.
Tomorrow, Sunday, we have a day at the wildlife refuge.
Philip
No comments:
Post a Comment