There are No Pumpkins in Kenya

I suppose that since this is a blog about some of my adventures, especially those that involve travel, I guess I do not see why I cannot post older entries from some of my travels over the years. The following entry is from my first trip Africa, Kenya to be specific, back in 2001. At the time I was traveling around the world on a scholarship that I had one after graduating from college. During the trip I had decided to take meticulous notes of some of my experiences and decided to give each entry in my journal a title, hence “there are no pumpkins in Kenya” because I had arrived on Halloween. Anyway enough of a back story: Here it is:

There appears to be no pumpkins in Kenya. Well from what I have seen anyway. Here I am in the capital city of Nairobi having arrived from a long overnight flight from London. Unfortunately, I opted to watch movies on my British Airways flight rather than sleep which means at present I am in a certain delirious haze. My first view of Kenya came via the airplane window shortly after we had landed. The area surrounding the airport was covered with tall, dry brown grass with small mangled leafless trees (almost like shrubs) interspersed throughout the landscape. The people are far from the backwards group of eccentric tribesman depicted in the “Gods Must be Crazy” idolizing coca cola bottles. They seem to be genuinely friendly and extremely eager to help you. Prior to arriving I had heard numerous horror stories about the dangers of Nairobi where danger lurks around every corner. As such I was a little guarded upon my arrival and treated those I met with a healthy bit of suspicion. One thing quickly became apparent, however. They like anyone else were very motivated by money, and offered various services to me for a nominal fee.

Almost immediately upon leaving the international terminal one rather persistent man, named Leonard, approached me and offered me his cab and espoused his top quality tour guide skills. I politely turned him down despite his persistence and began to proceed to the domestic air terminal to catch my flight to Mombasa along the Kenyan coast. I have been sitting at the airport for a few hours and unfortunately have a few more before I am able to check in for my flight. Leonard came by again, but he was much easier to shoo away this time. I am sure that he is off somewhere in the arriving flights terminal attempting to secure a passenger for his famous taxi-day trip tours around Nairobi. I have to give him credit for being persistent, but at the same time it does make him a little creepy. Not to be rude I did try to strike up a conversation with the man, and he was compliant, for at least a while. The conversation always seemed to come around to the topic of “where do you want to go, and how much do you want to pay.” I might just take him up on his offer if he is around after I return from Mombasa. He was a tall, skinny fellow with very short curly hair that seemed to glisten in places with the reflection of the sunlight. His narrow face, with a wide nose and cloudy brown eyes continually moved back and forth as he scanned the area for less troublesome more enthusiastic customers than me. Occasionally when complimenting his unsurpassed knowledge of Nairobi’s major tourist attractions, he would flash me a toothless smile with the exception of his remaining molars and a couple of yellow crooked incisors protruding from his upper jaw line. His well used brown loafers and blue socks seemed to perfectly compliment his faded grey trousers and stained pale red collared shirt.
As he delivered his anecdotes (a kind of sales pitch in their own right), he would often tap my leg with his thin, thick knuckled index finger as a way of receiving confirmation that his point had made an impression. Seeming to get tired, Leonard stood and walked away to find some business.

At present I am in the cafeteria area in the Domestic Airport Terminal and as Leonard says, “I stick out.” Not only because of my drastically out of place backpack or my somewhat loner appearance as I sit alone in a row of grey plastic bucket chairs, but my well callicked mop of long dirty blond hair, my blue eyes, and my white skin seem to be unique as I am the only person with these characteristics that I am able to see. I do not really feel uncomfortable as a result of this. I am actually excited by this because it is so foreign to what I am normally used to.

I just ran into Leonard again and we talked a little more. He is the happy father of three children who are 15, 10, and 8 respectively. We also talked a little bit about (of all things) the group Destiny’s Child. Leonard had a big grin on his face and said, “I like these girls! Black Americans, huh?” as he looked at the music video for “Bootylicious” that just appeared on the television in the cafeteria. The video seemed to surprise us but in different ways. He seemed surprised that not all Americans were white, while I was surprised that all the way over in Africa the first Kenyan television I experience is Destiny Child’s “Bootylicious.” Leonard went on to say that he spent his whole life in Nairobi, and I don’t only mean that he lives here, I mean that he has never actually left the city with the exception of a brief visit to Kilimanjaro as a young child. He asked me about America and I began to tell him that I was from California, however he seemed to be confused by the different states as it was all just America to him. And that above all else means wealthy. He listens to me tell him of my budget and he laughs. He took a guess about my daily purchasing power and estimated that I could spend between $100-200 dollars per day. And this appeared to be a conservative estimate on his part.

I think that I am going to enjoy my time here. I am going to head back to the main terminal and wait until my flight is ready to board. This means that I will have to head back out past the cabbie row, where they will all approach me without fail to attempt to get my business. When no customers are around they seem to just stand around talking. Apparently there business has really been hurt by the terrorist attacks in the United States. Anyway, that is all.