Keep on Truckin'

So there was then a little more driving, another beach, on to Nysna - probably spelled wrong (beautiful bird sanctuary and marsh lands) then on to see Bruce's Beauties (Endless Summer anyone?) and Cape St. Francis. I'm just going to post a series of pictures and the overall themes....relaxing, great wine, relaxing, hiking, great wine, amazing oysters, nice B&B, great view, great wine. Did I mention there was great wine. Here's the journey, picture style.

yeah, so it's a really good thing I'm afraid of heights and the only way to the top (other than an all day roped climb) is in a spinning partially open glass ball suspended several thousand feet in the air by what they claim are very strong cables (but I could see it was a bunch of wire wound round and round till it looked strong). It was worth it. The top of Table Mountain is a fairly rare ecoregion (according to all the signs anyway). Spectacular.

ok all for now. ciao, Kik.

Enough Said...

It really is a very good life lesson and certainly applicable to all kinds of things. Like lesson two of that day...don't get in the car until the Baboon is ready to get off the car.

My Mother always told me...

Still South Africa Dreamin'

Then it was off to the Cape of Good Hope. Holy Cow is really the best way to describe this area. Another beautiful day was had by all, great hiking, great views, and getting our asses kicked up and down South Africa by Robb's 87 year old mother. We had to run to keep up, it was great!

Here is the Cape...

Best lesson learned this day...

Guess the lesson will have to wait. Bandwidth issues again I am guessing. Oh well, back to the "with baited breath" wait you had when you put this blog together for me in the first place!

Cheers,

Kik

South African Flashback

Dear Luci and Emily,

Ok, so the great internet connection (although this is the 7th time I've tried to post this) and the cool weather in Nairobi has inspired me to try and post at least a little of where I've been roaming. This time last year I was in South Africa. I took a week with some friends to drive the Garden Route. It was really a surfer's guide to SA as Robb, the man we made coordinate and plan the whole thing, is a surfer from California stuck in land-locked Zambia for now.

We started in Capetown and went to a great B&B on the Southern Right Coast that overlooks the whale routes. It was stunning. Also, it was the first time I ever saw anyone in Africa walking a dog on a leash.

We set off for Boulder Beach.

Yeah, I don't know why they call it boulder beach either. It was, in a word, stunning. And, to top off the scenery, the company, the wine, etc...there were penguins. Yes penguins. Cathy didn't believe there were penguins in Africa either.

They affectionately call them Jackass penguins because they bray like donkeys. It's one of the funniest sounds I have ever heard. And they are everywhere. Oh, and they bite, hard apparently so don't get too close.

He may not look mean to you but this guy meant business. We gave him a wide berth while he stared us down. King of the beach.

Ahhh, yes. Anything worth doing is worth doing right.

- K.

Ahhh Winter in Kenya

Ok, so I completely forgot that winter in Kenya is actually winter. It's about 52 degrees right now and will get down to the high 30's tonight. I completely forgot socks and shoes. We've got a full house tonight, all roads led to Nairobi. It's Phil (our new doc), Martine (senior tech advisor for adherence/treatment support), Sandra (senior lab specialist), Shadrack (lab specialist) and me. Martine knows a great Mediterranean restaurant here and we are heading over at 7.

Nairobi always looks so strange to me, big concrete tenement buildings. A lot of the city looks like it was constructed by the Soviets circa 1982. And the traffic is quite a hoot. It has traffic lights, but I'm not sure what they meanb because everytime I see one showing red everyone drives through. Beats me. And a two lane road really really means four lanes of cars should weave in and out of each other.

Much like Kigali. Did I mention that in advance of the big International HIV meeting they put traffic lights everywhere. Small problem, I don't think anyone really knows how to use them yet. There are folks flying through them because they don't really know what they mean yet. Looking forward to some good old B'more traffic cams. It's the little things you miss you know.

I'll try and get some snaps this week and update while I've got access to rockin internet access thanks to Phil and his son.

Talk to you all soon.

Love,

Kik (aka Kristen or Krissie depending on whose readin')

Tanzania continued

All right, here are a few more photos to show you how completely deprived I am the whole time I'm over here.

I know, real hardship tour last week was. Well, off to Kenya tomorrow. Ciao for now.

Kik

Tanzania and back

Howdy folks,

Well, even though I don't think I got more than 3 or so hours of sleep a night, I'm not gonna complain. Our retreat was at Kunduchi Beach resort (for the 3rd year in a row) which is ever so unfortunately located right on a beautiful beach. I know, you feel so sorry for me. I spent the first 2 days forgetting where I was and trying to order meals etc in a mix of french and kinyarwandan. Note to self, they don't speak french in Dar es Salaam. But here are some of the views so you can get the full sense of just how much sympathy you should have for me.

Will have to post the other photos later, typical African internet connection right now. Miss you all.

- Kik

Bed nets and Samboosa

Howdy Folks,

Still in Rwanda until tomorrow. It's been an interesting conference, there are a ton of people here! Last night, CRS had a reception for the AIDSRelief team and colleagues. Lots of food, good beer and traditional Rwandan dancers, singers and drummers.

I love that this guy is wearing sneakers!

This is the view from the AIDSRelief office. The dogs are larry, moe and curley.

Got some laundry done this morning and got some pictures of Ruth's garden to share.

Her house is great, huge open spaces and balconies off the front and back. Ok, more from TZ when I get there.

Cheers,

Kik

Bungwe and Back

So day three was another trek up a different mountain. This time to Bungwe in the North of Rwanda right on the border with Uganda. It's a great clinic. There are these wonderful Sisters who run the clinic. They have been here for more than 30 years and are just lovely. This place is about 3 hours outside of Kigali, another hour on good tarmac past people carrying all kinds of things and tea farms in the middle of harvest. Then a quick turn off to a 60 percent grade of rutted dirt. You bounce up and down along steep switchbacks again through stand after stand of banana trees. More children, more neatly kept small cement and dirt houses with terracotta tile roofs and perfectly tended "yards" and fences made from thickly growing tall plants kept trimmed to shoulder height.

Bungwe is a very poor village, like all the others really. While people that had not seen the new auberge (sp?) were getting a tour I took a stroll down the lane.

Word of the lone mzungu woman traveled quickly and I was soon surrounded by all but the youngest children, who tend to be slightly frightened of the colorless skin. All crowded around repeating one of the few words they know in english, photo, photo, photo.

After 10 minutes or so of half words in kinyarwandan and very broken french, I got them to understand that they needed to stand still while I backed up so I could get them all in the shot. This was after backing about 100 meters down the road with them creeping forward with every step I took backward.

Then, it was off to the "restaurant" in town for goat on a stick. I skipped the intestine, and got a good laugh when I explained we called them chitterlings in the states.

All for now. Miss you guys,

K.

Back in Rwanda

Dear Luci and Emily,

Got in Monday and have been going ever since. This part of the trip is feedback to the health facilities on how their patients are doing and the HIV/AIDS Implementers Conference. Started at Centre de Sante Muhura. It's about a two hour drive from Kigali, 45 minutes of fairly good tarmac and then up up up up hill on red dirt roads flanked by small symmetrical rectangular houses. Each has a door directly in the center and then to the left and the right, evenly spaced between the door and the corner of the house, two small square windows. The front "yards" are well tamped down red dirt, cleanly swept. The gardens around are squarely hedged, each house has at least a small stand of banana trees and then there tends to be sorghum and a small vegetable garden. And children everywhere! 3 year olds walking up and down the road, groups of kids hollering and waving to the passing car, cries of Mzungu Mzungu (white person/foreigner)!

The clinic is modest, but they got solar power earlier this year so they can do a lot more now. The setting is beautiful, atop a hill overlooking terraced farms. Little red lines snaking up the hill where walking paths have been carved. Five minutes out your door and you and everything else is covered in a thin red dusting of the earth.

The beauty of this place always astounds me. The way they paint their houses, the care they take with their farms, the amazing smiles when you greet someone in kinyarwandan. Driving up to Muhura as you are about half way up the mountain, the smell of eucalyptus is everywhere as huge trees blow in the breeze with their silver grey leaves.

Houses carved into the sides of the hill on small perches. Steep steps cut into the earth so they can climb back up to the road.

More soon. Hope all is well at home. Love, Kik.

Updates

Dear Luci and Emily,

Ok, so I've decided there is no way I can backtrack and catalogue all the trips to now so I thought I'd do a summary...Haiti, home, Kenya, Uganda, home, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Zambia, home, Haiti, home, Haiti, home, Nigeria, Rwanda, Zambia, home, Tanzania, Uganda, South Africa, home, Uganda, Tanzania, Zanzibar (vacation), home, Haiti, home, Rwanda, Zambia, Tanzania, Kenya (just 2 days), Uganda, home, Haiti, home, Haiti....and here I am in Rwanda again. I'll be here until the 19th then off to Tanzania, back to Rwanda for a day or two, on to Kenya and the HOME!

I think that is it, but the passport is a bit hard to follow. I may have missed one or two so embellish at will!

More to follow,

Kik