Nairobi - second impression

Yesterday after work, Ziad and I went to the expats shopping mall in Nairobi - the Village Market. It is located near the UN headquarter complex (Nairobi has a huge population of UN staff as their base for Africa) and US Embassy.

The area is on a small hill and quite nice. There are many big fancy houses and villas. Passing by here reminded me of a Beverly Hill drive, except that palm trees get replaced by acacia trees. This, combined with the MCK meeting I joined Tuesday night, gives me a better sense of how expats' life here could be.

The mall itself is an open-air, three-story complex. Country-side style building, exotic. There's no Gucci, LV, or Nike stores here - except Rado, Mango, and a couple of others, I didn't see any other world-class branded retail stores. But there are some interesting boutique stores selling souvenirs and there is a food court. There is a supermarket in the mall as well, Nakumatt, that belongs to a local supermarket chain. Stuffs they are selling are nice - either global brand or home-grown ones that are well-packaged in English. I bought one Colgate toothpaste and one bottle of Dettol shower gel (it comes with a free bath loofah) and they cost 335 shillings (about 5 US dollars). Not cheap by local standard I guess.

We had dinner at a Chinese restaurant called Ro Ro in the mall. The owner is actually a Chinese couple from Inner Mongolia and they have been here for eight years. The food was not bad - in fact, a beef dish I ordered was even close to authentic Chinese food. I was quite content.

Tonight, Ziad, Abby, and I are taking an overnight train to Mombasa, a Kenya coast city overlooking the Indian Ocean. I am looking forward to seeing some of the culture clash described in the book I am reading, The Shadow of the Sun - cultures ranging from local African to British colonial, to Indian.

MCK

OK, but this is not the short of that big name consulting firm. This MCK represents Mountain Club of Kenya.

Our colleagues at KickStart, Sam and Ed, invited us to a MCK gathering. It's a local mountaineering club formed by many expats living in Nairobi. They have weekly gathering at the club house where members would bring food (like a pot luck) and make presentations about their climbing/hiking adventures.

There was a good turn-out that night – about 40-50 people came. It's a quite international and mobile community - people from all over the world - some work here on short assignments (like Ziad and me); others work here permanently. Before the presentation, people mingled, ate dinner, and chitchat in small groups. We met a girl from Switzerland, Jenny, who just arrived a month ago and will work for Swiss Embassy in Nairobi for 8 months. Jenny has been to China and during her three weeks there she seemed to have been everywhere, from Dunhuang to Guilin. We left phone numbers and might hang out in Nairobi on a later day.

Today's presentation is made by an American guy about his trips to a mountain in Samburu area. Apparently he's been living here for a while – the trips he talked about were back in 2005. The mountain is rather an off-the-beaten-trek one – it seemed no non-locals had ever gone up to the peak of that mountain. Impressive.

At the end of the gathering, club leaders announced some upcoming trips, including a 3-day hiking trip to Mt. Kenya, etc. I am interested in joining a hiking/camping trip to Nguruman the weekend before I leave Nairobi in late September. There will be some unofficial trips as well. A caving trip over the next weekend sounds interesting but I have decided that caving is not my thing as my rock climbing ability under the ground should be as bad as that on the ground.

The largest industry in Kenya

What's the biggest industry in Kenya? I thought it would be tourism/safaris. Abby was joking it might be security guard. She was living out of an UN compound that is close to an area where most of the expats live by in Nairobi. In that area, almost every house has no less than 5 security guards.

Then that night, we sent Abby to Country Club Lodge, a hotel where she's going to have her dinner appointment. It is located in a seriously guarded district, where there are road obstacles everywhere and broken glass on high walls. And every five meters, there was a security guy with loaded gun. Now I started to believe that security guard really is the largest industry in Kenya.

The real cornerstone of Kenya's capitalist economy though is agriculture, which employs around 80% of the population and accounts for over 50% of the country's export earnings or 25% of the GDP. Tourism used to be the mainstay of the country's economy but has suffered since the embassy bombings and terrorists attacks a few years before.

The GMIX I am involved with is at a nonprofit helping farmers and building agriculture marketplace. So I look forward to seeing some part of the rural areas that represent Kenya's largest industry.

Nairobi – first impression

Nairobi is my first stop in Africa when I arrived here but I didn't get to explore it until this Sunday. There are some other GSB friends working on their GMIX in Nairobi, so I had a small get-together this afternoon with Ziad and Abby.

It's a nice Sunday afternoon. We did a walk around the central city area, passing by the City Hall, the Judicatory, etc. People on the street seemed quite relaxed. There was a group of well-dressed people passing by the City Hall – we guessed that they must have come from a church activity. Near our hotel, there's a big green urban park area, where people rest, picnic, chat, etc. The atmosphere was good. In the central downtown, there is some nice combination of skyscrapers (much shorter ones than those in China) and colonial buildings. We took photos in front of what seems to be the tallest building in Nairobi and a mushroom-like building. Later we were told that the tallest building is Kenya International Conference Center.

But overall, you can tell the British didn't do much good to build its East African colony.

We strolled to a nice hotel in the heart of the city, where there's a thorn tree that you can put message post on it. We decided to write a short message for the future GSBers who'd visit this place. Finally our meeting ended with a chitchat in the hotel bar, with drinks and hot chocolate.

Traffic in Nairobi is bad. A small vehicle problem can cause a huge traffic jam. I have been riding taxi for many times, and every single time, I would get stuck in the traffic for a while, ranging from 10 minutes to a good hour.

Ziad, Abby, and I, in front of KICC

Message Board at the Thorn Tree Cafe

Ngorongoro Crater and Lake Manyara

Our last stops for this East African journey were Ngorongoro Crater and Lake Manyara, both national conservation areas close to Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. This time, in anticipation of the fatigues after the Kili climb, we booked a lodge safari (vs. camping) and stayed in Ngorongoro Farm House, which is an extremely nice lodge resort.

Ngorongoro Crater is one of Tanzania's most visited destinations. At about 20km wide it's also one of the largest calderas in the world. There is a soda lake at the crater's base. Thanks to the permanent water and grassland on the crater floor, there is a variety of animals living in the crater wall and they don't migrate throughout the year. We were hoping that we could see leopard which we didn't get to see in Masai Mara, but in the end, these shy animals didn't show up. The game drive was less exciting than those we did in Masai Mara as I had seen most of the animals there. One animal that is more abundant here is baboon. We got to see a lot of them, strolling on the vehicle road and often in groups.

At Lake Manyara, we had hoped to see thousands of flamingos, but unfortunately it was not the right timing as most of the flamingos have already migrated away. We saw a few of them remotely and a bunch of storks. Besides, there were many hippos sleeping on the muddy lake shore. They live peacefully with the birds. We also saw many elephants, impalas, etc. Close to the end of the game drive, we saw one pair of Thomson's gazelles mating.

I think these two parks are less impressive than Masai Mara in terms of scenery and variety of animals you can see. But they are probably better conserved than Masai Mara. In Mara, safari vehicles are allowed to cut off-road, chasing after animals, while here it is prohibited, which negatively affect the animal watching experience for tourists but good for the animals and nature. I really hope people can do something to make as little disturbance or negative impact on the wild life here. But I guess as long as people are coming for safaris on these metal "animals" that is not part of the ecosystem, the real animals' life will be inevitably affected. Isn't that sad?

Acacia trees inside Ngorongoro Crater

Crown Cranes

Thomson's gazelles are mating and there is a bunch of audience as well

Two male impalas

Klipspringer

Father and kid

Hippos sleeping on the lake shore

Ngorongoro Farm House Lodge Hotel

Lodge room interior

The Farm House grows coffee plantation and all kinds of flowers

Pole! Pole! Kilimanjaro

Day 6 Horombo Hut -> Marangu Gate

The last day, we said good-bye to Horombo Hut and descended all the way back to Marangu Gate. It usually takes 6 hours to get down but it only took us 5 as we were so eager to take a hot shower that we ran so fast!

At around noon time, we got our certificate at the gate and headed back to Arusha.

This time, we got to live in Arusha Impala Hotel, took a good hot shower, did laundry, and most importantly had our first Chinese dinner there. The egg tomato soup was yummy and authentic. And this marked a perfect period to our Kilimanjaro hike.

Pole! Pole! Kilimanjaro

Day 5 Kibo Hut -> Gillman's Point -> Uhuru Peak -> Kibo Hut -> Horombo Hut

It was midnight and clear. We could see every single star in the sky. I couldn't remember when in the past I had ever seen so many stars and constellations – it's even more beautiful than what I saw at the Outward Bound rafting night.

We ascended along a steep zigzag trail, slowly slowly. In pitch dark, there was this broken line of headlights, moving gradually. It's like some stars moving on the ground, mirroring the starry sky. I kept looking into the sky as it was so beautiful and saw a couple of shooting stars.

I was feeling quite well until around 5300m. I started to feel bad in the stomach and some headache. Then at about 5500m, I threw up. Once you throw up, you actually feel much better. For me, on my way to the peak, I threw up three times, and every time I did so, I gained some more strength, which could last for about an hour and then I felt like vomiting again. Shortly after the first vomit, we reached the Gillman's Point at 5681 m at 5AM. Steven asked me if I'd like to continue, I said yes without any hesitation.

From Gillman's Point, we started to walk on the ridge of the crater. It became less steep but still got some ascending. We could see some snow caps and glaciers on the way. Luckily, it was not very windy that morning – it could be very windy once you are on the crater and the wind chill is ruthlessly freezing. After 90 minutes, the sun started to come out when we started to walk in glaciers. It was amazingly beautiful.

At 6:45AM, we reached the Uhuru Peak. Of course, I forgot about all the altitude sickness and took lots of pictures.

On the way down, I started to feel bad again. But then I had nothing to puke anymore. I was so out of shape and my legs were so weak that I couldn't walk very fast. Plus the headache, I was not even entirely conscious. My guide came to my rescue and with his aid, we quickly descended. Thanks to him, I saved many of my brain cells. Once I was below 5300 m, my headache was gone and I didn't feel like vomiting anymore. So 5300 m might be my physical limit on altitude survival. It's good to know your limit.

We were back in Kibo Hut by 10AM and had a hot brunch before quickly descending to Horombo Hut.

That night, I had such a good sleep.

Gillman's Point (5681m)

First sun light

Sun has come out

100 m away from the peak

Uhuru Peak (5895m)

Mt. Mawenzi and glaciers

Glacier close-up

Pole! Pole! Kilimanjaro

Day 4 Horombo Hut -> Kibo Hut

It was drizzling all night last night. Unfortunately, the rain didn't stop in the morning. We hiked a good 4 hours in the rain. Till we got to Kibo Hut (4702m), we were wet.

Even worse, our porters didn't take good care of our backpacks and they got wet as well. Some critical items that got wet included Steven's sleeping bags, my book, passport, down jacket, etc. Good news is that my shoes remain dry inside. It's a new pair of Gore-tex hiking boots before I left China and good investment.

Kibo Hut has very shabby facilities, as there's no water supply. We get to stay in a 10-people room, with double-layer beds. Everyone who got here today was soaking wet and tried to dry up their stuffs. A group of old dudes from Austria were using cooking stove to dry up their shoes – a very funny scene.

The rain continued and at the altitude of 4700 m, it became snow.

By 8PM everyone finished dinner and went to bed. But almost nobody fell asleep. Two Australian guys kept talking and there were people going to toilet from time to time. Around 10:30PM, a guy who went out for the toilet brought back good news – it stopped snowing.
I actually fell asleep for a while, perhaps 1-2 hours in total. We got up a bit past 11PM and got ready for the summit hike. After refreshing tea and cookies, we started off.

Hiking in the rain

Mess in Kibo Hut - 10 people in a room - everyone is trying to dry up their stuff

Kibo Hut - snowing - porters and guides live in tents

Pole! Pole! Kilimanjaro

Day 3 Horombo Hut Acclimatization Day

It's a nice and clear morning. After breakfast, we went on a 2-hour hike up to the Zebra Rock, close to Mt. Mawenzi. We didn't get to see Mt. Kili though as when we were up at the view point where we are supposed to see one corner of the snow cap, it was covered by cloud. We returned at noon to have the first hot lunch at the Hut.

In the afternoon, I had nothing to do, so I started to read the book Steven brought along – Bad Lands by Tom Wheeler, the legendary trekker and Lonely Planet writer. The book is a collection of travel journals about countries that the western world considers "Bad", or around the "Axis of Evil", countries like North Korea, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, etc. It doesn't include China though. I started from Cuba. It was a fun read and re-confirmed my interest to visit Cuba.

At dinner, we met one couple from EU (Spanish guy and Swiss lady) who made it to the top, and they told us to wear everything we have as it is freezing cold up there. They said it was a tough climb. They are both avid trekkers and their account made us nervous. A little bit over 24 hours later, we'll be in the -17 °C thin air for the final climb ourselves. Fingers crossed.

Interesting-looking trees

Zebra Rock

Random places in the acclimatization hike

Mt. Mawenzi - view from Horombo Hut

Pole! Pole! Kilimanjaro

Day 2 Mandara Hut -> Horombo Hut

We got up 6AM, had a fresh-up morning tea, did washing and cleaning, and finished our breakfast around 7AM. This is going to be our daily routine almost everyday on the hike.

After packing, we started off to Horombo Hut (3700m). On the way, the rainforest disappeared and got replaced by open, grassy moorland. There are more flowers as well. There is one type of trees that look very interesting and photogenic. It grows close to river or wherever there's water. So it's a good sign to find water source.

Again we had picnic lunch on the way and after a 4-hour hike we arrived at the Horombo Hut around 1PM. Horombo Hut is a much bigger one than Mandara, as hikers from both way (up and down) live here. So we get to talk to some people who already reached the peak and on their way down. You basically can feel the nerve from everyone in the Hut. For those who won't have the extra acclimatization day, tomorrow will be the D-Day. For us, we have another day to acclimatize and rest.

Good morning! Mandara Hut

The second day, rainforest turned into moorland

Moorland flora

White neck crows - they are everywhere around the hut

Horombo Hut - mass complex of huts

Pole! Pole! Kilimanjaro

Day 1 Moshi -> Kilimanjaro Marangu Gate -> Mandara Hut

There's a small episode before the Kili climb.

The night before, we took flight from Masai Mara to Nairobi and then a shuttle bus from Nairobi to Arusha, Tanzania. After a whole day travel, we arrived in Arusha Impala Hotel around 8:30PM but were surprised to know that we had to continue to Moshi for an overnight stay at Keys Hotel, which was not consistent with the original itinerary. After a void fight with the travel agent, we decided to go to Moshi. This was probably the only bad experience we had had since the beginning of the trip. We just hoped that it's not going to be downhill from there, and it's not a bad omen for the climb.

It turned out that Keys Hotel is a lousy one, even though it gets recommended on Lonely Planet. We didn't get proper hot water for shower. Steven insisted that he didn't rest well because of the extra long-hour travel and other inconvenience caused by the schedule change (stay in Moshi instead of Arusha). We talked to the tour operator, asking to postpone the climb for one day. But it seemed that to change booking and everything is very complicated so we finally agreed to go as planned but managed to get a refund (difference hotel of charge between Impala and Keys Hotel) and a guaranteed stay in Impala Hotel when we get down from the mountain.

Steven was really pissed by the agent while I was more on the ease side. Shit happens. When it comes, fix it; if you can't, just smile and live with it.

After an hour's transport from Moshi, we arrived at the Marangu Gate (1700m), where we'll start our 6-day hike. We have a big service team coming with us – a guide, an assistant guide, a waiter, a cook, and four porters. Our guide, Thadeus, is a decent but quiet guy in his forties. He has 15 years climb experience in Kilimanjaro. He speaks OK English but not very well. We later got to know that you had to work as porter and assistant guide for 5 years before you can be qualified as a guide in Kili hike. Tough job.

We completed registration at the gate in about 30 minutes and started our first day's hike around 11:30AM. It was all the way in leafy, shady rainforest and not very steep. We had lunch halfway and arrived in Mandara Hut (2700m) around 3PM. One hut room is shared by 4 people. Our roommates for the first nights were a lovely couple from Italy. We had a refreshing afternoon tea, wandered around the campsite a little bit, and saw some Colobus.

We finished our dinner around 7:30PM and went to bed 8PM. It's uncommon to stick to a 6AM-8PM schedule when you are in the mountain as there's nothing to do except chatting with random people you get to know along the hike.

At the Marangu Gate

Rainforest

Rainforest

Colobus

Pole! Pole! Kilimanjaro

After Masai Mara, I did a 6-day hike in Mt. Kilimanjaro, which was a really unique and potentially life changing experience for me. It was not the most adventurous outdoor experience I had – just a year ago, I did a week-long white water rafting in Utah's complete wilderness with a bunch of GSB classmates. But this time, since I was not with a big group, I had more time to stay alone, thinking and observing. I learned a lot from going through the physically demanding and mentally challenging process. And I enjoyed the random meeting with people we bumped into along the way.

I had some serious altitude sickness on the final climb but I am glad I made it to the summit. In the end, it was more of a mental challenge than a physical demand. If I had known that this amount of altitude sickness would permanently damage my brain cells, would I do it again? Absolutely. If my guide had told me that vomiting more than three times on such high altitude is life threatening, would I insist to climb? Probably not.

With the benefit of hindsight, people could have made a better choice. But we don't have the luxury of knowing everything or predicting what to happen, so live the questions, take some risks, and embrace the uncertainty.

About the title."Pole" means "Slowly" in Swahili. Along the hike, you would hear people ,especially local porters, saying this as a greeting to you. We even met a guide who knows Chinese – and all he can speak is "Man Dier, Man Dier", which means "Slowly Slowly". Funny.

Masai Mara

Earlier this year, I went to Yellowstone National Park and loved the animal watching experience there. Then one friend told me – in Yellowstone, it's people watching animals; but in Masai Mara, it's animals watching people. Now I understand what exactly she's talking about. There are just so many animals in East Africa. You are immersed in the world of wild life. My first safari experience in Masai Mara was simply amazing.

We didn't get to see all the big fives properly – we missed leopard and only saw two rhinos very remotely, like two moving black spots. We didn't see the migrating animals crossing the river either – we were almost able to see it when two stupid safari jeeps cut into the group of wildebeests that were lining on the river bank and waiting to cross – they got scared away, twice. Nevertheless, it's really fun to see many other interesting animals and how the food chain works in real life.

I am really surprised at how sophisticated East African hospitality industry grows. Despite their poverty, they have really good facilities and are very service oriented. They are environmentally concerned as well. The campsite we stayed at uses solar energy and I saw no liters in the park. It makes me wonder why China can't do the same. There are so many interesting and spectacular places in China but almost none of them are well conserved and very few are tastefully designed or well maintained. I guess it's not an economic issue, but a mentality one.

With a 70-200/f2.8 telescope lens, I had a great time photographing animals this time. But the biggest learning is to let go those you can get. So Steven and I both brought a Nikon D80. But I had a better telescope lens than he does. I was very keen on shooting everything we saw, while he was more relaxed as his lens can't make good photos for animals from a distance. For a little while, I wasn't entirely happy with our guide as he didn't listen to us to stop the car for taking photos. And Steven started to comment on my being too particular about photography but I thought it's just because he didn't have good lens to shoot. At some point, I realized that he was right about my being crazy with this photography thing. Then I started to relax as well. And it feels good to be able to let go when you can actually take control. It's OK not to have a camera at hand when there's strikingly beautiful scenery in front of you. You can just chill, enjoy it and have it printed in your memory.

A young adult male. He is not fully blown yet.

Elephant mom and baby.

The most photogenic wild life in the park.

Vultures are the cleaners in the chain. They eat remains of predator's kills.

Cheetas - she's sleepy and chill, didn't give a shit to curious tourists and cameras

Baffallo and his friend.

Sunrise at the park gate.

Sunset

Our dirver/guide is very experienced - he knows exactly what the animals are going to do. Just before this crane was about to fly, he asked us to take photos.

Balloon safari

Lots of beautiful birds.

A baby giraffe - our driver's favorite animal

PS. For more photos, please go to my picasa album at http://picasaweb.google.com/dolma.tsering