A day in Nairobi

A day in Nairobi
The grounds outside our cottage at the Karen Blixen Coffee Garden & Cottages in Nairobi.

Today we took a driving tour of Nairobi, including the Karen Blixen Museum and a stop at a shopping mall to get a few things.

While Sammy took Rhonda, Megan, and me for a walk through the forest to see some coffee roasting and grinding machinery, Marsha hung out with this guy. They struck up a conversation (about Donald Trump, among other things) and were laughing when we returned.

After the museum, we drove to the Kobe Tough bead and leather facility, where we were greeted with some singing and dancing, then watched demonstrations of how they make their wares.

Next was a drive through the uptown area, home to many government buildings and large businesses.

From uptown we crossed into downtown, which is more crowded, colorful, and dirty than uptown. Few tourists visit downtown, so we got stares at times, and people would walk right up to our van and say things like "hello white people" in Swahili. I had to be careful with my camera and phone, and a few guys walked close to me and looked in the window. We had several people tell our driver that he should roll up the windows for our safety, but we needed to get some photos!

I got many reactions while taking photos, ranging from the guy who hissed and glared menacingly when he saw me take a photo (not of him) to this guy who started dancing when he saw me point my camera at his shop.
A blurry long-distance shot of Kibera, the largest slum in Africa. Megan and I took a drive through Kibera in 2007 with two men who felt more like bodyguards that tour guides. (They were recommended by a colleague of mine who lived in Nairobi.)

The we went to the Galleria Shopping Mall for a few things. Galleria felt like a modern mall in the suburbs of a big US city, with numerous stores on multiple levels and several American fast-food outlets such as Pizza Hut and KFC.

The supermarket at Galleria Shopping Mall.

Then we went back to our rooms to relax, and for dinner we checked out the fancy white tablecloth restaurant at our resort. I had the roasted duck, and it was great.

Tomorrow morning at the crack of dawn, we'll be loading into a 4WD for our drive to Masai Mara National Reserve on the Tanzanian border, known for its lions, cheetahs, elephants, zebras and hippos. Time to get some sleep!