Lamu

Be warned, this post may spark envy. I am already envious of my past-self who is forever enjoying Lamu.

The Lamu archipelago, a collection of seven islands on the northern part of the Kenyan coast, is a place forgotten by time. There are no cars, all the transport is done by donkey and traditional dhow sailing ships. Luckily, it hasn’t been forgotten by UNESCO who have made Lamu Old Town a world heritage site for being the best example of Swahili culture.



Peponi Hotel, Shela (Click picture to see the album)



Before arriving in Kenya, I hadn’t even heard of Lamu let alone planned a trip there. As it happens we didn’t even plan this trip: after another plan fell through our friend Heather invited us to join her folks at Fatuma’s Tower in the village of Shella, as the apartment they had rented had a spare room.



Dawn on Shella Beach



So after an overnight trip on a sweaty, cramped bus we flew the short 20 mins from Malindi to Lamu. We were greeted at the airport and taken by dhow to Shella, another of Lamu’s three towns. About two minutes into our dhow trip, as we gazed on the coastline of Lamu Island, I completely forgot that Nairobi existed (a sensation that was maintained throughout the stay, much to the satisfaction of all).



Lamu Donkeys



On our arrival, we trotted through the maze-like lanes of Shella (narrow enough for me to spread my arms and touch both sides) and arrived at Fatuma’s Tower: a tumble-down collection of buildings refurbished by a British ex-pat hippy (we fitted right in). Some might think the refurbishment is not complete but the retention of some of original ruins of Fatuma’s Tower certainly adds to the ambience, creating a kind of Indiana-Jones-esque sense of adventure.



Fatuma's Tower Court Yard



While Shella is smaller and more low-key than Lamu town it does boast the rather wonderful Peponi Hotel Restaurant, which might have been transported from the one of the classier Mediterranean coasts. Unlike most of the places on Lamu it looks and feels like an ex-pat hang-out because, well, it is. I can forgive its trappings of luxury in an otherwise more austere environment because the food was pretty exceptional; I will accept that my taste buds may need recalibrating when I get back to Europe, but it did have fantastic fresh seafood, salads, cheese, and a great wine list.



Lunch at Peponi Hotel Restaurant. The photographs show that Ed ate this meal in less than 13 minutes - not quite a record but still an Olympic sprint.



Somehow we managed to tear ourselves away from Shella and visit Lamu Town, a short boat-ride away. We sidestepped the tour guides (locals with a fine sense of history and directing you to the preferred curio stores) and endeavoured to lose ourselves in the back lanes of Lamu. In this we were marginally successful, as Lamu is not that large.

We then proceeded to engage the local shopkeepers in haggling. Haggling is skill that requires developing when in Kenya and Nairobi is not always the best location as many places seek purely to scalp a mzungu’s wallet. In Lamu, it seemed that shopkeepers were much more open and appreciative of our rather pigeon Swahili (I suppose to be expected in one of the major centres of Swahilli culture) and tellingly the shopkeepers were interested in ‘win-win’: they wanted the best price but wanted to you to feel like you got a good price too.

We also managed a walk around the Swahili Museum, which was a very enjoyable insight into swahili culture, despite it being hot enough to melt your face and being guided around by an intern who looked as bored as interns usually do. Swahili may be one of the nation's official languages but its culture is not at the heart of the Kenyan experience, so to have it proudly presented was very different to the cultural wasteland of some parts of Nairobi.



Lamu Market



We also went on a dhow trip with captain Babu (grandfather in Swahiii), who took us out through the mangroves of Manda Island. The dhow was a fantastic boat, made in teak from old railway ties of the South African Railway; it was constructed in Mozambique before being sailed up the coast to Lamu. Early in the day we snorkelled near the coral off both Lamu and Manda Islands, which was occasionally quite tricky as the currents off Lamu Island were very fast (you spent a lot of energy staying in the same place).



Sunset on a Dhow

We then went out again for a sunset trip, which was just as idyllic as the pictures suggest. Captain Babu was an informative and hospitable host, the samosas and bhajias that Mrs Captain Babu provided were accompanied by the crew singing Jambo Kenya and Malaika.

Dhow Crew in action



These are songs you may hear in Nairobi, which I had written off as cheesy tourist stuff, but would never be as appropriate as they are on Lamu. When people say hakuna matata here you get the impression they really mean it.



Captain Babu and his crew singing



People talk about a place being timeless, and it is something that can surely be said of Lamu. It is a place not only unhindered by time's progress itself but that seemingly releases you from time's grip. Our last real view of Lamu was the duty free shop on the airport, which really sums up the whole experience:

Lamu Duty Free

Quite a bit of our conversation while we were on Lamu revolved around devising improbable VSO placements stationed there and as we left we were asking ourselves one question: when are we coming back? When will you be able to ask yourself the same question? Seriously, if you visit one place in Kenya, make it Lamu.

Kuku on matatu

Sometimes I don’t think people believe us when we talk about public transport here:





That guy is strapping live chickens ('kuku' in swahili) to the roof of a bus. I think it was a long-distance route so those chickens were going be on there for a few hours. Well, I suppose that's as close as they're likely to get to their evolutionary destiny of flying.

Operation: Plunder Hell

Coming from a largely secular world, the religiosity of Kenya can take you aback; people will, on being introduced to you, asked if you have been ‘saved’ and downtown Nairobi is a ghost town on Sunday mornings when people are in church.

When I went to the YMCA the other day, I spotted this banner for ‘Operation: Plunder Hell’ a somewhat more aggressive marketing strategy for the church than you would see back in the UK. The event promised a range of miracles: ’Lame walk, Blind see, Dumb speak, Deaf Hear, Sinners saved, Oppressed delivered and prophetic release of destinies’.

That is some miracle list! I would be happy with strained muscles healed, lisps cured, short-sightedness corrected.

There is a lot of literal belief in the Bible and in the personification of the devil, so when the banner says ‘Operation: Plunder Hell’, they don’t mean it as a euphemism. People will probably be disappointed if there isn’t actual fire and brimstone at the event.

It just goes to show that church missonaries were very successful, it makes me wonder why there aren't any missonaries for atheism? Richard Dawkins doesn't count. I guess preaching the word of... ...well, nothing is never going to be as attractive as Operation: Plunder Hell.

3 + 2 = 32

3+2=32 To understand this you have to adjust your thinking, it’s a reminder that you cannot come to Kenya and always maintain your western point of view or sometimes your mathematical point of view.

I try to get my head around this by saying to myself if I combine 3 and 2 in such a manner as to get 32 and, rather than protest its mathematical correctness, accept that future combinations may require the same operation then life becomes a lot easier.

It is a similar process required to speak with people who don’t share your oral culture. Kenyans communicate effectively with each other, however a lack of specificity and accuracy in communication from a western perspective is common in many of conversations I have had here.

Kenya has a largely oral culture, and many conversations are not always about information sharing but about relationship building. There will be liberal sprinkling of ‘the nini’ (thing) which expresses: 'the thing that I can’t quite remember but in the larger context of our conversation you should be able to divine' and also a large helping of ‘sawa sawa’ (which means 'correct, correct)' which is a dangerous phrase for westerners as it should indicate agreement but sometimes just means an acknowledgement.

Kenyans love a good chat, and it is a pleasure speaking with Kenyans, it has just taken me a while to understand that three and two can create thirty-two.

Premier League football (but not the one you're thinking)

So we decided to go and watch the football. Most of the time if you say this in Kenya it means go down to the pub and watch the Arsenal, Chelsea or Man U game, but this time we went to watch the Kenyan Premier League (KPL). Kenyan football crowds have not had the best press in the last year or so, with a few riots and people being crushed by crowds (not unfamiliar for those who remember football in the eighties). A former volunteer who had been to watch a KPL game said it was 'hell'.

Undeterred we decided to watch Mathare United vs Karaturi and were more than pleasantly surprised. No crowd trouble and plenty of space, albeit this is early in the season and the game wasn't to be a championship decider.

Some of us had decided to support Mathare United. The selection of clubs to support in the KPL can be rather delicate, with some teams drawn on ethnic lines such as AFC Leopards (a Luhya team) and Gor Mahia (a Luo team) with others being company teams, such as Tusker FC (the beer), KCB (a bank), Mumias (a sugar company).

Mathare seemed an uncontroversial choice and are an interesting club. Their players are drawn exclusively from the slums. The players are contractually obligated to do a set amount of community work every month and are trained AIDS prevention workers. Mathare United also has a youth organisation, Mathare Youth Sports Association, whose Hope for Sport centre was used for KAIH's Fun Day just a few weeks ago.

MYSA is a very successful organisation and acts as a feeder club for the whole league with two of their most successful graduates playing European Champions League this season (Dennis Oliech at Auxerre and Macdonald Mariga at Inter Milan).

MYSA was even nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize, and I don't think that's an award Sir Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho or Arsene Wenger will be up for any time soon.

Having paid our money and made our choice, we got VIP tickets for the princely sum of 400Ksh (or about £3) and took our seats, concrete steps, in the stands. We couldn't really tell what made our tickets VIP, although the chairman of Mathare United, Bob Munro, came along, shook our hands and invited us to sit with him:

Left to right: VSO volunteers: Simon, Gaz, Jo, Allys with me sat next to Bob Munro

Sadly, Bob hadn't brought the prawn sandwiches or pinot grigio but he did make good company for watching his team play.

Mathare United didn't bring much in the way of support to the match but they didn't have some of their MYSA players, the U-12s boys and girls teams, in attendance, and they were in good voice.

And the youth team had plenty to cheer about as their team were 3-0 by half time, with pacey winger, Innocent Mutiso, creating most of the chances.

Mathare United celebrating their second goal

The game finished 3-0 but our day was not yet done, as it was a double-header at City Stadium that day with AFC Leopards vs KCB coming straight after the Mathare game. As I mentioned AFC Leopards are a Luhya team and very well supported, with a mascot and a band:

AFC Leopards' mascot getting his groove on

This was a much more even and open contest, plenty of missed opportunities on both sides but we were minded by Bob's parting advice 'if Leopards go down, leave before the final whistle'. When KCB scored early in the second half, the Leopards fans started to take umbrage with the ref and the opposition players, although the band and mascot didn't notice the goal and continued singing and dancing. We took our cue and left before we became a target of the Leopards fans' ire.

It was a good day's football and worth supporting; if Kenyan's supported the KPL as much as they support the English Premier League, it would be among the best supported leagues in the world.

This is Kenya, but it doesn't have to be

"This is Kenya" is something we hear most weeks. We don't hear it when we are enjoying the majestic view of Mount Kenya, or when we are having sundowners at Kiboko Bay overlooking Lake Victoria, or even when we are enjoying a Tusker beer and some nyama choma (roast meat) in a joint down town.

"This is Kenya" is the catch-all excuse for corruption, traffic, pollution and bureaucracy. It is meant to tell you: this is Kenya, and there is nothing you or I can do about it, not only that but there will be a day when you leave to go back to your cosseted western life style and you will forget us.

We hear it when we are kept waiting hours on end for meetings, when the electrician won't reconnect the power until he gets a bribe and when the taxi driver gets lost despite telling you he knew where he was going.

Other people may have heard it as "This is Africa", and it is a poor palliative. It smacks of an element of self-hatred which is unwarranted.

When we hear "This is Kenya" it fails to recognize all the other aspects of Kenya. Kenya isn't just slums and safaris, just as France isn't just cheese and wine or the UK is beer and football. We have been here a short time and are only beginning to understand and appreciate everything this country and its people has to offer.

Kenya isn't perfect, Kenya can frustrate, but it is changing and changing fast. I'd like people to say "This is Kenya, but it doesn't have to be" and one day to say "This is Kenya and it is amazing"