JK! I'm constipated...

Maybe this is TMI, but I figured since one of my previous posts was about how I might be infected with an amoeba, I should clarify something.  I'm just constipated.  The diet here is heavy in rice and other starches like ugali.  Also, dehydration is a constant worry here.  No worries though, I'm eating a lot of Weetabix for breakfast.  Also, it doesn't help that sometimes I'm afraid to go to the bathroom because of wasps nests and bats.

In short, ERISA APANTAKU IS PARASITE FREE.

What I'm Actually Doing

You know those pictures on Facebook that have a type of person (e.g. swimmer) and the following labels with pictures to describe what different people think they do?  What my mom thinks I do?  What my friends think I do?  What I think I do?  What I actually do?

Well, I think a lot of my friends and family have no idea what I'm doing in Kenya.  To be honest, I wasn't really 100% sure what I was doing either, until I got here.  I'd say I'm only 98% sure of what I'm doing right now and I'm doing it right now.  So... here's what's up.  While in Kenya, I'm taking 4 Princeton University courses in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Civil Engineering.  The first course is on African Mammals.  Everyday, I wake up at 6:30 AM in my luxury tent.  Then breakfast is at 7 AM.  Usually we go out to the field around 7:30 or 8 AM.  Over the first week we've done two field projects:  one involving elephant damage on the acacia tree; the other involving acacia ant mutualism. Everyday while we're driving we see animals, but sometimes we go out on Game Drives, the purpose being to see as many cool animals as possible.  So far, I've seen too many animals to count.  Probably the highlights have been ostrich, cheetah, giraffe, and baboons.  Some of my comrades have seen a lion, but my car was behind them and didn't get to see it.  We take special safari cars out (convertible vans) so that we can see out the top.  Last night, we went on a Night Game Drive, but didn't see much other than impala, jackals, and hares.

Sounds fun, right?  It is.  To be honest, it's some of the most fun I've ever had while doing school.  The other students here (Columbians and Princetonians) are all really cool.  And my roommate Devika (aka Doctor Drevika) is so fun!  We have a set of over 4,000 roommate rules and provisions that ensure maximal The only downside to this wonderful experience is ALL THE FRACKIN' WORK!  It's Sunday.  We are supposed to get Sunday off but everyone is working on lab reports or reading articles for tomorrow's discussion.  I'm hoping that this intense work load is only the first class.  I'm okay doing this for 3 weeks. I'm not okay with doing this for 3 months.  MEANWHILE, IN PANAMA, my Princeton roommate Clare is STRAIGHT CHILLIN' in the rainforest.  They have one project for one course.  We have 4 projects for one course.  Also, they have internet and Clare posts awesome photos of the rainforest.  Sorry for the lack of beauty in my posts; we have limited bandwidth here so posting lots of pictures is not allowed.  But I'll try to sneak one in... elephant eating on the other side of the river across from our campsite.  Picture literally taken from just outside our dining tent.

So, basically... I'm tired.  I've very tired after my first week at Mpala.  But this experience is so amazing, I can't even believe I thought of passing this up.

P.S.  Still haven't been bitten by a cobra.  Yay!

P.P.S.  I'm going to try to blog more, but it's hard because of ALL THE WORK!  Stay tuned for a philosophical post about nature coming up soon.

MACROPARASITE!

This just in... I may have a macroparasite.  I'll keep y'all posted.  Right now, I'm just hoping I'm constipated  (DEAR CLARE, MATT, MIREILLE, and JAMES:  I KNEW I WOULD NEED THOSE FIBER PILLS YOU MADE ME LEAVE BEHIND!).  We'll see.  All I know, I'm happy I took that immunology course this semester.  Now I'm just praying that my epithelial gut lining is turning over in turbo-drive.  Note to all humans:  don't eat mango pieces off the ground.  Leave them on the ground for the birds to eat.

The Road to Nanyuki

Nanyuki is a city four hours north of Nairobi and a pit stop on our way to Mpala.  It’s four hours north of Nairobi if you take there is no construction on the super highway.  It takes six hours if there’s construction on the super highway, causing you to have to take a detour around and through the Nairobi slums on a Saturday.  Guess which one we had to do?  YOU GUESS CORRECT!  We spent two hours in Kenyan gridlock before getting to the highway and spending another four hours on open road until getting to the unpaved road that leads to Mpala (after an hour).  I’ve gotten in the habit of using the catchphrase:  “we’re in no rush.”  I used it at the airport when we were going through the Visa line.  I used it while we were waiting for our bags.  I’ve used it a gazillion times, and I used it again the other day as we took one full day to travel from Nairobi to Mpala.  But, I have to say, this drive was an eye opener.  Driving through the slums gave me a picture of what another part of Kenya looks like.  I’ve seen upscale Nairobi (where our hotel was), semi-arid rural Kenya (Mpala) and low-scale Nairobi (the drive).  It was cool.  Every road was lined with shops or roadside market stands.  Men were making furniture and pool tables.  Women were selling fruit and vegetables.  It was slightly scary when our driver told us to roll up the windows or else someone might come by and steal our cameras; but better safe then sorry (another commonly uttered phrase here).  There were two highlights of our drive.  One:  while driving around the shantytown area, three little girls were standing and laughing.  One looked at me, so I waved and smiled at her and she waved and smiled back.  She started dancing and I gave her a thumbs up.  Then all her friends joined in.  It was so cute!  All along the ride, while I wasn’t sleeping, I was looking for children to wave at.  I guess I just love children.  At one point on the highway, we passed a truckload of dancing teenagers advertising for one of the presidential candidates.  WHY DOES THIS NOT HAPPEN IN AMERICA?  I would totally load up into a truck with a bunch of friends and go driving around blasting the Obama preferred playlist and dancing.  It might work…

When we finally made it to the dirt path (1 hour from Mpala), we (the car I was in and the other car full of students) for the car driven by Dustin (our professor) to arrive as well.  He drove slower, he claims, because the car can’t go above 80 kph.  I believe it’s because he’s not from here and thus drives slower.  As we waited along the side of the road, our driver, Joseph from Mpala, let the top up on our VAN.  That’s right.  We were driving in a CONVERTIBLE VAN.  I don’t know how much more bad a** you can get.  I crawled out the top and sat on the back of the van as my comrades (other students) got out and explored the ecosystem of the side of the road.  We saw this tomato-like vegetables that Professor Rubenstein (Dustin’s father) told us about yesterday.  They look like little yellow tomatoes, but if you eat them you’ll die in a matter of minutes.  They are toxic, wild, tomato-like fruits.  The cool thing about them is that this species is most likely the progenitor of the edible tomato.  That means, somewhere where this species grew in the past, an early modern human found a bush of non-toxic fruit (maybe he/she noticed animals were eating it and they weren’t dying) and cultivated it.  Thus, TOMATO.  You can thank that modern human every time you eat pizza, ketchup, or a tasty salad.  Also, I couldn’t help but think of The Hunger Games as I heard about these toxic tomatoes.  There should definitely a Hunger Games:  Africa.  As I just wrote this, I realized how not PC this could be perceived.  Maybe I’ll write some fanfiction…

So as I sat on the back of the van, a few comrades also went over to a group of goats herded by three boys.  They proceeded to take photos with the kids, who we decided were an entourage akin to Tracy Jordan, Dot Com, and Grizz.  The next hour we spent driving down a bumpy, dirt road to Mpala. 

At Mpala, we’re staying at the River Campsite.  Some of you might be hearing campsite and think:  “OMG… she’s camping for 3 months.”  Well, yes and no.  The campsite is what I would describe as a luxury campsite.  But it’s no Tom Haverford luxury campsite with a TV and DVD player.  We do not have electricity.  Lanterns sit outside our tents and on the dinner table at night.  Let me reiterate:  WE DO NOT HAVE ELECTRICITY.  About everyday we drive to the research center and spend time charging our electronic devices, but only so we can work on our reports and read/reply to emails.  So, my question is:  why did the packing list say bring DVDs?  I brought like 10,000 DVDs.  This took up a lot of space in my suitcase and now there is no power for me to play my DVDs.  Whatever.  Being free from electricity can be nice at times.  I just wish I hadn’t brought a gazillion DVDs!  So you’re probably thinking:  “Erisa, how is this a luxury campsite?”  There are beds in the tents!  YAY!  Also, we make our own showers, which I think is really cool.  Water is heated in an oil drum, then we put the hot water into a bucket attached to a spigot, then we hoist the bucket above our heads and pour the hot water over us.  I actually love it.  I don’t know why I love making my own shower, but I do.  I’m considering using this type of method in my own home.

My major concern with the campsite was midnight bathroom trips.  The bathrooms (flush toilets thank goodness) are about 50 paces from my tent.  When you add in the fact that COBRAS and OTHER SNAKES and LARGE MAMMALS WAITING TO KILL ME (elephants, jaguars, ) could be lurking in the bushes as I walk lackadaisically to the bathroom, this becomes a more difficult task then previously imagined.  I mean, freshman and sophomore year, I didn’t like super close to my bathroom, but I wasn’t worried I was going to die walking there in the middle of the night.  The first night, I was too scared to pee; I slept horribly.  Last night, I was like:  “F-it.  I need to PEE!”  And I did.  And as I got out of bed and looked out the window I thought it looks kind of bright outside.  It turns out, that was the moon.  Without light pollution, the stars here are AMAZING.  I can’t even describe them.  Last night, I saw the moon just above a few trees across the river.  The shimmering light on the river mirrored the shimmering of the stars and Milky Way galaxy.  It looked almost like a screensaver, but a picture does not do it justice.  Now I look forward to my nighttime bathroom breaks.  (Just kidding.  I don’t want to get bitten by a cobra.)  UPDATE:  Last night I say two eye shines as I was walking to the bathroom.  Wild dogs waiting to eat me?  Perhaps.  There are also still TOO MANY BUGS in our tent at night.  This needs to change.  I don't know if I can do this for 3 months...

At first, I didn’t like the campsite.  I think it’s just one of those things that takes a while to get used to.  Now that I somewhat have, I’m starting to enjoy the little things it offers.  Animals chill across the river all the time (monkeys, elephants, hippos, gazelles).  The food is wonderful (SO MANY BEANS) and the staff are extremely nice and helpful.  

Nairobi and Kenya At a Very Long Glance

Last night we flew into Nairobi and took a bus to our luxury hotel (seriously, it's got a bide and an omelette station at breakfast...).  But since it was night time, we didn't really get to see Nairobi.  Today we didn't really either, but we saw more of it than we did last night (which was only a few lit up signs saying "Casino" and "Luxury Hotel").

The morning began with breakfast (see previous statement about omelette station).  Then we took a 5 minute walk to the Columbia Global Centres Africa in Nairobi.  This is a new building that officially opened 2 weeks ago (but has been operating unofficially for one year).  The title of the centre (I'm going to start spelling the British way more often because it looks cool and I'm in a former British colony) makes it sound like there are other Columbia Global Centres in Africa, but actually this is the first one.  I assume they intend to open more.  What I'm wondering is where is the Princeton Club of Nairobi.  I mean, Columbia's got this nice gated centre where they work with the local government and the UN to set up and manage projects with the local UN Millenium Villages in Sauri and Dertu.  That pretty cool, right?  Well where's the Princeton Club of Nairobi?  At the very least they should be throwing parties, right?  Like, the Princeton Club of New York.  Anyway, I am disappointed.  But the Columbia centre is awesome and hopefully they will expand throughout Africa and the world and keep doing cool things.

We learned several orientation type things at the centre today:

1)  There's an election coming up in March.  When I went through the Visa line at the airport, the woman at the counter said that to me in a very "you know you're going to be here during our election, right?" kind of way.  I thought to myself, "are you trying to scare me into leaving earlier?"  But it was still nice of her to inform me.  I'm not really worried.  I've watched Argo and know what American ingenuity can do to sneak people out of hostile countries.  I could definitely pretend to be a part of a film crew.  But in all seriousness, I'm not worried because Princeton and Columbia aren't worried.  If they were, they would've canceled the trip before we left.  The political climate leading up to the last election (in which violence ensued in parts of the country we won't be visiting) was different than it is now, as I've been told.  And in case things do get too intense, they've got an immediate evacuation plan.  Honestly though, I'm not worried.

2)  There's so much going on in this country!  We talked about pastoralism, which sounds really cool.  I would go into all the interesting things I learned about the challenges with pastoralism and the differences between traditional pastoralism and Western ranching, but Wikipedia probably does a better job (do you like how I'm including the links now so you don't have to google things?).  A few interesting things I learned:  families that can, prefer to have their daughters attend secondary boarding school.  That is good right!  Girls are getting educated, even if it is mostly motivated so that the woman will fetch a better dowry (generally 10 cows = 1 wife).  Still, education is power.  Second, the pastoral society makes gender roles highly differentiated (women can't really herd cattle over thousands of kilometers while nursing a baby.  I guess, I mean, has anyone tried.  Women are pretty tough.) causing gender inequality in the society.  Third, mobile schools are a thing and they are working!  It sounds really cool.  Basically, the teacher loads up his/her materials onto a camel and when the herd stops to graze, he/she picks out some materials and sets up school underneath a tree.  It kind of reminds me of what the one room school houses where probably like, but imagine instead of a school house, there's a camel and a tree.  I just think it would be amazing to do that type of work.

3)  More about agriculture!  This time about farming and ranching.  Small farms produce most of the coffee and tea and milk that gets exported and consumed nationally.  Right now, it seems like Kenya is decently good at producing many of its own goods (especially things like milk), but that the need to rely on support for staples like cereals.  The goal is to improve in staple production and bump up more products to be commercially viable across the border.  I don't really know if all this info is right.  I definitely felt jetlagged today, but one of my courses is on Tropical Agriculture and we'll be touring farms and ranches so I'll get a better grasp on that aspect later in the semester.  Overall things seem really cool and totally doable.  Truly a country to keep your eye on.

Lastly, we went to an Indian restaurant tonight.  We took cabs and on the way there we were basically stopped in traffic.  Out the window was a homeless woman (or at least a woman begging on the street) with a baby on her back and a baby in her lap.  Our cab driver asked us if we had "street families" in the U.S.  We replied, yes.  "Oh," he said.  "So it's not just Africa."  No.  Definitely not.  There are homeless all over the world, in every country, developed or developing.  The only thing I could think of that may distinguish the homeless of Kenya from those in America is the support system.  The "net" as they say.  I don't really know anything about Kenyan government, so I have no idea if one exists.  It's inevitable, I think, that some people are going to drop into poverty and become homeless, but what matters is do those people have a realistic hope of getting out of it.  I don't know if that's the case in Kenya.  I don't know if that's the real case in America, although it certainly is a perception.  I don't like to thing of the world as "we have this and they don't have that" or "we don't have this and they have that."  But, from a scientific point of view, I think looking at differences is an important way to learn about what might work best in different situations/contexts.

I'll leave you with this.  Credit to Matt.

E

P.S.  In leaving the hotel, I'll also leave reliable internet.  Tomorrow we'll head to Mpala and the permanent tents that await us.  I really have no idea what to expect.  On one had, when I hear "tent" I think back to the Frosh Trip of 2011 and Tropical Storm Lee that caused me to have puddle of water pool in my sleeping bag.  I'm holding out hope for luxury though.  Blog posts will probably drop off, but quality will still be good (or bad, depending on how you've thought the posts have gone so far...)!  Also, Facebook will be gone until we come back to Nairobi for another part of the third course.  PLEASE EMAIL ME IF YOU WANT TO CHAT!

P.P.S.  Too the people that were planning on sending me things, mail here takes ONE MONTH to get from the States to Mpala so if you are planning on sending anything, I would send it now.  Also, it's probably really expensive so don't do it unless you REALLY REALLY CARE ABOUT ME (this is a test to see who my TRUE friends are!... just kidding.  To be honest, I probably wouldn't send me anything so I won't judge.).

EWR -> AMS -> NBO

It's strange to think that earlier today I was saying goodbye to my friends at Princeton while now I'm sitting in a hotel in Nairobi.  Although I slept intermittently on the plane, it was by no means the type of sleep that separates the days.  The trip to Nairobi (NBO) consisted of a 8 hour flight to Amsterdam (AMS), followed by a 7 hour flight to the Kenyan capital.  The amenities on the first flight were awesome:  lotion in the bathroom for after you wash your hands; TWO meals (dinner followed by breakfast 3 hours later). The suggested strategy to not be jetlagged was sleeping through the first flight and waking up in the morning in Amsterdam, then staying up for the second flight so that arriving in Nairobi at night, you're body clock would be ready to sleep again.  This is what I should've done, but it's not what happened.  Firstly, I drank some caffeine before going on the Transatlantic night flight -- BAD IDEA.  I stayed up to watch The Trouble with the Curve (not a bad movie, definitely a solid renter) then proceeding to think about an idea for a story about the Hong Kong Flu of 1968 (WIKIPEDIA IT!).  For about the last hour of that first flight I was in and out of consciousness, not enough sleep to keep me awake for the second flight.  Barely enough to keep me awake in the Amsterdam airport...

Amsterdam was interesting.  As we were landing (8 AM) it was pitch black outside.  I couldn't believe it was morning, but I guess higher latitudes means later mornings.  I wish it stayed dark later in Princeton so the sun wouldn't wake me up!  THIS IS A FUNNY STORY:  As people were disembarking from the plane, a elderly woman who was forced to have her carry on placed in an overhead container far behind where she was actually seated because of space constraints decided to stand in the way of everyone trying to get off until someone brought her the suitcase.  Well, some Amsterdamian (that's their demonym, right?) man would NOT tolerate this type of behavior and after verbally telling the old woman to move, he decided to try to bulldozer her out of the way so he could get off.  Both of these people were clearly in the wrong and being totally unreasonable.  At first, I was afraid for the safety of the old woman.  My classmate Rob and I tried to get him to stop ("Sir, do you really think this is necessary?") as the flight attendants were notified and rushed over.  The funny part is, this man was really trying to rip right through this lady, with NO LUCK.  Like a grown man couldn't push through an old woman.  Anyway, walking through that airport was hilarious.  Firstly, a group of ~12 American college students walking anywhere generally attracts attention.  That fact that we were laughing over the antics on the plane right before didn't help mask our foreign-ess.  But I suppose in an airport, most people are foreign, leaving to go home or stopping just to transfer to somewhere else.  Secondly, the loudspeaker amplifying messages throughout the airport spoke Dutch so every time there was an announcement it sounded like someone typed alskhdisofueijlkejrelwjhermsnmnclhsaosidhosureiuelkekansd into Google Translate and had it speak out loud.  Again, an impetus to laugh.  Caroline and I filled out water bottles earlier and unfortunately had to go through security again to get to our specific gate (why, I have no idea), so we did a water chug.  Luckily, I only had 1 L, she had 2.

We were in the Amsterdam airport for about two hours.  I never saw Amsterdam.  But on the flight to Nairobi from Amsterdam (operated by KLM) I was on the first double decker plane I've ever flown (I'm pretty sure).  It was AWESOME!  Obviously I was not on the second decker because we were flying economy, but just knowing there was more up there was cool.  The food was weirder than the previous plane (operated by Delta) and the bathroom had NO LOTION for dry hands.  However, their soap dispenser was kind of funny.  While sitting on the toilette, you become eye level with the soap dispenser, which happened to have written on it, something like this (paraphrasing):  "This is a mandala.  It shows us the complexity of the world and reminds us to... RELAX."  HOW APPROPRIATE FOR A BATHROOM!  There really wasn't much to say about this second flight because I was in and out of consciousness for basically all of it.  Even some of the meals I half ate because I was starting to pass out.  I guess that's why I'm not tired now (12:30 AM in Kenya).  Oh well.  Tomorrow we will be up early to go to orientation.  In this luxury hotel (actually luxurious, not being sarcastic this time), there's internet so I'm able to post this blog and check Facebook and Viber people (GOOGLE IT!) I probably won't be able to do in Mpala (the research centre).  Ok... tired now... GOOODNITE.

That's the summary of my travels to Kenya!  Here's hoping I don't have DVT (Deep Vein Thrombosis; GOOGLE IT!)!

49.7 lbs

So we leave today, and after starting off with a suitcase weighing 65 lbs, I've shaved off the weight to just under the checked bag limit.  After much complaining, I said goodbye to the extra snacks I packed as well as some vitamins and fiber pills.  If any of you kind readers would want to send me packages of fruit snacks, chewy bars, or fiber pills, send me an email and I'll send you my address.  Letters are also welcome!  My birthday is coming up and having a physical birthday card to read would help ease my inevitable homesickness.  I have no idea how much it is to send a letter or package to central Kenya, but I imagine it's not the cheapest thing in the world, so if you're content sending me emails, I will be just as pleased (although I can't eat emails...).