Rainy Season Almost

Another week has gone by and time is really flying! I have so much to talk about but not enough space or time, so I’m just going to ramble about what comes to mind.

I can’t believe I have already been here for almost a month (and that Brandon will arrive next week)! I am really excited to have him come and experience what I have been experiencing.

This week my roommates Anne and Damian arrived and it was great to have some companions to head out and explore the city with. We are all living temporarily in the other apartment I mentioned last week until ours is done being fixed up. But, I am very hopeful that our place will be all ready for us to move into by the end of the next weekend.

Last weekend we did the Nairobi tourist activities of visiting the elephant orphanage and Giraffe center just outside of Nairobi. The elephants were so cute, and they came right up to you and let you pet them. There was also this adorable little baby rhino that came out to say hello to everyone. You can tell it is a total tourist attraction because it was the largest congregation of white people I’ve seen since I arrived. At the giraffe center they give you food so you can feed the giraffe’s, and the center guides told us that if you put it in your mouth, you get a nice kiss from the giraffe. So, of course, I had to try it (see picture above)! I discovered that giraffe tongues are huge and really rough! It was definitely something that everyone who’s coming to visit me this year can look forward to experiencing.

During our weekend outing we had lunch at this really cute restaurant in Karen where we got American style pizza, yum! It was amazing! They also had these cute little fire places and little coal buckets next to the tables to keep you warm. Yes, for those of you wondering, fires and coals are very necessary. It has actually been fairly cold here most of the time since I arrived. It’s been in the 60’s during the days and I’m not sure what temperature at night. The little thermometer on my alarm clock says that our house has been 67 or colder, and there is no heater. Of course I only brought a blanket and no comforter or anything to sleep with, so I’ve been decking out in my fleece pants, fleece socks, and sweatshirts. Not exactly what I thought I’d be having to wear when I was thinking about living in Africa.

It’s almost time for the small rainy season here, and today we got our first real rain. It reminds me of Seattle with the dark gray clouds and sprinkles happening throughout the day with no sun breaks, just your basic gray dreary day. The only difference is that the rain makes the sidewalks (which are really just dirt paths) muddy and definitely has the potential to make walking to work every day an adventure J I am debating buying a pair of these giant rubber boots from the store when the rains really kick in. I tried them on yesterday and I look really stylish in them, yeah right!

Yesterday was a holiday for Kenya so we had the day off. It was national census day, where they were coming around to everyone’s house to count people and get census data for their 10 year evaluation (last census was in 1999). The census was Monday night and all day yesterday, so there was a no movement order out for the city and many closed shops and businesses. I was really looking forward to participating but no one showed up to talk with us L Oh well, at least I can say I lived here when they gathered the data!

I am now eating my delicious lunch of chipatis and samosas from a local restaurant by the clinic I am working from today. It was less than 100 shillings, basically $1, for the entire meal. If you eat traditional Kenyan food or at local restaurants, food here is very cheap. But if you head out to the fancier tourist locations, food is much more expensive and fairly comparable to the US. Our power was out yesterday afternoon so we headed over to the hotel next door to eat lunch and one of the girls I was with got charged $9 for a plate of French fries!

Well, that’s if for now, I’ll try to be better about updating this more often in the future.

Underwear Everywhere

Well, today I had my first experience with having my house cleaned and laundry done by someone I hired and while the place looks great, my underwear is hanging up for everyone in the entire complex to see! I had purposely separated my underwear from the rest of my clothes because I didn't want it to be hanging in the middle of the apartment complex where I've seen everyone's clothes hanging and I really felt much more comfortable washing it myself. I had put it in a separate tiny little laundry pail that I hid this morning and took out and left the other basket of my clothes in the living room with the cleaning supplies. Well, apparently I didn't hide my underwear well enough and I arrived home and every pair of my underwear is nicely displayed on the clothesline for all to see :) And, it's only my underwear (I have no idea where the rest of my clothes are, at least they would have helped hide the underwear). I guess I'm going to have to get more creative about where I hide my underwear next week!!

Another Week gone by

I have now successfully made it through another week in Kenya! I just finished making banana bread, which actually, surprisingly, turned out similar to what it looks/tastes like when I make it in the states. I'm also working on making homemade applesauce and basically, just turning into a regular Martha Stewart :) The reason for all this baking/cooking is that I've moved into another apartment for the next week which has an electric stove. I know everyone loves gas stoves, which is what my regular apartment has in it, but I am not a fan. And, I have no idea how to light the oven, haha!

So, I had to move into another apartment in my complex yesterday for two different reasons. First, there has been a huge ordeal going on with outstanding electric bills upon my arrival. Although the account numbers are now all figured out and the outstanding balances paid (this was a huge hassle to figure out), this did not happen before the electric company came and shut off our hot water heater. So, while we do still have lights in my apartment, we don't have hot water. It sounds like its going to be another ordeal to try to get the company to come back and turn the water back on, but we'll see how it goes. I have been showering without hot water for the past two days, so I was really happy this morning to have a hot shower again!

Secondly, the apartment I moved into was a disaster upon my arrival. There were no working outlets or lights in the living room (that is now fixed) and it looked like the bathroom hadn't been cleaned in ages. Picture white bathroom mats on the floor that are solid black with dirt/mold, paint peeling away from the walls with a nice layer of mold had built up underneath, and black floors instead of the normal yellow color they should have been. Throughout the apartment in general, instead of white walls, mine were a nice shade of brown and the floor had lost all of its finish and was covered by a nice layer of dirt that when scrubbed (by me on my hands and knees) just sunk right back into the wood and stayed nice and dirty. I know it sounds like I'm being picky, given that I am living in Africa, but when you saw what the other apartments in the complex are like and realize that yours is also supposed to look like that, you'd understand.

So, to get everything all straightened up, the apartment maintance man is working on fixing up the apartment with a crew this upcoming week and they are washing everything and painting and refinishing the floors. Unfortunately, I haven't figured out how to have someone else pay, so for now it's my expense, but I'm hoping to figure that out too. Even if it stays my expense, it's so worth it to have the place cleaned up! I am so so so excited to have this work done but can't stay there while they are doing it. So, this is the other reason I've moved apartments. The one I'm in now is actually much nicer than ours! But, I'm tired of not being able to settle in and unpack. I'm really looking forward to being able to finally be able to settle in to my apartment (and one that doesn't look like it's just been through a tornado and monsoon all rolled into one).

I went to work every day last week and, as usual when you start a new job, things are a little slow going at first. I'm working on figuring out which days I am working with who and where, but I think it'll still be a few weeks until everything gets ironed out. In general, I will be spending one day a week working in a pediatric HIV clinic, one day working on data analysis for the pediatric HIV project, another day working in an immunology/molecular biology lab, another day writing my proposal, and a final day working on an existing analysis project looking at immune responses in HIV positive women. Overall, a very busy schedule! But, they all feel like very worthwhile projects to be working on and even from my short time here so far, I know that this year will definitely be an eye-opening experience.

I've also spent some time this week meeting the other people living in my apartment complex. While the UW used to have a lot of people renting and living in these apartments, they have all moved away and it is now mostly students and employees of the University of Manatoba. I met 4 of them this week and it was really great to start meeting the neighbors.

Well, I need to go finish my applesauce! I'll write more later if I think of anything exciting I forgot to include.

Back to Work

Disclaimer: You are going to have to ingore all the spelling errors that are in these blogs. For those of you who don't know, I'm a horrible speller, and this blog site doesn't have spell check! Oh how I miss spellcheck. Anyway, try to ignore (and feel free to laugh) at all the funny spelling mishaps.

It's Monday and time to head back to work for the week. I'm sad to say goodbye to the weekend, it was really fun. I went out to dinner, drinks, and dancing with some of the other people in my apartment complex (Martina Morris and Steve Goodreau, professors at the University of Washington for those of you who are in the HIV field) on Friday. We tried every appetizer on the menu and had some of the most amazing white wine Sangria I've ever tasted! It even had fresh strawberries and rasperries in it! The restaurant turned into a dancing spot soon after we arrived and was playing music from the 60s, 70s and 80s. They played some great songs, including Men in Black, a personal favorite of mine from the days when I had a huge crush on Will Smith, haha!

On Saturday I went to this amazing jewlery store and to Michael Chung's house (another UW professor) for a BBQ with the some of the UW crew. The food at Michael's was great, smoked ribs, teriyaki chicken, corn on the cob, and some amazing salads. Micheal had even made homemade chocolate ice cream, delicious! After dinner everyone played games on the wii. If you don't have it yet, I highly recommend getting wii resort. We also played some crazy game where you had to throw giant cows by swinging the wii over your head like a lasso, pretty hilarious. Before the night was over there were also some dance dance revolution moves and rock band renditions that were quite amusing.

Yesterday we went to the Massai Market and did some shopping. I tried my hand at doing some bargaining for prices, but I'm not very good. Thankfully, the people in the group I went with were much better than me and were able to teach me some tricks :) If you are coming to visit, hopefully by the time you get here I'll be good at it and be able to get you some good prices!

After many phone calls with the airlines, my bag arrived on Saturday and was delivered to my apartment for me. Nothing was missing, except for the butane lighter I had packed to light our gas stove (which was confiscated by TSA because lighters are not allowed, oops!).

The apartment was a mess when I arrived, so disgusting, and many things were broken. I've been working with the maintenance guy to get things fixed and have been cleaning all weekend (well, when I wasn't out playing). It's coming along, but there is still a long way to go! I'm heading to the Nakumat (wallmart/target type store in Africa) to get some much needed supplies for the apartment tonight.

I think that's it for now and I should get back to work :)

I've arrived!

Well, I made it! The flights were long, they lost one of my bags (so far), but it wasn't a bad trip overall. I just arrived late last night, about 10pm Nairobi time, after obtaining my visa and trying to find my bags. I've been awake and meeting people and touring the hospital today, which has been fun. We are about to head out and grab lunch at a local coffee spot and then I'm heading to the grocery store with the same driver who picked me up from the airport last night so I can get some food. Well, that's it for now! I'll try to write more later.

Kenya Here I Come!!

Well, it's 1am the night before I leave, everything is packed, and this is the final task of the evening before I can finally relax with my husband and some champagne left over from a wedding present (thanks Jess and Dan). It has been a crazy month with the trip/training in DC, more training at the UW, buying a house and moving into it, and trying to find the time somewhere in all that madness to pack for my year abroad. But, thankfully, Brandon will arrive in a month and can bring me anything I happen to forget. Brandon wants me to tell you that he has been amazing at helping me prepare tonight and also this week (and I have to agree). For example, tonight he has been dutifully weighing himself and then standing on the scale while holding various bags and boxes to weigh them and make sure they aren't over the limit. Thanks to his help, I think I've managed to pack each bag right up to the 50lb allowable limit.

So, for someone with a fear of calling to order a pizza and who is terrified of flying on planes, moving to Kenya for a year is never something I thought I would do. But, I'm branching out, trying new things, and taking on solving all the world's problems simultaneously (haha, I wish!). So for those of you who don't know, or can't remember, I am traveling to perform research in Nairobi, Kenya through the Fogarty International Clinical Research program sponsored by the National Institute of Health (NIH). Fogarty is the department within the NIH that is specifically focused on international research and every year they sponsor a set of scholars (current students) and fellows (PhD or MD graduates) to perform research in developing countries. This year I will be working at the University of Washington sponsored site in Nairobi and performing research focused on factors associated with mother-to-child transmission of HIV. My PhD advisors (and I) are hoping that my work this year will contribute towards research for my dissertation.

As far as the trip tomorrow, I am feeling a little nervous! I know this is silly, but I am most nervous about having no one there to meet me when I arrive in Nairobi. But, I have been assured, previously and again today (had to double check), that there will be a driver waiting for me with a cardboard sign with my name on it when I arrive! I've never lived outside the US for this long before, and it is really hard to say goodbye to such great friends and family!!! I know it's not goodbye forever but I will really, really, really miss all of you next year!

Well, that's all for now! I will write more when I figure out internet sometime after Friday.