as Dorothy once said, "I'm DEFINITELY not in Kansas anymore..."

I have never seen any place like this and it is hard to describe because it is so different that I don’t know how to interpret it. I think the pictures will help. Traveling through southern Kenya (more specifically masai land) was pretty much what I expected it to be: a scene from The Lion King. It was very very dry with those trees that are flat on the top and their leaves are high up. We saw a couple of giraffes, (BTW their necks aren’t as long as they are portrayed in cartoons....) It felt like a movie until we passed through the villages. The communities are composed of homes made with metal sheets for walls and roves that look like anyone could just push them over... like a house of playing cards. And this is almost every community. The Masai tend to think that metal walls and rooves are more civilized than mud-houses... even though they are closer to microwaves than houses.

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As we got closer to Loitokitok, on the “dirt” roads (and I am putting it in quotes because the roads are closer to 4 inch deep trails of dust that they call dirt), and I don't understand why they refer to this as the rainy season. It never rains. Coming into town it was very exciting to see Mt. Kilimonjaro, there are two peaks to it, but we could only see the smaller of the two because of cloud cover. So, the closer we get to town the worse the road gets. The communities look the same, but with flat wood scraps as their walls. The dukas (shops) are painted with bright colors, but covered in dust and there is trash all over the place. All the kids would come running toward our bus waving frantically while the adults would just stare as we passed through. Seriously, their glares made me feel so uncomfortable that I questioned them ever wanting us here.

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And the staring never really stops, but I have gotten used to it. Here is a picture of me walking down one of side streets in Loitokitok towards the supermarket.... which is a fantastic place. One time I only had 100 KES on me and I really wanted peanut butter and crackers, so I took my peanut butter and crackers up to the front to check out and i was short 15 KES... so the owner said, "it's ok, just bring it to me tomorrow." So I left and decided that I would rather have a Chapati... so I took the unopened crackers back hoping that they would erase my debt... AND THEY DID!! Karibu Kenya!!