Durban, South Africa - Day two

A friend of mine had suggested that we had to check out Ushaka Marine World, which is in Durban. My Kenyan friend had been there before, and was of the opinion that we should also pay it a visit. Ushaka was a ten minute walk from our hotel.
Okay, call it 'boy meets world', but I will not be embarrassed. We got to Ushaka, and the entry charges were 150Rands per adult. We got in, and started by walking into a "ship wreck" themed ship, which had been renovated to enhance an underwater aquarium sort of theme. Saw all kinds of fish, from the smallest, to the largest, the prettiest to the ugliest, with only a very thick glass wall between the sea creatures and us. Ushaka also has what they called "dolphin feeding shows", though I think the show was purely for entertainment of the revellers, while the dolphins were given "snacks", to make them entertain guests even more.

After Ushaka, we had to pay a visit to a newly-built shopping mall in Durban, the Gateway Shopping Mall. Gateway was so large I recall we informed our cab driver to come for us after about 2 hours, but 4 hours later, we had not even finished one section of the mall (it had five blocks, all very expansive in size and variety, and it did effortlessly make Nairobi's premier shopping mall, Westgate, seem so out of place, in all fronts).
We got back to our hotel room, worn out and impressed, as we waited to experience another side of Durban tomorrow, Christmas day, as we are supposed to travel to a different place.

Durban, South Africa - Day one

Durban, South Africa, is a beautiful beach town. We travelled into South Africa literally the whole day yesterday.

We left Nairobi's JKIA at 3.30am, yes, a very early Thursday morning. Reason being we had booked Ethiopian Airlines, and it has direct flights into South Africa, but from Addis Ababa. The 3.30am flight was to Addis Ababa, two hours away, from where the 5hour non stop flight to Johannesburg, departed at 8.30am.

I have to say that it was the longest flight I've ever been in. We arrived in Johannesburg at 2.20pm (1.20pm South African time). We had to wait for our last flight for the day which was departing at South African time, 3.30pm, for the southern coastal town of Durban.

Durban is a beautiful town, lovely roads, clean environment, not anything close to Nairobi, in all honesty. The airport, King Shaka international airport is 34km from Durban CBD, and that gave us ample time to sample the outskirts of Durban.

Come Friday morning, we had to "hit the streets", literally. Site seeing was pretty much the order of the day. We first went to the Durban Holocaust Centre, from where I really learnt about the true reason as to why Adolf Hitler turned the Nazi against the Jews. It was pretty sad, reading about it, seeing the photos and videos too. Almost two million Jews were massacred in Europe during Hitler's tenure as Germany's Chancellor.

After that, we took a stroll into town, with our main intention was to see the Durban National Science Museum. Unluckily for us, we did manage to locate the museum, but they had already closed for the day.

So that gave us an opportunity to go site seeing in the city. Something which stood out was the fact that as much as South Africa overcame the apartheid 'error', (even the cab driver who picked us from the airport was white), we never at any one time came across a mixed couple. The more reason everywhere we went, my girlfriend and I were getting some sort of weird looks. Again, no one could easily tell that we were foreigners for the simple reason that South Arica has both whites and blacks as natives. The only thing that has been giving us away clearly is our distinct accent :)

Beneath the smiles

A smile can hide a lot of things: secrets, lies, deceit, hardships, failures, disappointments, and a lot more than I can list here.
I am one person I believe people have taken advantage of, in all fronts. I cannot pretend to be the saint here for I also think, know, I have done the same too. But that is a story for another day.
I have been accused of many things, but nothing ever came close to when my life was almost being threatened by a jilted man who had wrongly confused me, thinking I was after his wife. I did not even know the alleged wife's name! Again, that might be a story for another day too :-).
At times I do smile, not that I might be particularly at that time, rather I think it's a way of politely wanting the issue being discussed from exploding to unmanageable levels.
So what do you need to do when things might not be going your way, smile some more. It's therapeutic to do so as compared to having a grumpy face :-)

While I was away

Alot has happened since I last updated my blog. Can I really remember everything sequentially. I will  try.

Libya's Gaddafi was finally captured, but unfortunately killed in a barbaric way. He will never be brought to justice for the ills he did against his own people. I agree that he did alot of positive for Libya, but unfortunately the bad he did seem to have over-shadowed his gains. You can read the facts and figures about Libya under Gaddafi here.

Kenya and Al Shabaab. Kenya finally decided to go into Somalia to chase after Al Shabaab militants, whom Kenya accuses of having been behind a spate of kidnappings and attacks on Kenyan soil, a charge Al Shabaab has vehemently denied. Soldiers were poured into Somalia, and Al Shabaab warned Kenya to pull them out or it will launch a spate of attacks on the Kenyan soil. Kenya prodded on. A few days later, a grenade was lobbed into a drinking joint in town, luckily no fatalities, but wounding 12 revellers. Barely 24hours later, another grenade is tossed at a crowded bus stop in downtown Nairobi. This time round, it killed one person and wounded over 24. Luckily, the guy who was to blame for the twin attacks was caught by the police, and his case wound up in less than 4 days. He was sentenced to life in prison. It was after the young man's capture that it was established there are Al Shabaab sympathizers in Kenya itself!

I will update more on my personal stories later on.

My 'white' girlfriend, unmasked

Yes, you read the blog title well enough. My white girlfriend unmasked. There are tonnes and tonnes of things to write about, I'm actually even confused on where to start.
Here goes.
Previously, I wrote something almost in the same regard to my title subject.
Anyway, here goes:
My white girlfriend just happens to be American. Light skin, hair so light it gets blown by the wind (and easy to run your fingers through), funny accent where by they pronounce their "t's" as if they are "r's", very fast speakers, what have you. But beyond that, they are just like any other person, black person, red blood, have a heart, brains just like us, and are sweet too. What did you think I was going to write about, given my blog title, nah, it was only to draw attention and get to see how many people would actually think that I was going to describe them in other ways than I have used on my blog.

Changes

Sometime last week, I was informed at my workplace that I will be heading to a different sub-department. Not temporarily as had been the tradition, rather, permanently. I have to say and admit that I don’t really take changes as positively. For the new section where I was bound for, did something totally different to what I had been accustomed to. But, anyways, given that there was nothing we could do about the move (I wasn’t the only one who had been affected by the move), we just had to do the ‘big shift’.

So far, the new modus operandi is not that tough, at least, according to my new colleagues. I am adapting well, at least that’s what I think, so far, though as much am yet to learn new aspects of the section itself, so you all better wish me luck J.

Zanzibari memoirs

Last week Monday I went to the zanzibar archipelago, courtesy of two important people. Zanzibar is a beautiful island. With a populace of about one million people, the economy is largely driven by the tourism industry. Such a waste of a beautiful isle, I’d say.

Zanzibar depends on mainland Tanzania for all of its supplies. Okay, depends on about 90% of supplies from the mainland. Be it rice, maize flour, oil, gas, you name it. The only thing Zanzibar depends on itself is sea food!

Coming from a country where we have amongst the best laws in the world, albeit on paper, I found the law and order in Zanzibar outstanding. Everyone is orderly, the streets are sparkling clean. The people are also very friendly and accomodating, ever too willing to help those in need. Even the beggars are polite and understanding enough if you let them know that you don’t have anything to give them at that particular time. Not like the ones in kenya, they who hardly take no for an answer, and would go to the extent of literally begging for your last penny, or asking that you have given them too little!

We toured many places, Butterfly breeding center, Jozani Forest, Changuu (Prison) Island, their famed Spice Farm, and another island I cant quite recall its name, but it was the best area for snorkelling. Prison island is very magnificent, crystal clear water, clean beaches. Everything about it was basically worth writing home about. I would recommend a visit to Zanzibar any time.

Zanzibar

Zanzibar is a semi autonomous region of Tanzania. it is an archipelago of about 20 islands, with the main one being Unguja (Zanzibar). It comprises of about 20 small islands, with Unguja (Zanzibar) being the largest, and the main one.
We flew in on Monday morning. Our flight was to depart from JKIA at 9.30am, and given that by all means it was an international flight, we had to be in the airport two hours prior to departure. Our means of travel, Fly540.
Zanzibar has a very unique park, called the Forodhani Gardens. It is a part, right in front of the National Museum, by the beach. Every evening Forodhani comes alive, with all kinds of meals by the local people, being on offer by all who may want to sample the native meals. It is basically a food market, of all kinds of meals, by literally everyone in Zanzibar and they are all easily affordable, what with all the competition for customers. Another thing that really stands out is the cleanliness and how secure the island is. The food market is open from about 5pm every day upto midnight. I have not heard of any mugging, robbery whatsoever. Probably might be due to the dominant religion being Islam, which doesn't really tolerate such behaviours.
More blog posts coming up soon. I have to admit that I am feeling kind of funny though. At times I am accessible by phone, other times it's like I have been tossed to the end of the world, with no communication gadget at all. My hotel has wireless internet, unfortunately browsing from my phone is pretty taxing :)

Changing times

This past weekend, on Saturday to be precise, I went over to an uncle of mine. He recently became the 'proud owner' of a HP Compaq laptop. It was gifted to him by an in-law of his, who sent it from a land, very far away. It is his first computer, and clearly, he is over the moon about it. The only 'basic' software in his laptop is Windows 7, and Skype.
I got to his house Saturday afternoon, and he started going on and on how it was possible to call someone and you were able to see them, thanks to Skype of course. I looked at his machine and told him it did not have Microsoft Office installed. He kept on asking me what I meant by that, and I had to start and explain to him what it was all about. He then asked if it was important and I concurred. When I was just ready to start installing it, he led my hand to the touch pad of the laptop, telling me that almost everything was controlled from the 'mighty touch pad'. I had to burst his bubble, and tell him that I have been working with/on laptops for as long as I can remember!
I don't mean to sound mean or anything, but clearly the technological error did leave him very far away. I adviced him that he ought to buy an internet modem, so as to do his research. One goes for 2,000 shillings. He made a very cunning statement. Why couldn't I sponsor him half, for the modem. I think I was blunt in my answer. He got a laptop worth about 70,000shillings, and to buy something that costs only 2,000shillings, he didn't even want to pay for!

Changing Lives, all in a day's work

My line of study is Information and Technology. My place of work deals solely in resettling refugees to the U.S. I am happy with where I'm working, mainly for the sole reason that I am part of a team that helps refugees emigrate from their home countries where they are persecuted for various reasons.

Today, I went to speak with a certain refugee who had come to our offices. A young lady of 21 years. On my way to the refugee gate, a young man, almost my age, was smiling at me. I went over and said hi. He started by thanking me for helping him. The young man, from Ethiopia, had been continously coming to our offices, for help. The second time he had come to our offices, he insisted on speaking only with me, and no one else. While speaking with me, he was always relaxed. I tend to think it's because of the age factor, I don't know, but whenever he was speaking with any other person, the guards used to tell me how edgy and rash he used to be. I can't say that I did anything outside my line of work to help him, no. I only helped in ensuring that his application was up to date, and that my organization kept in constant touch with him. But to him, he thinks that I initiated the process of him being resettled. It's only part of my work.

After the new niceties with the young man, I went to take down details of the young lady who had come to inquire about her application. Same script, different cast, all in a day's work. :). It's all about helping refugees start a new life and giving them renewed hope in life.