Karibuni! (Welcome everyone!)

Welcome to Nairobi, Kenya!

Upon exiting the airport we were greeted by Pastor and Mama Karau. They greeted us with hugs and I felt like I had been waiting a long time to see them in their part of the world. It was a surreal moment; it almost felt natural - as if I were home. We then greeted our drivers for the duration of our stay in Kenya. Alex, Paul, and David were incredible and we grew to love them very much. Alex was the crew chief and all three were strong believers active in their churches. Alex explained that his heart was to drive mission teams so they could do the work God called them to.


Alex, the driver of the van that I rode in all week. Sometimes we could get him giggling; he was a lot of fun!


(L-R) David, the driver of the van when we were making longer trips, Rob, and Alex. David was the driver of the van I rode in to go to and from the airport and on our game drive in the Rift Valley.



Paul, the driver of the car we used during the week. Nick, Penny, and Kevin (seen sitting next to Paul) rode in the car as we traveled in and around Mathare Valley and Nairobi.


This is the van I traveled in while in Kenya. Alex let Nick take it for a spin around our Guest House parking area! You should have seen all of our luggage crammed into the vans!

We entered onto Nairobi streets right at about rush hour. It was very busy. People were walking, riding matatu's (public transportation - vans similar or exactly like ours), or riding bikes. There were people everywhere. It was a little overwhelming to see so many people moving in so many directions. As we drove through the literal stop and go traffic on roads that at first I didn't think were actual roads because of the bumps and holes in them, we were told that we were in a middle class area of Nairobi. I was stunned. It looked like our American lower class to poverty level housing, etc.

My first real impression as we started out from the airport was "organized chaos." Cars, bikes, people everywhere and it looked like chaos - to me it even felt like chaos - but when you really looked everyone was "organized" in the sense that people knew what they were doing and where they were going. The matatu's are full all of the time. There are tons of people walking and they are brave! They will just barely look and then step out to cross the street. The drivers are bold, yet very calm. Kenny noted that there was no road rage evident. I saw only two instances of "Kenyan road rage" the entire trip and those were extremely mild instances, almost unnoticeable.

This is actually pretty light traffic! See the bike rider on the right hand side getting ready to enter into the flow?

Traffic at one of the many round-abouts. These were called "jams." And that is exactly what it felt like some days, a big jam!


The "storefronts" are signs announcing the businesses. It was hard for me to remember that we were traveling through a middle class part of the city. Some of the stores reminded me of New York City - stores at the bottom level and then flats above. But what I saw more than buildings to house stores were tin sheds or lumber nailed together, sometimes with a roof, sometimes not. And then I also spotted a few stores that had no structure announcing them, the good were just laid out on the ground. Everything was rusted, broken down, falling apart. There were ripped tarps covering some stores. What really struck me was the condition of the actual structure in comparison to what was being sold. All manner of goods from nice furniture to clothing to food to toys to even what appeared to be insurance of some sort.



This is an outdoor nursery. We saw a lot of these, usually selling plants.


An auto repair shop set up off the side of the road.



While I never saw a sign announcing that this was a place to get hair done I think that is exactly what it was! There was a woman out there everyday getting her hair done. This is located right next door to church.


A roadside stand



Several stores lined up. You can see clothing being sold at the far left, in the middle store is fruit, and then the far right is another clothing store.



I wanted to show the contrast of 10 or less miles. This is a billboard in the actual city of Nairobi advertising Nakumatt. This store is what I like to think of as the Kenyan version of Wal-Mart. It is not owned by Wal-Mart but it is very similar in what it sells and prices. People in the Mathare Valley who have been born there and most likely will die there may or may not realize that a store like this exists less than 10 miles from where they will spend their lives.



More advertising billboards in the actual city of Nairobi.

The people walking were dressed nicely and there were a lot of kids walking, all with a variety of different school uniforms. Melissa made a great observation later. She said it was kind of like a sensory overload. There was so much going on and so many different things to take in. In addition to all that our eyes were trying to get our brains to register, we also smelled the diesel and the trash burning and this earthy smell that I have come to associate with Kenya. It was a lot to take in. Fortunately the traffic was so heavy that we had plenty of time!



A visual of the diesel we breathed in every time we traveled.


I noticed that people were very busy working and they worked hard. I kept looking at them and the thought ran through my head over and over, "There is no room for laziness here." If they weren't working at their businesses, they were walking home to make dinner from scratch, do laundry (which is an almost everyday necessity), or a number of other things that life dictated needed to be accomplished. These people were living out their lives. They were just doing it - life.



Hard at work. I wonder, how many times a day does he haul things back and forth?



Another man also hard at work. Manual labor is all they know for anything that needs to be done.

The people seem very stoic here. Isam explained to us that within their own circles they aren't. Kenyans, in fact, are extremely warm and gracious people. Everyone here makes eye contact; it is a sign of value.

The people walking intrigue me. Where are they walking to? Even when it looks like we are in a "rural" area there are people walking everywhere. I guess they are walking to work or to catch a matatu or bus but when you look around you don't see any place they could be walking to. They walk on the side of the roads, in the roads, basically wherever. There aren't sidewalks, just dirt, mud, or trash. The only pavement I have seen is that of the road and there is little of that left in some places.



Trash heaps are everywhere in the outlying suburbs of Nairobi and they increase in size the lower the income level and the closer you get to the slum. People just walk on top of them , through them, or around them.



Walking is normal for them, this part of the culture reminded me a lot of New York City. Public Transportation and walking are the ways people get to where they need to be.

The driving is something else. There are no markings on the roads and I have seen very few signs. Traffic lights are rare, we usually only saw them in the actual city of Nairobi. There seems to be a system to driving and they use their horns a lot to "talk" to or at each other. Short beeps, long beeps, or arms hanging out the windows to bang on the side of the vehicle. The matatu's get so close to each other we could literally reach out of our van and into the window of another had we wanted to. The drivers sometimes talk to one another out of their windows. We were very thankful for Alex, Paul, and David.


More traffic. In this picture you can see a brightly decorated bus. The transportation there was very entertaining. The majority are decorated to make statements. I saw one matatu with very detailed drawings of P.Diddy and Ice T on it! A lot of them had praises to Jesus painted on!




This traffic is closer to the city of Nairobi. It was always very crowded.

I just have to say it. Kenya smells. I mean it literally smells. It isn't the people necessarily, it's the air. I don't know what it is. Is it the soil? Is it the vegetation growing? I don't know but Kenya has a smell. But I am pretty sure they would think America stinks too. The diesel fumes, different body smells, and trash burning all add to this smell that is already there. And I noticed that a lot of what we ate had a similar taste to whatever this smell is. It is kind of like a stale greens flavor. It is strange and what's even more strange is it didn't really bother me and it grew on me and by the time I left Kenya I knew that I was going to be missing that smell! And I do!

After traveling about an hour (I think, truly I had lost all track of time by now...in fact I still haven't worn a watch since returning home) we arrived at our Guest House. Little Sisters located in Kasarani, Kenya (an outlying suburb of Nairobi). Going from the organized chaos we had just driven through to driving through the gate into the compound was like walking through the wardrobe door into a whole different world. It was beautiful; it was yet another facet of God's grace in this amazing country.

Little Sisters - Kasarani, Kenya