Friday, March 18th, 2005- Mombasa, Kenya

My friend from my Modern China class, Aimee, had invited me to go with her to go with a girl she knew who met a guy who offered to bring her around the city (very complicated). I invited two more people and when we all met in Purser’s Square everyone was just kind of invited in a chain and eventually the whole thing fell through because when we got to Moi Ave. the guy was not around. I ended up splitting up with the whole group and went with Linda, Amberly, and Joseph (the Field Office Assistant Coordinator). We walked 20 minutes in the hot sun to Likoni, which had stalls set up selling African linens and other stuff for the home that looked like second hand stuff that they had bargained from with tourists. There was also this open area that had a guy with a microphone next to an old Mercedes with a speaker on top of it. Originally we thought he was doing magic but we found out that he was actually a healer.

Afterwards, we ended up going to the supermarket that was right in the area and was very similar to Wal-Mart. After that we headed back to the ship.

In the afternoon I headed to the Bombolulu Handicraft Center which is a center that employs only handicapped workers to make their goods. The handicapped workers live on the premises with their families and their children go to nursery school on the premises so everything is pretty accessible to them.

Our guide Ali first took us to see the exhibits on the different houses of the African tribes. He then took us to go see some of the workshops where the workers were working. One of the shops that we stopped at was for making wheel chairs that had a hand crank to propel it. Since people can’t afford them they are donated by visitors or corporations, who pay $150 for each, and then given to the person in need. Other items that were being produced were jewelry and ornaments made from soda cans. Most of the products are exported (the ones to the United States are sold at a chain store called 1000 Villages), sometimes 50,000 pieces at a time.

It was quite an interesting experience in stopping at the center and it gave me the opportunity to see how some people with physical disabilities were treated in Kenya.

Some Random Interesting Facts:

- While in a taxi Amanda heard on the radio that Al Qaeda had threatened an American ship on the coast of Kenya. They didn’t name the city of Mombasa but named other cities on the coast of Kenya. After we heard about this there was noticeable security increase on the ship. Due to the fact that most of the people from the ship were gone on safari they don’t know about it because I think the people that know are trying to keep it on the DL (down low) until we leave Kenya.