Chasing Hemingway's Ghost

We are giggling uncontrollably at the mountains of freshly made deserts only feet from our table. An assortment of ice cream flavors is wonderfully garnished with cookies, bonbons and fresh fruit. Behind us a chef prepares stir-fry wearing a tall white hat. He tosses cubed steak into a wok that flames a brilliant blue with the emulsion of flavored oils. At some point a waiter arrives with our drinks—two sweating glasses of perfection with ice cubes that we haven’t even dreamed about having these past nine months. It’s all I can do to stop from erupting into fits of awkward laughter.

Having taken a few days to indulge in a safari we feel as though we have stumbled onto the other side of the planet. Our experience of rural Kenya has been of people raising goats and wearing sandals cut out of old tires. Our rural Maasai home is a world apart from metropolitan Nairobi and the well-trodden track that spirits tourists past in Land Rovers. The Maasai of our world are a culture of people strewn across the Kenyan-Tanzanian border; former nomads that have reluctantly adapted to modern life in a rapidly changing nation. This world and that of tourism only intersect through the window of passing vehicles and at dusty roadside curio shops. Sadly these interactions are so manufactured that they rob tourists of the chance to know these people. The Maasai are genuine, kind, uproariously funny, mischievous and willing to give you their proverbial shirt.

Even with the advance of modernity the Maasai have maintained traditions that make me feel transported to a lost time. Their singing is hauntingly beautiful. They live in homes made of dung and mud and they still wrap themselves in traditional cloth. Standing amongst dancing mamas bedecked with beaded necklaces, cleanly shaven heads and brightly shining faces I am inspired. Their strength and cohesion is amazing, and yet, it is mitigated by a humility and childlike happiness. These people eek out an existence in defiance of their incredibly bleak surroundings, and their unflagging optimism may be a major ingredient to their tragically iconic status as Kenya’s most famous, if not marginalized, tribe.

At times it feels as though we are in a zoo. Tourists pass and take photos of us as we hike out of the bush. Clearly there are two realities that run parallel here. There is the tourist world and the world that millions of rural people inhabit. More to the point, there is Kenya, and then there are places in Kenya that tourists go. As a country, Kenya is a complicated place where business minded Kikuyu, Asian traders, Swahili people and rural Maasai must all be governed equitably, and with deference to their particular climatic, religious and cultural needs.

Kenya is a dizzying array of cultures that few people can grasp through a window and a sad testament to how people oft times take a back seat to big game and hunting lodges. But this is not a new phenomenon. This is the legacy of decades, left behind from colonial rule and the haphazard visitation of the rich and famous. There exists an entire sub-genre of literature dedicated to the imprint Kenya has had on its high-profile visitors. The list includes ex-presidents and movie stars, and even Hemingway in the twilight of his life.

Hemingway loved the sunrise and the way that a hot bath soothed his feet after a long day tracking. He described it all in vivid detail, and thankfully, very little of it has changed. The Giraffe still amble into stands of acacia to feed amongst wildebeest and dikdik. Massive families of Elephant still make their way majestically to the cold waters of Kilimanjaro’s glacial runoff. And decades later camera wielding tourists can still enjoy Observation hill with its dramatic view of the Pleistocene hills.

Hemingway also loved to drink, and this led us on one particular evening to find a small bar bearing his name in Loitokitok. I have no idea if he ever graced the structure with his presence but his pictures are everywhere smiling next to the carcass of some formerly living and beautiful animal. The room has a decidedly friendly atmosphere and huge bay windows at the back. A set of spotlights are focused on a feeding station for nocturnal animals where they place leftovers from the evening’s meal. Jennie and I were the only ones there, and so we ordered a drink and chose the two best leather chairs next to the window.

Our site is arid, but has the capacity to support agriculture. And so, in an attempt to understand why so few people plant crops, we decided to start a garden and suffer through the drought stricken season alongside our neighbors. We started a large compost pile which attracted hyenas to feed in the evening. They make an ominous whooping sound that rolls across the plains and shudders up your spine. I grew up watching nature programs where hyenas stole from lions and snapped the necks of small prey with their powerful jaws. They are ugly and resourceful buggers with a creepy laugh and an appetite for meat. I sat up many nights worried that they would find a way into the house as we slept, maybe taking a limb or two before leaving us in terror. Thankfully that never materialized and as we sat staring out the windows on the feeding scene below we learned why.

Several large hyenas had gathered on the periphery of the spotlights reach. In the middle was a large boulder covered with table scraps upon which several house cats sat feeding. In a most pitiful display the hyenas, far from being vicious and predatory, were skulking in the shadows watching ten pound house cats devour chunks of chicken and steak. Any movement towards the food brought a stern rebuke from the claws of these otherwise domesticated fur balls.

We watched the drama unfold, sipping wine from the comfort of plush leather chairs as a group of German tourists wandered in ushered by a guide dressed in Maasai cloth. After they were settled the guide went behind the bar to prepare drinks. I wandered over, in search of more wine, and greeted him with a traditional Maasai saying. He coolly dismissed this in exceptionally clear English by telling me that he was Akamba. Now, I know that people in theme parks are actors, and that the medieval manor is not, in fact, filled with Elizabethan Englishmen, but I was somehow taken with the idea that this man was Maasai. And in thinking about the situation I began to realize how manufactured the whole tourist experience really was. We could have been in Arizona or New Jersey because the bar, named after an American writer, featuring Italian leather seats, British lagers, and New Zealand wines, was a showcase for domesticated animals and their nocturnal hand-feeding habits.

Hemingway’s baths were heated and drawn for him by servants. Men carried his gun, cooked his food, erected his living quarters, and even washed his clothes, completely separating him from the reality of rural Kenyan life. The man saw a beautiful country, but he totally missed out on the actual life of some amazing people—an eerily similar viewpoint from which modern day tourists view things more than 60 years on. I’m not advocating that safaris be turned into poverty tourism where tourists are routed through shanty towns to learn about how poor people live; that would be ridiculous and potentially immoral.

What I am saying, is that there is so much more to see given a little imagination and patience. Go and experience a safari, but, while you’re at it, take a few days and live amongst the people. Ride public transportation, stay in a cheap hotel, buy food from the roadside, take chai at a strangers home (they will invite you) and haggle for clothing at an open air market—you won’t regret it. It will bring you closer to the people in a way that organized tourism cannot accomplish. A good safari can redefine your view of a great vacation, but, I believe, a good trip through Kenya as it really is, will redefine your view of the world. That may be both the most cliché and most incredibly true thing I have written in my short time on this planet.

Hemingway can keep his guns and his trophies, and all of his widely acclaimed novels too. For all his perceptiveness, he didn’t see Kenya. He saw the animals and the trees instead. He lamented leaving the eerily fast equatorial sunsets and the snow capped peak of Kilimanjaro. But he missed the strength and the beauty of the regions people. He missed their wisdom and their greatest attributes—humility and optimism in the face of crushing poverty and marginalization. I feel like I’m chasing his ghost everywhere I go, and I want to tell him to look again.

Returning

Nobody was looking as we got off the plane. Nobody stared as I knelt to tie my shoelaces in the hallway. And nobody cared to notice as I hefted our bags from the carousel. In Orinie every move we made was watched and analyzed. Every item bought was a communication; every person talked to was some sort of political maneuver. Jennie and I were celebrities in our village. People liked to recount what they had observed us do and then ask a litany of questions regarding purpose and outcome. When you enter the Peace Corps they tell you about being in a fishbowl, a feeling that was decidedly absent now that we were back stateside. I'm not complaining, its just novel not to be gawked at.

Stan and Carol met us at Standiford Field with sympathy in their eyes. Sitting amongst a pile of luggage, we were still caked with dirt from our harried departure. I played football on Friday. The evening sky was clear and the snows of Kilimanjaro were visible in the distance. Saturday we got the word and started packing our things. Sunday we said our goodbyes and spent all day getting to Nairobi (at that point we believed our flight was Wednesday evening). Monday we got to the Peace Corps offices and were told we would fly out that night. And so after more than a full days worth of probing from the medical team, and endless paperwork from the admin staff, we piled into a cab, slogged back to the hotel, gathered our things, and were whisked off to the airport past the few remaining jacaranda and matatus we would see for quite some time.

Peace Corps sent us home with a $16 per diem, meant to last a full 24 hours of international travel, in response to which a fellow volunteer wryly opined, “It’s a nice round number.” While in service we got a small stipend for food and the necessities of daily life. This was paid through a bank account Peace Corps arranged. As part of the leaving process we were required to close these accounts. And so prior to getting our sixteen bucks, we were driven to the bank and asked to pay a 500 shilling per person account closure fee. I made a theatrical display of ripping the checkbooks from their jackets and retorted that I was keeping them for my trouble. I was tired and hungry, and really impressed with the clerk’s ability to ignore my flourish despite the cackling line of customers I had won over.

The medical staff was in rare form as we processed out. The nurses gabbed about the election troubles and other countries they had evacuated. They named off a shocking list of countries and sighed heavily over Kenya’s current state. One of the ladies actually got a text message the day before Kibaki’s swearing in. Her friend watched them pre-tape the ceremony and felt betrayed enough to send messages about it to colleagues. Maybe it’s a lesson for aspiring dictators. You can clamp down on the media, and bribe officials, but in this modern age, you can’t silence a country full of cell phone owners.

Our flight was re-routed south to Dar es Salaam before heading back north to Amsterdam. Still clutching my $16 dollars, I decided to invest in a Heineken and one stylish eye patch for sleeping. At this point airline peanuts and beer was a luxury I was happy to indulge, and really guilty for having the chance to do so.

By all accounts, our leaving was justified, but that doesn’t make sleeping with that decision any easier. Leaving a troubled country feels like kicking someone when they’re down. The peanuts and beer did nothing to quiet my conscience, and so I tried talking to passengers around me. Unfortunately I met eyes with a missionary who had been in country for a week. I told him that several of our friends were in western Kenya when the rioting started and had to be evacuated by helicopter. To this he replied that he had been through western and thought it was “no big deal.” I could have puked on him, and may have if the embarrassment of being accidentally associated with him hadn’t made me turn away first. I descended into the logic of a 3 year old and decided that my eye patch made me invisible.

We landed and went through customs in Minneapolis. The officer who looked over our passports asked why we had been in country. “Peace Corps” we replied in the stereo speak that couples acquire after 20 years of marriage, and/or a year of isolated Peace Corps service. He handed back our passports and said “was it everything you dreamed of?” Jennie nearly lost her hand while trying to pet a customs dog, and then broke out into a violent nosebleed which stopped only moments before leaving the tarmac for Louisville. By the time we found Stan and Carol, we must have looked pretty ragged.

We have returned home abruptly. Things in Kenya have not been good, and we have come home under a status of interrupted service, which means we can go back if the situation permits. Regardless, I hope that you will stick with us. I have a fair amount of material squirreled away in notebooks that I will post given the time and electricity.

As always, thanks for reading.

Some days in December

For the holidays and election time, we were invited to stay in Karen at a friend’s home while he and his wife were away. Among other things there is a Rothschild giraffe rescue, an orphaned elephant reserve, and an abundance of colonial era relics that add to Kenya’s interesting, if not unique, brand of African culture. Most importantly, we were eager to soak up all the electricity and hot showers we could in a week’s time.

Quite a world apart from our site, Karen could be a small British village. Besides the enormous, vaguely Mediterranean mansions, the roads are small and walled by thick hedge. I am taken back to my childhood. My mother, still a green-card holding British citizen, brought me to the family farm in Ockbrook every summer as a child. We would whiz through hedge-lined corridors in some rented bomber, or pass thousands of small homesteads nestled in greenery dotting the English countryside on the train into Derbyshire. Taking a cab home from the veritable American atmosphere of Nakumatt (a Walmartesque superstore) I am struck by how reminiscent the journey is of the British Midlands. I could be seven again, humming along to pop music, buckled into the wrong side of the car, and gazing at the monotony of the impenetrable hedgerows.

Thursday, December 27th, 2007 – Election Day

Outside observers have rubber stamped the election proceedings as overwhelmingly free and fair. In the space of 24 hours 70% of the Kenyan electorate has showed up to perform their civic duty. This is almost double the amount that American presidential aspirants can expect, and a monumental achievement for such a fledgling democracy. Consider that Mwai Kibaki is only the third president in Kenyan history. He was born and educated before independence. And he was one of the drafters of Kenya’s first constitution.

Friday, December 28th - Our two year anniversary

We start our day with a long run through the neighborhoods of Karen. A thick foggy blanket sits over the hills making it feel insulated and quiet. We notice with building curiosity that the roads are empty. It’s our second anniversary, so we decide to enjoy an evening in the city.

Overwhelmingly we are struck by the complete lack of activity given that it’s a Friday afternoon. We skirt the Kibera slum on Langata road—the streets are empty of vehicles, and the sidewalks are devoid of pedestrians. Everybody seems to have gotten the memo except for us. There are no men on bicycles or mamas with shopping bags balanced on their heads, and there is a decided absence of noisy youth.

Upon reaching Uhuru highway we turn left without stopping. The normally congested route is lacking in human presence. On workdays Uhuru Park, Nairobi’s central meeting place, fills with people enjoying sunlit benches or napping under towering Eucalyptus. But today, an eerie silence prevails. No hawkers or people in suits; no soda carts or maintenance staff; just empty space and political leaflets. We make the turn towards city center on Haile Selassie, and finally a few people are visible. There is no traffic at all, and it makes the four lane barricaded route seem like a marathon in which we have finished dead last. The lack of people, in a normally crowded city is ominous.

We wander into a supermarket where the workers anxiously crowd around a television monitor blaring results of the parliamentary seats, but still no presidential outcome. The bakery staff is setting up for the next day and heatedly exchanging ideas. Their Swahili is mixed with Kikuyu, a slang referred to as Cheng. I can only catch parts of the conversation, but it seems that several prominent MPs have been ousted. “A future without corrupt officials is still an uncertain future” says one man, waving a gloved finger at his bread making coworkers. “Now, will you take your bread sliced bwana?”

After dinner and a movie we arrange for a cab and head home. In the pitch of a Nairobi evening we pass onto a section of the Gichuru road lined by Jacaranda. The trees make an impenetrable tunnel, blotting out the stars in an eerie, sleepy-hollow sort of way. Posters cover the lower trunks. The orange and white of the Orange Democratic Movement (Odinga’s opposition party) are most numerous, with some blue Party of National Unity (Kibaki’s chosen party) posters intermixed. The polls have long since closed, but there are still no results.

I discuss with the driver, a young Kikuyu, how the president is fairing. What does he think the future holds given that the incumbent, also a Kikuyu, may lose? Current polls put him almost a million votes back from Odinga, a Luo and former political prisoner of the Moi era.

He thinks that legacy has a lot to do with the current situation. Kibaki has been in government since independence, and shares close political ties with the previous administration of President Daniel arap Moi. Power is shared by a select few, its borderline aristocracy, and according to our cabby, it has welled up in the non-Kikuyu consciousness as something to oppose. The driver worries that it will again marginalize the Kikuyu, the historical implications of which are not lost on him. And he makes an interesting connection as well.

Wealth, in his estimation, curbs civic action. “Your people probably don’t vote because they are rich” he says as we round Nakumatt junction, a bastion of Asian and Kikuyu owned consumerism. “My people have gained wealth and power through politics, something they stand to lose if they don’t get out and vote. All these businesses are here because of political connections, other tribes see this and feel resentful—they have reasons to vote.” He is young, and doesn’t feel that he votes along tribal lines, but he quickly follows by outlining why voting based on tribe is essential.

Saturday, December 29th

The country is still waiting for results in the presidential election, but the Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK) says it needs more time. Things are degenerating here quickly. To the south of us in Ngong, people are raising homes and killing each other with pangas. To the northeast of us in the Kibera slum, armed groups are engaged in small-scale warfare—poor Kenyan against poor Kenyan. The electoral commission has delayed issuing the results to the detriment of stability. The opposition party ODM is saying that the substantial lead they had is disappearing under the cloak of corruption as the incumbent PNU candidate catches up and, according to some sources, overtakes him.

Sunday, December 30th,

I walk into the small town center and chat with some of the merchants. And after procuring bread, tomatoes and Safaricom I head back home. Upon arriving, we decide to order pizza. I call to order and a distraught voice comes over the other end. The accent is clearly Indian, and he is sending his staff home “right now” as there is prone to be violence. “Did you hear? They have announced Kibaki the winner. I can’t believe it! Wherever you are” he says breathlessly, “stay there and don’t go outside, it’s going to be a very bad night.” He hangs up leaving me staring at the phone.

Renewed chaos has broken out in many parts of the country as the incumbent is announced to have won a second term. This is a monumental comeback considering two days ago he was almost a million votes down to the opposition candidate. Within an hour of the announcement Kibaki suspends nearly all media coverage of the elections, and swears-in for a second term. A stunned silence seems to follow Kibaki’s hasty swearing in ceremony, and the normally scheduled news hour gives way to cartoon re-runs.

Monday, December 31st – New Years Eve

Our food supplies running short, we decided to venture a little further than the kiosks in the center, but there was no transport. Rioters have been turning Kikuyu owned matatus into rolling Bunsen burners, leaving the transportation sector fearful and walking. In light of this, we called a cab and asked him to drive fast.

We arrived at Nakumatt just as they were closing the big metal doors. Apparently they were keeping them closed while groups of customers shopped, opening for successive groups every half hour. I have never personally attended one of those midnight super sales, but the bonanza type atmosphere upon the next door opening was quite ridiculous. We watched as rich Kenyans, expatriates and tourists trampled children, cut lines and swore at the more modest native Kenyans. Maybe wealth wears the same face the world over—the best dressed and the worst behaved. Or maybe we are still reeling from how different this world is to our site. Arriving at an ultra-modern supermarket after months of living in the bush was particularly jarring, and the brusque self-importance of the shoppers only insulted our senses further.

On getting inside we noticed that people were taking this civil unrest really seriously. The normally overstocked abundance of Nakumatt had been reduced to a ragged collection of damaged items strewn about on empty shelves and dirty floors. There were shopping carts everywhere filled with rotting produce, meat, and dairy products abandoned by impatient customers. The few remaining eggs were broken, the produce section was barren, and there had been a run on water and toilet paper. The apocalyptic state of one of East Africa’s best stores begged the question, what is it like in other parts of the country?

On the ride home, our cab driver acted oblivious as to why people were unhappy with the election results. I told him that as a neutral observer I only wanted the country to find a way through this mess. But he seemed much more dismayed that people would “play stupid with police and lose their lives,” as though government soldiers were crocodiles just waiting by the riverbed for an easy meal. “You can’t blame the soldiers he said.” But I wonder if he had considered blaming the men behind the soldiers that may have robbed the people of their right to a fair electoral process. I’m sure we don’t fully understand. I just hope that he acknowledges that he doesn’t either.

As I am writing this, Odinga has planned to swear-in as the people’s president—a move which the Kibaki administration has said will be construed as a coup attempt, and will deal with in a swift and militaristic way. This does not seem to be headed towards a speedy resolution. Frankly, it seems like the country we have come to love is screeching to a halt before our eyes.