i'm scared of baboons

it's been a looong time since i last posted, so this is going to be a looong post.

nairobi has been a blast...it's been so much fun being here the past 2 months, and since it's the longest i've been in one place since i started this gig, it was really nice to settle down a little bit....which is why the thought of leaving in a week is very sad for me. i made some good new friends here, and it's hard to leave them, not knowing when i'll get to see them again.

just to explain what things have been like here...i've been working a good amount, so i'll write about work first. my project here is the kenya aids indicator survey, which is a large surveillance project they tested people in every province for hiv and asked them a bunch of questions about difference behaviors and health indicators. the cdc has a good-sized office here, so every morning, i get picked up by a driver to head to the cdc office or downtown to the offices of our kenya government partners. the drivers are all kenyan, so they're my most regular kenyan contacts...we've had some good conversations about everything from kenyan politics (one driver and i have decided that if obama doesn't make president in the states, he most definitely should run in kenya) to where the best nyamachoma (kenyan bbq) place is.

so i spend my weekdays at the office, and i've been sharing a space with my closest friend here. she's super generous and sociable...always inviting me over to her place, taking me out to dinner and other social events. she's kinda the social hub of the office, so she'll organize a lot of outings with other co-workers and friends. so far, i've gone to 2 concerts, 1 music festival (in the german ambassador's backyard, no less), lotsa dinners (they actually have good sushi here!), and camping this past weekend. which brings me to my baboon story...

one of the first times i met heleen back in february, a bunch of us were hanging out at her house, and for some reason, it came out that she had these slingshots that she wanted to practice using. why? because the last time she went camping, they had problems with baboons stealing their food and she wanted to use the slingshots against them. she was kinda excited about the slingshots, so i kinda thought it was a bit strange. but other than her baboon obsession, she seemed normal enough. so we became friends, and the baboon/slingshot thing became a running joke. this past weekend, we decided to go camping in naivasha (about 2 hours from nairobi), which is where she last encountered the baboons, sparking this whole obsession. among the things we packed for the trip to use against the baboons: 2 slingshots, 2 water guns, a container to fill up the water guns, vinegar to mix with the water for the water guns, and bicycle pumps. the pumps served a dual purpose...most of the group were going to bike around the park, so the pumps were necessary, but they were also to be used as weapons against the baboons (they were about the length of baseball bats). not to actually hit them, of course, but to keep the baboons at a distance. (i feel like i must clarify that heleen is not an animal abuser...she loves animals. her intention is not to hurt them, but to keep them at a distance and teach them respect.)

so while i'm helping her pack, she's kinda excited about getting to use these things against the baboons, and i'm kinda laughing along with her, but also a little bit at her quirkiness. little did i know...dude, the first day we were there setting up camp, a bunch of us were sitting at the picnic table, snacking on lovely, hard-to-find, expensive doritos, and this ginormous baboon literally charges at us, grabbing at some other food we had on the table (including a brightly-colored package of baby wipes), and didn't leave until connie, the woman holding the doritos, gave up the bag. seriously, all i heard were the thuds of him running towards us and my friends yelling, and i screamed a little (i'm ashamed to admit), dropped the cookie i was munching on, and got out of there as fast as i could (again, i'm ashamed to admit). i got a little distance from the table and looked back to see connie trying to put up a fight (doritos are precious here!), but the baboon wouldn't leave. it was standing about a foot away from her, and it started baring its teeth and screaming back at her. that's when she gave up the bag, and the baboon took off with it, after swiping from the table the aforementioned baby wipes and cookies i was munching on. we were totally caught off guard (heleen had left to get water from the pump - she would've been prepared), but after that, we made good use of the slingshots and bicycle pumps, though the water guns were a bit of a disappointment. it was so bad that we couldn't eat without having some of us act as guards/lookouts. we ended up defending ourselves pretty well for the rest of the weekend, but we saw them totally harass some other campers. the day we left, we left a car at the site while some went biking and others went hiking, and when we got back, we found that they had climbed on the car and left a little stinky present on the roof of the car and on the picnic table. they also tore off half of a bumper sticker. the thing is, there wasn't any food around (we had packed up everything), so the baboons were just being punks. i seriously think that was their way of getting back at us for driving them away from our food.

all this to say, i now understand heleen's baboon obsession.

so here are some pics from the past few weeks:

did anyone else not know that warthogs kneel when they forage for food?
this time, we got to get up close and personal with Jock.
this was the view i woke up to in naivasha...
i ended up hiking since i don't remember the last time i rode a bike at all, let alone for 25 km on rocky terrain. there's this nice little gorge hike that reminded me of the river walk in zion...but a lot drier. there are hot springs in naivasha, so you pass this one waterfall that is seriously the perfect temperature for a shower. i took a picture, but at the time, one of my co-workers was actually taking a shower in the waterfall, so i'll refrain from posting it. (first - he kept his shorts on! who do you think i am?!? second - it was such a nice shower, that he wouldn't get out so i could take the pic without him in it. he even suggested that we go on with the hike and come back for him 2 hours later.)

so in a week, i'm heading down to zanzibar (it's tough, i tell ya!), then back to atlanta, then on to el salvador. sometime in the next few months, i should be heading to sudan and possibly uganda, but while i'm excited about these projects and getting to travel to these new countries, what i'm most looking forward to right now is being in la in august!