Oct 9, 1976. Nairobi. Found a cheaper room in downtown Nairobi (four dollars a night for a double), then met Scott at 1 PM. Never seen him so excited. Sat in the park for a while, then a nice cheap dinner in our hotel, a walk around town, and bed by 11 PM. Our hotel (The Iqbal) seems to be the center for hippie travelers, as well as Africans of all sorts. I like it.
Oct 10, 1976. Up kind of late, but then, over tea, met Abdul Qawii (nom) Fatwa (prenom), a young man from Mombasa, who spent four years in Belgium, two in Zürich, some months in France, not to mention most of the other countries of the world. Fatwan speaks beautiful French, and we struck up a friendship right away. Turns out he may be of some help in getting visas, work permits, friends in other countries, etc. Walked through town with him, buying some “tree tomatoes“, an apple to eat later at our hotel for lunch. At 2 we met Magavana, a Nairobi big shot, who drove us to his house for a beer, and then off to the “Kenya Bomo“ for some African dances. We arranged to meet tomorrow at 10 to start buying a car.
Oct 14, 1976. How fast time has flown these first few days in Africa! Looking back, I see a blur of teas, meetings with friends, visits to used car lots, movies, and always warm, beautiful days, the sky full of puffy cumulus clouds. A good city to begin a vacation. We spent a lot of time with Fatwan Abdul, who becomes more interesting the longer we know him. Nicole learned last night that he is only 23 years old, and yet wise all things concerning money. he started at the age of 15, by renting the car in which his father had him driven to school, and he hasn’t stopped wheeling and dealing since. Some sample of his wares: tires at wholesale, air flights everywhere at 1/4 the normal price, a Peugeot 504 coming from Uganda for only 20,000 shillings (worth many times that in Kenya), addresses all over East Africa and the Middle East. What does he want in return? As a longshot, he’d like Nicole to work for him: put his export business in Nairobi on a more respectable footing; and he’s hinted that I might be useful to facilitate the movement of goods (as yet unspecified) amongst countries. We don’t want to lose his friendship (he really does seem to enjoy being with us), So we’ve quite truthfully told him that “no” for the next few months at least.
This morning I put down sh 1500 as a 10% down payment on a VW bug. Looks to be in good mechanical condition; previously owned by an American now doing research on the effects of tourists on the wildlife and Kenya’s parks.
Ken and Vickie have moved into the Iqbal Hotel, across from us, and are busy looking at buses and getting about. Vickie doesn’t like Nairobi a bit (she doesn’t like cities, period), and is anxious to get moving. Nicole and I agreed that the best thing for all four of us would be to travel together for a while, just to see how we get along, and if, in fact, we can solve our interpersonal problems this way. I’m game, and we will probably leave next week for a trip to Dar Es Salaam, to view the eclipse, and then back via Mombasa and a game park or two.
We’ve seen Magavana several times since we met him – always peaceful and smiling and gentle. Again, his friendship seems open and natural, and he’s done so much for us just because he wants to. He’s off to a conference in West Kenya for a few days: when he comes back, I’d like to visit him again, and take his kids to Nairobi Park.
Met Katie, a most delightful American girl, at the Iqbal: she’s touring Africa for the third time; her husband working all the while at Yellowstone for the National Park Service. She left this morning by bus for Malawi, Tanzania, and Zambia. She’s really fun to be around: so lively, informal, and happy.
Nairobi Bird Walk: ' Golden breasted bunting, White-tailed barbet, White-eyed slaty flycatcher, Yellow-vented bulbul, Yellow wagtail (migrant from Volga),Violet-backed starling, Red-eyed dove, Streaky seed eater, White backed tit, Black kite, Augur buzzard, Dusky flycatcher (very tame: photo), Variable sunbird, Yellow white-eyed, Reichenow's weaver, Black rough-winged swallow, Golden-rumped tinkerbird
Oct 16, 1976. Met Micael Tadesse Soqvar at the Iqbal Hotel. he is an Eritrean who escaped to Kenya while working on the stretch of road near the Kenyan border (Yabello to Mayale). He says the road is fine from Isole all the way to Addis and beyond to Eritrea. He says driving on to Khartoum is quite possible, and we could perhaps sell the car there, because Sudan is also right hand drive. Or, we could take a boat from to Masawa, stopping at Mombasa, Mogadishu, Djibouti, and Masawa. He’s now on a UN passport, along with another 300 or so refugees, and is eager to leave for Haifa and Israel, where he thinks he can get work as a lorry driver or something.
Yesterday was truly amazing. Fatwan took us to Parliament in the morning, where we watched (but did not understand: all was in Swahili) the debate concerning the fate of the coastal port of Kenya, which was being forcibly resettled by folks from elsewhere. Had lunch with the MP from the district affected, and he told us what a battle this settlement was. He visited us later in the evening, at our hotel, and asked lots of questions about the American political system. A nice guy, only about 30, but knowing what the deal is.
Oct 24, 1976. Sitting comfortably in the incredible lodge at Lobo, in the Tanzania's Serengeti National Park. The Lodge, built of local woods and stones, is nestled in a high rocky crop overlooking a plain which stretches endlessly away. Nicole and I had oatmeal and fruit, and beans for lunch, while Ken and Vickie enjoyed a fantastic lunch in the lodge. We are resting after a full day in Kenya's Maasai Mara game reserve with our turkey guide Francis, who spotted nothing all day. The past two nights we slept in the backyard of Joe Popp’s house at the Mara Research Institute; Joe is a young guy with a love of baboons, having previously studied them in eastern Ethiopia. Julie Johnson and Barbara Smuts (the latter one of the Gombe kidnap victims), drove around this morning while they did 15 minute observations of different female baboons, which they will continue to study for another year. I was surprised somewhat by how inexact their observations seemed to be: “Which baboon is that?” came up several times: one argument arose after a few minutes of observations of a female because the girls weren’t sure they had the right one; often the observed animal would disappear just as the time for marking its behavior was due. Still, it seemed not nearly as boring as I would have imagined, and I think I could’ve easily handled the job (at least for baboons). Saw our first pair of lions two evenings ago, on the side of a little road near the park entrance. We drove right up to them, and I felt very thrilled and nervous. Saw thousands of buffalo, lots of zebra, as well as Grant’s and Thompson’s gazelles, impala, elephants, giraffes, wildebeest, warthogs, etc., etc. Topi and Coke’s Hartebeast occasionally; some eland; banded mongoose.
The VW bus I purchased a few days ago is performing quite well, except for the usual breaking in: a couple of flat tires, then the discovery shock was dismantled. Mechanically seems very sound, and the creature comforts are extraordinary.
Oct 29, 1976. Tarangire Park. Morning; very slight cover, warm and dry. Beside Tarangiri River.
Night heron - stalking and pointing
Great white egret. No crest visible
Grey heron
Sacred ibis. Three, fishing together
Fish eagle
Black-winged stilt
Black crake
Three-banded plover
Marsh sandpiper
Ring-necked dove
Black winged plover
Yellow necked spurfowl
White-browed coucal - in thicket
Magpie shrike
Helmeted guinea fowl
Oct 31, 1976, Arusha. Not being terribly regular about my diary entries. I plead that the last 10 days have been pretty hectic ones, doing the park “milk run “, and camping out every night. Now, comfortably ensconced in the Meru guesthouse. 48 sh for the four of us), I have some free time to catch up.
Impressions of the national parks: very large, very dry; tremendously torn up by the elephants. Hardly anyone else in the parks (except Ngorongoro, as organized a “safari” as I’ve ever seen). One morning in Lobo (Serengeti), Nicole and I went out early to discover first a pride of lions, and then a fine cheetah group, with four youngsters, all fluffy and frightened. The southern half of Serengeti was incredibly dry and uninterest, except for a few large kopjes. Olduvai, in the middle of nowhere, we reached by the worst road yet. Saw the site where Mary Leki found Zinjanthropus, the oldest remains of man’s ancestors, and also Homo habilis, his contemporary. Ngorongoro was full of tours, Maasa cattle, and ...
But met up with Gus, whom we had met in Nairobi at the Iqbal, and two Germans, so the Land Rover rental wasn’t too bad (360 sh split seven ways). We took Gus with us to Lake Manzara, and finally left him before turning south to Tarangire, the best of them all. Lake Manzara was a disappointment: hot in the day, humid at night, lots of tsetse flies, and Ken and Vickie like zombies. We spotted a rhino early in the morning, but nothing much else the rest of the day. Lots of flamingos on the lake, but impossible to approach closely.
The first night in Tarangire was a thriller: Nicole and I in the bus, and Ken and Vickie in their tent, on a cliff overlooking the Tarangire River. The next day we learned from Ken and Vickie that three lions had visited the camp at around three in the morning, staying close to the tent and rubbing against It for several hours. Ken and Vickie said they had never been so scared and all their lives, and talked about the feeling of terror all the next day. Nicole and I slept out the following night, with lions and hyenas, growling and cackling all night long, but we had no close visitors. During the two days at Tarangire we saw several rhino, including one with a baby which trotted beside the VW bus for at least a kilometer; many many common waterbuck; dik-dik; bohor reedbuck; and, as we were leaving the park, a fringe-eared oryx with magnificent, long scimitar-like antlers.
Thrill of the day: while walking through the Arusha market today, I felt my back pocket being picked and stopped the punk before the wallet was out of my pocket, berating him loudly all kinds of people. I now carry my wallet in my front pocket.
