Arriving in Africa

We moved to Kenya in September 2012.

It's the beginning of a big new adventure for us.

Britt and I are empty nesters now, having sent our younger son off to university and watched our older one finish his B.A. and start his first post-college job.

Kenya was my idea. When we were still living in Lima, Peru, I had the chance to come to Kenya on several different work-related trips and just loved it.

The colors and landscapes are beautiful. There are exotic animals and spicy smells in the air. There are people of many different tribes and origins. They bustle along the Nairobi streets and shopping areas with their myriad, often brightly colored clothing: saris from India, Masaii bracelets, women in brightly colored headscarves or fully veiled in black with just their eyes showing. There are children in their school uniforms, women balancing heavy loads on their heads, and stick thin men hauling huge loads on bicycles up and down the green hills of Nairobi. The streets are rutted and twisty, and lined with vendors selling hand made furniture, clay pots and plants, or big bunches of bananas. 

The skies are filled with the sounds of hadada ibis and other birds. The marabou storks stalk the median strips of the major avenue that links downtown to the airport, and eventually Mombasa if you keep going. The traffic jams are infamous, frequent, and liable to lead to hours of delays. 

There is dust when it's dry and mud when it's not. But the red earth and green vegetation offer a stark and striking contrast.

Nairobi is dangerous and in some ways difficult. But it is also wonderful, and lively, and welcoming.

So, stay tuned. And we'll tell you more about it.