The final week at Mumias was spent doing the same sort of thing - feeding centre, coaching and - when there was power - computer data input. The coaching was great fun and we took sometime to explain the rules and draw out a pitch - thinking about sending out some England matches on DVD to them so they can see it in action. Also did some defending with the girls and they took to it like fish to water - there's so much talent there!
One evening we had dinner with the mayor, which was very nice. It was quite funny when the waiter came to take our orders"What would you like to order?""What is there?""Chicken and rice""umm...errr...chicken and rice please!" Brilliant :]The Mayor is a really nice guy who told us how he enjoyed England, singing Alan's praises for his hosting skills!
On our last day we had little tour around the local villages and met some of the people that SAIPEH are helping. We went around with 2 other people from the UK who work for a charity called The Chello Foundation; they do scholarships for children and were inquiring how they might help work in unison with SAIPEH. Linet cooked us all our favourite foods for our leaving meal...we mean ALL our favourite foods. There were "Irish potatoes" (deep-fried whole spuds), chipati, pilau and chicken. Yes people, we are getting fat. We said our goodbyes (and we shall really miss the new friends we've made) and got on our coach for a thrilling 8 hour journey to Nairobi.
Fred met us at the station and we went back to his to rest until the next evening when we would get another coach to Mombasa. The journey took a lot longer than anticipated because the coach kept running to a standstill, also the driver was some sort of maniacal, raging idiot. Anyway, it was relatively painfree and we arrived bright and early at 6.30am, having left at 9pm! We were met by a member of the Mombasa police force, as Justin kindly asked a friend for a favour, and taken to our hostel...Oh here the story begins!
It was much further out than we thought and to get to the beach you had to go through a whole rural village of mud huts...then when we arrived a loud sign proclaimed "closed until 10th July"!!!! Oh dear. The owner was around though and said we could stay if we wanted, they were just revamping and the bar wasn't open. Needless to say we were slightly downcast at our hopes of a few weeks relaxing. The beach was rocky and dirty and the area was secluded. I'm sure it's lovely in high season but right now we wanted to meet some new young people and read on a white, sandy beach. Thus, we called in our knight in shining armour, Fred, and asked whether he knew of any other places or had any friends that would. He rose to the challenge immediately and a friend of his, and a member of SCI - Samuel - trekked his way to the hostel and picked us up. We really had no words to thank him, and couldn't begin to explain how relived we were. He took us to another friends house, Esther, where we were so warmly greeted we wanted to cry. We had a bed (after 48 hours of no sleep), food (after 24 without food), and hope for the next day (after 12 of despair).
The next day Esther’s niece, Charity, took us for a walk along the beach whilst we waited to hear news of any potential places. Amazingly our host came through with a place that would be about the same as the previous hostel, but with lots more. We expected a shabby room and a hole in the ground but got a bedroom, kitchen, living room, balcony and bathroom with running water! We are currently loving Mombasa and everyday making new contacts and friends. The beach is lovely. The food is good. Not much else to ask for really. The area has a few SOS schools which we're going to have a look at in the next few weeks, just to check out whether there is anything that SCI can offer that they don't have. After all this place is so happy I'm sure a bit of sport and support would be greatly received. So, so far so good. Mombasa is such a lovely place. We've also been given more Kenyan names! Jess is Bwibo Sabasaba - which means one who was first seduced by a white man(!) and George's is Bwibo Oronda - which means beautiful one with big legs(!!) ha-ha charming! At least that's what we were told they meant!!
Any ho, can't wait to see you all
Kwaheri
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