This post is for time spent in Nairobi. My post for time spent in South Sudan is further down! Newest posts on top!
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After the 10 days or so in Juba, South Sudan, I hopped over to Nairobi, Kenya to meet with potential solar suppliers / solar contractors to discuss their capabilities and available products / technologies. I got a cell phone and hired a driver all day to drive me around. Meetings were very positive. Friday was all meetings and then Sat was pretty much all play.
Nairobi is notorious for its traffic jams, which didn't so much intimidate me considering where I call home, but it did turn out to be a real drag. And NOT because of time delays, but because every tenth vehicle is a truck like this that pollutes insane amounts of crud into the air. And you smell it. And you taste it. And it gives you headaches.
We cruised over to the Elephant Orphanage and saw some baby elephants being raised with the ultimate aim to be released back into the wild later in their lives when they're less vulnerable.
Baby Elephant Orphanage in Nairobi -- Their Entrance
After the elephant orphanage, we cruised on over to the Safari Walk, and check out some lazy animals resting in the afternoon heat. Not the best time to see some action, but was still cool. A lazy rhino:
After the Safari Walk, we heard some chanting so went over to check it out. It was local Maasai Warriors singing for tourists (and the subsequent money I gave them, really). All very nice guys, though, and I had a blast. Springy dudes also. But of course, when we were jumping at the end of the video, I just want to say that I hadn't warmed up, I hadn't tightened my shoelaces, I was thirsty... :)
We left the safari walk and had some lunch. Was feeling very sunburned on my neck. Well, turns out Nairobi is just over a mile in elevation, and the sun happens to be directly overhead. This, actually, was my first visit to a place south of the equator!!
After lunch cruised on over to feed the giraffes. Very chill, and very cool.
she's shy:
the cutest kids feeding her:
And then...(yes, we did a lot this day!)...we zipped over to Mambo Village and saw some lazy crocodiles. There was a keeper there, about 25 y.o., armed only with a 1 m bamboo stick, that jumped into the croc pen and showed us some excitement. Pretty nuts.
note the dirty pantleg -- you can thank the elephant earlier in the day for that one!
Headed over for a drink and some appetizers at the famous Carnivores. Check that one off the list.
What a whirlwind trip in Nairobi! Headed to the airport and got on another overnight flight to London for the last stop on this trip before heading back to LA. I should mention that about a week prior to the Nairobi excursions it was announced that the Jordan trip had been postponed to April, so this blog will have to be on pause for awhile before the blog title is fully satisfied.
South Sudan is the world’s newest country, and its capital Juba is reportedly the world’s fastest growing city, which was evidenced by the complete lack of rules, order, police, infrastructure, as well as the excess of traffic, waste, construction, etc, etc. Most of our time was spent in the UNOPS compound working, but we did manage to make it out of Juba on a site visit and a few meetings, as well as a couple nights out. Very surprised we didn’t get into any traffic accidents. It's like the wild west!
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This post shows what the first few days of my experience in Juba has been like. More to come later. :)
This is photo of the UNOPS compound's flags.
The Kenya Air plane in Nairobi, Kenya, before flying to Juba, South Sudan.
some pretty African clouds.
Mt. Kenya
Landing in Juba. There's nothing! And then there's huts. wow. And then there's UN helicopters and cargo planes. another wow. we're in it now!
Shortly after landing on the tarmac, we deboarded the small plane and walked a short distance to the small customs area, where there was a great sign that said welcome to Juba Airport, which made me think, "that would be a great segway picture for my blog!" So i whipped out the phone quickly and snapped a pic. Shortly afterwards, an armed miltary guard tapped me on the shoulder aggressively and started questioning me why i took the picture! My poor colleague Hayley was just looking at me with eyes that said "damnit Chris, we didn't even make it past customs before you got us arrested!" We explained it was just a personal photo and he let us delete it in front of him and then let us go. Whew! lesson learned -- iPhone staying in pocket, check.
So after that, we then had to go to the Visa line, where we showed the guy our official UN letter, which was supposed to give us expedited entry. Nope. So we had to pay a $100 "visa fee", and then 1/2 hour standing around until they gave us our passports back. Good lookin' visa though!
Got my own cell phone. There's two different cell phone providers in Juba, so the phones here have two SIM cards and thus two different cell numbers. Call me if you can figure out how to! i'll have it 'till I leave this hot country.
Inside the UNOPS compound, and our ride. We have several drivers, so you just call one and they drive us around anywhere we need to go in Juba.
Our hotel, the Paradise Hotel. the rooms are old shipping containers that have been retrofitted. THere is essentially no electric grid in Juba, so each property has it's own diesel generator for juice. Our electricity goes out every few hours. We do have showers, western toilets, and extremely slow internet, so it's not too shabby, all things considered...
Traffic here is insane. I'm surprised i haven't witnessed several accidents by now, actually. Juba is the fastest growing city in the world, so several people have told me, and i've heard countless anecdotes about how much it's changed in recent years, and even months! Traffic in particular has reportedly worsened significantly. There's no police that I've seen here, and no traffic lights, or even stop signs. There's a few roundabouts, and it's a free for all.
We took a day trip out to an existing teachers training institute (TTI), 40 km west of Juba, to see an example of what we are trying to get built in other areas of South Sudan. It was an amazing trip out there, because we got to see some more of the sprawling outskirts of Juba.
A panoramic of the TTI we visited. Staff housing on the left, dorms in the middle. Classrooms in the background on the right. Cafeteria, Library, etc, are not pictured. This guy has an interesting story: while in the dorms, the worker there and I started to talk, and the worker explained that he was very unhappy; he’s been working there watching over the vacant TTI for 8 mo. without receiving his salary. This is because there are no students and so the Ministry of Education of SS thinks there's no reason for money to go there and is not paying. And long story short, quitting now would be burning the bridge with both the Ministry and the construction company that built the place (he has a relationship with and is his backup plan)… so he’s stuck. And the economy there is so tough; I don't think you can just start over. It was amazing listening to him describe this to us, with such hardship in his voice and face when doing so. A sobering moment.
Cruising back into Juba from the site visit, and came across this family -- 4 people on one moto!
We drove across to the other side of the Nile River and I snapped this pic. Taking pics can be a bit dangerous, as the military doesn't take picture taking lightly.
Dinner one night one the Nile. Bring your mosquito repellent!
This guy's shirt reads "No return to war".
We found a yoga class in Juba. No kidding (again)!
more to come...
...and below is the new stuff!
Open trash burning in the streets was commonplace. you could smell burning plastic most times of the day. In fact, during the yoga class, we were doing deep breathing exercises, right as wafts of burnt plastic started coming into the studio...haha... totally distracted from finding inner enlightenment.
My colleague Hayley returning to London and leaving me alone in Juba.
If you ever go to South Sudan and stay in a hotel, remember this: any clothes left on the floor mean that you want them laundered. Needless to say I did not know this, and left half of my neatly folded clothes on the floor one day, some of them dirty and some of them clean, including my nice formal wool coat, and returned at the end of the day to find them missing. When i got them back the next day, I tried my jacket on -- it still fit, but I felt this lump in my inner breast pocket...uh oh...reached in and pulled out a wad of mashed and mushed paper intertwined with my iPhone headphones. And what's more was the paper was a week's worth of receipts i was intending to expense. I peeled away the paper-mache-like paper from the headphones and to my delight they worked fine!
some beautiful fence constructions (ok, i'll be honest -- i think they're just good shots!):
Was there long enough that it barely justified (even this is up for debate) a UNOPS ID. Best picture ever.
The water trucks filling up at the local water treatment plant.
A night out in Juba. We went to a Red Cross party (at their compound), then to an expats bar full of Muzungus ('white people"), and then round time the 1am curfew was scaring less brave people home to the safety of their compounds, us brave night owls decided to hit up a local Juba club, with at least 98% locals. Wild.
A roof of one of their beautiful tukuls.
The team working hard, Jonathan overseeing progress.
Jonathan and Reisi -- all smiles at UNOPS -- lovely people to work with.
The driver picked me up for my last UN-truck ride :( to Juba Internation Airport, and dropped me off in a crazy crowd of people trying to just get into the airport! Crazy! Tried to go in through a side entrance and no go, so seriously had to go to the back of the mob and wait. Realized that the folks cruising in from the sides were the quick ones, so scampered around to the side and got in pretty quick, but had to do some shoving and some defending of position – intense! It was literally survival of the fittest, and those with children or large bags just got screwed. Chaos. Silly too, because a simple set of ropes and your standard cue would solve all this. Don't get it. Juba seemed like this in a lot of ways. It's the wild west.
Taking off from Juba, no run ins with armed guards this time, flying over the Nile until we lost visibility.
South Sudan is an amazing place and I'm so pleased I got a taste of such an interesting, rapidly changing, and unique country. Now off to Nairobi to meet with potential solar suppliers / solar contractors. And then back to London to get some work done on this project and then finally back to LA.
Before our work trip to South Sudan, I needed to spend Monday and Tuesday in the Arup London office, mostly to prep. I flew on a red eye Friday night from Orlando which landed early Sat morning at Gatwick. I had the weekend to play and site see before a busy couple work days, and then it was off to Nairobi for transfer to Juba, South Sudan!
This post includes some of the highlights from the London adventure:
Landing in cold London! Our plane was a big 747 -- first time for me I think on one of these bad boys
Got my Gatwick UK stamp, woohoo!
Took the train into the city, found my hotel, and a colleague met me and took me to the Arup HQ, They own two buildings, the green one on the right, and the one with the elaborate facade on the left.
The interior of the Arup office:
After a night out on the town by myself, I put on my running shoes, my jacket + scarf, and put in my headphones and set out for a jogging tour of the city. It was really really cold, and i was brimming with excitement over being in London, so jogging everywhere was awesome.
Buckingham palace
cruised over to Westminster Abby and said hi to Big Ben
Cool video of the area and of the London Eye, which was the next stop!
Took a cruise up the London Eye, one ticket buys you one slow (~15 min?) revolution. It was great.
More London Eye...
After the London Eye, I set out down the river, and quickly came upon a street performer with quite a crowd around him. I stood towards the back layer of crowd just trying to figure out what all the hooplah was about, right as the street performer pulls 4 tennis balls out of his bag. He locked eyes with me, and I thought, "oh no". He then called me out and threw the ball over the bulk of the crowd and to me. Damnit! haha so had to go into the middle of the crowd and participate in his show. He made all 4 of us introduce ourselves, and then do dances for everyone. haha. no video of that unfortunately. He made us do the grand finale, which was the four of us laying in a square, with upper backs on the knees of the guy behind us. He then took away the supports we used to get into position, and we all held the positions, suspended above some poor kid that he also picked out, who would've gotten crushed if we'd fallen! Anyway, that was that and then it was over and I continued on. 10 minutes later further down the line, a group of Italian tourists asked for my picture, as they already knew me -- Chris, from Los Angeles.
Checked out the Tate museum.
Dad, recognize this photo? It's on the refinery in the South Bay that we passed when we went to a Galaxy Game once. You said it would make a great photo...you were right!
Another one. smoke stacks from a power plant.
Several of the buildings in this color-coded key were Arup projects. Including Millenium Bridge and the Gherkin,
took the metro home and then spent the rest of the night making the cruise iMovie.
Monday was busy working at the office.
Tuesday was a busy morning, and then me and Hayley set out to London Heathrow airport for our flight to Nairobi!
