Hujambo!

The pictures of my Ethiopia trip are finally on my photo gallery. It’s been a while since any of you have seen a picture of me so I know you’re excited. I have about 100 photos in total but it’s not very practical for me to upload them all, and I’m sure you only want to see the best of them, so I only put about 30 online. Here are a few…

You can see the rest in the gallery here.

I visited Sureel in Kitui a few weeks ago but never got around to posting the pictures… I took a co-worker, Elizabeth, with me because she comes from there and promised to show me around.  We spent the weekend hanging out, cooking Indian food, and visiting this big rock called Nzambani rock.  The tribe in Kitui is the same tribe in Tala, the Kamba people, so it’s part of the Kamba “country,” or “Ukambani.”  Kitui’s a pretty modern town, though, with several banks, hoppin’ clubs, and lots of super markets.  It’s much, much bigger than Tala, but also much “deeper” into the country (about three hours from Tala).
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I was realizing the other day that my shoes have been so many places in the last four years. My one pair of Nike shoes has been in the United States, Mexico, Canada, India, Kenya, and Tanzania. Here are some of the highlights:

Randi and I were in India in December, 2006 – January, 2007 and we visited New Delhi to see some beautiful architecture in this old city. Pictured is one of the buildings at the site of the Qutub Minar, the tallest brick and stone minaret in the world. The inscriptions on the building I’m standing next to are all in Arabic, carved maybe 600 years ago. I can imagine Muslims in northern India standing at the top of the minaret singing “Allahu akbar!” to call pious Muslims for prayer. Delhi was a big, dirty city, but it is home to many relics of the old world.
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I went on a nice hike in the hills around Tala with some colleagues last weekend.  We walked to a huge rock where the view was pretty sweet. Check it out!

A month or so ago I a colleague and I bought a chicken at the local market. We took it back to his house and proceeded to slaughter and eat it. African style. I never got around to posting pictures, so here you go!

Although I was good at holding the chicken, the killing part is another story entirely. I figured if I saw it once or twice I might be able to do it myself. I am proud to say that I cannot even imagine what kind of instincts I would have to muster up (not to mention stifling a gag reflex) in order to actually kill one myself. I do believe that humans evolved as meat eaters (and of course, killers!), but wow… no thanks! I guess I just don’t like meat THAT much! In fact, a whole week will go by and I will have not eaten any meat!

By the way, in Swahili “kuku” means chicken. :)