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THROUGH MY EYES - THE MAASAI MARA

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 NOVEMBER 2024 THROUGH MY EYES - THE  MAASAI MARA At home, be grateful. At work, be appreciative. Gratitude is a gift we give ourselves. Appreciation is a gift we give to others - Anonymous   So, this blog is an appreciation to Charles for the work he gave us in the Mara. I have indeed been blessed to have friends, colleagues and associates who have, since 1994 given me the opportunity to experience and enjoy the beautiful and yet very fragile Mara. In this short article, I want to share with the readers some snippets and photos which I have taken during my several trips for work. “Surely, of all the wonders of the world, the horizon is the greatest.”   Freya Stark The flora and fauna aside, the beauty of Maasai Mara emanates from the rolling plains, blue skies, stunning sunrises and sunsets, the innumerable springs of water that eventually feed into the Mara River and its tributaries such as Talek River, Olar Orok and several others. The culturally steeped local Maa...
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SULTAN HAMUD & THE MAASAI CONNECTION

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 17 November 2024 SULTAN HAMUD & THE MAASAI CONNECTION “No WiFi out here, but I found a better connection." - Anonymous SULTAN ALI BIN HAMUD Today we are off to Sultan Hamud ... to see Arif (Imtiaz's Brother-in-Law), to see the Sheikh Nazim Mosque (which is within the town) and also take a walk into the hinterland to view the landscape, to hike and to meet up with some near and distant Maasai relatives. We drive along Mombasa Road for a distance of about 100km and reach the town in a comfortable two-hour drive - there is no way of saving much time due to the heavy but generally moving traffic.   The Town - Sultan Hamud - got its name from Sultan Ali Hamud who ruled Zanzibar from 1902 to 1911. When the construction of the railway reached present-day Sultan Hamud, the Zanzibar ruler visited to see the progress and camped there for some days. FLAMBOYANT TREE IN FULL BLOOM As we maneuver through the half tarmac-half murram roads of the sleepy and muddy town, one of the first ...
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THE NOT-SO-WILD WEST: A JOURNEY TOWARDS THE SUNSET

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 JULY 2024 TO TRAVEL IS TO LIVE ! MAP OF TASK AREA This week I travel to Western Kenya and Eastern Uganda. The task: A Feasibility Study for EAC. My tasks include the 3 border posts at Busia, Malaba and Lwakhakha (pronounced "Lwahaha") Its a weeklong exercise to a most beautiful part of Kenya and Uganda, peopled by some of the most hospitable and hard-working peoples of East Africa. AN EARLY MORNING FLIGHT Its 15th July and we board the very early Jambojet morning flight to Kisumu. Flight time: 6am. This means reporting time is 5am. Which means I have to leave home at the latest by 430am and this means I have to wake up at 330am I lose sleep at 3am.  I remember to switch off the alarm I have set on my mobile 📱 . A quick shower. As silently as possible. I don't want to disturb the sleeping family. At JKIA, long queues await the opening of the check-in counters for Jambojet, the low cost airlines that dominates most local routes in Kenya. For the record, there is not...
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THE DANGEROUS ROAD

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  THE DANGEROUS ROAD "IF YOU DONT KNOW WHERE YOU ARE GOING - THEN ANY ROAD WILL LEAD YOU THERE." - LEWIS CARROL If I had known that this road is used often by Al Shabaab Terrorists I wouldn't have agreed to travel it. In fact it has a nickname - "The Al Shabaab Road" --- all this was withheld from me till the end of the journey back in Wajir The elders were clever. They only said that we have to go East of Wajir, about 25km.  "It's just on the outskirts of Wajir ... about half hour away from our site", said the Chairman Thats how they lured me into this trip. As usual the 25km estimate was an underestimate .... it was actually 45km one way! And it took at least an hour plus .. one way! The reason for this trip, "He has offered us 240 tonnes of aggregate, for free! A donation to the construction of the Hudheifa Masjid". .... that's how they put it! "Please check for us the quality of this offered aggregate" added the ...
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