We decided to do a little weekend trip to Kisumu! Nik and I were extra excited because we heard about all the great Indian food this town had to offer. You can take us out of Gerrard Street, but you can’t take the Gerrard Street out of us (side note: Nik has never actually been to Gerrard Street). We actually had a purpose for this trip: for some reason, Nik’s doctor failed to tell her that it was pretty necessary to get a Yellow Fever shot, and so she strolled into Africa without one. Big fail. So thanks to her doctor, she now had to get a needle in Africa, something none of us wanted to do.
We headed to the Matatu station in Rongo and didn’t have to negotiate very much to secure three front row seats in the Matatu for 350 KSH (about $4.00). Of course, because it’s me, I got into the matatu and literally in less than 10 seconds, a piece of metal shanked me in the leg and I started bleeding. This time Mary took the backseat of being the mother as Nik had already foreshadowed that I would hurt myself and quickly pulled out some Polysporin and a Band-aid. Continuing on, we didn’t realize that we had a stopover in Kisii which took about 45 minutes. There are no timetables that matatus follow, they move when they’re full and they don’t move unless they are PACKED with every seat (plus more) taken. So we waited, and waited, and waited. In that time, I had all kinds of people trying to sell me CDs, fruits, watches and my most favourite, safety pins. How someone makes a living off of just selling safety pins is beyond me, but got a pretty good laugh out of it.
Once we got to Kisumu, our preceptor (who was taking a course in Kisumu) met us and took us to the hospital where Nik had to get her shot. (Danielle: I thought of you when this happened and thought about how much you would’ve hated this had this happened to you). She took it like a champ after carefully inspecting the sealed package that the needle came out of. We decided that we wanted some lunch and headed to a nearby mall. There are only 2 restaurants in the food court and although different, each have the exact same menu. I got a samosa, fries and a paratha, but Mary was craving butter chicken like no other so Nik decided to split it with her (even though in Rongo, she is a stickler about being “vegetarian”). When the butter chicken came, I laughed so hard because it looked nothing like butter chicken. Nik’s dad who owns an Indian restaurant would have been appalled. This “butter chicken” included dry pieces of chicken with an oil-based curry with some onions thrown in. They had no idea what to do but to eat this chicken. When the bill came, it all made sense. The waiter had heard the order as being “broiler chicken” and brought that instead. HAHAHA. I had no idea what broiler chicken was until that moment.
We had reservations at a place called “Soopa Guest House”. Turned out that the people who were staying in the room before us randomly decided they wanted to stay another night and so the staff just agreed. I went to the front desk to lay the smack down and saw there were about 5 other people in line with the same complaint. Not so “soopa” after all. The guy from Soopa walked around with us for about an hour until we finally found a place; a room with 2 beds and a hot stand-up shower for $3/person/night. Everyone knows how much I love deals so this was just spectacular for me. We decided that Nik got her own bed since she agreed to sleep on a towel since there were only 2 pillows. We’re great at decision making. We met up with Evance (our preceptor), some of his friends and the two other students (who met us in Kisumu) for a dinner. We ordered their “hummus” which turned out to be chick pea soup. C’est la vie!
The next morning we woke up and headed to a place for breakfast where Mary found a hair in her eggs and I found a dead fly in my soup. The only good thing about that restaurant was meeting these old Indian men who pointed us in the direction of a great Indian restaurant (where we would end up spending most of our time). We then headed to Impala Park which came highly recommended to us. After eating lunch by Lake Victoria (with our Nakumatt lunch), we went to the animal sanctuary. We didn’t think that we would be blown away since we had just come from a great safari, but we decided to check it out anyways. We saw leopards, ostriches and buffaloes. Monkeys were roaming all around the park which was the best. Just when we thought our time at the sanctuary was mediocre at best, a worker at the park offered us the opportunity of a lifetime: for 200 KSH (which I bargained down from 1000 KSH), we could enter the cheetah cage (where they were not on leashes), pet the cheetahs and take pictures. HOW COULD WE NOT. It was lunchtime for the cheetahs but they said we could enter anyways. After entering at a snail’s pace, each of us took turns sitting beside the cheetah and petting it while it was eating its large piece of meat. Also important to note that a second cheetah was also in the cage just roaming freely and we had no idea where it was. As we looked up, we realized that about 50 school children had gathered around to see us hand our lives over to these beasts. After trying to lay my head down on the cheetah’s body and it jumping up, I decided I had enough and we left. Craziness. After that, the worker also led us behind the scenes to where the lioness was chomping down on its lunch. He also let us pet the lion (but we were on the outside this time) and it was not very happy. After a few growls (and pictures), we decided our death wish was over and left. **Please note that after telling our moms this story, Nik and I got some verbal lashings**.
After the park, we went to another mall where we somehow managed to get pedicures for $5 and the best 25-minute massage of my life for $2. Oh to live the hard life. Then went to the “Super Nakumatt” where I managed to buy a lifetime’s supply of Mr. Noodles and cookies. Excellent. After that we headed to Haandi, the Indian restaurant recommended to us. The food was insane and I ordered pretty much everything on the menu including some amazing pappadums. They told us that they were having a South Indian lunch buffet the next day for $5/person and we told them to count us in. When we got home/to our room, I was so full that I literally couldn’t move to the next room to watch our soap opera, so while Mary and Nik watched, I took a fat nap. Then we went to sleep, and woke up the next morning just in time to pack and head to the lunch buffet. After a large helping of masala dosas, idlys and jalebi, we went to the Kisumu market (one of the largest in Kenya) and left for home. It was a great weekend and on the way home, the matatu driver was trying to get people into the matatu by selling them on the fact that “muzungus were in there and they could practice English with us”. This place never fails to amaze me.
Thanks for reading everyone!
Love & Masala Dosas,
Shahla
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