Alex ditches will for the slums

Ben and a Hari Krishna volunteer in front of the truck

Breaking the ice with Obama

Henry is to the left of me.

Glue sniffing

Ben on soup duty



While Will was out frolicking in and around Victoria (the lake, that is), Alex stayed back in Nairobi to do some real work.  With his trusty wingman Ben in tow, Alex devoted his Wednesday to seeking out the cream of Nairobi's female crop.  After a play at the International School, we were introduced to all of Camille's friends, and departed to Village Market for a nice dinner with a select few.  Food was good, and we managed to impress them enough to get invited to a Valentines Day dinner (more on that later).  

With the social situation solidified, Thursday was spent back with the Hari Krishna Temple.  This time Alex and Ben arrived early and helped prepare the food before traveling to the worst slum in Nairobi to pass it out.  The day's menu was rice with a kidney bean-potato soup.  Salvation, here we come!  Our first stop was a rehabilitation center for young boys.  One of the older kids, Henry, was especially friendly and we hit it off immediately.  We exchanged addresses, and promised to keep in contact.  I wrote down my email address, but was sure we would be writing letters as there wasn't a working computer for miles.  When I got home, however, I had a fresh email from Henry in my inbox!  I don't know how far he had to travel to get to a computer, but he warned me that he wouldn't be responding very soon since he had to go to pretty great lengths to compose this email.  

As we got off the truck in the slum, however, I quickly noticed a very different vibe.  We were no longer the life of the party - we were the rich privileged (and slightly resented) white kids.  Last time Will and I went to to pass out food with Hari Krishna we were surprised to see a few kids sporting only a plastic bag for us to put their food in.  On this trip however, a full plastic bag was a luxury most couldn't afford.  The vast majority of the people we served had no more than a shred of trash for us to put their food in.  After passing out the food, I had a couple minutes to snap some pictures and attempt to socialize.  Most people we met had about half the brain cells they should from sniffing glue, which made socializing tougher than it should've been.  We got offered both glue, and a locally made maize-based alcohol, which we politely declined.  People started to open up when I mentioned Obama (he really is a great ice breaker), but unfortunately we had to leave shortly after.  

Friday was spent solely in preparation for our climb of Mt. Kenya at the end of this week.  Alex did pushups all day, with only a short break for some crunches in between his usual chin ups.