Nihao from Shanghai

First, 14 hours is longer than any person should ever have to be trapped in barely more than their own immediate personal space in a semi-upright posture when you really really really want to sleep.  But I made it and managed to sleep just enough in transit to not be completely wrecked on arrival. Now that I'm showered and refreshed, I'm looking forward to a good night of solid horizontal sleep.

It's been three years since I was last in China, and while I've only been to Shanghai once for a couple of days, I can already feel that China is (to borrow my favorite Thai phrase) "same same, but different." I can't pin it just yet, but it does seem to be the effects of the lurching economic boom.  So many of the cars leaving the airport were Audis, VWs, and big Buick SUVs. It's still the same place - dirt and soot tainted buildings, ladies on rickety wooden chairs selling phone cards, street vendors grilling all things on sticks and littering the gutters with the skins of pineapples.  But there's an air all about that things are happening here.  For one, the corner grocery store I'd been to before is now a Walmart...

Me and my three enormous pieces of luggage toting live animal traps are checked into a hotel with my friend Zhe near the campus of East China Normal University.  I finally got an answer for what the "Normal" means.  Seems so weird to a native English speaker that "Normal" would be chosen as part of a University's name. What's considered an "Abnormal" university?  Apparently it means that it's a teaching college.  Still not sure exactly where the "Normal" arises out of "teaching college", but I'm satisfied enough with that answer.

We went to dinner with Zhe's advisor here who is an outrageously outgoing with a huge personality.  He hugs me whenever he sees me.  That's the first and biggest thing that makes him stand out.  He's traveled extensively and says he has to get out of China every couple of years.  I can completely identify with that, however I can't even wait two years between trips. So he's seen a lot of the world and explained to me last time I was here that he hugs me because "Americans like to hug". He's extremely, and rightfully, proud of his lab.  He has a magnetic board with all of the lab publications, and across the top of each in red marker he's written "I.F.=" and a number indicating the impact factor of the journal.  He was a little bit distressed that some of his best papers are missing, but that's apparently because there are 8 new fresh faced prospective masters students who are on the Chinese university equivalent of "Survivor." I guess they're brushing up on what the lab does and trying to out compete each other to make a good impression since only 5 can stay. He had them all come over and introduce themselves to me so that I could assess their English and tell him who he should take.  They were all so cute and enthusiastic and impressed on me how much they REALLY REALLY want to be chosen for "Mr. Zhang's" lab. As if they thought my opinion could make or break their future. I couldn't give an opinion and crush any single one of them, so when Shuyi went one by one asking of a few "what do you think of this one? and this one?" I just kept saying "very good". So he pointed at himself and said "What about me?" to which I responded with a half cocked brow, "Ehhhhh..." and he burst into laughter and hugged me again.  I think we get each other.

But truthfully, his surged to near the top of my favorite labs when I had the sudden realization looking at his publication wall of fame that *THIS* is the lab that published the bat fellatio paper last year!!  I told him I thought that was cool because it got so many people in the general public interested in the oddness of it, and he told me they got an IgNobel prize for that work. Also hilarious. 

One more day in Shanghai, and I travel onward to Urumqi on Thursday. Incidentally, I forgot that blogspot was also banned in China in 2009, and it apparently hasn't come back online. As such I'm posting this via an email submission so if anyone gets a chance to let me know if this posts okay, I'd greatly appreciate it.

London and Spain

Monday morning initiated phase 3 of the trip - London! I'd decided to stop off in London on the return home so I could make a side trip to Santander to visit friends and colleagues as long ago promised. In a passing conversation, I'd once told Paul that I hated London, so he was determined, in a day, to change my impression of one of his favorite cities. I'll have to say that he succeeded. My last trip to London was a whirlwind in not great weather chasing two very dear but very tall and fast moving friends through the city. This time was far more leisurely. And it was actually sunny! We started off the morning with a breakfast picnic in Hyde Park and continued on to the Natural History Museum. He had gotten tickets of a special exhibition of wildlife photography that was fabulous. It is an annual competition with a dozen or so different categories, and the photos are stunning. Plus the presentation is really nicely done such that the room is dimly lit, and the photos are strikingly backlit so the colors pop and everything is sharp. That also makes them really easy to photograph, so I got some nice images of my favorite ones. The winner of the whole exhibition was a great shot of leafcutter ants captured from through the leaf so you see just the silhouettes of the ants with a few peeking through a hole they've removed from the leaf - their little hairs glowing from the light behind the leaf. Simple and gorgeous. After the exhibit, we made a pass through a few of the permanent exhibits to satisfy my geek needs and saw the taxidermied jerboa they have in the mammals collection. I have yet to see a jerboa mounted in true posture, and this was the worst of them all. I may have to write a letter of complaint :)

On from the museum, we caught the tube to Westminster and walked across the river to the Thames river walk. There weren't as many mimes and street performers this time as when I was there last, and we apparently missed the Mime Convention by about 6 weeks. Disappointing. But the river was lovely, and it was a splendid walk with a stop for meat pies - mine was steak in a red wine gravy with just a hint of Stilton. Mmmm, good food. Yes, I know I write a lot about food, because that's one of the greatest things in life, and dinner was no exception! After a stop for pints of English ale in a truly authentic pub, we made our way to an amazing north African restaurant that is a favorite old haunt of Paul's. With good reason. The atmosphere was beautifully decorated and cozy, and the staff were lively and fun with great North African/Middle Eastern music playing in the background. Suddenly, in the middle of dinner, the lights went down and the music went up, and the whole staff were dancing joyously between the tables. Turns out it was someone's birthday. And they took their sweet time celebrating. After a couple of warm up songs, a cake with candles made its way to one of the tables, and the strikingly beautiful hostess pulled a lucky man from his seat for a quick dance before returning him to his dinner companions. Great fun. And the meal ranked up there as one of the very best ever - starters of chicken livers with smooth hummous, pomegranate seeds a walnuts, delicately fried little triangles of cheese wrapped up in pastry with an apricot paste, and my favorite was the savory pidgeon pastry gently dusted with cinnamon and powdered sugar over slices of fresh tomato and orange. Followed by the best lamb tagine ever that fell away in heavenly tenderness. I'm now inspired to perfect my culinary skills with that dish.

Following in the food pilgrimage, I made my way solo from London onward to Spain where I was picked up at the airport and whisked away to yet another fantastic dinner. Croquettes! I'd forgotten how lovely are the Spanish croquettes. And chorizo, jamon, and cecina. A heavenly trio of meats. On Thursday, Marian, Federica, and I drove up into the Picos de Europa for a stroll through some of a old farm villages with the white peaked mountains looming over. Lunch was the long awaited cocido. It's a stew made with chickpea and cabbage that has about 6 different kinds of meat including hunks of pork, fat, chorizo, and morcilla (blood sausage) that was sooooo yummy. And coma inducing for the long drive back down the mountains to Santander - fortunately I was not driving, and the narrow windy road with nets to stop the falling rocks was enough to keep Federica white knuckled and awake. Friday things had to turn away from food and fun and back to work as I visited the lab and gave a talk for the institute. It was in part to bookend a great collaboration that will soon result in what we hope to be a really nice publication - with more work to be done on future potential projects, I think my stomach and I will have to return to Spain for longer next time.

These trips get more and more surreal with each one as it feels like I've been gone far longer than I have while I'm away, but it seems like a dream and I never left by the time I'm home again. Unfortunately, there's not another on the immediate horizon, so the itch will just have to build for awhile as I'm grounded back in reality.

Petra, Day 2

The second day of Petra was a little more leisurely but still an invigoratingly active day. We got off to a slightly later start at around 10:30 am, which put us at the gates as large busloads of tourists were pouring in. It's common for people to visit Petra in one day by coming over from Israel and then back again. Seems ridiculous to me when you consider the border crossing and 3 hours of round trip driving. And the fact that the entrance fee is almost twice as much for a single day as it is for two days. A lot of the package tour folks also seem to see only a 10th of the site. They work their way slowly through the Siq listening to a sarcastic tour guide make the same jokes day after day and pass through to the Treasury in processional line to exclaim "WOW!" on cue as they catch their first glimpse. But while it was different and perhaps not as serene and mystical as our first day, it was a hoot to join in on a group and laugh at what a different experience they were having to what we'd had just the day before. And it gave us a chance to learn a little bit about the history of the site. But we quickly ditched the masses and continued our climb through the rocks to explore some of the royal tombs and return up the mountain to the Monastery for a second time.

I think the Monastery is my favorite of the two major buildings, and that is primarily because of its location and grand scale. It's about a 40 minute climb up the mountain to a point where you come around a corner, and the Monastery just appears before you in all it's splendor. It's not as elaborately carved as the Treasury but is perhaps twice the size. All impressively carved in one piece out of a solid rock face. Across from the Monastery and up a hill just a bit is a gift/tea shop that I think has the best view of most any tea shop of the world. They have rows and rows of low sofas with comfy pillows and delightful black tea with fresh mint leaves, so we got a couple of tea cups and unpacked our lunch picnic. Paul has accquired an appreciation for the picnic and has been collecting beautifully staged food photos from various travel destinations. I think this will turn out to be one of the best - fresh pitas, tinned sardines, dried apricots and figs, salted almonds, and amber cups of tea set against a backdrop of the Monastery. While we sat enjoying our lunch and view, a couple of the local Bedouin boys bragged that they could reach the top of the Monastery and set off to scramble like mountain goats up the rock face and to the very top of the spire 30 meters from the ground below. It was nervewracking and exhilerating to watch. And not something I'd EVER dare attempt.

The view from the top of the mountain to the surrounding area is again stunning. Not something a photo can even remotely do justice. They've called the best lookout point the "View of the End of the Earth", and it truly is. Not a tree in sight and jagged cliffs all around dropping off to the valley between the mountains of Jordan and Israel and the Dead Sea far out of sight in the distance. We made it back down the mountain and through the park to the entrance again right as they closed at dusk and were welcomed into the city by the haunting call to evening prayer. A delightful dinner of the best tabouleh, falafel, and hommous ever, a good rest, and we were off at daybreak to return to Israel.

And here came the next hiccup. We'd calculated our combined finances to cover everything down to the last Jordanian Dinar thinking, on my failing, that the exit tax was 5 JD per person. Between the two of us we had 11.5 JD remaining when we got to the border with no ATM machine, no willingness to take foreign currency, and a request for 16 JD to cover our exit. Oops. Fortunately, we crossed at just the same time as a good natured Kiwi couple who had enough to get us up to 15.5 JD, and the border agent reluctantly let us pass with the short change. Thank goodness for that since we had a 10 am flight to catch to Tel Aviv and not a lot of time to spare. Especially considering the Israeli airport security. Wow. Before we could even check in for our flight, we had to wait in a long line for security clearance that placed us in front of a grim-faced young woman who wanted to know where we'd been, why we were traveling, and how we knew each other. Then she asked Paul to step out of earshot to wait for her colleague and started in on me with the Spanish Inquisition. Another woman came along to give Paul the same questioning. How did we know each other? How long had we known each other? How did we meet? Why were we traveling? Where had we been? Where had we stayed? Where had we eaten? What did we do for a living? Why were we at the conference? Who had invited us? Why had Harvard decided to send me rather than someone else? Did I have a business card? (no, scientists don't carry business cards) Did I have proof of the conference? Would I show her my presentation? And each time I had to dig for a hotel booking or meeting roster, she started in on another question that would distract me from finding the first answer, and she re-asked the same questions several times trying to find inconsistencies in my story. After a good 15 minutes of drilling us both, the two women conferred on whether our stories were consistent and released us to catch our flight. They apparently do this to ensure we aren't using each other, or no one else is using the two of us to compromise their security. And they're really good at their job. Once the woman questioning me was satisfied, her whole demeanor changed, and I was joking with her that I couldn't have kept anything from her if I'd had anything to hide. Super intimidating!

Onward to Petra, Jordan

So as I said, primarily I was away for the conference, but those of you who know me well know that I will take every opportunity for adventure as it presents itself. A good friend for years had been to this same conference when it first occurred 3 years ago and had decided that if it happened again he wanted to hop over to Petra. I don't have to be asked twice. So since I enjoy trip planning so much, and life had taken over his time, I just decided to take on all of the arrangements for that leg of the journey - border crossing, taxis, onward flights, etc. With only a couple of minor hiccups that really amounted to no worries. We realized a day before departing the conference that the border closed 2 hours earlier that I had thought. Stupid military time. So it was a little bit of a rush getting there and getting across to Jordan, but ended up being perfect since we avoided any of the border traffic. Out of Israel, down the long walk through "no man's land", and into Jordan in about 15 minutes. The driver was supposed to be waiting across the border when we arrived, but no one seemed obviously expecting us. I called the number I'd been given. No answer, and the vultures were descending. I called the hotel owner who I'd made the arrangements with, and he apologized profusely that he'd forgotten to finalize the time with the driver who was at that moment 1.5 hours away in Wadi Musa (the village near Petra). Oops. The collection of drivers at the border told me one of them could take us for 60 JD. Uh, no, I had an agreement for 45 for the driver I arranged, so why should I pay more? They nodded in admiration of the good deal I'd made and insisted on talking to the hotel owner. So after some discussion and negotiation, a deal was struck that one of the drivers at the border would take us for my pre-arranged price. So we hop into a cab that takes us into the city of Aqaba and into a residential neighborhood to behind an apartment building where we hop out of the one cab and into another to make the rest of the drive. Don't ask why we had to change cars. Sometimes these things just don't need to be known.

In fact, the timing of everything was perfect, so getting into Jordan in the evening meant we could be at the gates of Petra by around 7:30 am. That let us get the amazing morning light and avoid the hoards of tour groups that pass through at the mid day. The entrance to the city of Petra is through the Siq - a long and narrow canyon with dramatic red sandstone cliffs rising on both sides that form a passage through loosely joined puzzle pieces. The city itself was build by the Nabateans more than 2000 years ago and was a central location for trading in the region. It must have been absolutely amazing at the time. This was at a pinnacle of art and science in the middle east, and the evidence for their advanced society is impressive - water channels were cut into the rock face that were covered to prevent contamination and had built in filtration for sediments. They even somehow calculated the gradient of the slope so that the channel is level throughout the city, thus controling the rate of water flow. And looking around the absolutely barren landscape, it's obvious why water was so precious.

The first "wow moment" is at the exit from the Siq into the front of the Treasury. This is one of the two most famous buildings at Petra, and it really is breathtaking to walk through the narrow rock passage and catch the first glimpse of the columned building. Made even better by the two resting camels in front and no people littering the view. We hung around the Treasury for quite awhile watching the sunlight rise over the rock wall to briefly bathe the glowing face of the Treasury. It's beautiful how the color of the rock changes depending on the light. The building itself is the best preserved of the site, and the intricate carvings of the pillars and sculptures just reinforce the amazement that all of this was done more than 2000 years ago, not built from stone but carved out of a solid rock face.

Onwards and further, you start to appreciate the massiveness that must have been this city at it's peak. There are caves and elaborate tombs carved into every rock face stretching through the valley for miles. We had decided to clamber up a mountain to the High Place of Sacrifice (where I managed to avoid the threat of bloodletting) to see the view of the surrounding valleys and then passed over the back side of the mountain past other monuments and tombs to work our way back around to the main route. I had thought that would be the end of our first day, and we'd save the major tombs and the Monastery for day 2 but was easily convinced to climb up to the Monastery with plenty of afternoon remaining. This meant a grand total of about 20 miles of hiking and probably over 5,000 feet in total elevation gain. I was pretty proud of my endurance and refusal to be "broken".

We reached the gate precisely at the closing hour and passed on offers for a cab ride up the hill into town. When you've already walked so far, what's another mile or so? Good decision, because as we passed through town we came across a bakery and decided to pop in for some bread to complete our picnic the next day. The shopfolks were extraordinarily friendly and gave us tastes of various sweets, so we purchased a couple of extra treats along with our pita breads. Off in the corner of the shop, there was a guy at a long table bagging pitas as they fell from the ceiling. Somehow we thought this was just the funniest thing ever - pitas raining from above, and I was taking video while we laughed and marveled at the whole thing. So some young guy came over and asked if we'd like to see where they come from. I said absolutely, and we followed him up two flights of a back stairwell into a room that was a maze of machinery. Every pita in the surrounding area must be made in this one bakery. Hundreds of pitas at various stages of production snake through the room, and they are running the marchinery from 3 am until 8 pm each day. The guy enthusiastically led us around to show us where the dough comes out in balls, how it gets flattened into pancakes, and where it travels along layers and layers of conveyor belts into the flaming furnace oven to be cooked. He even took our four steaming fresh pitas and replaced them with four that were straight out of the fire - doesn't get much better than that.

The lowest place on earth

I'm actually back in Boston now but sad that I wasn't able to keep this up while I was away, so I've decided to "back blog" the last couple of weeks since I last wrote from Jerusalem. 7 flights, 6 hotel rooms, 4 countries in 14 days, and maybe it's not hard to imagine why I found it difficult to find time to write. It truly felt like the Amazing Race at times. So here come a few catch up installations...

The primary purpose of the trip was an integrative musculoskeletal meeting in Ein Gedi on the Dead Sea. Best conference location ever. The meeting itself was fabulous - good speakers, good colleagues, and a great chance to catch up with old friends. But it also raised my standards for future speaking engagements...you cannot beat spending the afternoon before giving a talk relaxing at a resort and floating on the bouyant sea in the warm sun. A group of us, smaller than I'd expected, spent the free hours between sessions at the spa. Fantastic people watching. Folks from all over the world, and particularly the old israeli ladies, come to the dead sea spas for what are purported to be the great health benefits of the mineral rich mud and salty sea. So we joined right in the mud bath which involves slathering your whole body in slimy sulfuric mud that dries and cakes in the sun and makes it difficult to move. I joked about doing a slow "running man" until I froze in statuesque position. The guys took the mock mud wrestling approach. And then we strolled down to the sea to rinse off the mud and float. When I say "float", that's an understatement. It is impossible to sink on the Dead Sea. It is the craziest feeling ever. You aren't in the water. You're on top of the water. You can assume a full crucifixion position, fall completely asleep, and not drown. You might end up floating across to Jordan, but you'd arrive safely at least. But next time I will be bringing a little pair of surf socks since the shoreline is encrusted with thick salt deposits. The sea is apparently about 35% salt, which is pretty much super saturation, so the water's edge is almost like a coral reef of salt. Not fun on the feet, but worth the pain for the reward. And I do think my skin is radiantly healthy now!

Jerusalem

Warning: this is going to be a long post.

I arrived in Tel Aviv at 5:30 this morning and had an uneventful shuttle transfer from the airport to the Jaffa Gate of the Old City in Jerusalem shortly after sunrise. The scenery around here is lovely - rolling hills of vinyards dotted with green spaces and natural steppes of limestone rock. Every structure here is made of pale limestone which gives the city a calming quality. Especially at 7 am when you're one of the only souls wandering the narrow streets. I'm staying in a really sweet guesthouse that's a Lutheran Hospice. The best places to stay around here are apparently the ecclesiastical hospices for pilgrims who happily rent rooms to anyone regardless of religious affiliation. I picked St Marks because it was highly rated online, and the photos on their website made me swoon. Courtyard garden, roof deck with a panorama of the city, and recently remodeled rooms. All at a price that won't entirely break the budget.

Except that I couldn't check in until noon, so what to do besides hit the city and see what this place is all about. I brought no guidebook (didn't even look at one before I came), so I took a quick glance of the map in the hotel to get my bearings and set off. Old Jerusalem is divided into four quarters - the Jewish, Armenian, Christian, and Muslim. The guesthouse is more or less in the center of it all on the border of the Armenian and Christian Quarters. So I headed up through the Christian quarter, really only because I ended up following a group of kids make their way off to school, and realized I'd made one loop around and back to where I started. Back to George.

I'll start by saying that everyone here is extraordinarily friendly. I'm uber cautious, fully trust no one, and always have an escape route in mind. Also after 5 years in Boston and all my travels, it's hard to imagine anyone would want to just sit and chat without an ulterior motive. George was standing in for a friend as a tea and coffee vendor and had hit me up earlier in the morning, so I figured I'd stop off for a cup the second time around. He invited me to sit and visit, I figured I had nothing better to do with the morning, and thus started a charming conversation (through a smokers hack) with a sweet old guy who just likes people. He offered to meet me a few hours later for a personal guided tour, but while I like George and all, I couldn't see spending the rest of my day with him. So I bid a kind farewell and was off to explore further.

Not even knowing where I was going, another nice guy on the street quickly pointed me in the direction of the Western (Wailing) Wall. It was still quite wee in the morning, but the most devout of devout were out for the morning prayers. I went back by the wall in the evening, and it really is amazing to see all of the clearly different sects appear throughout the day from the various orthodoxies with tall hats and long locks of hair at the ears, or full beards with white stockings, shiny black robes, and big round fur hats that look like something from a car wash to rather western-looking young men wearing simple yarmulkes. People gather 24 hours a day to pray at and touch the wall - the men on the left and women in a separate and far smaller section on the right. A wide stripe along the lower margin of the wall is left from the hand prints of centuries of followers.

The outlook to the wall itself is an amazing vantage point for the religious aspects of the city, as from the wall - which is the most religious site in Judaism - one can see the Dome of the Rock at the Temple Mount (thought to be the ascension point of Mohammed as well as the site where Abraham was intended to sacrifice Isaac), as well as the Mount of Olives in the background. So from the wall, I wandered around to the outside of the Old City wall and up to where I could see enormous tour buses and throngs of visitors in the distance. The first site was the Garden of Gethesmane, where Jesus frequented with his disciples and went to pray the night before the crucifixion. The garden itself is still planted with centuries old olive trees, though I'm not sure if they're (probably not) the original olive trees. Though they look really old. From there I swam upstream to the Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdalene and the Dominus Flevit (The Lord Wept) Church. That is apparently where Jesus wept for the future destruction of the temple of Jerusalem. Onward and upward (all of the tour groups smartly start at the top and work their way down), I met Abraham, the streetside hawker, who gleefully showed me a panoramic poster and gave me a quick overview of the city skyline - for free because I'm from the same country as his new friend (and trainee) from New Jersey - and sent me on my way up the hill further to the Church of the Ascension. Unfortunately that was closed, but a nice young man whose name I didn't catch eagerly pointed me back down the hill to the Grotto of Gethesmane (where Jesus was arrested) and the Tomb of the Virgin Mary.

So I feel like I've had a whirlwind tour of religious history and saw so much so far, though I missed the Church at the site where the Lord's Prayer was taught to the disciples, and I missed the site of the Last Supper. Ah well, there's so much to see, and I'm doing pretty well without a guidebook. It's easy enough to pop in and out of enormous group tours and listen to their guide for awhile before wandering on to the next site. And the people watching is unbelievable - big groups of Fransiscan monks and Russian Orthodox Catholics in full religious regalia toting digital cameras and posing for photos in front of various churches and relics.

Evening here is hauntingly beautiful, and after a quick afternoon siesta, I headed back out for a dusktime stroll through the city again. It is really fascinating to hear each of the religions coexisting, if not completely peacefully then at least with some degree of respect. From near the Western Wall, you can hear the rhythmic chants of the Jewish followers, the Muslim call to prayer echoing hauntingly through the valley, and the various church bells clanging from all directions. But not all at once as if the mosques and churches are each patiently waiting their turn and one picks up moments after the last left off. I'm sure it's all random chance of clocks not perfectly set, but I'd like to think there's more to it than that.

Sardine can death traps

Public transportation in Kenya, particularly Nairobi, is a thing to behold with a small amount of awe and fear. Busses are limited, and in their place is a collection of thousands if not tens and hundreds of thousands of mini-vans called “matatus”. They’re unmistakable. From a far distance you can hear them rolling into stops, brakes squealing, side door sliding open with the tout shouting the name of the destination in rapid fire, and the horn tooting a quick beepbeepbeepbeep. And they’re thrilling. I waiting until I could get one of the students to take me into the city of Nairobi, since I didn’t feel bold enough to attempt the matatu by myself. They’re supposed to seat 14 but easily cram 25 passengers on board. They blare hiphop or reggae music. Some have a screen showing scantily clad women in the accompanying music video. And some are eerily lit from within by neon lights.

The first matatu we boarded was blaring hiphop at an extraordinary decibel level, but only in the high range. Annoying. No fear – about half a mile further up the road, we made a stop to pick up the recently repaired subwoofer. A few quick moments to throw it in the back and wire it up, and we had the full ear bleeding range.

Wednesday I had decided to go to Lake Naivasha with a couple of the gals from the workshops we were teaching. We got up and out and off to Naivasha town where we switched to another matatu to go the last half hour to the edge of the lake. Half way there, we pulled into a gas station, but not up to the pump. The driver and another guy came digging amongst passenger legs to retrieve two 5 gallon jugs that they filled and returned to fume up the inside of the matatu. Another few miles down the road, we pulled over to pick up a man and his young son and their stack of 5 ft logs that were slid in the back door, again in amongst passenger legs. All we needed was a match, and we’d have a pretty decent bonfire.

My goal for the day was to rent bike and cycle Hell’s Gate national park, but that didn’t go so well. One of the gals I was with wasn’t much of a biker and ate tarmac pretty quickly. I felt horrible for her, but she seemed to pick up ok and struggled on like a trooper. But it quickly became apparent that this was too much of an undertaking for her when we hadn’t even gotten to the gates of the park and realized we had a good 14k bike ride ahead of us with too broad a range of fitness, so we turned back to explore the backpacker lodge/campsite area and then made our way back into the little near village for dinner. And then drama ensued. I’m still not entirely sure what happened, but the one who pitched off the bike suddenly decided to go back to Nairobi, and her friend stumble stuttered and quickly followed. I was left with the quick decision – go back with them late at night or stay with the other foreign backpackers I’d already met and enjoy the rest of my visit at the lake. So I stayed, which was great. I ended up with a couple of ecology researchers – the guy is from Sydney, and his girlfriend is from Mozambique. They were lovely, we had a lot in common, and we just had a really nice relaxing day over lunch and a boat ride on the lake. I’m now wishing I’d stayed behind another day to visit Hell’s Gate with them on Friday, but I felt I should get back to finish work at KU – particularly to make a meeting with the ambassador. This was a re-scheduled appointment after we were trapped in traffic for 3 hours and had to cancel our first meeting. Unfortunately, with some schedule misunderstanding, I missed the second meeting as well. I guess it just wasn’t in the cards for this meeting to happen.

I am now lounging in the Amsterdam airport in an extremely long layover. New favorite airport. If you ever have to be stuck somewhere, this is the place to be stuck. I’m in an eggplant colored body hugging lounge chair watching music videos, and the whole airport looks like it’s got enough interesting nooks and crannies to keep me entertained for awhile at least. And there’s an art gallery around here somewhere that’s exhibiting “Dutch Cows”. Will have to check that out.

I’m home again in about 16 hours and looking forward to it. This has been a really exhausting but rewarding and fun trip. And it’s settled my wanderlust for at least a little while…

Giraffe Snot

This has been a pretty fabulous weekend. Of course, no trip to Africa is complete without the requisite safari. We departed on Friday afternoon with a fourth companion, Jen - a Canadian (the French part) who is 15 months into a 2 year round the world trip. Part of me is incredibly jealous and part of me is exhausted by the thought of being constantly on the move and unstable for that long. But most of me is jealous. I'll get mine in bits and pieces, I guess. The exhausted part of me is probably the "I'm not 22 anymore" part that's ready to be a bit more of a grown up. But not entirely. Not just yet...

The safari was truly amazing. We saw everything we could have asked for - huge herds of elephants and even a little little baby less than a month old. Dozens of giraffes towering from as close as 20 feet away. Lions and lions. The first night it had rained before we arrived, and the cubs were playful. I have spectacular video of six cubs play fighting in a flowering tree. It doesn't get any more stunning than that. And we saw loads of other animals - hippos, a crocodile (huge and from really far away), jackals, hyenas wallowing in a mud hole, zebras, wildebeast kicking up their heels, all sorts of gazelles, exotic birds, dikdiks, mongooses (mongeese?), and crazy blue lizards with pink heads.

For two nights we stayed in a tented camp managed by the local Massais. It was quite nice - a platform tent with proper beds and a concrete structure bathroom at the back with shower and toilet. Rather nice by backpacker standards. And our hosts were delightful. The Massai are one of the minority tribes of Kenya but what most people think of when they think of traditional native Kenyans. They're nomadic herders, and each clan has hundreds of cattle, sheep, and goats. In this part of Kenya, it is very common to see extremely tall and thin men wrapped in brightly colored blankets herding animals with a long staff. These guys kept a fire going at camp all night with one sitting sentry aside a long spear usually used for defending the herd against big cats. It felt extremely safe and reassuring.

We visited the nearest village which is open to guests for a fee of about $12. The fee is supposedly distributed amongst all of the local villages and goes to support services such as the local primary school. I didn't take many pictures, because I don't like for this sort of thing to be a spectacle and to dehumanize people even though they're opening their village to us. But it was fascinating. The houses are short and squat mud structures with straw roofs and are build by the wives before marriage. There is a big termite problem (we've seen loads of the flying nasties), so they have to pick up and move the entire village about every 9 years. It's a polygamous society, and the chief's son who led our group told us his father has 4 wives and over 20 children - 7 of whom were born to this man's mother. The clan are all related descendants from one grandfather, so any of the men have to take wives from other villages. The first wife is arranged by the parents of the son, and if he chooses to take additional wives then he gets to pick those himself. The dowry is 10 cows, but that can be reduced if the man is particularly fit and able to jump extraordinarily high in a contest among his peers. The Massai men decided that Jimmy's jumping skills should drop Amanda's dowry to a mere 8 cows.

Speaking of cows - the landscape and wildlife in the Massai Mara is unforgiving, so special care must be given to the livestock. They are let out to graze during the day but return to the village at night so none are eaten by lions, cheetahs, or leopards. The entire perimeter of the village is walled off with thick interwoven tree branches, and there are corrals in the center made of tall tree branches where the goats are kept separate from the cattle that roam freely among the houses. Each small house in the village has a closet-sized room where the baby calves are kept and another internal room where the baby goats and sheep sleep. I image it's a cacophanous menagerie at night with hundreds and hundreds of livestock packed in with people, but probably becomes as much of the normal background as city street traffic to some of us.

We made our way back to Nairobi after an early morning game drive on Sunday, and on Monday visited the giraffe park. It's a non-profit breeding program to reintroduce the endangered Rothschild's giraffe to the wild. There is a feeding platform where you can give them bits of pelleted food which brings them right up face to face. They don't want to be pet, so the only way to get up close is if you have food. As one of the guides told some spanish visitors "No comidas, no amigo". Well, I got super up close and personal in a Ghostbusters sort of way when I was face to face with one of the adult females as she got a tickle in her nose. Literally 6 inches away, full face slobbery snotty blast that left my glasses looking like I'd been through a rainstorm. Ew. We were later told that giraffe slobber is highly antiseptic, so I'm hoping I got *some* good benefit from the experience that'll keep me extra healthy for the rest of the trip :)

Sweet success

I think we're all feeling quite pleasantly self-satisfied. The two weeks we've been working here have been extraordinarily challenging, and I said early on that I'd be satisfied if we impacted at least one person through these efforts. It's been fraught with the challenges of scheduling meetings and identifying the right people with the authority and motivation to get stuff done. We started to feel a glimmer of hope early last week when the Director of the Centre for Research Development offered to follow up on the equipment distribution and usage. He's a really fantastic guy with a lot of experience both in Kenya and overseas. He's also got the right skill set and position to make a lot of positive change around here. He enthusiastically agreed to coordinate the chairs of the different departments, inventory the equipment, oversee a website that will detail the locations and contact info for each piece of equipment, and regularly check on the usage of log books so we can see that the equipment is being used and properly maintained. So if that all happens, win.

He also connected me to a number of people on campus he's recognized as needing extra assistance with grant writing. I had a meeting on Tuesday evening with a group of three women and was expected scientists. So I was pretty surprised when one said she's in the School of Fashion, another was in Finance, and the third was in the library. The woman working in fashion has a proposal to develop a skills training program for high school drop outs. The finance woman is writing a proposal for materials and support to increase alumni giving to the university so they can establish scholarships for orphans and disabled students. The woman from the library is writing a proposal to increase availability of library resources for the blind by developing a recording studio to turn some of the frequently used materials into audio books. So of course I was honored to help - and incredibly intimidated and a little terrified at first. But a lot of the essential principles of grant writing are consistent across disciplines, so I think I was able to be helpful. I'm scheduling another meeting for Friday through the research development office to follow up on these few and help others that are identified this week. And there's some talk of having me perhaps come back in the future for an intense one week grant writing "boot camp". We'll see. I said I'd be happy to come if they could provide the financial support for my trip. That puts some of the motivation in their hands and means they'll make the most of my time if they put the resources into having me back again.

But the most satisfying part of the entire two weeks was our final "wrap up" on Thursday afternoon. We plastered the place with flyers openly inviting all of the faculty, staff, and students - including the director of research, the deans, and all of the chairs. We were a little worried it wouldn't go well because of the hierarchy here - students and faculty wouldn't speak openly in front of each other. But we were encouraged by all of the higher ups who wanted to hear what we had to say and were intrigued by the unconventional format. So we put together a handful of slides highlighting our key observations and used that to guide discussion. It was fabulous - beyond all expectations. We have had a core group of about 15 students at all of the workshops, and they rose to set the tone. They talked openly about all of their concerns and frustrations - the faculty don't challenge them enough, they don't get enough mentorship, they'd like the opportunity to assistant teach. I watched the faces of faculty for the first half hour or so, and a lot of them looked pensively sour. But they sat there, and they listened. Then one of the lecturers who is deputy director of one of the research offices spoke up and thanked the students for their insight. She said she'd never heard these words from the students before and felt it was eye opening to realize their perspective. Then more and more faculty started to speak up, and before we knew it they were all engaged in a really frank discussion about their expectations of each other and hopes for the future of KU. The director of research, dean of sciences, and several faculty made little speeches about their new vision of collaboration at KU, and the director of research encouraged everyone to strive not only to be the best in Kenya or Africa, but to see Harvard as a benchmark for success.

Afterward, the students and faculty said that nothing like that had ever happened at KU, and they felt empowered. It was awesome. I emailed the group of students afterward to thank them for taking the time to be with us for the full two weeks and encouraged them all to remain in contact with each other and with us. Most of them have since written back with thanks and appreciation for our time and efforts. Several of them said that we have shown them that research is difficult but worth the effort. They say we've open their eyes and changed their lives. So even if we only impacted this small group of students and encouraged them to keep striving, I feel like we've done a pretty amazing thing.

Weekend in Mombasa

Mombasa is along the coast of Kenya, an old port town with a multicultural history that includes the Arab slave traders and British colonists. It's also a resort location, since it's reported to have great beaches. We didn't actually go to the beach, even though it was oppressively hot and humid, but it was lovely anyway. Hours and hours strolling through the narrow streets of the old part of town gazing at intricately carved doorways and elaborate balconies with the occasional stop to goof around with some random group of kids animatedly playing soccer with a long worn and mostly deflated ball. Everywhere we went, we heard calls of Jambo! (Hello!) and Karibu!(Welcome!). Even from windows several stories above where it was unclear anyone had noticed our passing. A significant portion of the town is Muslim, so there were the frequent calls to prayer competing with the hustle and bustle of street life and traffic. I was disappointed by the fact that the haunting reverberations can't quite reach deep into your bones like it does in Urumqi or Kashgar (China), but then this morning I drifted out of sleep at about 5 am to hear the dawn call. That was pretty special - the faint haze of early morning light, silence of the streets below, and a lone voice calling to the faithful in melodic tones.

We are back in Nairobi now. I am really enjoying my work here. It's a challenge - an immense personal challenge that I find to be really fun. I'll give you one example by way of my day today: we decided last week that it would be useful to call a meeting of the chairs of the science departments that have benefited from the equipment donation that was made by Seeding Labs in the spring. There are some complications and apparent misunderstandings that would be efficiently addressed with everyone present. The departments fall under two schools - Health Sciences and Pure and Applied Sciences. So first we talked to the dean of PAS who was on board and ready to schedule the meeting. But she said we should first coordinate with the dean of HS. We walked all over this immense campus on friday trying to find the office because we couldn't reach him by phone, failed until the day was nearly done, and resumed an attempted phone contact upon return from Mombasa. That still didn't work, and the internet for the campus was down (again), so we again made our way over in person and got an audience with the dean. He didn't seem to understand our request but finally said he could call a meeting of HS chairs but couldn't involve PAS. Finally, we got the full story from a faculty friend of ours - hierarchy. Each office on campus has a flow chart of the administration. Each person knows their place, who is above them, and who is below them. And there are rules. Chairs cannot call meetings of other chairs because someone above the chairs has to oversee the meeting. Deans can call a meeting of chairs, but only within their own department. So a meeting amongst chairs of two departments involves two deans. But deans can't call a meeting of other deans, because again you need someone above the deans to oversee the meeting. So that sends us up the food chain to either the deputy vice chancellor or the director of research. We are only here for three more days, and hectic schedules fill up quickly, so we'll see if this meeting actually happens, or even gets scheduled, while we're still around.

My window to Rwanda

The last few days have been an unbelievable cultural experience, and not just because it's Culture Week at Kenyatta University. Truthfully, we couldn't have picked a better week to come. Not only is it like we're touring all of Africa without leaving the campus, but I'm also getting the chance to meet some truly inspiring people. Two nights ago, I was sitting alone on the balcony updating the last blog post when a whole group squeezed past me to a table, and each one said "hello" on the way by. After a while, a very soft spoken, shy young man came over to talk and ask who I was. He was quietly enthusiastic and a little bit intense. He told me that his performance group is here from Rwanda to be part of culture week. Then his whole group convinced me to join them and proceeded to burst out into song and folk dance. It was indescribably beautiful. They said this is a sort of oral tradition that is a "pastoral poetry". Many of the songs and dances are performed by rural farming cultures to recognize their appreciation for the land and the cattle. The vocalizations are deep in the throat and nasal passages with a lot of harmony, and the body postures of the men evoke the horns and mannerisms of the cattle while the angular arms of the women and flowing movements are like stately trees and running rivers. It was beautiful and special because it was spontaneous and genuine. One of those unique cultural experiences you couldn't pay any amount of money to experience in a theater.

Last night, I joined them again for dinner and a couple of drinks, and we started talking about *everything* - academics, politics, family, culture, etc etc. After a while of discussing when I felt comfortable, I asked the question that had been racing through my mind from the moment I heard "Rwanda". Not "what happened?" We saw the news and heard the stories, and I'm sure that was only a fraction of reality - but that is precisely why I could never ask. It's only a fraction and yet a horrible story. Instead I asked "What's it like now?" I feel like I saw a lot of Cambodia, a country that also came through a massive genocide, and what I've seen was dark and deeply saddening. Depression, alcoholism, low economic growth, prostitution. It's a country suffering PTSD and not realizing it. So I wanted to know how Rwanda is progressing by comparison since our news doesn't cover what's happening there now. What I heard was inspiring - they credit the president that rose from that time for saving the country and in fact each of their own lives. Things are stable, lives are moving on, and while nothing is perfect (by their own admission), it's still like they have created "heaven" when before everything (even before 1994) was hell. Since the Belgian colonists left in 1963, there was one university in Rwanda until after 1994. Since 1994 there are now 14 universities. The One Laptop project has been incredibly active, and many of the Rwandan children are at least minimally computer literate. They're proud of their progress but see that there is a lot of work left to do. In fact, they feel like their country has come so far but fear that it won't continue to move further.

I'm actually really sad that I won't see them again after tonight. We are leaving for Mombasa in the morning, and they are returning home the same day we get back. Each of them has warmly invited me to visit them in Rwanda any time, and I think I will really have to consider it. From what I've seen of their hearts, enthusiasm, intelligence, and kindness, it seems like a beautiful country to visit.

One small step

I think I made an incremental amount of progress today that may have a monumental effect at KU. I gave a grant writing seminar for about 25 participants and went through the general structure and preparation as well as the expectations of reviewers and granting agencies. The whole presentation went really well, and I clearly had an interested audience actively taking notes and asking really insightful questions. A good conversation followed about international collaborations and preliminary data. (How are you supposed to get preliminary data when you don't have the resources or equipment to do some of the the first fundamental experiments?) One junior faculty member even gave me a grant he was about to submit to ask me for feedback and suggestions, and I think I can expect several more to follow. So I felt overall quite useful in expressing that this is a learned skill that takes years to acquire, that it's worth the investment, and that individuals shouldn't get frustrated by failure and give up. They seemed surprised by the rejection rate in the US.

Two things came out of these conversations that were particularly striking. One was a question - "Are there mechanisms built in that recognize when you have difficulty with an approach and spend too much of your money troubleshooting before things start to work?" That's something none of us really have to worry about. Grants in the US are *huge* by comparison, and we can spend a lot of time trying different things without worrying about the funds running out too quickly. We can be at least a little bit innovative and risky day to day. Here, a grant that is $20,000 is quite good. But that money has to be wisely and carefully spent, and there isn't much wiggle room for trial and error. It was a really good question and one I wasn't sure how to answer other than "lean on the experience of others to work out technical issues more quickly so you can move forward more efficiently".

The most animated conversation that came of the day was surprisingly focused on the budget. I hadn't planned to talk much about administrative specifics until I was in a conversation with a faculty member this morning who said that the university "takes" from the research money they receive. She really didn't like this. So I explained the way it works in the US and probably most other places - there are "direct costs" like salaries, equipment, supplies, etc and "indirect costs" that are the institutional overhead (space, administration, electricity, water, etc). The indirect costs at KU are about 15% of the total grant, but the communication between the administration and the researchers hasn't clearly stated what that money is for and how they should budget accordingly. One of the grants administrators (also a research faculty) was present, which was fabulous because she was able to clear up a lot of misconception. And I was able to back her up so they wouldn't be so suspicious. The researchers at KU had started applying for grants independently and taking money directly rather than go through KU because they thought the university was "stealing" what they'd worked so hard for. Or they stopped bothering to write grants at all. I can understand that. I feel that way about Harvard sometimes also where the indirect rate is far far higher. But I was able to explain the purpose for including those funds, and the administrator from research development was able to explain to the audience that they should budget 15% beyond what they think it will cost to do the work so that it doesn't feel like the university is "stealing". Win.


On a less serious note - it's Culture Week! This is fascinating. One week each year, the campus of KU becomes a festive environment of multiculturalism. They have performances each night from all over Africa, so we're getting to feel like we're traveling the whole continent in our very short stay. There were dancers, musicians, and martial artists from Nigeria, Tanzania, and more in addition to the students at KU. Even salsa dancers! Here I was captivated by the students from the school for the blind dancing a traditional African dance in grass skirts when the announcer enthusiastically introduced the KU salsa dancers as "probably the only students on the campus who know how to do this dance." Exotic is clearly a matter of perspective!

Splitting rocks

There is a lot that can be changed at KU but also a some internal resistance. Oddly, the resistance seems to come from some of the same people who want change. There’s an initial resistance that melts a little when you start to ask questions, but then I gently poke and prod and make suggestions, and people open up and start to talk. And I start to feel like I’m making a little bit of progress. The best example is use of faculty time. KU wants to expand their research program and start to be more competitive for grants and increase publications. But when you start asking faculty about the structure of their day, all they do is teach. Some are teaching three classes in a semester at KU and another two short courses at other campuses, plus over seeing the “open learning” courses that are essentially self-tutorial students who work and can’t come to class. Then they’re supposed to be supervising masters and PhD students, many of whom are not even working on this campus because they’ve gone to other institutes or campuses with better resources.
I had a meeting this morning with a faculty administrator. The first thing I asked is how the time is being managed for faculty and if he thought research expansions was feasible. He said that the lecturers complain that they teach a lot, and he sounded dismissive. But his face changed, with some surprise, when I said “Well, it sounds like they do teach a lot”, and I started to ask about his own teaching load. He listed off his responsibilities and said that he actually used to do research before the university started taking more and more students, and his teaching and administrative loads increased. Now he has no time for research and was only able to dedicate about 24 hours to writing his own grant. So I start asking about having graduate students take some of the undergraduate teaching load, and various faculty say “the graduate students won’t teach without being paid, and the university doesn’t have the money”. So then I went to a few of the masters students and explained to them how we structure graduate school in the States – how students are required to teach as part of the curriculum. They liked the idea and said they would actually enjoy teaching and being trained by faculty on how to teach. So there goes that straw man. Slowly slowly, bit by bit, I’m going to jostle this place around and see what happens. The resistance will come from the old folks who say “but this is how it has to be done, because this is how it’s always been done”, but the hope comes from one of the young masters students who said he wants to go through all of his schooling and professional training so he can eventually be an administrator and change the education system of Kenya. And another student who said “if you want to break a stubborn rock, you have to hit it harder”.

On being an American overseas

This was a fascinating day of perspectives. Evans was our gracious host (along with his two beautiful and energetic children), and we were out and about the city of Nairobi. We started with a hillside view of the city where he pointed out the major buildings, including our second destination – the former site of the US Embassy that was bombed in 1998. The site is now a memorial garden and museum. A marker in the garden lists the 218 casualties of the bombing, and the striking thing is that all but about 7 of those names were Kenyans. It’s sad and disturbing when any lives are lost, but even more striking when those lives aren’t even of the nationality the terrorists are bent on destroying. People who are just doing a job. Inside the museum, one of the placards reads off the story of a Kenyan guard of the garage gate who is credited for saving even more lives. The original intent was apparently to drive the van full of explosives into the underground parking garage, but this quick thinking guard avoided gunshots and grenades and managed to keep the van out of the garage. Instead, they detonated on the street and took more lives of passers by – but it didn’t take down the whole building full of people.

After a visit to the very well done Kenyan National Museum (complete with exhibits of venomous snakes!), we drove back to the KU campus through “Embassy Row”. The location is stunning. The embassies are scattered throughout small valleys with all sort of lush tropical vegetation. They look more like garden estates (albeit walled off) than any embassies I’ve ever seen. Until we got to the new US Embassy. Wow. The previous embassy was an unassuming concrete block office building in the center of Nairobi. The new embassy is a gianormous structure with minimal landscaping surrounded by high gates and guards that keep anyone without granted access at least 100 yards from the building itself. It’s a military complex. Understandably.

And now I’m settled back in my room flipping through the TV trying to tire myself enough to sleep before a very busy day tomorrow. It’s news hour. All of the channels are showing local Kenyan news. Except for one. Al Jazeera. It’s fascinating. What’s striking to me is that we hear at home about how it’s a horrible station that’s run by terrorists, but you know what? The anchors are all British and American. And the news they report has largely nothing to do with us. Most of the news is just news – riots in France, cholera in Haiti, Chinese protests against the Japanese. Truthfully, it’s probably far more world news that what anyone in the US ever pays attention to (there is a whole great big world beyond our borders). And even the ones that are about us are quite well done and to the point – like the current story on the impact in public schools of cutting property taxes in Arizona. Of course, I've only watched an hour or so, but I just found it kind of surprising. Something to chew on.

Aminals!

We’ve only been here for 48 hours, and we’ve had a fabulous time already. Yesterday, we met the director of the Center for Linkages which is the office that oversees international relationships at Kenyatta University. She’s arranged everything for us and introduced us to the chairs of the various departments. After lunch, we got a tour of the campus which briefly included the departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry and a long tour around the department of Zoology. The new chair has been in office for only one week, and his enthusiasm shines through. The chairs here only serve four year terms, so I imagine there’s a lot of change and a little turmoil every 4 years. He showed us around a few of the teaching labs with gorgeous dark wood benches and old brass gas fixtures. They were sparse spaces because the equipment is all stored away unless class is in session. I’m looking forward to next week and hope to sit in on a few classes.

But this weekend is all about fun, relaxation, and getting to know Kenya. Hudson picked us up this morning for a 2 hour drive north to the Nakuru Wildlife Park to see the animals! It was the first time we got to see outside the gates of the university, and the road we came in on is even more impressive by daylight. It will eventually be a major highway with four lanes going in each direction, but right now and for the last year and a half it’s been a red swath of dirt. The sides of the roadway are bustling with people on foot, and there is a large outdoor produce market not far from the university. There were hundreds of people milling about mountains of cabbages, bananas, potatoes, etc all stacked inches deep in thick red mud from the rains last night. Mmmm, tasty.

From the corrugated metal shanty towns, we turned down a road leading through a nicer neighborhood that got progressively nicer until we were in the “Runda Estates”. This is apparently the wealthy part of Nairobi, and it shows. The grandeur of the mansions competes with the extravagance of the US with one exception – heavily reinforced gates and high walls that gained razor wire and then electric fences as the houses got nicer and nicer. I had a chuckle at one that had invested in a “green” security system. They’d instead planted 8 foot tall cactus bushes all along the perimeter of the wall.

And holy missionaries, Batman! Ok, I know that I tend to exaggerate for emphasis sometimes. Just a little bit. But I think about one in ten non-residential buildings outside of Nairobi is some sort of religious organization – a church, school, orphanage, something. Seriously. They’ve got the Baptists, the Pentacostals, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Quakers, the Shakers, the candlestick makers. How many souls are there to save in this place? You’d think they must be fighting over the lost, and a main weapon seems to be fear. I saw plenty of signs about the wrath of God and the turmoil of humanity. Yowza.

About an hour north of Nairobi is the Eastern escarpment of the Rift Valley. Stunning view. That was one of those wow moments. Scenery you can’t do justice with a photo because the enormity of it all can’t be expressed in a two-dimensional image. Flat expanses of plains rimmed by volcanic mountains with a tiny little dot of a satellite station in the middle that I am sure seems far more impressive up close when not competing with the space surrounding. Further north, the Nakuru Wildlife Park surrounds Lake Nakuru which is just south of the city of Nakuru. Way hecka cool. I wasn’t sure what to expect but was sort of two minds about the whole thing. Either the animals would be spoiled by visitors feeding them from cars and would swarm in a very unnatural sort of way, or they’d be so skittish they’d be hiding in the bushes and we wouldn’t see anything. My how wrong I was…

This is a moment in literacy when I’m going to break the rules banning “laundry lists” since there is no better way of conveying what we saw: baboons, rhesus monkeys, pelicans, flamingos, zebras, antelope, gazelles, ostriches, rhinos (black ones and white ones), a hippo, giraffes, AND a lion. It was like the zoo but not at all like the zoo. Because they belong here. That’s what kept blowing my mind. This wasn’t the “Texas Safari” gamepark I went to as a kid where some rich eccentric weirdo imported a bunch of exotics to some random location. It wasn’t a zoo with “natural” enclosures where the animals looked bored.

The baboons had babies. Cute nursing babies that clung to mom’s chest until they tired of nursing and clamored up to cling to her haunches. Zebras ecstatically scratched their bums against well-worn trees. Flocks of hundreds of thousands of flamingos made the banks of the lake look painted in pink. Crowds of pelicans fishing in groups that swam together and suddenly circled and dove their heads under the water in unison to scoop up schools of fish. Enormous tank-like rhinos looked like a giant boulder with a snow plow for a head. A slow lumbering hippo surprised us wandering through the grass away from the shore of the lake. They look so goofy and non-threatening when they’re out of the water, but are one of the most deadly animals in this country. The giraffes were quite well-camouflaged in amongst the tall thin trees resembling their necks. And finally, just as we were leaving the park, we spotted a lioness that was only about 6 feet from our van and on a ridge right at eye level. Amazing.

Tomorrow we are touring Nairobi and visiting the national museum, so I am sure there will be much more to share. This post could get longer and longer depending on how the internet goes here. Theoretically, there is wireless internet, but it seems to not be working reliably. The connection in the hotel hasn’t worked since we arrived, but the graduate school next door has a separate router. Millie said it was working this morning, so us email junkies went on an excursion this evening after dinner – to no good end. We snuck through a closed gate and made so much racket we alerted the security guard who was super nice and let us wander around the outside of the building, through a barbed wire fence (there’s a lot of barbed wire here – keeps the students out of the landscaping. Well, clearly not very effectively). After much giggling and finally lining up our laptops in the dark along a low rock wall, we got the router connection but no internet, so I’m just going to be collecting these little stories until I can make a massive upload all at once.

Ga! Ga!

Hello from Nairobi. We made it in last night just fine - after a 6 1/2 hour flight from Boston to Amsterdam, a 2 hour layover, and another 7 hour flight to Nairobi. I was feeling pretty travel scuzzed by the end of that, so the hot shower in the Conference Center hotel and firm bed were very welcome.

We were met at the airport by two of the faculty who were our guests in Boston for the summer - Hudson and Evans. They couldn't have looked any happier to see us, and the warm hugs all around were very welcoming. Kenyatta University is on the other side of Nairobi from the airport, so we got a little bit of a tour of the city - albeit in the dark. What I can tell you of Nairobi so far: small shacks and old concrete buildings juxtaposed with glass highrises and a smattering of Mercedes dealerships selling giant SUVs. I have a feeling this is a country of contradictions. The main road leading from the city to the university is under construction, so it's mostly a two lane dirt highway that is variably converted to three or four lanes depending on the urgency and boldness of the drivers. There don't seem to be many small cars on the highways - mostly passenger vans and mid-sized buses. And a lot of the buses and lit up on the inside with brightly colored neon lights and have and odd combination of corporate advertisement and Bible verses blazed across the rear window.

Waking up in a new country this morning was blissful. It's peaceful but with the soft clamor of folks milling about the hotel. The landscape around at least this part of the campus is gorgeous, and it seems like every piece of vegetation is different from all of the others. The title of this post is referring to what Amanda has called "the Lady Gaga bird". It appears to be some sort of crow or raven but HUGE with a white breast, and it's very verbal. There seem to be a number of verbal birds around here, and they're roosting up in these gorgeous trees that are heavily loaded with purple flowers.

We're off soon to meet with our hosts at the university and get a lay of the land. I think the weekend plans are full of wild animals and a daylight tour of Nairobi, so we're excited to see what there is to see around here! More soon...

One step closer to home...

Well, it's been an eventful past few days. The guts have decided to behave themselves again, and I just managed to stomach a whole sandwich and a handful of fries.  That's important.  It's tough to make a recovery when you can't eat enough to maintain your strength.  It's also sort of a crap way to spend my birthday weekend, though everyone around me was really kind and made it as fun as possible.  On Saturday, I re-visited the English training center where I went last week and had another chat with their students. The best question this time was "Do you believe in UFOs and life on other planets?"  That continued on to "How big is the universe and is it shrinking or expanding?" and "What's beyond the edge of the universe?" They were also very sweet and arranged a cake for my birthday, and several of them sang songs.  In English and terribly off key.  Is was an incredibly sweet gesture, but something more traditional would have been nice.  Then my friend Nigar danced a Ughyur dance for us.  That was really special.  I got it on video, so I'll have that memory for years to come.  Unfortunately my stomach didn't cooperate and started to cramp again, so after grimacing through a round of photos I managed to get back to my hotel and crash for the night.

The day of my actualy birthday, Sunday, all I wanted was to go to the Fubar and chill with some good Western comfort food and relaxed company.  I didn't want to have to smile and show my happiness.  I didn't want to have to make or receive speeches about how much we're all appreciated for the hard work we've put into this project.  But that's Chinese custom, and therefore I had to seeing as my birthday was also happened to be my last night in Urumqi with our colleagues.  So I pre-arranged an "out" with my friend Hiroshi that would let me escape the banquet early while allowing my colleagues to maintain face.  I told them that a party had been planned for my farewell and birthday weeks earlier by a college classmate who lives in Urumqi (true, Hiroshi and I did go to Cornell at the same time but didn't know each other).  I then informed the professor that I asked my friends to wait for me since I had a very important banquet to attend with my colleagues. That made him feel important, it made me look good for keeping my appointments, and it got me out of dinner after only about an hour and no baiju.  I was particularly happy about that last bit.  I've been hugging the sink a little too much lately to want any Chinese rotgut in my stomach at the moment.

At dinner, I made my best attempt at a good show to keep up the honor and happiness. It was my farewell dinner, but it was also a welcoming dinner for a professor visiting from Shanghai.  He seemed to be a nice guy.  He spent 7 years at Rutgers as a postdoc.  He name dropped someone at Rutgers, and I didn't clearly understand the name with his accent.  He gently scolded me in that "you should know him because he's done blah blah blah" sort of way.  Okay, fine, maybe.  So later we were talking about his work, and he said he worked on genomics as a postdoc and is now working on plant and algal genetics and is interested in alternative fuels.  I said "Then you must know George Church who is at Harvard and works on blah blah blah" - all stuff that is directly relevant to his field.  He stumbled just a little and said "I'm not always so good with names."  I just smiled and said "I understand.  I'm the same way sometimes."  And with all of the pretention off the table we had a nice coversation about crop-based energy production and energy input versus crop yield for rice versus corn - his plant of choice.  I think I did well for my host professor.  He is establishing a collaboration with this guy to work on plant engineering, and having a bright young researcher from Harvard make a good impression on his guest was important to make him look good. I think it also went a long way toward strengthening our working relationship since he suddenly seems to be a bit perkier and more enthusiastic when speaking with me.

The escape to the bar was a little tricky.  One of the students was tasked with getting me into a cab except that she flagged one in a turning lane in heavy traffic and had to jump in with me.  She kept dropping hints on the way to the bar that she would like to be invited in to my "party", but I just kept playing clueless and said "I'll pay for this cab so that you have enough money to get home."  I hated to send her off that way, since she's a really sweet gal, but it would have looked *horrible* for her to find out that the "party" was me, Hiroshi, the other surly Irish owner Manus, an aged and decrepit old cat, and the resident drunk who laughs at all the wrong moments and keeps falling of his bar stool.  But all of that sounded like heaven to me, because I could belly up to the bar, toast myself with a weak vodka and soda, and enjoy the specially requested tomato soup that Hiroshi so thoughtfully had his kitchen staff prepare for me.  Not a bad 31.  And no harm, no foul.  Everyone is happy and feels honored and respected.  It's one thing to "know" the customs.  It's another to be able to manipulate them...

And now I'm in Beijing. It was kind of funny to get on a flight full of Ughyurs in the western frontier excited for what is probably their first trip to the big city.  I think they were all part of one big group, since the whole plane seemed to know each other.  I seemed to be the in-flight entertainment.  I kept getting funny looks and big smiles and heard "hello" and "thank you" from random directions once in awhile.  But all I wanted to do was sleep since I had woken up with stomach pain the night before and hadn't slept well.  My seat mate had other ideas.  I requested a window, but when I got to my row there were two men sitting in the window and middle seats.  No way, dude.  That's *my* seat.  So I politely pointed at his seat and handed him my boarding pass.  He pointed at the aisle seat, and I smiled but shook my head.  So they moved.  And then he tried to chat me up for awhile.  Not in any verbal language that either of us understand, but in a combination of fractured english, attempts at chinese, and lots and lots of hand gestures.  "Where am I from? How long have I been here? Where am I going? Am I married? Do I have kids?" Standard questions.  And then he indicated that he's married with two kids.  Very nice man.  With very sharp elbows that he proceeded to jab into my protruding ribs every time he wanted to get my attention.  As I said before, all I wanted to do was sleep, but he made it his duty to be sure I woke up for the drink cart and meal.  He got agitated with the flight attendant when he thought she was overlooking my empty water glass.  He gave me all of his cherry tomatoes as well as his travel companion's when he realized that's all I was eating from the dinner tray.  And at one point in the flight when he got up, he put his flight blanket over my lap.  But then I didn't see him again.  He must have disappeared to sit next to some one else, because we landed and he never came back.  It made me a little sad that I didn't get to say bye to Mr. Sharp Elbow Man.

I am now in the lap of luxury and loving every moment of it.  I decided that after "roughing it" for two months and my slow recovery from food poisoning, I deserve a little extra care.  So "Harvard" booked me a room for two nights at the Crowne Plaza by the Beijing airport.  I've seen enough of Beijing in the past that I don't care to do any touristy things and should reserve and increase my strength.  And I'm only about 10 minutes from the airport which makes catching my flight tomorrow a piece of cake.  The room is fabulous by any standards and especially compared to my adequate but meager accomodations recently.  A real king sized mattress.  That is the number one most exciting thing.  I've been sleeping on an inch thick cotton pad set atop a particle board frame (twin sized) that leaves me less than rested and with an aching back and hips every morning.  International cable TV with limited channels, but there's HBO and Cinemax which far surpass the CSPN (Chinese knockoff of ESPN) and the English language government run station that only plays Chinese language lessons and fluff news pieces. Though I may still have to flip back to CSPN for the World's Strongest Man competitions and the Snooker World Championship. I would love for the interior designers of the Crowne Plaza to come design my bathroom someday. It's all sandstone marble with a dark brown granite countertop and an in-set deep white procelain sink.  Very modern Asian and very cool. But my two favorite bathroom features are the enormous deep bathtub that would only be better if it had jets and the proper shower stall (separate from the tub) with two shower heads.  There are few places in this part of the world where you can find a bathtub, and even if there is a tub it is rare that you'd want to get in it. Usually there isn't enough hot water to fill it, or more often the water there is to fill it smells so badly that soaking is not appealing.  And it's nice to be able to shower in a stall without getting the whole room wet.  Most places have a shower head mounted on the wall and a drain that is often at the highest point of the bathroom floor.  Add to that the fact that the sink, floor drain, and toilet often share the same piping system, and it makes for a rather odiferous experience.

The next time you hear from me, I will be back on US soil.  My flight is tomorrow afternoon to Newark, straight over the North Pole, and then I'll be connecting to Boston by Wednesday night.  It will be soooooo good to be home.  Darren and I have spent 5 weeks together since the first of January, so this travel blog is going to come to a screeching halt for awhile so that I can stay home and get back to my normal life.  It's been fun though.  I'm glad to have you guys out there reading along with me.  It makes the world seem a little smaller...

Be thankful for your healthy intestines...

I am so happy to be feeling better today, but it was a little dicey there for a while last night.  I don't know what hit me, but it feels like an 18 wheel semi-truck. I went with a friend to climb the red mountain to a pagoda on the edge of Urumqi and then to lunch before a visit to the regional museum.  Lunch was pullo with carrot salad (cooked) and yoghurt.  Okay, so maybe the yoghurt was homemade which makes it a little suspicious, but it tasted fine.  And the carrot salad was cooked.  And it was a nice clean restaurant (by Chinese standards).  So that's the thing.  We're told as foreigners "if you can't boil it, peel, it or cook it, leave it", and I'll admit that I'm not always as diligent as perhaps I should be.  But it gets exhausting after two months, and you get a little careless sometimes.  I do avoid most street food (except kebab and fresh cut watermelon).  I eat in nice modern restaurants.  But I think the biggest problem in this country isn't even the water or the street food versus restaurant food.  It's the distinct lack of soap anywhere.  It is very very rare to find a bathroom in china with soap.  I carry a little bottle of hand sanitizer, but that's just me.  The guy cooking my food doesn't have his pocket cleanser.  And if he happens to have an infection, goes to the bathroom, rinses quickly with water (at best) and goes back into the kitchen, well, that's when all hell in my digestive system breaks loose.

I started feeling unwell in the evening, and then everything in my stomach came back up.  I called a friend to come over, and she brought me some bananas to ease my stomach and try to soak up the grease from the pullo thinking it just hadn't settled well.  Pullo is rice with lamb, and it's boiled for a long time in a big metal wok with oil.  So it's kind of greasy and heavy and sometimes doesn't agree well.  But an hour after she left, I lost about 2 liters of fluids and suddenly got dizzy and parched.  I called her back because by this point I had lost so much water and wasn't able to keep anything in my stomach and knew I was in danger.  I travel with antibiotics, so I popped a couple of those but knew I needed an IV to replace my fluids.  Mmm, that's fun.  Needles in developing countries.  So when that friend arrived, we called my other friend, who runs the foreigner bar, to ask about hospitals. He's Japanese and also lived in the states through high school and college.  In fact, it turns out that we were both at Cornell at the same time.  And he's been living in Urumqi for 6 years.  So not only does he know the good hospitals in town, he also knows my western expectations of medical hygiene.  So we hopped in a cab and met him and his girlfriend across town at the ER. Well, there was no hopping involved.  There was me doubled over with stomach cramps dragging myself into the cab.

I got checked in, and the doctor, who spoke decent English, started asking me questions. "Have you been drinking?" "No"  "Is your heart pounding" "Yes, a little bit".  So she hooked me up to a heart monitor.  "Hooked me up" is a very accurate description.  I felt like a car battery.  She took four clamps and connected one to each of my wrists and one to each of my ankles.  Then she lifted my shirt and put five little suction cup electrodes in various places over my left torso.  I'm not sure what she read, but I guess it was fine.  Then they did a blood test, which I guess came back fine.  Most of this got explained in Chinese to my friends.  I just sat and let them poke me and stick me hoping that eventually I would rejoin the world of the healthy.  But I did see needle packages opened in front of my eyes.  Very good. 

After the blood draw, I was moved back downstairs where we were told there are no beds.  Instead there was a big room full of sick people sitting in uncomfortable chairs hooked up to IVs.  Then all of a sudden there was not only a bed, but a bed in an empty room.  Apparently Hiroshi's girlfriend knows someone on the staff at the hospital.  That's how this place works.  You get things far easier if you know someone or have money.  So I got a bed, hooray.  And 1 ½ liters of saline plus glucose and an anti-nausea drug which rocked my world.  I started feeling better almost instantly.  Well, almost instantly after the nurse actually found a vein.  My veins are very very small as it is, and I was dehydrated to the extent where they were almost non-existent.  She stuck me in my right hand but missed.  I can't watch when they do this, but after she withdrew the needle and I saw that she was switching to a smaller guage, I said "*I* could have told you that was too big."  Second attempt worked, and by 7 am I was discharged and on my way back to the hotel.  I'm feeling a little weak and empty, but my veins have all reappeared, I can eat small bits of bland food, and my "functions" seem to be slowly returning to normal.  Hooray…

On being American in the Muslim world...

Things have been…eventful lately.  I've been fully immersed in Ughyur culture for both the good and the bad.  First the good.  A couple of days ago, one of my friends invited me to her Ughyur dance class.  That was fun.  We went across campus and up a hill to the arts school where she takes a beginning dance class.  The campus is fabulous – like any arts school anywhere, you see students sitting outside jamming, but the difference between here and home is that they're playing traditional instruments from this region.  First we saw a group of men with one playing the dutar and the others singing in chorus.  The dutar is a two-stringed instrument with a fat gourd-like body and a very long and delicate thin neck.  The sound is very evocative of its middle eastern roots.  And I think the young men enjoyed the audience.  The dance class was fun to watch, since I had been to the big dinner theater here where it was brightly lit with fabulous costumes but a little overly produced.  The authentic experience is in watching ordinary people learn and perform because, as I have been told "every Ughyur person knows how to play dance." Dancing and music are integral to the culture, and it's a deep heritage far different from the concept of "dance" in the US. After the dance class, we came upon another group of men playing a traditional hand drum.  It's round and flat, much like a tambourine except that it's stretched with sheep skin that has metal rings hanging from the edge.  It is played by both shaking and thumping the hands against the sheep skin and has a deep drum-like and metallic rattling sound at the same time.  Very cool.

Then today I arranged to meet another friend in the morning to visit her English class.  She is an assistant instructor at one of the language centers in town, and when her students learned that she had a new foreign friend, they all wanted to meet me.  So we walked toward the center of town into a highrise building, up four flights of stairs into a winding suite of classrooms.  They teach English, Chinese, Ughyur, and Russian, and apparently most of their students are Ughyur with a few foreigners from time to time.  But not many.  Only one of the students had ever spoken with a foreigner, and word spread like wildfire through the school that I was there. Before I knew it I was perched on a stool on a stage with a microphone in my hand.  The questions started simply. "What is your name? How old are you? Why are you here? How long have you been here? Do you like Xinjiang? What do you like about Xinjiang? What is your favorite Ughyur food?"  And then they got a little more complex as students warmed up and felt more bold.  The first challenging question was "Do you believe in God?"  Imagine answering that to an audience of about 80 Muslims.  I gave a delicate and truthful answer about being raised Christian and yet believing that all religions are cultural interpretations of the same "God".  That seemed to go over okay.  Their language skills are just about good enough to understand me, but not good enough to carry on a discussion about the topic.  Then I got "Is Michael Jackson Muslim?"  That was a stumper.  Good question.  Uh, yes? No? How do you explain that the Michael Jackson version of "Nation of Islam" doesn't really have much to do with the centuries-old Muslim faith.

But the real winner was "Why does America hate Afghanistan?"  At first I didn't fully understand his accent well enough to get the question, and my friend started to try to explain it. One of the teachers had a pained look on his face and said "No, no, don't.  Don't tell her." I had caught enough to understand the question and said "No, I want to hear what he asked and would like to talk about this."  I assured everyone that it was okay, smiled at the very embarrassed student, asked for the question to be repeated, and gave a long but simply worded answer trying to explain a little bit about America.  I started by saying that no, Americans don't hate Afghanistan.  In fact, the average American can't even find Afghanistan on a map (laughter from the class).  I explained that decisions were made by my government that a lot of people in the United States don't agree with. I talked a little bit about the election process and how we all get a chance to vote and change our government and that enough people were unhappy with American policy to vote for someone who will hopefully do things differently.  I tried to explain that, contrary to China, the American government can change dramatically in a short amount of time, and that I hope this is one way that we are changing - by having a better relationship with Muslim countries.  But at the same time, I explained the concept of "you break it, you buy it" and told them that we have contributed to an unstable situation and now have to stick around until we can make things right and give the countries (both Iraq and Afghanistan) back to their people.  He seemed okay with my answer, but I'm not entirely sure how much he understood.  He's a beginning English student.  Some of the more advanced students clearly understood and were smiling and nodding at points, so I hope that they can at least discuss it with him.  In any case, I felt bad because he left soon after that.  I'm not sure if he didn't like my answer or if he was embarrassed because the teachers tried to stop him from asking the question.  He lost a lot of face in feeling like he had crossed a line, and I feel bad for that even though it was out of my control. 

Most importantly, it's one little step in the big goal of "winning hearts and minds".  And it's critical if we're going to make progress.  People in this part of the world have a narrow view of the Western world – particularly America.  They believe what they're told and see in movies and on the news, and most have never seen evidence to the contrary.  I hope that through my being open and communicative, I can convince one by one that we're not evil and hateful people bent on a Crusade against the Muslim world. A lot of misconceptions here (and in the US) are due to lack of dialogue and lack of education.  At least this experience ranked second in nerve rattling to the guy in Kashgar last year who told me he hates Americans and wants to move to Afghanistan to marry a Taliban woman and raise sons to kill American soldiers. That was an eye-opener as to just how much damage has been done to our reputation and how far we have to go to win back even basic respect.