jonnywhite

When last I wrote I was looking forward to a Safari in the Serengeti and the Ngorongoro crater. We spent our 3 days off hanging out of the roof of a jeep and saw every animal you could want to see in Africa. Particularly incredible were lions slumbering on huge rocks jutting up from the plains (think Lion King for the scenery), a leopard sleeping in a tree, giraffes, hippos, elephants, cheetahs, a rhino, and wildebeests, hyenas, zebras, and impalas 20 feet away. The animal highlight, however, was a bush pig that did a midnight raid for a KitKat bar wrapper in the tent of one of our riders - a kindly, quiet British lady. The pig ripped and broke the tent but was no match for Judy, who screamed and punched the pig in the face repeatedly until it ran away. This lead naturally to delightful fun for the remainder of the trip in sneaking around making pig noises outside tents at night.

And after a lovely rest, complete with a feeling of guilty pleasure for not riding for 3 days, we’re back on the road. We just spent a wonderful seven days riding through Tanzania on dirt and mud roads with an absolutely incredible number of thorns, and thus an incredible number of punctures (I think the record was 7 in a day). We also had rain most days and nights. Changing tires and running out of spare tubes (and so repeatedly patching old ones in the mud and rain) had some of us a little flustered, however the group’s (and my) spirits are now high. We’re going to hit pavement tomorrow and there are only 2 days of off-road riding left in the whole trip.

I had a realization whilst riding in a particularly bad mood after 2 flats and a crash exacerbating my hand injury in the rain on the morning of my birthday. I was questioning (again) what the heck I was doing here and concluded that I could see the trip as a circumstance I was caight in or as a decision that I'd made. If you see life as a series of circumstances you are caught in (work to make money, make money to pay the bills, pay the bills to keep working), then taking hard earned time and money to suffer riding everyday and sleep in the dirt at night makes no sense, when you ask yourself what you are doing it for. BUT, if you see life as a series of decisions, and in each one you can choose to expand your horizons and challenge yourself or to stagnate and shrink away, then all of a sudden there is a great reason to be on this trip. I think that this type of thinking is one thing that has made the company on the trip, a bunch of wierdoes choosing to ride 7 hours a day and camp without even water for washing some nights for 4 months, so interesting and has allowed us to help each other and keep on.

So with our good spirits, a bunch of us hit up a local pub last night (conveniently the day following my 25th) for some silliness, which has been rare because we’re normally too tired and normally sleeping along the roadside. The evening had lots of laughs and ended back at camp with us zip-tying some of our slumbering comrades’ tents closed and pulling out the poles, which leaves the sleeper basically confused and swimming in a nylon sack. The evening then really ended with some tackling between sleepers and trouble-makers, but we’re friends again this morning.

And so on we go. We’re 4 days from the Malawi border. Tanzania has been quite rustic, with hardly a paved road, even in the cities. there have been locals all along the road and at our camps mostly living as they have for a few thousand years, herding and hunting animals while dressed in cloth and carrying bows, spears, and swords. Four nights ago a few of our group were lucky enough to wake up and very very warily, initially, join a tribal celebration in the middle of the night a few hundred meters from our camp. They danced and sang and drummed in the pitch dark without being able to see the faces of the hundred or so children and adults dancing, singing, and drumming with them. They could hardly put the experience into words (or walk) in the morning and were a little freaked out by some parts of the celebration (seizures, chanting, everyone talking over each other in prayerful tones at once) but didn’t regret the experience at all. I wish I had been there but I was, as usual, passed out in my tent by 8pm and sleeping like a log. Somebody will wake me if such a chance comes up again.

(pronounced Nai-robbery by people who find themselves funny and don't tire of telling the same joke... yes, they're everywhere)

So we've been in rural Africa and the Dida-Galgalu desert for a few weeks and I haven't been in a modern city in a while. Now that I am in one, something is a little odd, I can't quite put my finger on it... the traffic is normal, big buildings, everyone rushing, oh wait...that's it! I'm the only white person! As I travel alone through Nairobi it's a very interesting and unusual sensation for me, being a minority in a big city. Little kids point, I'm harrased by salesmen, and I'm aware that everyone is conscious of me although most react no differently.

Despite my uniqueness, I'm greatly enjoying Nairobi. I gorged myself on Italian last night and had an omelet, toast, juice, a medium pizza, and a milkshake for breakfast. If you could see how much weight I've lost you'd understand. It's quite impossible to consume the number of calories we are burning, although I do enjoy trying - except for how it feels on the bike when you eat like that and then drink 10 litres of fluids a day.

As I must document a few major highs and lows since Addis, I'll begin with the lows. I have had two major crashes, both involving locals. The first came in Ethiopia just a few days out of Addis, flying through a town in a pelaton (group of riders drafting each other to cut down on wind resistance). These 'towns' consist of huts that are shops and houses all lining the one road. The entire population of the town is usually out on the road in between these places and vehicles passing through honk like mad to clear the people out. Cyclists shout like mad. The trouble with this is that we draw the reaction that aliens driving down Spring Garden Road in spaceships, shouting like mad, would in Halifax. Locals generally see you and leave a line but many come running out to push and see what's happening. Some like to stand in front of you until the last second, pretend to hit you, spit at you, or throw things. As I do not have time to beat up every person who does this in Ethiopia I generally ride through, dodging as necessary. For a pelaton, the locals generally give a little more room, but on this occasion one curious cyclist coming the other direction got too close. Our leading cyclist hit the brakes and we all swerved and hit the brakes in sequence, but I wound up swerving to get away from the rider in front of me into the local cyclist at about 40kmph. We crashed and flew, bits everwhere. A huge crowd gathered, then got pushed back as we lied in the road. The local on the bike was half-pulled, half-dragged into the crowd, presumably for fear of what we might do to him. I got away with a few scrapes, a bloody imprint of a bar-end in my shoulder, and what we now think is a fractured index finger and a bend in my bike, easily repaired. While no one was very impressed with the local rider (who we didn't see again) I maintain that the accident was my fault for riding too close and fast through a town. In Canada he would be at fault (wrong side of the road, swerving at us...) but here we are in their land which operates their way and can't expect clear roads or people to behave as we would like.

The next accident was slightly more humorous but requires some background information. With the fractured finger I had to put thick pads on my handle-bar grip for the rough roads and can only use one hand to shift and brake - the other stays on the padding for the 'smooth' parts and has to be lifted for rough stuff. There has been a major drought in Kenya (meaning no water-bottle showers for a few days...pee-ew!) and there were a bunch of local kids hanging around the only puddle we would see in three days of riding through the Dida-Galgalu desert. When the kids saw the rider in front of me coming, they came together, yelled, gestured, danced, and them split at the last second to let him through. I was 50m behind and they turned to put on (presumably) the same show for me. Things went well until the 'split' part. All the children ran to one side or the other save one pea-brained 13 year old. He decided to run forward. All I saw was legs and arms in front of me as I careened into him and slammed on the brake. And therein lies the problem. With two brakes the wheels lock and skid and one can swerve and stop quicky. With one brake, the one on the front wheel, the bicycle front flips and the rider gets tossed, in this case, swearing, over a confused pea-brained child, into the puddle. The kids ran for their lives and the riders behind me where kind anough to take pictures and then help me up upon finding me laughing at myself sitting in the only puddle in Kenya. Palms and knees got scratched but nothing too serious, I refused to comment on the accident upon arriving at the finish line covered in wet mud and simply told people I had gone for a swim.

The high points have been this awesome country. We camped in Marsibit at a campsite overrun by very 'interactive' baboons in the trees (very keen on us and our food) and I woke up to people running by my tent to see the elephants in the trees nearby. Elephants actually move very gently and quietly and were incredible to watch tiptoeing through the forest on their huge pads, picking at leaves and moving away at any sound we made. We saw the limited town of friendly rural Kenyans, bought togas for the equator party, and had a bar-b-que that night. The equator party was a few nights ago and featured awards for the loudest snorer, biggest porridge eater, and most awesome farter among other things, as well as dancing at the hotel-ish campsite we were parked at. I actually stayed up until 9:30 for the party but had to make up for the sleep deficit later.

The trip is getting more 'civilised' as we get South and the riding should be getting easier. We have actually had pools at our campsites 2 nights this week and took over a bar for the equator party. We can get milk products and cold drinks in the big towns and fruit on the roadsides. We have 3 days off coming up in Arusha, Tanzania (2 days ride) for which I am going on a (hopefully restful) Safari through the Serengetti and the Ngorongoro Crater with other riders. The toughest section of riding (northern Kenya) is behind us and we will be mostly on pavement from here on out. Personally I am grateful for the change given that my health has been less than perfect lately, causing some agnoizing rides, and I hope to recover and speed it up on the road again. I actually came in dead-last, behind 63 year-old leisure riders, yesterday because of low energy levels and the state of my stomach, but am feeling stronger already today and plan to recover fully in Arusha.

Tour D'Afrique also did it's first bicycle donation yesterday to Nairobi women and youth groups, a ceremony I attended with great interest. In Africa people are incredibly resourceful with what they have. We have seen people riding bicycles with crates of bananas and sugar cane piled high on the front and three children on the back to get to the market, or with 2 or 3 full grown adults on the back, or carrying more produce or goods that I could fit in a car. The women explained how previously donated bicycles are used to bring medicine and food to AIDS-infected women in the slums, as ambulances to bring people from rural areas to medical care, and how they are shared and constantly available for groups of hundreds of women volunteering to help health in their community.

One shocking thing in Africa that I have commented on in my own notes but not on the blog is how much of the work women do, particularly in less-developed areas. There will be almost entirely women carrying huge loads of wood on hunched backs, passing concrete up construction sites, and laying brick or digging holes and any other hard labor you can imagine. Men sit and supervise, drinking cokes and smoking cigarettes. When you consider Africa's history it makes sense in a sick sort of way. In North America we have an ideal notion of someone who is happy in their work contributing something valuable to society and making good money doing it. The men used to be thought of as more capable and the primary breadwinners, although this is appropriately evening out. Here in Africa, the 'ideal' evolved from slavery, which is to sit and do nothing and make others work. Since the men are more powerful, this is the role they aspire to. While the women bear the loads they reap the benefits. Imagine watching your mother or sister carry 80 pounds of sticks 8 miles to a construction site. There is a realization going on here that women should not be working for men but for themselves and there are people doing incredible things all over Africa to achieve that end. In most major cities you will see initiatives for women helping women, microbusiness efforts, education efforts, health efforts.

It's amazing to see these efforts in action and to hear about their successes, as we did yesterday. It's also amazing to see the intimidation and abuse of power by male officials. During the ceremony, each woman that spoke told her story and how the bicycles had helped her small group to make a difference and thanked Tour D'Afrique and did not ask for anything from the (relatively) rich foreigners ('Mzungus' here). Each woman also (seemnigly reluctantly) paid respect to an attending 'official' before speaking. This official got up and hounded the Mzungus to attend the expensive tourist parks in and around Nairobi without even acknowledging the women's groups for who the ceremony was being held. There are alot of changes coming around here and I am grateful to see some of Africa as it is now, and very eagerly await seeing changes take place in the future.

Thanks for reading, I'm hoping to post many many pics very very soon (internet works in Nairobi) and would love to hear from you. All the best.