5 Things I Will Miss in Kenya

I’ll just go ahead and say it now—I’m not going to say anything about people I will miss.  Obviously I will miss my friends and coworkers here, but I’m sticking with the food, places, and things that cannot be replaced in Minnesota, at least not perfectly.

1.     Chapatti: 

Chapatti are sort of like flour tortillas, but thick, really soft, and fried.  They are sort of a means of getting food in your mouth here, and they are delicious.  Use them to soak up the rest of soup, make an African Taco (copyright 2015 Erin) by filling it with beans, or dip it in sauce.  It is just a really ideal food and I love it.

2.     Fresh mangoes:

At about 20 cents a pop, you cannot beat the fresh, sweet, huge mangoes that I can get at the shop down the street from my house.  There are mango juice stains on roughly 28% of my shirts at this point.

3.     Kitengela Glass factory:

See blog post.  This place is really cool and really close to my house.  I love the shop, the bridge over the gorge, and the crazy cabins.

4.     Random animals on the street:

Goats and sheep chill by the dozen on the field across the street.  Donkeys pull carts down the road.  Sonia saw a camel by her house.  Cats find us and move into the apartment building (I’m aunt to a cat named MJ who constantly escapes her owner’s room and comes crying at my door for cookies).  Warthogs eat trash in the gutter.  Baboons play by the river with their babies.  Zebras hang out behind the school I worked at.  Cows cause frequent traffic jams.  A one-armed monkey sneaks into ANU dorms and steals bananas.  Chickens meander. It’s a zoo and I love it.

5.     Tailors

Basically, it costs about 12 dollars to have anything I want made perfectly to my specifications.  That is all I have to say.