One Month Update

These are some highlights from my last month. I now have a new modem and can connect a little better to the internet.

Masai Mara

Once again my team of Americans, Canadians and Japanese voyaged to the far reaches of the Masai Mara reserve to camp and chase animals.

I managed to spot some lions and cheetahs this time. The Mara is one of the most spectacular parks when it comes to viewing animals.

A lioness even walked under the bumper of our van. I decided to stay in the van. We stumbled upon a family of cheetahs one morning but were quickly crowded out by 50 safari vans full of camera wielding tourists.

Sweet Water

This is one of my favorite game parks that sits just west of Mt. Kenya. Our

group of eight secured some great rates at the tented camps outside a

popular watering hole for giraffes.

I somehow convinced the owner of a 2008 Land Rover Defender to let me take the wheel for a day. The Defender is a cross between a Hummer and a Land Cruiser. Nothing gets in its way.

We drove it across rivers and pounded through thick forests in pursuit of elephants and rhinos.

Horse Races

Nairobi is home to some nice race tracks seemingly left over from the

British colonial days. The Ngong road Raceway came complete with a golf

driving range in the middle of the track. I look forward to attending the Kenya Derby on April 5th.

Ngong Hills

The outdoors of Nairobi are what Karen Blixen made famous in that

book/movie "Out of Africa." My two friends, Kerry and Eline, from

Doctors Without Boarders, joined a human rights lawyer and me to explore this vast region. We climbed the seven hills shadowing Nairobi. We even hired an armed guard in case we had to fend off the bandits, rogue buffalo or lions.

Mungiki Protests

The national underground quasi-mafia group decided to stage a protest

the day I was to visit two of Nairobi’s worst slums. None of our clients showed up for the meeting and we could not understand why. We later discovered that the Mungiki had not only frightened people into their homes, but they had effectively shut down most public transportation for the day with some death threats.

Goat Eating Party

Our chief accountant is getting married in April and he invited me to their “goat eating” party. I have developed quite an appetite for tender goat meat and now prefer it over lamb. The “party” was more of a fundraiser and roast for the bride and groom to be.

Fly fishing with the Hippos

A few brave souls came with me on a treacherous fishing expedition to the hippo invested Lake Naivasha. Hippos kill more people each year in the continent of Africa than any other animal. Juvenile giraffes lined the banks and watched us as we casted for prize black bass. We did not catch a single fish and managed to get the boat stuck a few times but we made it through with no hippo attacks.

Fishing Video

Work

While my blog may not indicate this… each week I work myself to exhaustion trying to make sense of a complicated business with a dizzying financial model. It is extremely challenging and fascinating work. I would like to think it is having an impact on the rural poor of Kenya.

Most of my time last month was taken up with entertaining some visitors

from the Grassroots Business Fund. I had a nice time showing Vinay

and Rafi some of the daily joys and challenges I face in Kenya (like

the internet connection). We ate kilos of Nyama Choma (Kenyan grilled

tender meat) and drank our fill of Tusker beer in remote places like

Kitui and Nkubu.

I visited another village bank in Itoleca and was hailed as Obama’s cousin and offered a boiled goat brain. My favorite town is now located in the lush hillsides of Meru in the northeast part of Kenya. Vinay and I were out with our field staff tagging our client’s cows for an insurance company. We tagged close to 20 cows in two days. I learned all about dairy cow breeds and their corresponding daily milk yields. A Kshs 120,000 ($1,500) Austin Heifer can produce as much as 50 liters of milk a day! This is some serious business.