Another day another blog

Spot the Camel! Our Table Waiters

Another day, another Blog..

Sunday February 3 and we were in Mombasa, Kenya, along side the dock at the unearthly hour of 6 am, not that we chose to crawl out at that time but there were Kenyan drummers on the dockside to welcome us a little later when we walked down the gangplank.

JB had not been to Kenya since 1957 when he was but slip of a lad who came here from Aden for a spot of R&R, nowadays he’s about 3 stone heavier though that seemed to be about the only change. The poverty is in evidence everywhere and Sue got very upset at the state of the poor trading people who were trying to sell rich tourists their wares. In fact although she was inclined to bargain when buying anything she always ended up buying more than she wanted out of sympathy for the seller who always pleaded “poverty and many children to feed!”

In order to see as much as possible we booked on one of the Saga organised tours, a so called “Panoramic” but the panorama was not up to much. There was a Hindu temple which was impressive if you’ve not seen one before. A stop at Jesus Fort, dating back to the 1500’s and a view of the markets and the shanty towns, all too dangerous to let us out. On top of that it was Sunday so nearly all the shops were closed. Many of the local Christian population were at worship in the open air ( not that they had a lot to be thankful for) and in the large parkland many families were out picnics onde the shade of large trees, watched by one or two scruffy camels! By contrast we were taken to the Nyali Beach Hotel for coffee and this was on a beautiful coral beach where again a couple of camels were taking a bath, (see picture of Sue, somewhat masked by the photographers thumb.) JB found a business centre where he could do the internet access and then it was back to the ship for a late lunch.

Again we noticed the large differential between the way the locals live a few hundred metres outside the hotel grounds and the life style of the affluent tourists staying there. It’s quite upsetting when you realise how big the gulf is between “us” and “them”, yet the problems of poverty, hunger, education and aids will never be cured by a few tourists buying souvenirs. One realises what an impossible task the various helping charities have set themselves in trying to improve things and we can only admire them for trying. If you stop too think about it, and we did, it’s just overwhelming and made us feel somewhat humble and over privileged.

Sailed away to in the direction of Seychelles at 5.30, much food for thought.