a map in nairobi

Hello everybody...its been 4 days now that I'm on the island of Rusinga and its great. Life here is like in the farm of Jack Daniels...No electricity, no running water from a tab, lots of animals around (cats, dogs, chickens, cows, goats, bats and of course lots lots birds…time passes slow and there are many hours of just sitting on your sofa, feeling the breeze, listening to African music and having long conversations with the family that hosts us. They are very nice people and they share with us their daily life and experiences and also they are doing a lot of good work for the community of rusinga…Of course during the morning we go to the nursery school where I'm spending time with the children and soon I will write more details about everything here on Rusinga. I have to say that the internet conexion is hard to be found and when you find it you have to be vary patient...But first I would like to share a story with you...is going to be long so take a relax sit, the smokers light a cigarette and here we go.....

Ps: it’s impossible to upload the photos. Maybe next time…



The last day in Nairobi, we decided with Inga to go alone to the city and do some last things before we go to the island. I wanted to go to the immigration office to ask about a multi entry visa (I have a single entry visa and if I go to Ethiopia and come back to Kenya to take the plane I'll need another one) and she wanted to check something on her mobile and exchange some money also. So we took a matatu from the suburb that Joseph lives and there they are 2 muzungus in the center of Nairobi. I had a rough idea where the office is so we started walking, after some minutes I want to be sure that we are going the right way so I took out a map of Nairobi, 10 seconds later a black man stopped and ask us what are we looking for and if he can help us.
 We are heading towards the immigration office. I said
 Ah, its five minutes from here, you see this big building? He said.
 Yes, we said.
 That's the one, he continued.
 Ok thanks, we go there.
 But now its not a good time to go, there will be a lot of people. Better if you go around half two

I looked my watch and it was 14:25.

 Well, my friend is almost half two.
 Ohh, my watch is not going well then he said. And where are you from? He continued.

In order not to explain everything I said to him that we are both from Germany.

 Ohhh, from Germany. Big country and from what I know is a European country. By the way, my name is John and I'm a teacher of Enlish and mathematics in a secondary school.

The guy seemed something like 45 years old, with a shirt and a suit and his face and the way he was talking was very funny.
 So, why don't we take a coffee for 5 minutes and you tell me more things about Germany, i'm very interested in learning about countries outside Africa.
 No problem, we said.

After all the office is very near from here. So we went to a cafe that smoking is available and I had black coffee, Inga had a coke and John a tea with milk. We started talking about the educational system of Germany and Kenya. He told us that at the same time that he works part time teacher, he studies a career in economy and there 3 years left to finish the university. We were having a very nice time the three of us, talking, laughing, smoking. I even said him that I was from Greece and not from Germany and no problem at all. I asked his age and he told us 36. We even spoke about religions and all these in 25-30 minutes. At one point he went to the toilet and I said to Inga “ that happens when you open a map in Nairobi” and we laughed about that.
Later on he tells us that he is not Kenyan but from Zimbabwe and that has been in Nairobi for 3 weeks. He and some other students have been expelled from the regimen of Mugabe and that they had to flew from Zimbabwe to Malawi then Tanzania and then Kenya to find a student Christian organization that can help them to go to England to continue their studies. At the Kenyan borders a man that works for the railway help them to get inside and gave them host in his house in Nairobi and the whole family has been very helpful and they have managed to obtain them some documents but the organization is no more based in Kenya but in Zambia. So they need to go to Zambia. From Kenya to Zanzibar by boat and then with another boat go to Tanzania and from there by sneaking go to Zambia. In total 18 days trip. We kept asking him various questions about Zimbabwe, his family, his friends etc and he was responding to all with no problem. So after he had explained all his adventure (past and future) with many details he told us that the cost for all that is about 180 euros and they have managed to gather till now 60 euros, so he asked us politely if we can contribute by any way and if we want we can give him our e mails so he writes us when he arrives safe to Zambia. We told him that we can give him 20 euros and we gave him our e mails. Time was passing so we asked for the bill and when the waiter came we also asked him to take a photo with the 3 of us. So after a while we gave him the money.


Till that point the story looks like a human, sensitive, honest and believable story where strange people meet and they communicate well and deep from the beginning. But thats too good to be true...
:-)
Ten seconds after we gave him the money a guy appears and he shows his id card telling us that he works for the Kenyan government and that the Zimbabwe man is being watched because he is a bandit and wanted.
 In Kenya we don't want bandit people and we want our tourists to have a good time in the country. So now, this man is going to be taken to a car nearby and we will have to go to have a chat with another man, in a cafe next to where we are.
Another man came, dressed very well and he showed us also his id card where we could see Kenyan armed office or something like that. As you can understand the situation changed immediately. From relaxed time with nice chat we found ourselves into this kind of conversation. The first man took John towards a car and the other escort us to another table where he started telling us about 10 years ago the american embassy has been attacked by terrorists and since then they are very careful and bla bla bla. 3 minutes later the first guy came with the paper of our e mail in his hands and told us that he found that John was carrying with him many banknotes of euros , dollars and sheilings that are fake ones and also some grams of cocaine and tomorrow is going to be taken to the court. But as they show us giving him money they have to check our money in the office because he may tell to the court that we gave him these fake money, so we will be in trouble.
We asked them to show us again their id cards and the first guy in a tough way he told us
 This is not a movie, don't think that you can do whatever you like.
I asked him if I can call a friend of mine in Nairobi and his reply was “ Don't even think about it”. Inga started talking to me in Spanish and his reaction was “ stop talking in your language”. All these were a bit intimated and we started to worry. We said to them that we want to come with them in the office where the money will be checked but they told us that we cannot enter a government building so we said we can wait down the building but the kept on telling us to take out our money and that in 15 minutes they will be back and no problem if the money are OK. We kept on saying that we want to go with them and no way we give our money to them like this. So the tough guy again told us “ do you want me to call the police and take you to the station where you will have to spend the night there and see what will happen tomorrow to the court? This is not a movie”. And we told him “ yes, call the police”. At that point the other guy told us that we can go with him to the building and give him the money there, we said OK and we started walking on the street. During our walk he asked us about our countries, about our visit in Kenya and other stuff and he had employed a very friendly attitude. After 10 minutes walking we were in the entrance of a place like a commercial center and he asked us again to give him the money and in 5 minutes he will be back. We didn't see any government building so we refused again and then he said “ OK, lets have a coffee and I will explain you some things. So here we are again in another cafe (this time I took a Tusker) and he started telling us that we have to be careful, that Kenya could be a dangerous place and that his boss will not be happy but he will tell him that he checked the money and were good and that he forgives us for everything and that he will tell to the other guy to destroy the paper with our e mails as along as we give him some sheilings so he can spare some beers with his colleague. As you can imagine at that point we just wanted to have this story ended so we gave him 2000 sheilings and he left. I looked at Inga and I said to her “ That's happen when you open a map in Nairobi”.
The next hours we kept talking about that and every time it was more clear that we got conned and that was a very well organized plan since the beginning. They were many clues about that but at the moment the situation was different. We were having a relaxing time with a man and suddenly we were being talked about terrorism, about no movies etc, in a strange country and I forgot to tell you that 2 minutes before the opening of the map I was telling Inga that I saw on the news that Kenya is the most corrupted country in east Africa and that the police department of Nairobi the most corrupted in the region, so at that point everything seemed possible. Of course after that and with our minds clear we could see that we could have avoided all this adventure but if not how it would have been possible to say the world famous saying “ I wish I knew then, what I know now”.
Sometimes you have to pay to learn and these guys are still probably drinking beers in our health, but what can you do. Sometimes you lose ,sometimes you win. I can imagine many of you laughing of what happened and I can tell you that we also laughed a lot with our selves and our naivety but I can assure you at that moment it was nothing funny, rather frightening. They crossed my mind images of jail and movies (midnight express) and of course my mother that has been telling me lots of times not to trust easily the people I don't know and as we all now very well “Mum, there is only one” but if I was listening all the things she has told me I wouldn't have met many of you people, and for that reason I'm glad that sometimes I ignore what Mrs. Maro tells me...