The new musical trends taking over Anglophone, Francophone and Lusophone Africa

Dancefloors all over the continent are rocking to a new beat – unlike that of previous decades, this new sound is a homegrown one. Africans are increasingly listening to and dancing to African music. What makes this trend even more exciting are all the cross-country collaborations that are bringing musical genres and cultures to other countries. Whether it is Angolan zouk kizomba dance classes in Accra, Kenyan comedians speaking in Nigerian pidgin or Anglophone/Francophone collaborations, one thing is clear – our music is traversing borders in a way that our people might not yet be able to.

In Francophone Africa, there is no ignoring the power and influence of Ivorian Coupé-Décalé. A literal translation of Coupé-Décalé is “to cheat” and “run away.” Having originated in Parisian night clubs in the early 2000s, brought to the French capital by Ivorian DJs, the music initially celebrated Africans who were living the migrant dream, they had struggled as most migrants do and eventually make it -  many times through illegal means. The popularity of the music grew at the time of the first Ivorian Civil War (20002 – 2007) when a dispirited population needed to believe in the migrant dream – of escaping challenges back home and finding fame and fortune abroad.

Coupé-Décalé is extremely percussive featuring deep bass and repetitive minimalist arrangements. Vocals of most songs are usually about looking forward to a better future (e.g. Oudy 1er’s“Never give up”) about enjoying life despite its challenges (e.g. Molare’s “Sauvagement”, “Tu es fou elle est folle”), about an ideal pan-African existence (e.g. Serge Beynaud’s “okeninkpin” and “Kababléké”) and to a lesser extent about making money and living thegood life (e.g. Jodi’s “Beaucoup d’argent”, Dj Arafat’s “Gbinchin Pintin”) – this is in contrast to Nigerian afrobeats where the theme of making and “chopping” money seems to be more central to the theme of enjoying yourself, dancing, letting loose etc. In Ivorian Coupé-Décalé it is clear that dancing comes first, the popping of champagne bottles, the expensive cars and the fancy houses are merely a backdrop for the enjoyment.

When it comes to lyrics, Coupé-Décalé favors simple repetitive lyrics that match well to a dance. There is also an acceptance of a variety of voice types (almost mostly male)– from the raspy sounds of Dj Arafat and Debordo Leekunfa (“Shake your body”, “Apéritif yamoukidi") to the harmonious melodies of Serge Beynaud (“Talehi”, Mawa Naya” “C nous les boss”,) Shado Chris (“J'S8 Jahin Pret”) and Bebi Philip (“Move”, “Balaumba”, “On Va Piétiner”). Most Coupé-Décalé songs have a unique dance that quickly spreads throughout clubs in Abidjan and eventually to other cities. It is a typical sight to have hundreds of people all lined up in a club in Abidjan facing the mirror (as most people dance facing a giant mirror on the dancefloor) dancing for hours to a Coupé-Décalé set in perfect harmony. Coupé-Décalé is to be danced to and lyrics such as “Bougez/move”, “Levez les mains/raise your hands”, “Avancez, Reculez/ Move forward, Move back,” are quite common.  Though extremely quick dance music dominates the Coupé-Décalé scene, special mention must be given to artists who are challenging the status quo. Female musician Josey is managing to get continuous airplay with her slower catchy tunes mostly focusing on love and heartache (“On fait rien avec ca”, “Diplome”.) One thing is for sure – Coupé-Décalé will make you dance – whether you understand the lyrics or not.

From Lusophone Africa (Portuguese speaking countries) – Zouk Kizomba is working its way across African dancefloors and radio stations. Dominated by artists from Angola and Cape Verde, this sweet, seductive sound is winning converts, even if only a small fraction of the continent speaks Portuguese. Kizomba is the evolution of an Angolan dance genre from the 1950s – semba and its marriage with a Cape Verdean musical genre – Passada. Cape Verdean immigrants to France in the 1980s encountered Compas – a musical style from Dominica, French Antilles, Martinique and Guadeloupe. They incorporated its beats and rhythms to it and this musical genre got imported back to Cape Verde – not difficult to do for a country where more of its citizens live outside the country than inside it (Cape Verde.) The music spread through Portuguese speaking countries and when it made its way to Angola, it had the effect of slowing down the tempo of semba dances. Today this musical genre is famous in lusophone Africa and beyond and goes by various names including zouk kizomba, kizomba etc.

Stylistically kizomba has a slow, insistent, sensuous rhythm created via electronic percussion. It is danced accompanied by a partner, very smoothly, slowly and sensuously. There are frequent simultaneous hip rotations between dance partners, particularly in the quieter refrains of the music – and quiet refrains are quite common in kizomba. This is a dance for lovers. The main theme of zouk kizomba is love, longing and loss.

Contemporary kizomba musicians and songs to watch out for are: Cape Verdean, Netherlands based musician Nelson Freitas (“Rebound chick”, “Miúda Linda”, “Something good”, “Simple girl”), Angolan C4 Pedro (“Bo tem mel”, “African beauty”, “Spexta one”, “Robocop”), Congolese Kaysha’s kizomba remixes of US hits (“Diamonds”, “Drunk in love”, “All of me”), Cape Verdean, France based Jennifer Dias (“Sorry remix”, “I need you so”, “Viens danser”, “Reste avec moi” and “Femmes Fatales 5”.) You will definitely fall in love with kizomba and its enchanting beats and the angelic voices behind the music.

Last and definitely not least is music from Anglophone Africa. Nigerian afrobeats has taken over the continent resulting in several cross-country collaborations (J. Martins featuring Dj Arafat “Touchin Body”, Diamond featuring Davido, “Number one”, Diamond Platnumz Ft Mr Flavour “Nana”) and interesting remixes that cut across language barriers. Modern day Nigerian afrobeats clearly marks the country’s cultural dominance on the continent. First Nollywood, now the music – Nigeria is quickly determining what is considered as contemporary African culture. The influence of contemporary Nigerian music has gone even beyond African borders to the West. D-Banj’s “Oliver Twist” and “Fall in love” are as much at home in clubs in Lagos, Kampala and Durban as they are in London, Boston or Amsterdam. Davido & Meek-Mill’s (“Fans mi”), P-Square and Rick Ross’ (“Beautiful Onyinye”) – Afro-beats, hiphop collaborations are now becoming commonplace.

Nigerian afro-beats was initially typified by the presence of the talking drum, but electronic music is increasingly replacing traditional percussion instruments. Nigerian afrobeats is now best known by the use of some key elements – Nigerian pidgin, modern Ankara outfits (Tiwa Savage, Chindinma, Yemi Alade etc.) In terms of themes, the overarching one is wealth, fame and fortune (Davido ft. Olamide “The money”, P-Square ft. Don Jazzy “Collabo”). Sub-themes are (i) Religious gratitude for fame and fortune (Koredo Bello’s “Godwin”, Yemi Alade “Na gode” and Wizkid’s“Ojualegba”) (ii) Love mostly ending in a grand engagement or marital bliss, wealth, fame and fortune (a grand wedding with breathtaking views, Bentleys in the background, private jets landing, speedboats carrying champagne and dollars, foreign violinists is usually required for this.) e.g. Flavour Ft. Chidinma “Ololufe”, D’Banj’s “Fall in love”, Flavour “Ada ada”, Davido’s “Aye” and Tiwa Savage’s “My Darlin’.”

Of course there are some outlier songs and artists in the Nigerian afro-beats sphere, though the typical song that crosses the continent tends to follow the three main themes above. Credit has to be given to Nigerian afro-jazz/soul musician Omawumi for “If you ask me”, tackling the issue of incest and abuse. A song that will not soon be forgotten is Yemi Alade’s “Johnny” on dealing with serial philanderers. We cannot forget the strong neo-feminist stance of Tiwa Savage’s “Kele kele love” or the absolute dance-ability of Burna Boy’s “Yawa Dey” or Patoranking’s “Mywoman.”

No matter what one’s opinions are about the subject matter of the music, we do have to accept that it is an exciting thing indeed to see Africans embracing music by our own people, in our languages, telling our own stories. This is part of a larger cultural trend seeing Africans looking inside to reclaim what we might have lost. As the Sankofa bird symbol of the Akan tribe reminds us, “It is not taboo to go back to fetch what is at risk of being left behind.”

Beyond the Africa Visa country openness index – what are the barriers to Africans traveling to other African countries?

The African Development Bank (AfDB) recently put out an Africa Visa Openness report – the first of its kind – assessing how easy it is for African travelers to visit other countries on the continent. For me, this report could not have been more timely.  I am a Kenyan citizen. At the time I was in Ivory Coast jumping over very many huddles as I tried to obtain the necessary visas that would take me on a road trip from Abidjan to Bobo and Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso, to Lome in Togo, to Cotonou and Ouidah in Benin and finally get me back to Abidjan in good time to catch my flight back to Nairobi. I cannot fully explain the incredulous looks on the visa officers’ faces when I said I was not visiting friends or family in those countries but simply traveling as a tourist. “Then you need to show us confirmed hotel bookings if you cannot provide all these documentation from your host.” At this point I should mention that not only was my non-existent “host” in those countries required to send me an invitation letter, proof of their residency in the country, but these documents had to be signed and stamped by a high ranking police officer based in their home area. I wondered, “Hotel bookings? I am traveling by bus, how could I possibly know what exact dates I will get to these cities, how long I will stay etc.” I definitely did not mention I was planning to couchsurf in the different cities. I quickly learned that as an African traveler that there is no room for spontaneity – when traveling you need to have every single aspect of your trip planned.

I have traveled to 42 countries worldwide, 16 of them in Africa. I can claim to be an unofficial expert on visa affairs. What surprises me the most is that having made my peace that I will almost always be treated with a certain level of suspicion when traveling outside the continent, especially when I claim to be traveling simply for wanderlust – not as an economic migrant or a refugee, and not helping my cause in any way by being a single African woman – a segment I have increasingly began to understand is considered a flight risk, I thought my travel experiences on the continent would be easier. I was ready for my continent to embrace me with open arms and tell me “We trust each other, even if the world doesn’t trust us.” I hate to admit it, but actually traveling within the African continent as an African is not any easier. Even the African Development Bank agrees, stating “North Americans have easier travel access to the continent than African themselves. North Americans require a visa to travel to 45% of African countries, can get visas on arrival in 35% of African countries and don’t need a visa in 20% of African countries. Africans on the other hand need visas to travel to 55% of other African countries, can get visas on arrival in 25% of other countries and don’t need a visa to travel to 20% of other countries.”

While the requirement of having a visa and all the documentation that needs to be provided is highly restrictive, I chose to focus on additional factors that would make a middle class African more willing to go to Dubai, London or Paris on vacation rather than immediately thinking of going to another African country. This is a great loss to the continent as it means collectively we are not yet benefitting from the “Africa rising” rhetoric if huge proportions of tourist spending is not used within the continent.

Cost of visas – From my experience traveling, costs of visas to some African countries are unbelievably high. A one month multiple entry visa to Ivory Coast is $125 for a Kenyan. My visas to Burkina Faso, Togo and Benin ranged between $65 - $120 each for one month visas (single entry in some cases.)

Duration of visas – Most African countries are still only willing to give one month single entry visas to other African visitors (with a multiple entry visa for that same time-frame almost being twice as expensive.) Given all the hurdles one has to cross to obtain some of these African visas, the least that can be expected is not to have to go through the same process every time someone travels to the same country again.

Ambiguity of visa processes – Google any telephone number for an African country you know little about, but would really love to travel to. It is highly likely you will not find contact details for their embassy in your country (perhaps they do not have an embassy in your country.) If they do have an embassy in your country, it is very likely their website was last updated before the new millennium. Try calling the number on the website and it will likely not go through or you will get a message that the number no longer exists. Send an email to the general email address on the site and it will likely bounce back. You will have to go in person and even then you might arrive and have the guard tell you they only open on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 10am – 2pm. Eventually you might give up and decide to travel elsewhere.

Inflexible bureaucracy – Many times the consulates have a check-list that they will not make any compromises on. When applying for my Beninois visa at the consulate in Abidjan, they needed my airline ticket. I told them I would be traveling by bus and they asked for my bus ticket. When I mentioned that would be the 5th or 6th long distance bus of my trip – and as such I did not yet have it and would have to book it along the way, they insisted I purchase my first bus ticket (Abidjan to Bobo in Burkina Faso) and bring it to them before they could process my application. How does me having a bus ticket from Ivory Coast to Burkina Faso, prove I won’t disappear in Benin? I’m not quite sure, but they somehow think it does.

The remaining set of factors, I describe as the chicken and egg factors. Perhaps they are the way they are because there is not enough intra-African traffic moving between the countries, or perhaps there is minimal intra-african traffic because of these factors.

Flight costs – It is sometimes said as a joke, but at any given point it is much cheaper (50-70% cheaper) to fly to Europe, the UAE and sometimes North America than it is to fly within the African continent. A quick internet search for flights, and you will find return flights at over $1000 from Nairobi to Maputo, over $1200 for Nairobi to Dakar, Nairobi to Zanzibar $300. A similar search for flights and you will find return tickets from Nairobi to Dubai for $350, Nairobi to London - $600 and Dakar to Paris - $600. Coupled with the visa challenges, it is easy to see how even well-traveled Africans might just not be well-traveled on the continent. Traveling round our own continent is a labor of love.

Shortage of tourist facilities – While tourist facilities are really well developed in some African countries, the reality is that in others they are severely lagging behind. It is not surprising given some of these countries have not historically been seen as tourist attractions and have rarely been visited by tourists. In many cases the main interactions such countries have had with foreigners is with aid workers, NGO employees etc. As such a tourism industry has not developed – facilities will be poor and overpriced in many cases. If it was however easier for people (including Africans) to travel to such countries, one can envision a scenario where an entrepreneur would then put in the necessary facilities to attract tourists. Even if one is trying to travel cheaply and stay in hostels, you quickly realize that “hostel” in Africa is rarely synonymous with hostels in other regions that have a backpacking culture – Europe, South America and Asia. It is noteworthy though that even in the most challenged of African countries, there is likely natural beauty, history and culture around which a tourism industry could be developed. A few years back I spent a few weeks in the Comoros Islands. I was equally amazed by how beautiful the country was, how unique the culture was but also dismayed that this country that could likely be compared to Seychelles in natural beauty, is one of the poorest in the world.

So what are the solutions? The African Development Bank report states them well: (i) Visa on arrival for Africans – Progress is being made in some countries e.g. from last year Kenyans are able to get a visa on arrival in Lagos for $25. (ii) Visa free regional blocs – Those largely exist in SSA in West Africa (ECOWAS), East Africa (EAC) and Southern Africa (SADC). The next step after this is moving to reciprocity for regional blocs – essentially if all one needs is a single visa to enter ECOWAS region even if from a different region e.g. EAC or SADC, this would greatly improve the current system. If another African travels to East Africa shouldn’t they be able to go the Maasai Mara in Kenya, visit the island of Zanzibar in Tanzania, attend a gorilla naming ceremony in Rwanda and swim in Lake Tanganyika in Burundi all on the same visa? The Schengen visa is a model we can build upon – thinking as a region rather than as a country. (iii) Multi-year visas – 5-10 year visas requiring the candidate to leave every 6 months or so would go a long way in encouraging repeat trips. Even at a substantial cost, many would be willing to forego all the hassle of applying for visas to the same countries every few months. (iv)Promoting positive reciprocity and opening up on visas unilaterally – Several African countries have already taken this up and we should see it happen on a larger scale. Seychelles offers visa free travel to all African citizens. Senegal recently got rid of visa requirements for most nationalities. Rwanda is one of the two most visa open countries in Africa (second to Mauritius). The effects have been positive with increased trade, tourism and investment in the past few years. GDP growth increased to 7% in 2014 and tourism revenues rose by 4% to USD 305 million. In 2013, the Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta announced that Kenya would eliminate visas for African states on a reciprocal basis and there has been progress on this. (v) Simplifying visa processes and (vi) Improving access to information online and in different languages.

The continent needs to capitalize on ways to increase intra-african travel with the aim of fostering unity and understanding and increasing trade and investment. On the demand side, there is no shortage of Africans who would love to see our continent with our own eyes. 

 First published on Suluzulu, republished by Quartz and World Economic Forum

The face of 14th century traditional Senegalese wrestling in a changing world

It is dusk. You are one of the thousands in the roaring crowd at Demba Diop stadium in Dakar. You catch snippets of conversations in Wolof and some French – but such sports events rarely need explaining. You look down at the stage to see the two opponents preparing for their big fight. Each has a marabout or two who leads him through a series of rituals that while steeped in traditional Senegalese culture also heavily borrows from mystical Sufi Islamism that is practiced by most Senegalese. A huge well sculpted loin-cloth clad wrestler walks through a wooden loop four times to ward off any negative spells that might have been placed against him to cause his defeat. Another equally huge sculpted loin-cloth clad wrestler wearing leather charms and amulets douses himself in an oily looking liquid handed over to him by his marabout (spiritual leader). This potion is to increase his strength, make him invincible and assure him victory. The match is about to begin and there are hundreds of people in the sandy stage below. You take a minute to assess everything else that is going on there – just a minute – any longer and you might miss the actual fight. Awrestling school’s members are run-dancing a lap round the field. They are clad in their jerseys – every so often they stop and break out into the most amazing dances – each wrestling school has their own signature songs and dances. To the right you see a drumming troupe – the crowd gets more excited the faster the sabar plays. Near the drumming troupe there is a dancer who moves as if he has no bones in his body – the drumming tempo increases, he dances with even more vigor, the crowd is elated. Near the center stage there is a group of women singing. You are taking it all in then you remember that the main event is the fight. You look back at the main fight – they have started. Years of preparation for the wrestlers, hours of smaller fights and the side-shows at today’s event – all culminating in this one large fight. If you are lucky it might last four minutes. If not so lucky it might be a quick fight where one wrestler simply knocks the other on the head and within less than 5 seconds the whole match is done – once the wrestler falls to the ground howling out in pain (as was the case the evening I watched a match between Ama Baldé vs. Gouy Gui). In any case, you will have been fortunate to see a 14th century Senegalese wrestling match come alive right before your eyes in a 21st century stadium.

La lutte or laamb as it is known in Wolof has existed since at least the 14th century in Senegal when the first known wrestler – Boukar Djilak Faye lived. While traditional wrestling is also common in other West African nations, La lutte is unique in how it has managed to grow, adapt to the times while still holding on to the interesting cultural and mystical elements that make it a must watch. It is one of the few bare-fisted wrestling forms that exists worldwide. The fame of modern day wrestling in Senegal is attributed to a wrestler called Tyson who started off in the 90s. He is credited with changing it merely from a sport to a real business becoming the first Senegalese wrestler to earn lots of money from the sport. Traditionally wrestling served various purposes In Senegal. It was a form of entertainment – after the harvest season villages would organize wrestling matches against each other. It was sometimes a way of paying homage to respected leaders – wrestling matches could take place at funeral remembrances of community greats. Sometimes it was used during initiation, to court wives or a show of masculinity. The sport has now grown to become even more famous and attract larger sponsors that football.

In a country where at least half of the population is unemployed. The fame and fortune that wrestling promises attracts many fighters – especially those from less privileged backgrounds. But what really is the potential earning from wrestling? There are around 3000 registered wrestlers in Senegal. Of these, only a dozen or so earn the legendary figures sometimes quoted of $100,000 - $300,000 a fight – and most times these wrestlers will only earn that once a season – wrestling season runs from January to end of July. Majority of the other wrestlers make around $2000 per season (which is still significant in a country where the UN estimates of annual income per capita are less than USD 1000.) As such people who are turning to wrestling might still not be wrong in thinking that this might be a good alternative option for them to create a livelihood.

But what about all the violence that such sports encourage? It might be counterintuitive but with high unemployment and frustration, violence is typically on the rise (as seen in many countries.) To create an outlet where people can channel these emotions within a controlled environment might calm some of these tensions. In reality the option is not really between wrestling and formal employment for many, but really wrestling and unemployment (or underemployment.) Senegalese society is also quite peaceful in general. Even during the matches themselves, people are not out for a bloodbath, but really for entertainment. Many Senegalese will speak of a wrestler known as “The Butcher” with derision – he was known for leaving his opponents bloody – the fans did not like it. During the matches, people are not baying for blood but really for an entertaining match that combines skills, culture and technique. Violence among fans as a result of the sport is also a concern, but the incidences reported are nowhere near as serious in magnitude as those witnessed in European countries after English Premier League matches or even sometimes in my home country (Kenya) after some football matches. Past incidences have been attributed to the fact that betting on the matches is really high and a vast proportion of youth from neighboring environs who place bets get violent when they lose their money – if the match does not end in their favor.  Increased security at the matches can ensure that they remain safe for all who wish to watch it – sports betting globally increases with popularity of a sport.

Why La Lutte is really fascinating is that it is further evidence of a growing trend on the continent where we are beginning to look within ourselves, embrace some of our unique cultures and find ways to grow them locally and then internationally. It is Africans refusing the rhetoric that arts and culture on the continent never existed before colonialism, that the most interesting thing about our countries is colonial history and post-colonial struggles and that the only good things to be found in our countries are those we got from the West. There is a cultural revolution taking over the continent – one that has started with music and literature and is spreading into even more aspects of our cultural heritage. We need to realize that even across the different African countries, people hunger to know more about other African countries. My education system taught me little other than we had some kingdoms, then we enslaved each other, then Arabs and the West came and took slavery to another level, then colonialism happened, we put up a good fight (The Battle of Adowa, Mau Mau rebellion, and so many other not so successful rebellions including using some magical potions that were to ward off bullets (Maji Maji rebellion). After that the colonial powers left us to our own defenses and we made a mess out of everything – descending into war, famine, disease etc. The West then came back to save us in various forms and anything good or interesting taking place on the continent right now is because of the benevolence of the West.

We as Africans need to change this rhetoric – and what better way to do that than owning and embracing our unique cultures, discovering them and monetizing them (La lutte attracts numerous corporate sponsors, but has still managed to remain authentic.)

La lutte in Senegal is a must see – now my next article will be on this little pesky visa situation that makes it EXTREMELY difficult for an African to travel in Africa. Thank you Senegal though for not requiring a visa for most people – lots of other countries need to take up this initiative.

First published on Suluzulu

The end of 6 weeks Eurotripping - 12 countries, 14 cities...

 I wish I could say it was all smooth sailing after our dramatic departure from Amsterdam....I really wish I could. After leaving Amsterdam at 9pm we got to Copenhagen an hour or so later...Drama. So I had booked accommodation through Airbnb but for some reason the payment had not gone through. On my end I had no idea anything was wrong. We got to the apartment and the host was surprised to see us. On her end it appeared the booking had been cancelled. We were just about to be broke and homeless in one of the most expensive cities I have been to. Thankfully the host was so kind - she let us stay and said we could sort out the payment the next day. 

The next day - once we sorted out the situation (more money needed from these broke girls), we went out clubbing in the evening. The following day we went for dinner at an old colleague's place. The conversations were great. The food was amazing - her husband is a professional chef.

On our final day in Copenhagen - we spent most of our time in pubs in Stroeget. We randomly met some nice girls who we played a Danish dice game with in the bar. A few years later one of our new friends came for my 30th birthday in Nairobi - she was in the city at the time. I love how small this world is..Later in the evening, our other friends joined us. 

In the evening we staggered to the airport - and thus ended 6 amazing weeks, 12 countries, 14 cities.....

The wages of epic debauchery, is missing your flight

After the Amsterdam tours, we went to town to have a beer. Then we visited a coffeeshop - after which we went back to our hostel for happy hour. Our hostel was really really bad (White Tulip), but happened to be in the middle of all the fun stuff and right on top of a great Irish pub - Slainte. We got back to the hostel in time for happy hour - Buy one get one free. We each chugged around 4 beers in quick succession because we were trying to get to a certain club for free - by 10pm. We got to the club, but they were already charging entrance. We decided to go back to Slainte. Most of the team was sleepy, but I really wanted to party. I went to a club in Rembrandtsplein called Smokeys. I got there and it was lots of fun. They had 10 shots for 10 Euros - we indulged....I called The Reluctant and asked her to join me. We had fun and got home around 6am....

That night would however fade in prominence when compared to the next one...I  learnt many lessons the next day : 1. Expecting to party all night and catch your morning flight is foolhardy at best 2. Sleep is dangerous - don't trust it 3. Just because the offer is 10 shots for 10 Euros, doesn't mean you suddenly have superhuman strength to drink 4. They say with age comes wisdom, but Amsterdam proved to me that this can be a fallacy....

Such a lovely day - it started so well. We went to town to buy boots. We got back to the hostel in time for an early dinner and happy hour. There was a huge crowd of pockmarked guys at the bar chanting some football songs in an unknown language. They looked like fun - though we couldn't understand their language. We had our happy hour beers as we tried to figure out what to do. At some point in the night, the leader of this tribe of football fans approached us and we became instant friends. That strange language they were chanting in - was English.....apparently....they were Man City fans who had traveled for a game. Him and his friend joined our table and they were good company. Their 30-40 football tribemates did not disturb our peace. 

Our new friend told us to join them on one of the bridges for a post victory drink. We got there and there were thousands of people drinking and dancing by the bridge. Our friend was a gentleman and plied the 6 of us with lots of beers. Finally around midnight we were finished. The more logical in our group went back to the hostel to sleep. They had a flight to Nairobi that they would need to leave the hostel for at 8am. The Safety Net and I who had to leave the hostel at 5am for our flight to Copenhagen, decided "it is easier to wake up if we don't sleep." .....Yeah. I know. The devil comes in many forms. 

We went to Smokeys to party the night away...I bought the first round - 10 shots - which we shared. The Safety Net bought the second round - 10 shots - which we shared. After that, hell broke loose. We made it back to the hostel and The Safety Net pleaded with me "Let's just go to the airport now" but sleep and alcohol (the two headed demon) had taken control of me. "No, please. Just let me sleep 15 minutes." We had only an hour before we needed to go to the airport.....

You can guess what happened. We woke up at 8am as those who were leaving for Nairobi were on their way. We decided that since we had already missed our flight, there was no need to panic. We went to the Jamaican-Ethiopian hostel manager and pleaded to check out at noon. He was quite kind - and I did look like a train wreck - he knew we needed that sleep. 

Around 1pm we finally went to the airport. In the US when you miss a flight, you pay around $25 to $50 to book a new one. We thought that would be the case.....If only.

"Miss Kimeria - you two were a no-show. Your tickets have been cancelled. If you are to travel, you need to buy a new flight for 350 Euros each" (over 3 times the cost of our initial flights.)

I still remember the moment I heard that news. This was the end of a 6 week Eurotrip. None of us had 350 Euros to spend just like that.....I had already paid for housing in Copenhagen....We had no money to pay for new housing in Amsterdam.....and our return flight to Nairobi - required us to leave from Copenhagen to Munich. We thought of our options......We really had  none. We thought of taking a train - costs were almost similar and the journey would take 24 hours or so.....I put the new costs on my credit card - really hoping it did not get declined.

The wages of epic debauchery is missing your flight.....and having to cough up 350 Euros...and having to sit at the airport with your hangover from 1pm to 9pm for a flight..OUCH!

Touring Amsterdam - Christian reformation, Rembrandt, Nazi occupation etc

Continued from last week

Another area in the town that showed us Dutch Tolerance was the 'square of the spiritual women.' It started as a home for Berginjof nuns who were being persecuted in France. Berginjof nuns are pretty much nun-tryouts who didn't make it to become full blown nuns. They were ostracized throughout much of Europe, but the Dutch welcomed them with open arms. Their former home is now the home of spiritual women. Women the world over who adhere to a religion- any religion and want to grow spiritually apply to join the place. It offers a home to Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Bahaaists etc.  I thought it was so interesting that one place would encourage growth of spirituality in different religions. The place was quite tranquil.

Amsterdam officially has only 5 Catholic churches. After the Reformation all Catholic churches were seized and Protestantism was declared the official religion. Unlike other countries, where all former priests, nuns etc would be killed, in the Netherlands they just had to convert. The State even let them meet in a house as long as the house didn't have a cross. This turning a blind eye and letting people live their lives was something I really admired. Everyone knew it was a catholic church. Every Sunday a crowd would gather there. They had an organ, hymn books etc. As long as it was subtle everyone was willing to pretend they didn't see it.

After this we passed by the museum where Rembrandt's 'Night Watch' was stored. I had never seen it before, but it was a painting that changed how portraits were done. It was an action portrait of the Rifle Squad of Amsterdam. It was later redone into a sculpture that was in the city park. I really liked it.

We got to see the widest bridge, and the narrowest house which were all on the same street. The narrowest house was 1.7m wide. Can you imagine? Horrid. I had noticed the importance of saving space in Amsterdam.  The last time I was in Amsterdam, the stairs in my hotel were so narrow that I had to climb them sideways.

Random note – The Dutch are officially the tallest European people. I
always thought it would be Swedes, Norwegians or something.

We passed a statue of Multatuli who was a Dutchman who wrote about the atrocities being committed by Dutch colonialists in Indonesia. He even named names. His book led to a huge reform by the Dutch public who were horrified to learn about how they were treating the locals. I really liked the Dutch, and wondered if they were really related to South African boers. Maybe the Boers were all the black sheep of the Dutch community....

Amsterdam was really multicultural. I kept on seeing all this people who looked African, but I couldn't figure out from what country. I kept on racking my brain trying to think if Netherlands ever had an African colony. It turns out this black people are from Suriname. I was so jazzed. Back in the day I used to think Suriname was a country somewhere in Asia probably near Myanmar. At least a few years back I learnt it was the smallest country in South America. Little did I know that it's a predominantly black country. That was an interesting history and geography lesson. The other foreign looking people come from Aruba, Dutch Antilles, Indonesia etc.

We then saw the old men's prison that was now a public pool. The Dutch being Calvinist believed in the redeeming powers of hard work. All men in the prison were meant to work daily to get atonement for their sins. Some men were rebellious and chose not to work. To force them to work, water would slowly be let into their cells. At the corner of the cells there was a pump. The only way to prevent one self from drowning was to continuously pump i.e. one was forced to work to live. One prisoner completely refused to do this, and let himself drown. This
method of getting people to work was promptly stopped.

Netherlands being such an open and welcoming society had attracted a lot of persecuted Jews from other European countries – Portugal, Germany, France etc. They all lived in the Jewish Quarter which was an upscale region and not a ghetto like in other countries. Famous
Non-Jews like Rembrandt even chose to live in this region because it was really good housing. When the Nazis invaded Amsterdam in the early 40s, their occupation was a peaceful one. The Nazis liked the Dutch and believed they were distant relatives since they all spoke funny.
For a year they didn't do anything other than stay on as occupiers. Finally they started their attacks on the Jews. The first day they attacked the Jews was on a Saturday and very few Dutch people were in the Jewish Quarter to witness the atrocities. The next day they did it
was a Sunday – market day. The Dutch witnesses were horrified by what they saw and decided to revolt against the murder of their brothers.
The 'February strikes' were led by Dutch workers to oppose the mistreatment and deportation of the Jews. The Nazis fired at the crowd, and killed many citizens. Though this was by no means a success for the Dutch, it however was the largest demonstration during World
War 2 by non-Jews for the Jews. It did not stop the deportations, and it probably did not save any lives. It however showed the Jews that the Nazis were a minority, and not all Europeans shared their dream of exterminating them. It was a moment of hope, and a day when the Dutch
policy of tolerance and turning a blind eye was put to the test. They would not turn a blind eye to acts of torture, hatred and inhumanity against their fellow humans.

When the Allied forces started freeing European cities, they neglected to free Amsterdam. It was so out of the way, and they had no idea that many Nazis were occupying the area. The Nazis starved the people for their collaboration with the Jews. By this point the Jewish Quarter
was a ghost town. All the Jews had been deported and met their end in the Nazi concentration camps. Anne Frank's family was one of these. The winter of 1941 was the worst winter in Europe. Food ran out. All the trees were cut and used for heating. People ate the
'roof-rabbits.' Roof-rabbits was a euphemism for cats. Then they ate the rats. Then they went to the ghostown – the Jewish Quarter and started using furniture, building materials and anything they could get their hands on for heating. Today all the trees in Amsterdam are
the same height. They were planted around the same time – after the war. The old Jewish Quarter does not look anything like it would have in the past. Everything was destroyed in the search for firewood. It has been redone in garish 70s architecture. Bold, bright colours. Long
clinical columns. It's an eyesore.

***The Miracle of Amsterdam****

This is a true story. It has no exaggerations and no additions. I am
telling it as it came from the horses mouth.

Sometime in the 1600s in Amsterdam an old man was on his death bed. A priest and a nun came to give him his last rites. They gave him the communion bread to eat, but as he was so sick he threw it up immediately. As the bread was blessed it had to be disposed of in a
certain way. The nun wrapped it up in a bundle and cast it into the fire. All of a sudden she notices that the bread doesn't burn. It instead floats on the fire with a strange glow. She grabs it and realizes it's a miracle. She begins her journey with the bread to see the pope (all miracles had to be declared a miracle by the pope.) She gets to Rome and realizes she doesn't have the bread. She panics and wonders how she could have lost it. She realizes these are serious
negative nun points – finding a miracle and losing it. She gets back to Amsterdam and it's in the house. Her and the priest now take it to Rome. They get there, and discover the bread has vanished again. They find it in Amsterdam. They then build a church where the loaf lies.
That must be what the bread wants from them. In the next 50 years, the church burns down twice. The only thing that survives is the bread. They move the bread to another location. This fires are a bit worrisome and they want a safer location. This time the bread agrees
to be relocated. They put it in a nice steel case in the new church. A thief comes one night and robs the church. He takes off with the steel case thinking it has money.

He runs over a bridge and pries it open. With each push his heart is pacing faster and faster. He expects to find jewels, money or something precious. It finally opens, and he finds a dry dusty piece of bread.

He tosses it into the river Amstel.

That is the end of the miracle of Amsterdam.

Moral of this story? The bread was fireproof and could translocate, but wasn't waterproof.

Ps- The old man didn't survive. The miracle was only for the bread….not for him.

Touring Amsterdam - Redlight district, religious tolerance, marijuana laws

We left Geneva early on a Sunday morning. We traveled to Amsterdam through Brussels and Paris. We got to Amsterdam at 4pm - checked into our hostel - a really dingy hostel, but it was on top of a fabulous bar. Winning! But that hostel was dingy! We had to pass through some toilets to get to our room - yes.....who built this place???

4pm - everyone passed out and we vowed to wake up and PARTAAY! Cause, hey - this is Amsterdam......Well, we actually fell asleep till the next morning. All our traveling had finally finished us. The next day we woke up and went for Sandeman's New Europe Tours - amazing free tours in different European cities.

**The tour***

Amsterdam was actually really cool and quite multicultural. I kept on wondering how a country that is bordered by Germany and Belgium attracted so many people of all races, religions , ideologies etc. I also wondered why the people were so nice.  People had been so nice
and friendly even the older generation who usually stare at you with xenophobic suspicion. 

Amsterdam was founded by two men and a dog. History claims that. How two men and a dog were able to build this town is a good question. They built a dam on the river Amstel….Amsteldam became Amsterdam. We  went to check out the old part of town and it dawned on me how fragile the place is. Most of Amsterdam is on reclaimed land. People don't store anything in the basement for fear of flooding. We passed one street where all the houses were toppling forwards. Apparently this was intentional. All houses had a one meter or so beam extending horizontally from the roof. This was used to support ropes to pull up
merchandise from the river direct into the attic when the merchant boats came. All storage had to be done in the attic for fear of flooding. The houses were built leaning forward so as to avoid stuff breaking your windows as it was pulled up. It took the town 100 year to realize that this danger could be avoided if they made the beams longer.

During Napoleon's reign in France, he invaded Netherlands and gave it to his silly younger brother. His brother was not that sharp. The first time he tried to speak Dutch to the people and announce, "I am your King," he actually said "I am your rabbit."  They never really took him seriously after that. Before his time, the Dutch never used surnames. They had names like, "Dirk from Utrecht" or "Jan the baker" etc. A law was passed forcing everyone to have a surname. The Dutch had an interesting sense of humour and took on nonsensical surnames –
"Dirk PeesInTheForest", "Jan TheLaughingCow" etc. It was quite funny then, but many young Dutch of this generation do not find their surnames that hilarious.

Another curious thing was that houses in Amsterdam didn't use to have addresses. They had gablestones. If the dentist lived there, there would be a tooth sculpture at his door. The baker, there would be an oven etc. I found the founding of Amsterdam quite organic. Who says
addresses are the only way to mark houses? It would be nice to know
who lives in what place by looking at their door.

Our next stop on the tour was the Red Light District. Right at the entrance of the Red Light District was an old church. This District is the oldest part of the town. When the sailors came back they would visit the bordellos first. After this they would go to the church, repent their sins, pay for their forgiveness and get a "Get out of hell free" card from the priests. Understanding the Red Light District is an important aspect in understanding Dutch culture. They are very Calvinist, and believe that everyone has a right to live their life how they see fit. It surprises people, but the Dutch are actually quite conservative themselves. They however tend to turn a blind eye/ have a non-inteference culture when it comes to many things. This is why the Netherlands is known as the hotbed for people of different sexual orientations, marijuana-legality and lax immigration laws. They themselves may choose to live what they consider pure or religious lives, but they don't impose their thinking on anyone. I really liked
that. Your reality is not my reality. 

The Red Light District is basically a collection of windows in buildings with red lights, and women on display behind the windows. Pimping in Netherlands is illegal. All the workers here are self-employed. They pay 150-200 Euros a night for their window, and what they do there is their business. They also pay taxes. I thought it was very practical as banning prostitution just means that more people are forced to be sex workers and work under horrifying circumstances, have no basic rights, have a middle man oppressing them etc. In Amsterdam they are unionizable workers just like teachers etc. They also have better police protection than they did when it was 'illegal' but still happening. In Kenya one always hears horrific tales of prostitutes reporting cases of violence or rape to the police, only to be further brutalized -because the police know the women have no one to turn to - as their trade is illegal...

The first three windows I saw were African women. The next one I saw was a woman with bondage gear. The next one was a woman sitting with a huge dildo on. The District is organized into all sorts of different fetishes. I was told there is also a part just for Asian prostitutes, leather, foot fetishes etc. A basic appropriately named "suck and **ck" goes for 50 euros and lasts 15 minutes. These women are making bank. How many 15 minutes do you have in 8 hours?

Another thing that would be worth mentioning about Netherlands is the marijuana laws. In the 60s and 70s Amsterdam was hit hard by the drugs madness. The town had more heroin abusers than it could rehabilitate. The Government took drastic measures. It decriminalized marijuana which it considered to be a pseudo-drug and had stricter punishments
for heroin and cocaine. Though these measures seemed crazy, it helped the town put more funding into catching dealers of hard drugs, and leaving the pot-head down the street alone. Contrary to popular opinion, weed isn't legal in Netherlands, but is tolerated. 'Tolerated' means that as long as it doesn't disturb anyone else then it is fine. I can't tell what the difference between tolerated and legal is. There have been no weed-related arrests in over  30 years.  The
Dutch also believe in subtlety which is why everyone calls these places 'coffee shops.' Netherlands now has half as many heroin addicts, percentage wise as the US. Their experiment was a success after all. It was funny to learn that the Dutch are not even a big consumer of the product. It is now quite a tourist thing. The Dutch themselves rank 7th in Europe on the list of most marijuana consumed. The highest is Spain, France, Germany etc. Also equally surprising was learning that New Zealand is the country in the world with the highest percentage of weed smokers – 16.7%. Everyone had thought it was Jamaica. We were also given a tour of the outside of the Hemp Marijuana Museum and the Cannabis College.

To be continued......

Geneva - partying and hadron colliders

Geneva made it into our itinerary because one of my closest friends lives there and another great friend was also based in Geneva at the point. These are my ride-or-die friends who always come visit whenever i'm in the continent - mostly Germany. They had actually joined for part of Oktoberfest too this time. My main friend in Geneva actually came to surprise me for my 30th birthday - all the way in Nairobi. Imagine that - going to open the gate and finding Pattiko there - all the way from Geneva to visit for my 30th. I love you Patti and Constantinos!

We left Venice in the afternoon and got to Geneva in the evening. We were instantly picked up by our friends, they took us to drop our bags and off we went clubbing. It was a fun Friday. Despite our exhaustion and sleepiness we had a blast - two of those in our group - The Reluctant and The BARacuda even danced on stage. Geneva was expensive. I remember each drink was around 25 Swiss Francs/USD. 

Saturday morning we woke up a bit more refreshed. My other friend - Constantinos - also a friend from my university days in Boston - is a nuclear physicist......Yes, you heard right. Nuclear physicist [name dropping alert]. He took us to his workplace -  The European Organization for Nuclear Research - CERN. This was a few months after the Higgs Boson particle had been discovered by CERN scientists. Constantinos told us the coolest stories about how lectures had been given at CERN shortly after the discovery and the lines to get in were even longer than lines at famous rock concerts. CERN houses the largest and most powerful particle accelerator in the world! Yes, we were nerding out at CERN and it was lovely - especially when you are being given an insider tour. 

We spent the rest of the day walking around Geneva then had dinner at an Italian place called Luigi's. Later on we went clubbing with our friends and their friends. 

This was our Geneva experience - great friends, great memories.

Venice with the girls!

We left Rome for Venice at noon and got to Venice around 5pm. Arriving in Venice is magical. My first time in Venice was in 2006 and I actually shed tears - because of how beautiful it was and how different it was for me from 2 years before that (when I had gone through a really rough patch.) I felt so grateful to be in this magic place. We were staying in a guest house (Villa Stella in Lido) a bit far from the main part of Venice - St. Marco, but it was a lovely place......and affordable:-)

We got off the boat close to our place, but were not sure how exactly to get to our guesthouse. We asked an older lady for directions and the sweet woman almost drove us there. The only challenge was there were 6 of us and we each had huge backpacks....This was not going to work out. I was really touched though - this woman was going to let 6 strangers into her car? We dropped our bags at the hostel and took a boat back to St Marco's square for dinner. It was quite funny because the restaurant was right by the water - dimly lit and the restaurant was full of couples.....likely on honeymoon. I have to confess that at that moment - I really wanted a boo - if for nothing else, just to kiss by the water and whisper sweet nothings about everlasting love to each other - in that magical place. Venice is a city for lovers.

We enjoyed our romantic dinner for 6 though. We had some great laughs. I would not trade my friends in for anything. 

The following day, we spent all afternoon at St. Marco's taking in the magic that is Venice. 

In the late afternoon, we left for Geneva. 

**Excerpt from my 2006 emotional moment in St Marco square**

Oh back to Venice . So I am now sitting in the train watching the lovely scenery outside. Suddenly the train is on a bridge and the only thing below us is the Adriatic Sea (the name of the Mediterranean sea in the East of Italy.) It was so amazing. The sea was sparkling in the morning sun, and I felt this warm glow in my heart. It was soooooo beautiful. Arriving in Venice was so sooooo soooooooo one of those moments you can never forget in your life. Venice can truly not be described in words or pictures. I still find it hard to believe I saw such beauty. The whole city is right on the water. There are no buses, roads or taxis in the main part of Venice only boats, gondolas (the lovely narrow boats from ancient times), canals and very very narrow streets.Venice’s beauty is made more spectacular and fragile by the fact that the city has flooded 300 times in the past 10 years. One day there might be no more Venice . I really mean the buildings are right in the water. I honestly don’t know how the city was built. I saw someone get off their boat and jump into this huge building. The door of the building was only 2feet above the water, and the whole foundation was under water. Truly a marvel. I hopped into boat  ie bus no.1 (5 euros) – they call the commuter boats,buses- and traveled half an hour to St. Marco’s square which is the most famous part of Venice. The whole journey there was spell binding, and I kept on expecting to wake up. I got to St. Marco and passed all these traders selling all this carnival costumes/masks and swore to myself that the next time I come to Venice it will be during carnival ball. At St.Marco’s square I went to the famous St. Marco basilica. It was just toooooo much to take in. The whole beauty of the place. The whole magic of Venice . I was now beginning to feel overwhelmed. The basilica is really magical, and the symbolic sculptures on it were too many for me to really take in. The lion of Venice . Standing there in the middle of St. Marco’s square a single tear dropped down my cheek. It could have been the acid water affecting my eye sight, but it was not. I believe it was just the joy of being in Venice . The joy of seeing a place I had only read of in books. The whole feeling that God, Fate and Fortune wanted me to be in this exact spot at this exact moment of time. The fact that life is so unpredictable. The fact that a year ago I would not have dreamed of myself being in Venice , breathing in the cool ocean breeze, standing in a place of such historical significance. Just the feeling that this must have been a vital point in my life…..one which I will probably never fully understand. But even sitting here writing this email, yet more tears of joy roll down my cheek. There is beauty in this world. Beauty that is capable of evoking such strong emotions in someone’s heart. Standing in St. Marco’s square I felt so happy to be such a small small tiny fragment in this big big world. Standing there in St. Marco’s square filled me with wanderlust- a feeling that there is so much out there in the world to see. It made me make a vow never to pass up an opportunity to travel anywhere – Africa , Asia , Australia etc. There is so much for one to see that one could never know until they see it.

How Kenyans got conned in Rome...then later met a Kenyan priest at the Vatican.

Rome - how can someone not be fascinated by this city. Something about walking around in this modern city - turning round a corner and suddenly seeing ancient ruins - the Colosseum,  arcs of triumph etc. It's lovely. I can't be in Rome and not think of my epic first time there in 2006 and my legendary pub crawl......Last pub crawl I am doing in Rome...

The journey to Rome was great - we were so happy to be leaving Paris. We had a quick stopover in Milan and got to Rome in the evening - after leaving Paris in the morning. We were exhausted but went out for a delicious dinner. We slept early and went off to explore the city. We were excited. As we were walking, we came across some guys dressed as ancient Romans and carrying the most fabulous props - swords, shields etc. He could tell we were enchanted by the costumes. The next thing we knew, they invited us to take some fun pics with them. We had a blast.....up until a few minutes later, we were each  made to part with 10 Euros each.....OUCH! Yes, that's how we were taken in. I'm sure those guys make a killing off tourists.

We went to the Vatican after seeing the main ruins in Rome. As we were walking into the city, we met a Priest who looked very Kenyan - which coincidentally he was! We were all excited - what are the odds of a group of 6 Kenyan women meeting a Kenyan priest on entering the vatican? Father Boniface was equally pleased to meet us. He gave us the best tour of the Vatican. The highlight of it for me was seeing Michelangelo's work on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel - divine. We had to leave for Venice around 1pm, but that was a quick lovely trip in Rome. We wished we could stay longer, but given the 4-5 day delay in Paris, we were quickly running out of time. 

Sans domicile fixe/Homeless in Paris

This is such a long story. First of all - why were we back in Paris - a city we had tried to leave for so long the week before, but kept on having challenges getting train tickets? Second, now that we were back in Paris - how did we end up homeless? First things first - why were we back in Paris. Well to get from Barcelona to our next stop, Rome, we had to travel through Paris. Unfortunately the connection was  not great. As such we would get into Paris at 5pm but our next train to Rome would leave at 7am. I decided that booking a hostel would not make any sense. Paris is expensive - we would pay loads to stay in the city. Our next option would be Chelles - the far off godforsaken town we stayed in last time. The same town that had no taxis and required a half hour walk with our backpacks to get to the apartment.....It was a no-brainer - too much effort for just one night of sleep. I decided we would sleep at the train station - on our backpacks.....It seemed like a grand plan, until.......

So we got to Paris at 5pm, managed to book all our remaining tickets - Rome, Geneva, Amsterdam. We were happy - this time Paris was going to be a breeze. We had our tickets out of the city - what's the worst thing that could happen. We went to the Eiffel tower, took pictures with giant teddy bears close to the tower and finally headed back to the train station around 9/10pm to sleep....Or so we thought.

Total balaa! The first signs of problems was the closed toilets. Where did they expect us to go pee in the middle of the night? Ah well, we will survive. We set our bags down - everyone picking a nice wall to sleep against. Then we saw an official looking person say something to other tourists who seemed to have the same plan as us. They stood up and carried their bags. Uh oh! They got to us and the message was loud and clear. "You need to leave the train station. We are closing for the night." Excuse me? What the hell type of regional train station closes for the night? Till today I think this is intentionally done to prevent people from sleeping at the train station. 

What to do.....We are homeless and sleepy. You do recall the activities of our previous night in Barcelona. The BARacuda and I partied till morning then caught the train to Paris. We needed sleep. We went to a part of town that had a bar that promised to stay open till 5am.....Good, then we would only have 2 hours to kill before our next train. We got into the bar. We were a sight. We were falling asleep on the table. "Wake up! They will kick us out thinking we're drunk." "Ok, what do we do to stay awake?" "Let's play cards." That was the sorriest game of cards ever played. "Oh, that's a 5 of spades? I thought it was a Queen of hearts." People were struggling. 

Finally the light at the end of the tunnel came in the form of a little Nepali bartender who liked The Reluctant. He started getting us all shots on the house - now that kept us up:-) Finally at 5am, we dragged our exhausted feet out of the bar and into the train station. 

Goodbye Paris!

Cypriot house parties, dentists and partying in Barcelona

Did you know that sometimes lions eat humans because they have toothaches? Yep, toothaches make it impossible for them to hunt game.....and humans are soft.. Why did I tell  you this story? No, I did not get cannibalistic tendencies when my tooth started killing me in Barcelona......but I can understand how a toothache can make you do atypical things...It drives you mad. 

On self-medication I was able to do a few things - until things really got bad. We spent an idyllic Sunday morning/afternoon at the beach. In the evening we went to my friend's brother's place - he is Cypriot. We had a fun house party that included lots of dancing up until the neighbours came to complain about the noise. 5am we got home - all partied out. 

A few hours later I woke up to the worst tooth pain. I frantically went searching the city for a dentist. The first dentist I went to, did not speak a word of English (not their fault - I really should have learnt Spanish, but I didn't know I would be looking for a dentist in Barcelona.) The second dentist did not speak any English, but could understand enough for me to relay the fact that I was on death's doors and would die if she didn't do anything about my tooth. She did some scans and told me to come back at 7pm when she would be able to tell me more. In retrospect the tests were hilarious. I was given all instructions in Spanish and sign language. "Open your mouth." "Turn your head right." "Rest your jaw here." They were quite patient with me. In my distressed state I searched for a cybercafe to print my medical claim forms. 

At 7pm I was back at the dentist's. They had bad news - my tooth was really bad and I would need at least 3 days in Barcelona for them to do the necessary work. Only problem was we were scheduled to leave Barcelona in the morning.....I decided I would have to survive on my own stock of anesthetic until I got back to Nairobi. 

I got back to the hostel, packed my bags and went to party the last night in Barcelona away. Alcohol is a great pain killer. We started off the night in Los Libertias in Universitat for 1 Euro chubidas (shots.) We had quite a few shots. After that we went to Apollo Club for "Nasty Mondays".....Yeah, that name.....they probably meant it to be "crazy mondays" or something of the sort. The club was packed. Only 2 of us were partying. I met some really great guy, we danced till morning (at which point is was time for us to catch our train back to Paris.) I recall my guy walking me back to my hostel (which wasn't far from the club,) and carrying my ginomous backpack to the train station - from which I took the subway to get to the main train station. The guy my friend was with - also tried to carry her backpack, but he was quite annoying. He had been drinking beer on the streets as we walked to our hostels to get our suitcases, yelling and propositioning prostitutes. My friend yanked her backpack away from him and wouldn't let him carry it. Some part of me felt that I should practice solidarity and also not let his friend carry my backpack......but to be honest - it was so great to not have that monster on my back....and really.....when else would I find a guy offering to carry my giant backpack. 

The two of us (The BARacuda) and myself finally got to the train station. We found the rest of our crew there. We got into the train and passed out immediately. We arrived in Paris at 5pm. 

About that time in Barcelona when we went to an all-you-can-drink Australian pub

There are few things as dangerous as an open bar. Commonsense out, greed in. That is exactly what happened to us in Stoke pub in Barcelona. The hostel gave us a card with all the must-do things in Barcelona and one was to go to an Australian pub with 10 Euros all you can drink beer or sangria for what they called "power hour." As much sangria and beer as you want for an hour. We did the math and figured out this would be a nice cheap plan - go drink at Stoke then not need to buy any drinks for the rest of the night.  

We got to Stoke at a respectable hour - around 5pm. We did the math. If a glass of sangria or beer costs 3.30 Euros, then to break even we need to have at least 3 glasses to break even. But we are Kenyans. Do you think we win all those olympic medals by doing the bare minimum? Of course not! We were going to do even better than break even - we were going for gold. We had to pick whether to go with Beer or Sangria. It was decided by our small committee that sangria was more bang for our buck - how much beer can one realistically drink in an hour - before getting bloated.....How that hour began and how it ended are like night and day. We got in as proper cultured ladies and pretty soon we were yelling at the top of our voices.  

They started by bringing us 2 pitchers of sangria. There were 6 of us. When we finished our pitchers, there was a bell we were to ring for them to refill. Towards the end of that power hour, we had some frantic bell ringing courtesy of The BARacuda. We also had some erratic chugging, some crazy pouring - that resulted in more sangria on the table than in the glasses. There was one casualty of the power hour - whose partying came to an abrupt end after the hour. She found herself home by 7pm. 

The rest though - we left Stoke and moved to the next place. A bar that had live music, wine and shots for a flat fee of 5 Euros. I'm still not quite sure how we managed to have more drinks. Later in the night, we went to a night club called Jamboree where we danced and danced and danced. We got home at 6am. 

Barcelona was clearly our type of city.

Oh....you're wondering. Did we break even at Stoke? Hell, we bankrupt the place:-)

Leaving Paris for Barcelona

It was long journey to the train station. I was unsettled. I had a horrible toothache, had slept 2 hours, was really getting tired of Paris and we had no train tickets to leave - not for lack of trying. We had gone to the train station almost daily only to be told we couldn't get tickets. We got to the train station and I tried again to book tickets. I had the rest wait by a train that we would hopefully get on. I had around an hour or so before that train was to leave - plenty of time, right? Everything that could go wrong, went wrong. There were long queues, half of the booths had no one working in them, when I finally got to the counter we had communication issues and a rude teller to boot. Her computer was slow and kept on freezing. Her printer jammed when she was to print my ticket. There were 5 of us, but she could only find 2 seats to reserve. I took them! I heard them announcing my train's departure. I ran like a crazy person. I jumped into the train just as the doors were closing. I knew my friends must have done the logical thing and entered the train too. I finally found them. It was a long journey - we changed trains 3 times because of our ticket-less situation. To make matters worse, we had each parted with 35 Euros to secure the few tickets we were able to. On most other routes, we had been able to use our Eurail passes without having to pay anything additional. This was not the case for trains leaving or getting into Paris. 

We finally got to Barcelona in the evening. We were extremely happy to no longer be in Paris! We walked to the beach and went to a bar near our hostel in the evening. It was a lovely hostel. Be Dream hostel at Pep Ventura train station. In a complete contrast to Paris, everyone we met was kind, helpful and friendly. Things were looking up again. 

The official Paris tour

Today we finally managed to go for the official free Paris tour. The tour guide was a Dutch guy who seemed really high. We learnt quite a few interesting things - who knew Napoleon was Italian?  Napoleon was born on Corsica on August 15, 1769, just 15 months after France had purchased the island from the Italian city-state of Genoa. Next we spent quite a bit of time learning about the French revolution - whose most bloody memory is the death of Marie Antoinette and 4000 other royals. The French Revolution overthrew the monarchy, established a republic, experienced violent periods of political turmoil, and finally resulted in a dictatorship under Napoleon that rapidly brought many of its principles to Western Europe and beyond. Some of these repercussions included the end of slavery in French colonies.  

 The safety cord was unfortunately able to join as her leg got injured in the previous day's long walking adventures. After the tour, we went to the train station to try and buy tickets to leave Paris for Barcelona the next day. Yet again, we were not able to book any tickets. It was beginning to get very annoying. By this time, most of us were tired of Paris and its unfriendliness. We were ready to leave.  In the evening, we went to a quartier of Paris called Montmarte for dinner. 

I started having a killer toothache - that could only mean one thing. A cavity in need of a root canal. I am an expert at teeth issues. This had to the the worst timing for a tooth to do this to me. On the following day, I was bedridden. Toothache was killing me. I had bought a little anesthetic and was self-medicating. I sent The Little Toe and the Reluctant  to buy train tickets - yet again they were all sold out. Paris was trying to hold us captive. We decided we would have to go to the train station the next morning and find train tickets out of town, however we could. I tried to sleep early, but pain kept me up till 5am. By 7am, we were up and on our way to the train station with all our bags.......and no tickets..

Heading to Paris

We got to the train station quite early for our train ride to Paris, but the journey was delayed as a result of someone jumping on the train-tracks. We left for Paris at 2:30pm on the TGV – one of the fastest trains in the world. The journey was good with a proper lunch being served on the train – there are some perks to traveling with the faster, more-expensive option. I had booked an apartment for us in a place called Chelles. This was the first place I was to find with reasonable prices when I was looking for Paris accommodation. I would later realize that this price meant we stayed quite a fair distance away from the city and the inconvenience of a very long walk to the apartment. From the central Paris station, our stop was around 20 minutes away. This was not that terrible, but once we got off the train – with our heavy backpacks, we realized there were absolutely no taxis in this part of Paris. We asked around at a bar and a restaurant near the train station and we were told that the only option would be to call a taxi from Central paris (which would automatically charge us $40) to get to us. Thus with our backpacks, we began the 30 minute walk to our apartment. This became our daily routine while in Paris (obviously without the backpacks.) A 20 minute train ride followed by a half hour walk to our apartment or vice-versa depending on whether we were heading out or coming back home. On the plus side our apartment was lovely – and affordable. We got there around 10pm and immediately passed out after our long journey.

The following morning we went to town to catch the free city tour, but didn’t get there in time. We instead walked around by ourselves – we went to the fountain at St. Michael the archangel – the most flamboyant statue I have ever seen. After that we went to the world famous museum that houses the Mona Lisa – the Louvre. We then went to Champs Elysees - the beautiful 2km long boulevard which runs between Place de la Concorde and Place Charles de Gaulle and is where the famous  Arc de Triomphe is located. We also passed by the  royal gardens etc. Paris is extremely beautiful. 

After what must have been a 20km walk, we went for dinner at a lovely Greek restaurant – washed down our dinner with delicious Kir cocktails (champagne and crème de cassis.) I begged the team to pass by a French lounge that I had fallen in love with a few years back (Les Soffleurs/the glassblowers.) I had wonderful memories of being directed to this place a few years back when I was working for the German Rail Company (Deutsche Bahn) in Saarbrucken, Germany and was in town for a meeting with the French rail company officials (SNCF). My first night there had been magical – I had spent it drinking lots of champagne with Chantal – the 65 year old Martinique owner, a few musicians from St. Martinique, some French actors etc. The vibe was great. I remember at 5am, Chantal completely refusing to accept payment for my drinks (because she said I was great fun and I was the first Kenyan she had met in Paris) and even getting me a free ride back to my hotel. After that trip, I had gone back to Paris that summer once or twice more to party at Les Soffleurs. One day I will tell you my Les Soffleurs stories. We walked all the way there and were sad to find out that it had closed up. I had been dying to see Chantal again and listen to her funny stories. I realized I didn’t even have her contact details anymore and silently wished that the universe would bring us back together. 

Heal the World - Oktoberfest style

We had one day in Munich before the end of Oktoberfest. We were in a very festive mood. We woke up at 2pm – exhausted from our various trips. One of our close friends from Nairobi arrived shortly after – she would be joining us for the second part of the trip. Her pseudonym will be “The Lady.” “The Safety Net cooked up a storm. We ate to our heart’s content and went out clubbing later to Pimpernel – We had a lovely time and got home quite late.

In the morning we woke up excited about the last day of Oktoberfest. I went with The Lady to the festival around 4pm. There we met up with 2 of my lovely college friends who had come in from Switzerland to join us for the festivities. It was one of those nights that is difficult to explain if one wasn’t there. Key highlights of the night for me included:

·        Me having a mini-meltdown and yelling at my friends when I started feeling frustrated – like I had to be responsible for everything given I was the organizer of the trip. “I am not your mother! People need to start being responsible for themselves – you can’t expect me to know everything, do everything, tell you everything, have all the directions etc.” It was not pretty - especially because I was inebriated, likely slurring and repeating the same thing over and over, but we had a debrief the next day and after that I felt that people were being more responsible for themselves. I can’t really blame them though because I also know that when someone takes charge it becomes very easy to just go along with the flow and not feel the pressure to know anything/do anything for yourself. How many times have I been driven somewhere and not bothered to note the directions given someone else is doing it for me? It’s human nature.

·        Lighting candles with random strangers, singing “heal the world” and hugging people over mugfuls of beer – that closing ceremony was a very wonderful emotional experience – those moments when complete strangers are brought together by the powerful force of alcohol and pyromania and cheesy kumbaya music

·        Going out clubbing alone – determined to squeeze out the most of my time in my beloved city of Munich. Getting lost trying to get to Pimpernel, but making random friends along the way who I partied with till 6:30am

·        Getting home at 7am, packing in a state of drunkenness and us heading off to the train station – Paris bound. 

Touring Copenhagen - getting royally lost

Aaaaah, that hostel – Danhostel Bellahoj! What a pain. In addition to having to physically construct your own beds , the showers and bathrooms in the hostel were closed from 10am – 2pm. I imagine that this time range is when most backpackers are waking up….arrrgh. On this day we actually managed to make it for the city tour. To be honest it was not that great a tour, though we did learn a few interesting things – we passed by the royal family house – found out how approachable the Danish royal family is – one can bump into them on the streets. We learnt about how Denmark made a fatal error in partnering with Germany during WWII – not really partnering but never putting up a resistance to German occupation. During much of World War II, Denmark was occupied by Nazi Germany – from April 1940 up until German forces withdrew at the end of World War II following their surrender to the Allies on 5 May 1945. Contrary to the situation in other countries under German occupation, most Danish institutions continued to function relatively normally until 1943. Both the Danish government and king remained in the country in an uneasy relationship between a democratic Danish government and a totalitarian nazi system. Over 3000 Danes died as a direct result of the occupation.

Later in the afternoon we went to the city center to visit my company’s Copenhagen office. After this we went to Freetown Christiania – a self-proclaimed autonomous neighborhood in Copenhagen – which is the hippie part of Copenhagen. We then took a boat bus round the city. Soon it was time for us to meet our new friends and my boss who was in Denmark for meetings. We got so lost and walked round in circles for 2 hours in Copenhagen before we finally made it to the meat-packing district. Times got so desperate to the extent where we had to sneak into some art gallery or something of the sort to use the washrooms – we had drunk a few beers in Christiania and after many hours of walking idly, we were really really pressed. We met up with everyone in a reggae place in the meat-packing district, partied the night away there and in another club close by called Joleen. The next day was chaotic – we left Copenhagen in the morning and were to get to Munich at 11pm, but a train had fallen on some train tracks. We finally made it to Munich at 5am the following day, and quickly prepped for the festivities that would be the closing ceremony of Oktoberfest.  

Scandinavian diaries

After the lovely Berlin city tour , we took at 3:15pm train to Copenhagen. We finally got to Copenhagen at 11pm. Part of our journey included a very posh ride in a great ferry that had shops - it was like a moving mall. We were so exhausted and finally managed to lug our luggage to what we thought was our hostel – Danhostel Copenhagen. After spending close to 15 minutes at the reception without the receptionist finding our booking, she finally asked “Are you sure you are in the right hostel?” “Of course! Danhostel.” “But you do realize there is also another Danhostel out of town. Please look at your booking confirmation.” Aaaaaaaah! Now this does sound familiar. I do have a vague memory of seeing Danhostel Copenhagen and Danhostel Bellahoj online and picking the one of the two that was cheaper….Cheap is expensive. At midnight, exhausted and with huge backpacks, we had to make our way to Bellahoj. We finally got to our hostel and it was like an IKEA showroom – you had to make everything from scratch. The beds were on the walls, and had to be pulled down from there. After that, one had to look for beddings and make the bed. I still have no idea why the hostel would want tired backpackers to take a forced class on masonry and housekeeping!

The following day we planned to take a city tour, but we were all so worn out. We had been invited for dinner by our new Danish friends. Prior to that we linked up with a Kenyan friend of ours who worked with one of our Danish friends. We went to her hotel to have drinks and wait for her to get ready prior to our group dinner. Olale has always been a very great dresser. Her smashing outfit for the night, makeup, manicured nails etc. only made us realize how we all looked like dirty backpackers. It’s funny how a few weeks of backpacking will make one look like those jungus one usually sees in town, emerging from hostels on river road and the neverlands of deep town. I felt solidarity with all my fellow dirty-looking backpackers, the world over.

Our hosts were extremely welcoming and we all felt extremely happy to be in Denmark. We kept on telling and retelling the story of the posh ferry much to our host’s amusement – “Yes….The train got on the ferry…Why is that a big deal?” After dinner, we went for drinks at a bar down the road. Yet again, we were amazed by how tall and handsome the men were. They were shy though – which was very confusing. The Reluctant referred to it as “The gentling of the Vikings.” How did these giants who were once known for their fierce conquests, now get reduced to terribly shy men who would not approach a woman first unless at gunpoint?”

One wonders…

Berlin city tour

It started in the Parisian square which is in the middle of the city. The square got it's name back in the 1500s or so. The Swedes had poisoned the city's water with sewage and arsenic, and had killed off most of the population (who knew the hedonistic Swedes could be this bad:-) The rotting bodies on the streets had caused a plague that had pretty much wiped out all of  Berlin's population. The Kaiser pleaded with France to send 5000 engineers, builders etc to repopulate the city. The French did this, and that's why they got this place named after their capital. They also got a cathedral built for them. Our next stop was Brandenburg Tor which is this huge victory gate in the Parisian square. On top of the gate is a statue of the female protector of Berlin sitting on a horse-ridden chariot. She looks menacingly at the French embassy which is near the Tor. This was all intentional as Germany has had loads of beef with France in the past centuries.

After this we went to the controversial Holocaust Memorial which is in the middle of the city too, and was built in the 1990s. It has a controversial name, "Holocaust Memorial for the murdered Jews of Europe." I thought the name was appropriate though because to use any sort of euphemism to describe the Holocaust or any other genocide would be to undermine the suffering of those who died. It is also controversial because it has no names. It is just a labyrinth of different sized square rocks. Some are only a foot high while others go up to 20 feet or so. It takes around three minutes to walk from one side to the other if one chooses a straight path. I kind of thought that the monument was interesting and open to many sorts of interpretations. The main interpretation is that the small pillars represent things considered harmless. Such things include anti-semitic jokes, racist thoughts etc. Such "harmless" things eventually lead us to the largest pillars which include ethnic cleansing, torture, rape etc. My own interpretation was that the ambiguity of the monument was necessary. 'With genocides so much is unknown. Perhaps the different heights of the pillars represent the different ages of the dead. Perhaps the ambiguity mirrors the ambiguity of genocide. What  counts as genocide? This is the question the international community was pondering for a while as hundreds of thousands died in Rwanda. Darfur - is that genocide or not? Perhaps we never know until it is all over, and we can tabulate the results. This doesn't help those undergoing it though. As I walked through the monument I didn't expect to get as strongly affected as I did. The first minute I was still towering over the pillars. After this the pillars started getting higher, and I felt as if my path was getting narrower. The fact that I could not see around me or above me made me fear that I would get to the end and not be able to get out. My breathing started getting faster, my heart started pounding and my steps were faster. I was filled with fear, desperation and was feeling claustrophobic. One actually had the scary feeling of entrapment. I hurried and finally got to the end and quickly stepped into fresh air, sunlight and freedom. I was actually still shaking and taking deep breaths of air as if I had thought I would never get out. Three minutes.

After this we went to Hitler's old bunker which was now just an empty parking lot. The Government had intentionally left this place unmarked. They feared that if they made it an official site then it might be a meeting ground for neo-nazis or that Hitler would be getting the commemoration he definitely didn't deserve. The tour guide told us that in his day, Hitler used to be a sex symbol and women would faint just by touching his coat. I was really surprised because even if we momentarily ignored his personality, homeboy was not a good looking fella at all. Apparently he lived in a bomb shelter underground, and when he knew he was going to be captured- he poisoned his dog, his lover and then himself. As soon as his guards found him- they took a cigarette break. He apparently did not allow them to smoke while he lived. Their bodies were taken by the Soviets, burned and then thrown into the river so that he may never have a resting place. The fact that he would now be 120 rubbishes any rumors going around about him being spotted with 2pac and Biggie in Cuba sipping on some crystal.

After this our next stop was some old Nazi buildings which had then been taken over by the Soviets and still contained all the pro-communist propaganda. Posters of happy children and joyful peasants were all around to perpetuate the myth that communism would lead to progress. We then walked through many other parts of Berlin, and I just got more and more fascinated with the city. I had been here in 2001 and 2006, but I felt like this was the first time. Everything that could be said about Berlin, the exact opposite would be true too. There were this huge skyscrapers, but there were also this bombed out unrestored buildings. There were this huge HP and coke ads, but there were also this ancient castles, cathedrals and libraries. It felt like such a changing place. Our tour lasted 3 hours.