Kenya versus Sri Lanka

Nairobi-It was inevitable that I would need to compare one experience to the next; I think it is human nature to look for similarities and differences. I lived in Sri Lanka for almost a year after finishing law school and when I returned I know I talked incessantly about what life was like there. I compared and contrasted away, surely driving my friends crazy. Now I'm doing it again. Every adventure I have here, from driving to the store, posting a letter, or learning the local language, I immediately compare it to my time in Sri Lanka. Strangely I rarely contrast things to life in NYC, perhaps because there are some things that are too dissimilar to try and find parallels.

Food

For almost 15 years I was a vegetarian. I grew up on meat and potatoes, then in 1992 right after the Olympics, and at least 6 books on the subject of nutrition, I decided to make the commitment. I didn't do it for the animals, I mean we are at the top of the food chain, but I did do it for my health and for ecological reasons. Somehow, now that the rest of the world has jumped onto the "green" bandwagon, I have jumped off into the world of meat. It is a good thing too, because in Kenya, meat is king.

Nyama choma is roasted goat meat, which I've really only had once and that was at an Ethiopian restaurant with Scott and this cool British couple we met at Upperhill who took a year off from their lives to drive from England to India before shipping their car to Mombassa and driving around Africa and back up to Europe.

I love Indian food, but I must admit that as a vegetarian back in '06 in Lanka, my choices were very limited. Unlike Indians who venerate those who abstain from meat, Sri Lankans just look at you real funny. The curries there are very hot and my palate did grow accustomed to it, but hotness doesn't mean goodness and other than Kotthu Roti, a noodle-like stir-fry dish that is great late-night, I didn’t take any favourites home with me.

Language

Mate Sinhala tikkak puluwan: I can speak a little Sinhala. That was after a year and one round of lessons at the British Council during my last 6 weeks on the island. I didn't want to make the same mistake I made in Sri Lanka where I tried to learn the language too late in my stay, so I bought my Swahili Made Easy book and got off to a roaring start. Sadly, that sputtered and died quickly. The book I bought wasn't making Swahili easy, in fact it has made me almost give up. Normally when you learn a language they teach you important things at the start, like what to say when you go to the market and need to buy 5 tomatoes. This book is teaching me complex verbs that I will never use in the next 2 months and I still can't go shopping. My swimmer girls did teach me to say ninataka ku-ogelea: I want to swim.

The worst and most embarrassing part of my language problem in Sri Lanka was not knowing until I was there for 9 months that "O" means yes. I spent months talking to co-workers who would nod their head side to side in the South Asian fashion saying O, O. I thought they had no idea what I was talking about. Turns out I was the idiot.

Transportation

The greatest thing for me in Colombo were tuk-tuks, 2 stroke diesel powered 3-wheelers which took me everywhere I wanted to go. They were cheap too, which made them perfect for getting to work and to coaching. It was also pretty safe to travel at night. As long as I was in a tuk-tuk I felt safe, even when the drivers tried to ask me to marry them. I always relied on my made-up fiancé back in the US to dissuade them. Once I learned to speak with a bit of a Sinhala accent it certainly helped.

I thought there would be tuk-tuks in Nairobi since there were pictures of them in the Lonely Planet. Sadly those pictures are old and there are no tuk-tuks which has forced me to use public matatus, of which you can read about my last post.

Clothing

When not dressed in traditional saris, unfortunately, Sri Lankan women are quite possibly the worst dressed in the world. Their style is non-existent when trying to dress Western; they combine polyester shirts from the 70s and 80s with long narrow skirts, sandals and UV protection umbrellas. I don't understand this at all since price is not the issue: Sri Lanka is home to dozens of factories which produce everything from Gap and Victoria Secret to Speedo and several UK store brands. The prices are low, and it is just as cheap to buy this stuff as it is the ugly stuff. I wish they all wore saris or even shalwar kameez because they look so much more beautiful when they do.

While in Colombo, I got to tour a clothing factory that made swimwear, including Speedo. It was really cool to see the FastSkins being made and I was given several after the tour. I was also relieved to see that the place was not a sweatshop, in fact things looked very civilized for all the workers. The weirdest part, and what for a feminist is a bit hard to swallow, was how the pregnant women had to wear pink smocks to differentiate them. On the one hand it seemed sweet that people were warned to treat these women with a little TLC, on the other it is quite offensive to think that just because a woman is pregnant she somehow cannot do her job the same way.

In Nairobi, the style is a lot more revealing that conservative Colombo. There are women wearing shorter skirts and showing much more cleavage. I am dressing much like I would in NYC. There are a few women who I see wearing more traditional African dresses, but for the most part everyone is wearing western clothes. Men cannot wear shorts though and Scott is often the teased by schoolboys who see him in shorts and think he looks like a young boy. Personally, I can't stand wearing jeans when it is so hot, so shorts are usually part of my weekend wardrobe.

Up next week: Prices, Swimming, Tourism, Development, Animals and of course, Men.