Part Four: Kenya

Tuesday 30th June Descending into Dubai, 2 small children started vomiting, one was panicking, and her dad was rather brusque.  She coped much better when she sat by the window with her mother. 
What a hot place, 32° at 5.30 a.m.!
We had a rather frustrating time trying to get our homeward journey organised.  We wanted to use our Skywards points to upgrade to business class from Nairobi to Dubai, and also wanted to find out whether we would be able to get a shuttle to/from our hotel.
Everyone had a different idea as to where the Skywards desk was!  First we were told it’s at Gate 121 in the old terminal – nothing!  The information desk sent us upstairs, two sets of people directed us back through security to another desk where we were told to go upstairs to the Business lounge.  However, we couldn't get there from where we were, so had to go back to Transfers passing through security again!  Well, we were back where we started, halfway down Terminal Three! 
When we went upstairs, we were confronted by a large lady who asked if we were registered!  Only Silver and Gold customers can use the Skywards desks at the airport, so we'd have to use the internet or phone!
After walking around the airport for 1 1/2 hours, we were feeling rather tired!  After having orange juice and sundaes at McDonald’s, we put our feet up for 20 minutes before heading off the the boarding area.  We were very surprised to be upraded to Business class along with many others!  God has a real sense of humour!!It was good to be able to put our feet up on the plane, no swelling for once!  None of the other planes had had foot rests.  You certainly get a much larger variety of foods (including a glass pottle of jam!), larger servings of juice, a choice of teas & coffees, a bottle of water and good earphones!
Take-off was delayed by the paper war that ensued after a passenger didn’t board, also their baggage had to be offloaded, caused a paper war.  Further delays were caused by rescheduling the runway!  However, we were still on time in Nairobi!
Part IV – Kenya
It was humid, and warm, 21° at 3 p.m.  We were shocked by the brownness of the countryside, it should have been green.
After waiting in the queue for ½ hour for a visa, we found we needed another form!  That meant another ½ hour wait!  They were certainly taking swine flu' seriously, you were given a special form to fill in with a tear-off slip for a doctor in case you got sick.
We were met by 5 Maasai including our friend John Tino. They’d been there since lunchtime, although I'd told them not to be there before half 3!  Some had never seen planes before, so had been having lots of fun watching them take off and land.
Unfortunately I managed to lose some travellers’ cheques by accidentally replacing them between my money belt & skirt.  I was trying to be very careful as it's offensive for a woman to show her waist!
We went to the Kenya Airways office outside Departures hoping to pay for our tickets to Tanzania, but they wouldn’t accept our voucher although we’d been assured it would be OK.  That meant planning a trip to the Precision Air office in Nairobi the next day.
We all went in Nicholas Teeka's ute – one of John Tino’s half-brothers – to his house in a small Maasai settlement near the airport.  He and his wife Agnes live in a 3-room corrugated iron hut with their 2 children and one of his other wife’s children.  The other lives with its mother at his father’s manyatta.  Pictured from L to R: John, Nicholas, Agnes + child, Elizabeth (John's fiancée).The house is surrounded by netting fences - animals live on three sides in pens, the fourth has a gate.  A smaller hut contains the jiko (stove), a bed and cupboards.  Hens fly up to peck scraps off the dirty plates stacked in the wooden dish-stand in the yard.  Young animals stay around all day, older ones are taken out to grazing.  The bathroom is a tiny iron shed behind the 'house' with a branch for soap and wire for towel + clothes.  The toilet was a padlocked long-drop in the open space outside the fence.
The settlement has sll kinds of houses from traditional mud/thatch huts, through mud brick to iron.  Many are dilapidated or derelict.  It's approached on a dirt road that first passes between home-made dukas (shops) and kibandas (roofed stalls).  It's a noisy place to live, there are planes all day, (a Red Cross one at 4.30 p.m.), and at night: cow bells; animals snorting, coughing, & urinating; little children crying; people talking; even 2 birds that together sounded like a squeaky see-saw! 
We were only able to eat half the food offered as by the time we got to eat, it was so late at night! However, it was good to meet John’s fiancée, Elizabeth, who’d been staying with Nicholas and his family for a couple of weeks.  She finds the city hard to get used to as her home is out in the bush. 
We were quite shocked and very sad to hear, during the after-dinner discussion, that their wedding had been postponed.  The church leaders had decided this at a meeting on Friday: because John's house isn’t finished, and people can’t afford to bring gifts due to the drought.
It was hard to sleep too as it was so cold and we only had a bottom sheet – usually you supply your own, but we hadn’t packed one!  Everyone else had gone offto bed too, and we didn't want to disturb anyone, so we put on sweaters and socks, and huddled together under my dressing gown all night! 
I woke up in the middle of the night feeling very upset about losing the money, feeling such a fool! I'd only found out when we went to bed so couldn't do anything about it straight away.

Last day in Germany

Monday 29th June  After checking out of our hotel, we took our bags to Jeremy's (left) then went to the North Duisburg Industrial Park.  This factory was closed 20 years ago, but used to make iron using coke from the Essen plant. 
Interesting sights: small fish in a ground-level storage bunker - how did they get there? trees and shrubs taking over the buildings and old railway tracks; a large wind sail near two cooling ponds (right); gas pipes stretching for kilometres over the countryside!  We climbed 253 stairs to the top of the furnace structure.  Our souvenir - a €5 flattened and embossed with the plant name by turning a handle!
After a brief rest at Jeremy’s, we went out to let Judith work uninterrupted.  It was SO hot, over 30°, that I got a really bad headache.  I wanted to get my hair cut before landing in Africa, but it turned out that but Monday is hairdressers' day off in Duisburg.
We took some books to the Botanic Gardens to read in the shade, but had to move off the grass when Jeremy got bitten by ants to some semi-reclining seats.
After repacking our bags and wrapping gifts, we caught the U-bahn to Düsseldorf. It was fun riding high above the pavements and roads in the free twin-carriage Sky Train, suspended below a curved concrete span, from the station to our terminal!After a search to find the right check-in desk, we enjoyed a good coffee and doughnuts with chocolate & hazelnuts inside before wandering around an interesting photographic display about immigrants living in various parts of the world.  It took a long time to pass through security, but we were happy to use some €2 vouchers to buy sweets for the Maasai children.

Part Two: Belgium

Sunday 21st Changeable weather, fine then colder, windy and cloudy.  I got up too early, making the dog rather excited when I went downstairs, she wanted to go outside - but I missed one deadbolt so she had to wait a bit longer!Managed to bypass the Baptist church due to talking too much, realising once we reached the Catholic one that we'd gone to far.  We ended up about 15 minutes late but enjoyed the service plus chatting to some of the friendly congregation and pastor afterwards.  They help an African church in Nairobi by sending teams to teach pastors and Sunday School teachers.
We went to Heathrow by bus after lunch. British Midlands seemed very efficient, but there was a long delay on the tarmac before we were cleared for take off, so the pilot made a big joke out of it.  However, we made up half an hour in flight time due to tail winds!
Part II - Belgium
Our first glimpses of Belgium were interesting: lots of tiny fields, some looking like mediaeval strip-farms, entwined within a cobweb of roads that sprouted clusters of houses along their lengths.  There seemed to be few trees apart from a large area near the city, but there were quite a lot of canals and other waterways. 
At first airport formalities seemed pretty scanty with no arrival forms to fill in.  However, two out of the three queues for non-EU passport-holders were stationary or almost so, so people started moving to the only one that was proceeding quickly.  We decided to do the same.
The charming official only wanted to know whether we were there for business or not, so was interested to hear that we were going to visit our daughter in Belgium, and that we were from NZ, saying, “Old Zeeland is very close!”
It was a little hard to find the right platform for the train, but it was a quick trip to the Midi.  It seems young Belgians love covering things with graffiti, even the train carriages! 
It was also hard to find the right exit out of the Midi station, we thought we’d come out on the other side, so we went in the wrong direction down the street looking for our hotel.  There seemed to be few street signs + my street map was confusing, even the bus stop one didn’t help, so we went back to the station to ask directions.  I also asked at a few places on the way, trying out some French! 
The hotel was a bit grotty, and our room only had a shared toilet, with no bathroom, so we paid a bit more to get a room with a shower.
Dinner was interesting, we went to the next-door Greek restaurant.  It was hard to work out which dish was which + the staff only spoke French - but a kindly Asian girl helped us.  The chef complimented her on her excellent French and it was quite funny how quickly they became a little flirtatious, although he was twice her age! It was a cheap filling meal, so we slept well afterwards, although it was amazingly light outside after 10 p.m.

Part One: England - On our way!

Part I - England

Monday 15th Left Christchurch New Zealand at 3.55 p.m., arrived in Sydney at 5.15, a pleasant 18°. I was screened for explosives – need to learn NOT to look at security staff!

Tuesday 16th Arrived 40 minutes late due to headwinds in Bangkok, 27°; Dubai was even hotter, 32°; arrived in Gatwick 12.25.
I was pleased to be allowed to use the phone at the information desk to let my uncle and aunt know which bus we were catching as I didn’t have any small change for the pay phone outside, although I was prepared to go to the Forex.
There was no sign of Uncle Norman and Aunty Mary at the bus stop in Oxford, so I went to the public phone after changing some money with a kindly bus conductor. Of course, there was no answer, they'd already arrived!
After a cuppa, we went on a long walk in the water meadows with Varga, their Norwegian Elkhound, now 8 years old.
Bruce went to bed early, but I couldn't resist the chance of playing chamber music with one of Uncle Norman’s quartet groups - we tried out a Schumann Piano Quintet! I had a nice chat with the group over supper at 10 p.m.