Blog

Hello over there,

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The internet out in my neck of the woods has had amnesia lately. It’s forgotten what it’s supposed to do. I’m at a coffee place in Nairobi now where there is wireless access. I’m here today because after checking with two lawyers and a four hour wait in the ramshackle office of the Land Control Board in Athi River yesterday, I didn’t have a document with me that they virtually never require, but did yesterday, for the final title transfer of the three acre property. There is likely a small amount of local political intrigue in this mess, but I’ll leave that.

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So I had to meet with my lawyer today in Nairobi to gather the stuff. In addition to the land Control Board episode, here are a few of the hair pullers of late.

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This morning I went to the room at the hostel in Daystar I had rented for the new construction foreman. The first one bailed, without notice, as I think I have mentioned. Room 22 at the Silver Springs. 8:00am. Second floor. I knocked and then again. Louder. Four or five spaced bursts. Finally the door opened and the lovely young woman in her night shirt and I looked bug-eyed at one another. Actually her eyes were bugged and sleep-filled at once. I struggled to explain; she struggled to understand. I left and called Kariuki, the manager. the same manager I had placed a deposit with a month ago, and to whom just two days ago I had paid the rent for the balance of August.

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I found him downstairs and he was sleep and terror-filled at once. My horror movie hands kept moving on their own to his neck. I checked them, for the moment. He was stuttering and, I imagine, sincerely hoping he was still dreaming. I hollered at him and after a short while said I would be back with the receipts and the police to have him arrested, which I am entirely willing to do if he doesn’t remedy the situation. This is the second episode.

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PS – He remedied the situation later today. So he’s still a free man.

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The silver lining, I suppose is that the construction foreman hadn’t arrived the night before as he promised and so the young woman in the twice-rented room only had to answer the door in her night shirt once for a stranger. The second foreman is still AWOL. But we’re starting brick making and excavation Thursday, with or without.

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I went to my bank today to change my account to a less expensive type since I don’t need the extra services, because I have started banking at another branch in a more secure area. I met Irene, a lovely and personable manager who, despite a surfeit of good will couldn’t make their downed computer system give up my account info. Her willing it too hard may have been the cause of the electricity shutting down.

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It’s not all bad. I had dinner the other night with an Italian photographer named Manuel, and a friend. He has a series of exhibits in Paris and Finland and then around much of the world set for this year. He is a fine photographer and now devotes his energy and resources to raising money for several African charities. Over French onion soup he told me that in 1996 he was staying for some time in an expensive hotel in Budapest, where he met Michael Jackson, a fellow guest. He and some friends became Mikey’s concert and after party pals. Manuel brought expensive sweets and postcards of monkeys doing all kinds of weird things as gifts. MJ was mightily tickled by the monkey shines. Among the folks in the suite, post concert, was a dwarf, who was just a fan and had somehow wrangled the invite of a lifetime. He started dancing and Michael loved the jacket he was wearing so much he bought it for his young nephew who was there with his mother and sister. Just so you know.

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This morning on the way into town, the right headlight popped out of its socket like a gouged eye and hung there tethered by the electrical wiring. The toll of the roads on the truck now stands at:

– both headlights losing their moorings and flopping out

– the driver’s side window being knocked of its roller which was, in turn, broken

– the body on the passenger’s side being torn away from one of the braces by which it is bolted to the body

– my relatively new shock absorbers – done

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The really good news is that the new road has been opened up in several sections between here and Nairobi, and driving which used to be a twenty on a nightmare scale of one to ten, is now about a three. It is the single biggest improvement in my quality of life since arriving here.

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I drove to the quarry the other day with Raphael, the driver I had hired to make these runs. It was a elongated DMV test for him. He passed. Here’s what you would have seen if you had stowed aboard.

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That\'s our lorry down yonder.

The quarries are lined up for several kilometers along a narrow stretch of old dry river bed.

And very tough guys work them, hacking out big chunks of overhanging rock, which is then hand cut into 9\"x9\"x whatever blocks, which are then sold for 16 Kenya shillings a linear foot (about a quarter). It\'s going up to 20 ks per foot on Monday. It\'s dangerous work and a few guys get killed every year.

It is a place of stone.

I\'m not exactly sure why, but it reminds me of the leper colony in Ben Hur.

The basic tools, pt 1

pt. 2

The entertainment center.

The quarry guys lay out the stones.

Then we measure them, by the foot.

And they load them int the truck.

We take 250\' per load. Eight rows per layer. Two layers and two extra rows on top.

This woman who came walking along carrying a pretty heavy load of stuff turned out to be the owner of this and several other quarries.

I\'m not sure who this young guy was.

But he made the group photo.

I had a semi private sitting.

Before we brought the load home for Scoobie to get excited over.

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This is Kelly a mechanic who makes house calls. After the inaugural quarry runs, one of the fan belts got too small for its britches and popped. There was a day and a half fiasco involving two trips to Nairobi and ill-sized belts and and oversight by the incomparable Masa,

but we re-britched and got her going.

Two of our three tents for temporary worker housing.

And two of our four permanent fixtures.

Kelly had a lot of compnay under the Bedford

Makiga Engineering, off of Likoni Road, the brick machine makers.

I picked ours out of the line up,

and headed over to Edward\'s to get a base welded for it. 2\"x2\"x1/4\" angle iron. Very stout stuff.

I believe it\'s trying to say hi.

The brain trust pouring over the operations manual.

The operational riddle, although we have since cut off the short legs and put on larger mesh screen.

It\'s pretty, don\'t you think?

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The yakkety-yak machine and it soon-to-be base.

The OSHA approved safety goggles.

Fire in the hole!

A young man who looks like he is in the process of grinding off his own foot.

I\'m just kind of taken with these sparkler shots, I guess.

Th rod in this photo is used to fill in gaps that are a little wider than you\'d like. It\'s probably cheating.

It\'s a good thing Gilbert doesn\'t live in a glass house.

It\'s a good thing Gilbert doesn\'t live in a glass house.

I came across this in my lawyer\'s office building. But it wasn\'t me, honest.

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I have some more stuff to tell you, but I’m awfully tired and it will keep. We’ll talk again soon.

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We here hope you there are all well,

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David