Mombasa Trip--Mainly Pictures

On Friday, August 22 Nan, Mark and Nan's sister Patti took University transport to the Nairobi train station downtown for our trip to Mombasa. In spite of some challenges mentioned later, it's a wonderful adventure: one of the classic train trips of the world, and for a first class cabin and two meals it's a bargain at around $50 US.

Since we arrived an hour early, we were directed to the station restaurant where we grabbed sodas and samosas (kind of meat-filled triangular egg rolls) while we waited for the train. A little after 6PM we were allowed to board, and promptly at 7, the train started its trip south east from Nairobi to the Muslim port city of Mombasa on the Indian Ocean.

We had signed up for the "early" seating for dinner, so we headed to the booth-filled dining car around 7:15 for meal service starting at 7:30. The place settings in the dining car were almost a history of East African railroads. SOme silverware was marked "UR" for "Uganda Railway." SOme was marked "KR" for "Kenya Railway." Some was marked "EAR&T" for "East Africa Railway and Transport." The linens were marked "RVR" for Rift Valley Railway" the current owner of the railroad we were on. We were offered first soup, and then lamb, or chicken or vegetable curry. We opted for the chicken which tasted good as we ate later than usual. So far so good. When we got back to our cabins, they had been made up with crisp sheets and pillowcases and nice blankets but, long story short, even though we were all sleepy and there was the appropriate rocking of the railroad cars, we could not get to sleep. We dozed, we woke up, we GOT up, then started the cycle again. We were conscious of the train stopping often to pick up and drop off passengers during the night, but we could not get to sleep.

About 6AM, we gave up, got up, got dressed and started looking out the windows. The next few pictures are some of the things we saw. After this picture series, a bit about Mombasa itself.

After a good breakfast and four more hours of travel, the train finally pulled into the Mombasa train station at 11AM--SIXTEEN HOURS after we had left Nairobi. A driver we had arranged for picked us up and took us to our hotel--a kind of faded resort directly on the Indian Ocean. We mainly crashed the rest of the afternoon, but took a walk on the beach in the evening and then spent the next day exploring Mombasa. It's famous for the ancient doors on several of the buildings in the old city. More pictures follow.

Left to right above (if the formatting holds!) our local guide, who for the equivalent of about 8 dollars led the three of us through the old city, past ships under repair, the old Portuguese "Fort Jesus", and the famous arab doors of the old city. We finished up our trip with a visit to the spectacular "Tamarind" restaurant located on a hill overlooking the harbor and Mombasa island. It's their black door you see among other doors below...

Bob and Kim Cantrell from our home church in Nampa are coming in a week and planning to spend part of their time in Mombasa. These are some of the things they will see, and if you come, these are some of the things you will see as well. At the risk of "spiritualizing" things (we're glad to take the risk), the Muslim movement is on the march in Africa. There are many mosques--large and small--in Nairobi and the overwhelming number of places of worship in Mombasa are mosques. We'd ask you to pray for the Nazarene churches and for other Christian churches in the Mombasa area, that God will move in a mighty way and that people will understand the transforming Good News of the gospel.

Matchbox Collection

In the US, there are lots of choices for lots of things. There's an almost endless selection of fast food restaurants, kinds of toothpaste, and varieties of potato chips. Even so, there are some things for which Kenya offers more choices than the US. Obviously, there are many more kinds of animals and birds and fruits and regularly spoken languages in Kenya than there are in the US. Another area where there's more difference is in different kinds of matchboxes.

As best we can remember, there are only a couple of kinds of matchboxes on offer at Walmart or Safeway or Albertsons. Even these boxes are very utilitarian--either decorated with company ads for matches given away by 7-11 or other companies, or with obvious labels like"Safety Matches." Most matches in the US seem to be used to burn trash or to light cigarettes. Even barbecue grills seem to be lighted more with the fancy propane lighters than with plain matches.

In Kenya, we rarely see people smoking. People mainly and constantly use matches to light charcoal cooking fires or propane stoves, and stores offer them lots of options both in terms of "cover art" and in terms of country of origin. Matchboxes are small works of art and geography lessons. At every grocery store or quick mart, several different kinds of matchboxes are on offer: small, 40 stick boxes; large 200 stick boxes; and packages of 10 or 12 small boxes.

This blog post includes pictures of several diffrent kinds of matchboxes. With the understanding that not everyone is fascinated by matchboxes :-), here's a little information about each one:

• Falcon--Made in Pakistan. The back of the package gives the company founder's name: Hussain Almoudi.


• Flora--Made in Kenya. This is a good thing. In some respects, the fact that nearly all of the matches are made outside the country is a lesson about one of Kenya's challenges: it needs more national manufacturers and fewer imports.


• Zebra--Made in South Africa and imported by a Nairobi company.


• Leopard--Made and purchased in Malawi. Back and front are identical.


• Sparky--Made in Pakistan. The back of the box says "Approximately 45 splints."


• Farasi--Made in Kenya. Farisi means "horse" in Kiswahili. One travel blog writer calls these the "best matches in the world" because they are coated with wax to make them almost 100% waterproof.


• Rhino--Made in India. The back text says, "The right match at the right price! Manufacturing perfection, Excellent Quality, That's your Rhino."


• Three Stars--Made in Sweden. This is a larger box with 200 matches compared to the smaller 40-45 match boxes.


• Rambow--Made in Pakistan. The back text says, "Carbonized Damp Proof. Average 45 Sticks. Superior Quality."


• Kangaroo--Made in India. On the back is a picture of Augustine Okocha, a Nigerian football (soccer) player, although on the matchbox his name is misspelled "Okicha."