Kisumu Town

Thanks to everyone who sent their well wishes to me last week. I am now basically fully recovered from my little bout with African infectious diseases but I was still feeling tired this weekend so wanted to make sure to take it easy so I stayed here in Kisumu.

This past weekend was a perfect weekend to explore the town of Kisumu a bit more and get to know some of the places I hadn’t been yet. The town of Kisumu is spread out along the banks of the lake. In the center of town there are many shops and a few places to eat. A bit further outside of town there are two “malls”, one that houses the big super market, a movie theatre, and some places to eat. It also has a pool hall and a bowling alley, though I haven’t been to either of those yet. The other mall has a very American coffee shop place which I have been to once but seems very misplaced in this part of the world. There is also a museum in town that I visited over the weekend. It tells the history of this area and the traditions of the main tribe that lives here. It was interesting to see since I live and work here, but I wouldn’t say that it is something that your average tourist probably needs to visit. Next to the museum is the row of touristy shops selling African masks, safari animal sculptors, and things made of soap stone. There are some nice things but nothing that really caught my eye.

After the museum I met friends for lunch at an Indian place. The restaurant variety in Kisumu are somewhat limited, especially if you are use to the options in Washington, DC or Atlanta. The popular hang-out for the “Mzungus” (which is the Swahili term for foreigner or white person), is “Mon Ami” which offers a variety of American/European like dishes and drinks. There are a few good Indian restaurants in town, including “Inca” which is probably my favorite, if only because I have been then twice. There are many people of Indian descent in Kenya because England as the colonial power had brought in Indians as skilled laborers and shopkeepers. There are a few Asian food places which seem to serve a mix of Chinese and Thai-like dishes. I haven’t been yet but have been told that they are pretty good if you aren’t expecting the same kind of dishes that you find in Chinese or Thai places anywhere else in the world. There are also a few good places that serve more African food and are popular with the local middle and upper class as well as the mzungus.

Every day there are many stalls all along the main roads of town, where people sell everything from fruits and vegetables to shoes and books. There are several more formal markets as well. There is good sized fruit and vegetable market very near my house, where you can buy fresh avocados, tomatoes, mangos, and pineapples. I have only passed near the main Kisumu market which is open everyday and is housed in part in an old building near the bus station. On Sunday, I went to the Kibuye Market which is on Sundays is the largest Market in East Africa. The place is huge, every time you think you have reached the edge you turn a corner and find another alley full of little shops and sellers. The market seems to be laid out in two different ways. The main part is very open which is sprawling with the clothes and other wares sellers. Then all around that there are little alleys that run away from the main area where there are also little shops. These alleys often widen and give way to another larger selling area. There seems to be sections of the market where everyone is more or less selling the same thing: rice bags in one area, spices and tea in another, and the metal workers in yet another. Often it seems that each of the shops in each section is more or less selling the same things and one has to wonder how you know where to buy your things and how anyone makes any money really. The colors and sound of the market are something that can hardly be described in the extremes that you find but it is now probably one of my favorite places here in Kisumu. I have posted some pictures of the market on my picasa website.

The part of town that I see the most is the roads to and from work. The roads are a busy mess of cars, jeeps, mini-buses, tuk-tuks (which are these mini-taxi type things), bikes, and people. What makes the ride different everyday is seeing the variety of things that people are carrying in the various forms of transportation. The baskets on women’s heads, the wood on the back of a bike, two kids on the back of a bike on their way to school, bags of rice and goats on the top of buses, and so much more. Everyday I think that we just barely miss hitting someone or something with our car, but that seems to be the norm here and as of yet I haven’t seen any accidents actually happen. I will say I am extra careful when crossing the street or walking anywhere, since moving objects seem to appear out of nowhere sometimes. I also have to keep remembering to look right for cars instead of left, as here in Kenya they drive on the left side of the road like in England.

Kisumu has the extremes of wealth and poverty, maybe not as clear cut as in Nairobi but here I think you might see the difference right next to each other more frequently. Working in a modern laboratory and research facility, living in a nice compound with electricity and internet (some days), and going to nice places to eat sometimes you can forget the outside the gates of all those places there are children without shoes, women carrying wood for their fires, and men getting paid less then a dollar a day to support their family of 8. This is what I see everyday and what I myself have to reconcile with the life that I lead here and in the US, as well as the kind of work that I do.