Kenya Report #1 Dear All, I did not have an opportunity to write letters from Kenya for a variety of reasons. I will do so now, motivated in part by my personal need to write about my experiences there so that I can understand them better. The main attraction for my going to Kenya was the potential for putting my and Janice's experiences in Cameroon in greater perspective. I was right in thinking I would learn a great deal about Cameroon and Africa. In writing about my visit to Kenya I will first state a fairly straight- forward chronology. Then I will write a series of fairly extended essays about various aspects of my visit. In many of the essays I will compare what I saw in Kenya to what I learned in Cameroon. For me the trip started on Friday, 18 May, at 3:00, which marked the end of the final examination in CSc 109, which had about 55 students. I had to grade the exams and submit the grades before 1:30 on Saturday, when a Lehigh van would take us to Newark for the flight to Amsterdam and then to Nairobi. I finished grading the exams around 5:30 AM and was able to submit the grades around 6:15 AM. Then I got a few hours of sleep. During our 5 hour layover in Amsterdam (6-11 AM Sunday) we took the train downtown and took a walking tour of a very quiet Amsterdam, including a stop by the Ann Frank house. We arrived in Nairobi around 8 Sunday evening. We stayed overnight at the Methodist Guest House. The next morning we boarded the school bus from Gikumenne Girls' High School (one of the schools in Meru) and took the four ride to Meru, which is about 200 Km north of Nairobi on the lower slopes of Mt. Kenya. Tom Schultz, the organizer of the trip stayed behind to start the process of getting the computers through customs. The computers had been airshipped via British Airways, whereas we had flown on KLM. Each of us was assigned a different family who would host us for our stay in Meru. It would end up taking Tom Schultz until Friday to spring the computers from customs. One could conceptualize the problems of gaining clearance in terms of our being ignorant of the rules, but it is more likely that the customs officials created the rules as they went along in an effort to extract bribes from us. In the meantime, back in Meru, our hosts tried to find various ways to keep us busy. Most of the hosts were headmasters or headmistresses, so many of us ended up spending time at their schools. The computers arrived Friday evening. We spent time that evening and part of Saturday unpacking the computers, assembling working systems, and grading them so that we could equitably distribute them. Saturday afternoon (26 May) we drove to a private game preserve to view all sorts of wild animals (zebra, giraffe, wildebeest, ostrich, rhinoceros, etc.). That evening we ended up at a lodge at the base of Mt. Kenya. On Sunday, we drove to Met Station at 10,000 ft on Mt. Kenya. From there we started our hike up Mt. Kenya. We stayed overnight at MacKinder's Camp (14,200 ft). The next day we descended and drove back to Meru. On Tuesday and Wednesday we assembled computer systems at a central location, then we boxed them and took them to the various schools, where we reassembled the systems to be sure that they were functioning. On Thursday, we spent much of the day at a "launching cermony." We officially presented the computers to the various schools, and the various schools gave various dance and song presentations. On Friday we drove to Nairobi and then flew to Lamu, an island resort in an estuary on the Indian Ocean. This started the "touristy" part of the trip. The students spent much of the time on a tropical beach relaxing. I spent my time exploring the town of Lamu and the surrounding environs. On Tuesday (5 June) we flew from Lamu to Mombasa. From there we took minibuses to Amboselli National Park, a game preserve in the shadow of Mt. Kilimanjaro. We stayed overnight at a very posh lodge. Early the next morning we spent a few hours viewing game. In those few hours we saw an amazing diversity animals, many in great numbers: wildebeest, flamingo, hippopotamus, lion, zebra, giraffe, elephant, buffalo, hyena, jackal. We then drove to Nairobi for a goodbye meal with our hosts from Meru and for a chance to buy souvenirs. Wednesday night we started our flight home.