Susan's Blog july 12

Well it has been almost a week since I last blogged. there was no Internet at Tiwi beach where Lilly and I went for some r and r. The nearby town of Diani had a power outage (common here) when I went to use the Internet and anyway was five times as much as I am paying now so better to blog now!
It was hard to say goodbye to Paul and Eliot. Paul had to return to work and Eliot returned as he leaves today for a summer program at the University of Reno. Paul will be flying solo for about 10 days.
We decided to take a flight to Mombasa as it was only $60 vs an 8-hour bus ride for about $12. the flight was great except after we said goodbye to Paul and eliot at the airport we realized we were at the wrong airport and our ride had already gone. I was slightly panicked but luckily we had enough time. we actually got a ride in a very nice corporate car for a bank and the executive didn't mind the 20-minute detour. The driver asked for $1500 ksh, about $23, but I got him down to $1000 ksh. The airport we left from was tiny and the plane only sat about 40 passengers, but it was a very enjoyable flight and they even fed us a snack!
The trip to Tiwi beach was unfortunately another 2500 Kenyan shillings to get the driver to take us to the cottages where we were staying. We needed to go on a ferry and it was about a one-hour drive. This area is very Muslim, and there is a totally different feeling down here at the coast. We stayed in a really nice thatched-roof cottage with a kitchen and you could see the beach from our porch. It was huge--she put us in the biggest one because business is slow-- and gave it to us for $52 including all. Really nice African touches to the decor. Kitchen could stand an update though. Every day one of her workers would light a kind of barbecue type thing in the back twice a day which would heat our water so we could take showers. Wild monkeys visited us every evening, which is pretty cool, except one was threatening me several times when I was eating a cookie, so Lilly went out there screaming and waving a towel to scare him off. It was pretty funny. The second time the monkey peed on the edge of our porch, I think in fear, although the owner says that is a sign of embarrassment. There were tons of wild monkeys all over the property, and then the owner who is an animal nut has a pet monkey and got a week-old one while we were there that was rejected by its mother. She let us hold the baby as it didn't have teeth yet to bite. She also had 10 dogs, at least 20 cats, huge outdoor bird ages with all types of tropical birds, and lots of geese and chickens. she buys them and gets them from people who have abused them and gives them a second chance at life.
The beach is absolutely gorgeous, but at first we couldn't spend any time there because every moment someone would come up to us and try to talk to us and then they wanted something from us, to buy something to go snorkeling. It was nonstop, and we finally gave up. We told the owner and one of her workers went down to talk to the group of "beach boys"and miraculously the next few days were blissfully peaceful and we could even purchase a few souvenirs. The problem is there are no tourists. After the Feb violence most people cancelled their trips. It's hard when you are the only customer. The beaches were empty. some days we were the only tourists on the beach. There were never more than five others on the long stretch of white-sand beach.
At our cottage fishermen would come around with crabs, prawns and other catch of the day. I felt bad that we didn't buy, but we had visited the grocery store before we came, and Lilly and i just don't eat that much.
One day we visited Diani Beach as the owner gave us a ride there. This is supposed to be the hub of tourism for Kenya, and those beaches were completely empty too. I only saw two tourists there. Pretty sad.
Now we are in Mombasa waiting for our overnight bus (9 hours, arrives Nairobi 6 am to Nairobi and then we are taking a Matatu (public transport van, but not a very nice one) to Meru (four hours). I hope all goes well. All the Sunday flights were booked and we needed to get back to Meru. A weaver we met in Nairobi is coming with two of his weavers on Monday and Tues. to train the women and two men). I want to be there for the training, and to videotape part of it. This will feel like we really completed a big part of the project. From there I hope the women will practice for a month and then the trainers can come back for more advanced training in a month or so. They are going to train in three small simultaneous groups instead of one big one. In this way the three groups can later share what they learned among each other and it saves time for the head weaver who cannot leave his business for very long. I liked him when I met him, and I liked his work, so hope fully all will go well. The total cost for the two days is $300 including travel, which is four hours each way in addition to the two teaching days. I'
I'll blog again when we arrive in Meru.