Only one more sleep to go!!!

Well if I'm not ready now I never will be, I have checked-in online and printed my boarding card, packed everything that I need and given up fretting about the few kilos extra I'm carrying. My storage cards are all cleared, camera batteries all charged and copies of all documentation safely distributed. The eReader is loaded with books (as well as a guide to Kenya and copies of my travel docs) and my laptop is ready to receive what I estimate will be around 3000 images of everything from sunrise and silhouettes to bugs, butterflies and big cats. My next update will hopefully be when I reach the Fairview hotel in Nairobi tomorrow evening.

WIKI notes on the Masai People

"The central unit of Maasai society is the age-set. Although young boys are sent out with the calves and lambs as soon as they can toddle, childhood for boys is mostly playtime, with the exception of ritual beatings to test courage and endurance. Girls are responsible for chores such as cooking and milking, skills which they learn from their mothers at an early age. Every 15 years or so, a new and individually named generation of Morans or Il-murran (warriors) will be initiated. This involves most boys between 12 and 25, who have reached puberty and are not part of the previous age-set. One rite of passage from boyhood to the status of junior warrior is a painful circumcision ceremony, which is performed without anaesthetic. This ritual is typically performed by the elders, who use a sharpened knife and makeshift cattle hide bandages for the procedure. The Maa word for circumcision is emorata. The boy must endure the operation in silence. Expressions of pain bring dishonor, albeit temporarily. Any exclamations can cause a mistake in the delicate and tedious process, which can result in life-long scarring, dysfunction, and pain. The healing process will take 3–4 months, during which urination is painful and nearly impossible at times, and boys must remain in black cloths for a period of 4–8 months."

Going dark

One week to go and I have made an important, and positive decision to leave my mobile phone (and my Blackberry) behind. It will be the longest we have ever been apart, but with a 15Kg luggage limit and probably zero signal on the open plains of East Africa, it seemed a pointless waste of weight allowance, space and cost as well as being yet one more thing to keep safe.

8 days to go

I have now started reading 'West with the Night' by Beryl Markham. A book which very poetically provides an insight into colonial Africa as lived by one of the very first female aviators in the early 1900s. Beryl flew back and fourth over the Masai and Serengetti for a large part of her adult life and for a wide range of reasons; delivering medical supplies, searching for missing people, or stranded planes, hunting, transporting passengers, delivering spare vehicle parts etc. In a land and a time where landing strips were marked with oil-soaked rags set alight inside tin cans and the sight of a motor car always turned heads, every flight was a mini-adventure.
I managed to collect my Malarone tablets today too, along with some one-a-day anti-histamine and a new mosquito-bite electric-clicker (a marvellous invention and saved both mine and Ant's sanity on many occasions whilst travelling in the van). I think I am now well and truly ready to take on those African mossies.

13 days to go - amazon delivery

Dad and Janet gave me some Kenyan Shillings today and some US dollars that they hadn't used on their last trip to Kenya, which is fantastic as not only does it tick another thing off my list (which always brings a smile to the face of an avid list-ticker like me), but it saves me the commission charge too. I am not expecting to spend much of it as the trip fee I have already paid includes everything apart from my entry VISA and food at the airport on the return journey, (even alcohol is included!!! - are the Kenyans mad??).
I then got home to find not only the two second-hand books I have been waiting for, but Series 4 of the Big Cat Week on DVD too. Very happy bunny, that's my weekend sorted.
Also making minor progress on obtaining the anti-malarial prescription - Malarone. I at least have the piece of paper from the doctor now, which cost me £8 and is half covered in black ink due to a fault with the surgery printer which has rendered it almost illegible, so fingers crossed the chemist accepts it otherwise it's back to square one again. I have made a few phone calls and chosen Lloyds pharmacy in Haywards Heath to collect it as they will charge me only £50 as opposed to £74 which was the quote I was given by the Cowfold surgery! Online would have been even cheaper, but I just don't want to risk the postal system delaying their arrival.