Mombasa

So I've spent a week in Mombasa, the place where my parents grew up. Not that I've seen much of it. I stayed at a small hostel called Mombasa Backpackers. Small but complete, with its own pool and garden area, a bar with cable TV, a foosball table and a cafeteria. I've spent most of my time lazing around by the pool enjoying the free Wi-Fi while taking occasional dips in the pool and ordering food. Our outings consisted of: going to the local shopping mall which housed a rather posh cafe/patisserie called, imaginatively, Cafesserie; a trip down to the local Nyali beach; a trip to the more distant Tiwi beach; and a tour of Fort Jesus and Old Town.

And that's about it really. Fort Jesus was quite nice but the tour of Old Town was rather short and pointless. Much of the architecture and history is pretty similar to Zanzibar. Oh, and one of my friends got mugged. We were just walking down this street and she was walking a bit behind the rest when we heard a scream as some man grabbed her before running off. It happened so quickly and, as he ran off, he let go of her bag thus leading me to believe he had given up when I had turned and shouted at him. Unfortunately, the man had been doing it for all his life and I think that the whole bag grab was a distraction from the necklace. Fort Jesus itself was impressive as we were told it had been carved out of the rock rather than assembled.

For the most part though the trip has been about chilling out and meeting other people. And that is what I have loved most about my time travelling in Tanzania and Kenya. I wrote a blog post not long ago about the fellow volunteers that I became such good friends with but in the last two and a half weeks I have also met some really interesting and awesome people while in Zanzibar and Mombasa. It's included eight Canadians, seven Brits, four Norwegians, two Germans, and two Americans among others. Staying in backpackers dorms, travelling alone, one really has to be able to be open to saying "yes" to everything. Everyone is friendly when you stay in places like these because, much like the first day of university, everyone is usually in the same boat. At Kendwa I was invited to join two Canadians and an Aussie for dinner. At Mombasa, I already knew the two volunteers I had joined up with and, although I just hung out with them for the day, on Saturday night we joined the rest of the Mombasa Backpackers crew in heading to the casino before hitting a club. The casino was a enjoyable affair and it was  here that I got to know the Canadians and the Norwegians. Oh and I also left having doubled my money on roulette after hitting three numbers in a row as we geared up to leave. Not the most culturally rich experience I've ever had in another country but fun nonetheless. We then headed to a nightclub to dance until 5am at which point we headed back to the hostel and jumped in the pool. I managed to get to sleep at 7am for a couple of hours before getting up for breakfast and heading to spend the entire day with the Canadians at the beach just chilling out.

For the most part, Mombasa was about sitting around enjoying the heat and the sun, playing the occasional game of foosball and jumping in the pool. It also served as the catalyst for helping me accept the fact that soon I will be home. Sure, I will miss all the volunteers and, even though I will want to come back to Tanzania as soon as I step off the plane at Heathrow, I now want to go home and reimmerse myself in some of the trivial first world problems that I have been away from for almost four months. Silly things, like what phone I'm going to get to replace my HTC Legend (probably a Samsung Galaxy S3) and watching TV and movies again. Staying in Mombasa, where there is not much to do, allowed me to think abuot all the things I want to do when I go home. Things like learning a new language, attempting to teach myself the guitar or relearn some piano, start building a proper fitness regime. I need to look for a job again and start applying for another round of training contracts in the Autumn. I want to go to a sushi buffet with my cousins and drink ale and go to dim sum. I want my dad to cook mussels or prawns or lobster noodles. I want to start cooking myself again. So many things I want to do, so much money I need to pay back and then save. It might turn out that there are not enough hours in the day. I know that I will need to keep myself busy when I reach London though, otherwise I will spend the entire time wishing I was back in Arusha.