Kenya - 2001

Outward Bound - the first time I got to use the word oxymoron.

ox·y·mo·ron

/ˌäksəˈmôrˌän/

noun

1. a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction

My parents decided to play a practical joke on me in the dying days of 2001. They sent me to the Kilimanjaro. Father had told me once or twice of this camp in Kenya where he had been sent as the head boy of his high school along with the rest of the prefects' body. He claimed that it was a wonderful, life changing experience. There were two other Ugandans, the son and daughter of one of our "neighbours." [That is really using the term loosely since they lived on the other side of the hill. However, in Makerere those days everyone on the hill was your neighbour.] The others were older than I was and seemed sensible enough. So the rents thought I would be safe enough with them. I do not remember the details of how things were paid for. I was at school for most of the preparations and left school only a few days before our bus trip to Nairobi. I panicked a little because the packing list required climbing boots. However, I did not expect that I would actually need to climb anything significantly higher than say, Mulago hill. I also packed my favourite pink and white bunny pyjamas because I thought it was going to be like church camp where everyone was trying to show off their latest whats-it-not.

The journey to Nairobi was uneventful. I slept most of way, refusing to eat the roadside roasted meat and staggering passed immigration at Malaba. There was something about a possible robbery in the darkness after Kisumu. I heard a scream but the driver sped on. Obviously, he knew slowing down was deadly. We got to Nairobi and somehow manoeuvred a taxi to the Outward Bound location. They seemed pleasant enough, those instructors. We smiled at each other and then greeted the other participants. I was one of the youngest though not the smallest of the lot. There was a chubby Indian boy, I think he was a year or so younger than I was. We got into the bus, then we drove out of Nairobi and into a little town called Oloitokitok, at the base of the Kilimanjaro. I was still upbeat about all of this. We were told follow the instructors into the woods to "acclimatise," another new word. 

ac·cli·ma·tise           ac·cli·mate

/əˈklīməˌtīz/                                        /ˈakləˌmāt/

verb

1. acclimate.

   "they acclimatized themselves before ascending Everest"

1. to become accustomed to a new climate or to new conditions.

   "it will take a few days to get acclimated to the altitude"

I thought we were just going to breathe in the mountain air for a while before heading to dinner. We gathered around a small pond that seemed to have its source some where up in the mountain. We were told to hold hands and say a prayer/chant to whatever higher power we believed in. Suddenly, the instructor yelled, "Jump!" 

In jumped the bafoons that we were. I think we were scared or nervous or something. We dove into the water like our lives depended on it. I had worn the only white shirt I had that day (I cannot remember why). I learnt 2 lessons that day while struggling in that muddy freezing pool of murk.

1 - Do not trust the instructors. 

2 - Always wear something you are not attached to when you hear the word acclimatise

The bathrooms were some make shift shade of some sort. With the girls and boys wings right by each other. I don't think there was running water. We had to wait in a line at the tap and then wait at the showers too. It got dark while I waited. 

I finally made it to dinner and chatted with the others. In my quick browse, I figured that most of us were there because our parents wanted to teach us some unknown lesson. We had either stagnated in life, looked like we were about to stagnate or just needed to lose weight. There were the few daredevils who actually wanted to be there. I think they were gaining points for some awards program. I had become a bit of a rebel and was giving mother a headache. I was just 14 at the time but I thought I knew everything there was to know about the world. I had anger issues and was beginning to take my anger out on the folks at home and school. 

I think after dinner we had our first meeting, got our camp rules including: no phones, no reading material with dates on it, no sex and no dying during the course. We all laughed about the last one. Silly little children that we were.

Every day for the next 17 days, we work up before the crack of dawn, run around the base of the mountain and just when we were ready to collapse we arrived at the training grounds and went through numerous exercise drills. We did everything: squats, push ups, that thing where you hop over tyres laid on the ground. We were divided into teams and each team had to gain points everyday, which, eventually would earn us bonuses during our wilderness training [wilder-what?, wilder-who?]. Each team member had to go through the same timed drills. The less time you took, the better and the more points earned.  I think my team was a middle team, not the worst or the best, just ok. 

Over the next few days we learnt how to read maps using a campus, how to set up and take down a tent in 5 minutes and how to prepare meals over camp fire. There were more exercise drills and more adventures into the forest. One day, we returned to the dreaded cold pond. This time we noticed that there was a rope tied to two trees at opposite ends of the pond and another rope dangling off a third tree. We were each supposed to cross from one end of the rope to another in the shortest time without falling into the pond. We know how cold it was. We did not need any further motivation. Again, this was about points. I think there was some background lesson about togetherness and cheering team members or something, but it was lost in the fear of that cold water. We shouted and cheered our team mates on but each fall reminded us of how much we dreaded our own failure. Meanwhile, I was still wondering when the fun camp my parents told me about would start. 

Surprisingly, when I got up on the rope, I was calm. I was aware that my shoes were less than ideal. [The Muyindi who sold me climbing boots in Kampala had sold me fakes!] But I was steady. I did not see or hear a soul. Nothing interfered with my concentration. I was unstoppable and I was soon across the rope. There's a photo of one of the Ugandans who decided to make his crossing more interesting. He got to the middle and twisted the rope and his body so that he was balancing upside down for a few minutes. His head was barely 5 cm off the water surface. Then, like an acrobat, he straightened up and cleared the rest of the distance without a fuss. Lesson learnt: Fear is an effective motivator.

Finally the time to go off into the wild had arrived. We were given backpacks with everything we would need: tents, water, food, cooking utensils, sleeping bags. We were also given digging implement [I cannot remember what it was exactly]. One of the girls asked what it was for. The instructors smiled at her knowingly until it dawned on all of us that there are no loos in the wild. We could only take one set of clothes i. e. the one we had on. I chose to wear 3/4 pants [capris in regular English] because I thought this was still about showing off. I should have worn longer trousers. We were given our map, compass and that day's destination. The aim was to arrive before night fall since we had to set up camp, cook and wash up, if we ever found water. 

Strangely enough, once you move away from the mountain, Oloitokitok turns into a savannah grassland. There were no shady trees to comfort us during our walk. The earth turned from a rich dark brown to a reddish curse. We quickly run out of water and out of patience with each other. I remember shouting fits as we got lost. The thirst and weight of the bags was constantly fuelling our rage. Once again this was about points too. The team with the highest points so far got favours like water to bathe and a well prepared dinner at the end of the day. There are days when we were just happy to eat a few scraps of tinned pineapple and pass out in a shoddily set tent. On the second day, I discovered that I was in my period. And then, as if miraculously, I just dried up. We did not shower for 5 days. Initially I was worried that my feminine smell would embarrass me. However, amidst the accumulated stink and lessened awareness of the team, even with 5 of us crammed into a tent, no one bothered to complain. [Panga-walking. I remember now. It was a panga. That was the digging tool.]

I thought that walking and starvation were enough to bear with until we reached the activity of the last day in the wilderness. As usual, the instructors gave some huge speech about reaching goals and stretching limits. Then he told us to look up towards a cliff at least half a kilometre high [I may exaggerate here. It was high and scary.] There was another instructor at the top of the cliff. holding a rope that was dangling off the edge of the cliff. The first instructor ended his speech with the words "trust the rock and it will support you". We were meant to climb up this thing with no advance training. This was out in the wild, not in a nice safe little gym where if you fall you drop onto a mattress. I died a little. It took most people about 20 minutes to climb up. I later learnt that once you reach the top you were expected to pull the next person up. So not only was the climber inexperienced, so was the person holding the rope! It took me hours to work my way up. Trust the bloody rock my foot. Those crevices were smaller than my little toe. I was going to die in the Tanzanian savannah and they would bury me without my family. 

Of course I lived to tell the tale! It was the final day of the walk-about. They said we were going back to the camp site - the one that had beds and water.

ex·cite·ment

/ikˈsītmənt/

noun

1. a feeling of great enthusiasm and eagerness.

Until they said we had to run back, all 20 something kilometres. I died again. 

Once we got back, I realised that I could eat a whole bafu of ugali na nyama on my own. Talking was a luxury when there was the business of eating to attend to. We had a quiet night, laughing at the antics of the last few days. 

The next day, we work up to the usual morning drills around the mountain's base and in the training ground. I remember that we had a swimming pool, an actual pool, not the pond. I think I did a few laps in that too. After breakfast, we gathered for the next set of instructions. 

sol·i·tude

/ˈsäləˌt(y)o͞od/

noun

1. the state or situation of being alone

We were to spend the next few days [2 or 4, I do not remember] living in the forests nearby. Each of us would have an area to ourselves, a boundary beyond which we could not cross, day or night. In addition, to the previous rules, we also had to give up our watches. We had a couple of pieces of dried meat, a few biscuits and as much water as we could carry. We were given a little piece of tarpaulin [not a whole tent, but just enough to cover your body] and a sleeping bag. This time I was wise enough to wear long trousers and a sweater. I could not take my journal. We weren't allowed to carry reading materials at all, even novels. We were meant to spend our days thinking about our lives, staring at the sky, nature, contemplating the next step in our lives. I was 14 years old. 

I now understand why those in the villages sleep so early, after the sun fades, there is little else to do. Light dictates activity, well at least for normal people and creatures. Some genius decided to scare the rest of us by drumming on his water bottle every night. The rest of us were left to contemplate what demon-possessed creature was chanting and dancing a possible few metres from us. There were tales of a leopard that roamed the woods and the grasslands. We had been told to be ware of it during the wilderness walks but  I had forgotten about it all in the struggle to stay alive. Now with nothing else to do but sit and wait, that leopard is all I thought about. 

Every day, an instructor would come by with more water and ask me if I was ready to give up. This was still about points. There was some pride involved is staying out as long as one could. I set up my little sheet of plastic each night on a couple of sticks I had broken off from nearby trees. Each night I closed my eyes and prayed for it not to rain, for the red ants not to find my stash of cookies and for the leopard to be warded off by the urine I had squirted in the corners of my boundary. Finally, it was over. I was several thousand mosquito bites worse and terrified of every sound I heard. But I had endured. I survived. 

We got back and packed up for the next phase. We had one more night to celebrate the civility of Oloitokitok. We were off to even worse conditions. We were going to face Mt Kenya. 

We drove passed Nairobi and arrived at the base of the mountain. I think it was in a national park. Initially, we were just glad to be back together. We were glad that we had porters on this round. Clearly, they knew that we were not cut out for mountain climbing with all our lives on our backs and dropping oxygen levels. We were told to pack all our clothes. I thought they were joking. 1000 metres later, I was wearing half of my clothes. We were all cold and sufficiently layered. The porters on the other hand were running up the mountain like we were going downhill. Some of them had no shoes on! I lost my camera on Mt Kenya. I put it down. I think I was tying my laces. Then I forgot it and walked away for 5 minutes. I came back and the mountain had swallowed it. We stopped the climb, searched all over and I swear, the mountain ate my camera! There was no one else there. 

That night we got to 2000 metres. We set up camp, like we normally do but it was too windy to prepare any food. We snacked a bit and went to bed. In the middle of the night, we woke up to rain and screaming and suddenly 4 people crammed into our 5 man tent, that already had 4 men and a woman! It was pouring outside. Apparently, their tent had not been set up properly and had collapsed under the wind and rain. Now, because we were crammed in such a tight space, we couldn't quite zip up the tent. It was dripping and dropping all night! I have never been grateful for a cold dry bed as I was that night. 

The next day all out clothes were soaked but seeing as we had nothing else and seeing as it was close to freezing, we trudged on. At 4000 metres we took our second stop and I finally succumbed to the air and altitude. I unwisely had eaten a crepe after been warned against eating or drinking anything with milk. [Starvation does that to you. Besides the porters seemed fine.] I got diarrhoea and an nausea. I remember trying to use the outhouse [it is an out house - it was outside, exposed to the conditions]. I dropped my pants and pulled them back up. It was too cold to take a dump. Diarrhoea or not. I was not pulling my pants down for anyone or anything! I rushed back to the waiting station [it was a wooden structure, where people wait for the next break in the weather to continue climbing]. We had piled up onto each other, in an attempt to keep warm. I huddled next to my beau-hopeful [you see in this circumstances, no one will look at you funny for cuddling up to some dude. The cold was real.]

The rest of the group woke up before sunrise and continued with the last 1000 or so metres. They wanted to catch the sunrise at the top of the mountain. Later I saw pictures of snow [white and yellow, if you know what I mean. wink wink] They had to wear yellow and orange wind breakers to avoid flying off the side of the mountain. Eventually, they came down and gathered us sicklings before making the final trek down the mountain. 

sen·sa·tion

/senˈsāSH(ə)n/

noun

1. a physical feeling or perception resulting from something that happens to or comes into contact with the body.

I had lost all feeling in my limbs and face for almost 3 days. Every layer of clothing that we were able to peel off was a couple of degrees more of heat returning to our bodies. The cuddling of the previous night seems to have worked its magic. [Or maybe it was the near-death experience of freezing in the middle of nowhere with no certainty that you will be found and given a decent burial.] He was talking to me. He was smiling at me. 

We had one last night together by the camp fire. We cracked jokes like it was a bad dream that we had just woken up from. Hard times have a way of bringing people together.