Sunday
9/10-2011
NB! This is (still) a
fictional blog. I have not been to Kenya, and everything I write are based on
facts I have read. (The funeral I am going to write about is a real event that
happened though, I just was not attending it).The incidents that i refer to at towards the end has also happened. The pictures are also not mine,
but borrowed from the internet. (Source under every picture). I also have a
list of sources I have used to find my information at the bottom of this entry.
Hello
again!
I am still
here in my flat in Nairobbery (just love the nickname) although I have to start
packing soon. I am leaving Nairobi today to go to Masai Mara to watch animals
in their real surroundings (popularly called safari). You remember right?
Anyway, I
did not write anything yesterday so I figured I could keep everybody updated
before I leave the city. I promised you I would attend a funeral and I did. I
have never been to a funeral of a person I did not know before (I have hardly
been to any funerals at all for that matter) but I figured I would attend this
one. The woman who was buried this
Saturday was called Wangari Maathai. She is a strong and very admirable person
and when I heard that she was to be buried in Nairobi while I was here, I
wanted to farewell to her.
The picture above shows Maathai in Oslo just before she recieved the peace prize in 2004.
It turns
out Maathai was actually the first African woman to ever achieve the Nobel
Peace prize. She got it in 2004 for “her contribution to sustainable
development, democracy and peace”. Maathai was born in Nyeri, Kenya in 1940 and
she died here in Nairobi the 25th of September this year of
complications from cancer. Maathai was a very strong woman with many
opinions. She stood up against what was
considered as the oppressive regime of Kenya under Daniel arap Moi, Kenya’s
former president. Maathai has also achieved a lot of other prices for her work.
In addition
to fighting for democracy in Kenya, she also fought for the environment. In
1977 she formed something called “the Green Belt movement”, an environmental
organization. It focuses on Kenya (and especially women). It encourages them
to, among other things, plant trees, stop soil erosion and also fight
deforestation. This organization has alone planted around 45 million trees!
That is impressive! Actually the whole woman is impressive and apparently I am
not the only one who thinks that. There were thousands of people who had come
to say goodbye to her. I did not actually go into the church, it was full long
before I got there. I watched from the street as they drove her coffin in the
car and buried her in a park she had fought to save. I am going to post some
video-footage from BBC in case you want to watch some of the funeral and maybe
learn some more about Maathai. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15228649
After the
funeral I took a taxi to the Norwegian embassy in Kenya which you can see on the picture under (bad quality, sorry about that).
I visited a friend of my mum who works there. When someone you know is in a
place like Nairobi at the same time as you, you kind of feel like you have to
meet up with that person, right? It was really cool meeting a fellow Norwegian
again! Nairobi and Kenya is not exactly the type of destination where there are
Norwegians and Sweeds lurking around every corner so I had not really heard the
Norwegian language in a while.
Just one
more thing before I have to start packing for safari (have delayed it for over
an hour now). You should know that while I am being here in Kenya, I am being extremely
careful where I go and always have somebody with me. Recently there have been
several incidents where people have been kidnapped here in Kenya and I have to
keep that in mind. I mean, when they are capable of taking a French elderly
woman in a wheelchair, you cannot really feel sure that they will spare you. I
too have to take the famine in Somalia, a country which is neighboring Kenya,
into consideration. There are a lot of people traveling over the board. I just
thought I should let you know that I am being really careful.
But anyway,
stay tuned! My next entry will be written from Masai Mara, the safari-camp!
Sources:
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