We are now in our second week of elective classes at the United Kenya Club in Nairobi. Each student gets to choose two classes from a total of four offered to complete their schedule, along with Swahili and the core course which every student has to take. I am taking Biodiversity and Conservation in East Africa, and Health Healing and Sickness in Kenya. So far both classes have been a little slow, but we have only been reading introductory and general information about each subject.
This weekend, our group drove about two hours west to Mt. Longonot, an active volcano which last erupted in the 1600's. The hike was very beautiful, with views in the crater floor, which apparently has a healthy leopard population, and views out to the surrounding arid lands. We could just make out the Western rim of the Rift Valley in the distance, along with the shoreline of Lake Nakuru. The most exciting part of the hike turned out to be the walk down. We saw a herd of Cape Buffalo stampede away from a herd of stampeding giraffes, who were scared into flight by a group of off-trail tourists (you guessed it: Americans...but not from our group). It was a pretty cool sight, and our first glimpse of Kenyan megafauna. We also saw a couple gazelles, but they were very far away from us and hard to make out.
Currently, our group is preparing to travel to Tanzania to visit and learn about the Hadza, one of the last remaing hunter-gatherer groups in the region. We will be there for a week, camping and travelling around the area.
More pictures to come soon!
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