Home Sweet Home

Many of you have been asking about me. I returned to San Francisco last week after a 2 week stint in Nairobi. I have lost some steam on updating my blog.

I still need to share the photographs I took on the train from Nairobi to Mombassa. I spent 18 hours on the train. It was supposed to be a 12 hour trip but it turned out to be a wee bit longer. The following weekend, Stephane and I went to Naivasha park. It was amazing to be able to hike amongst the wild animals and talk with Masai people. I am running out of words because the three months I spent traveling and meeting people was more incredible than words.

I have an even better appreciation of life. Even when the DMV gets me down and when the electricity doesn't work in the laundry room in my San Francisco apartment, I am able to continue to put things into perspective. (The DMV is still incredible difficult to deal with...I will be nice and not say too many mean things about them here.)

So people keep saying "welcome back to reality." If "reality" is dealing with the DMV, I just say 'no.' If "reality" is opening up 3 months of bills and unnecessary paperwork, I also say 'no.' Before getting into all of the mail and laundry, I spent a lovely weekend with my out of town friends from Albuquerque and my close San Francisco friends. I appreciated the Golden Gate bridge, had a croissant at Tartine, visited the Saturday organic market, took the cable car to Pier 39 etc etc...I was a tourist in my own town and loved it. I do have to admit...sleeping in my own bed is quite a treat.

I think I might continue to update my blog. I might not be on the same voyage but I truly believe that whether I am in "reality" or in another country, I am always traveling. It is cliche to say that life is one big voyage but, hey, why not enjoy?

Romania

I had a short stop in Eastern Europe on my way back to my home base, Paris. I am actually writing to you from Kenya - my second home base. I know this all sounds so complicated but really it isn't. So to get to the point - here are some photos I would like to share.

In such a short time it is hard to really get to know any city but I found Bucharest (not Budapest, that is Hungary!) to be a very nice place to visit. Some of the things I liked included the food such as their delightfully light donut-like pastry, stuffed cabbage and beet soup. (ummm, just like mom's cookin' !) I guess coming from an Eastern European heritage, the food is not what shocked me the most.

The aspect of the trip that was the hardest to digest was the number of elderly who were accepting money on the streets because their pensions are not paying enough. Now, the eldery do not necessarily beg, they stand on the streets and everybody knows that they are waiting for donations. I had yet to see something quite like this in all of my travels so far.

One day, we were out for a walk (no corresponding photo so you will have to imagine...) and an elderly lady with advanced osterperosis was hobbeling along with her groceries. She was so hunched over that she couldn't see the street in front of her. My friend, Alina, asked her if she needed help to get to her home. I was glad she stopped and asked her if she needed help. It took us 45 minutes to inch our way about 100 meters to get her home. It turns out that this women was only 78. She looked 98. During the long walk, we found out it was her birthday that week and she has no family.

Sometimes it's the little things you can do for people. She didn't ask us for money but she was very grateful that we were there to lend her a hand.