Crickets and Canaries

Ghada and i got up before six this morning to meet Mr Haji who was to take us to the fish auction in the village this morning but we never made it. I had barely slept all night - my mosquito tent is very secure, except for when a mosquito manages to sneak inside as I open it up to climb in. i fall asleep, wake up itchy, and the night then becomes a routine of trying to fix the situation. also I keep opening my door and walking outside of my hut staring into the darkness like a hungry person who opens the refridgerator door over and over again even though there is nothing in there to eat. each time i am surprised and dissapointed by the darkness, as if only the morning could offer at least the solution of starting a new day when we can stretch the day as long as it will allow. and so I find myself dreading sleep time, when my body asks for rest and there is no promise of it. Delivered like this into morning, most days start out slowly, except when Ghada and I have ventured into the village for photographing and interviewing.

the first sound of the day is the ocean, the first sight is the light blue water prefaced by white sand and the two mamas on the beach who sleep outside next to their huts with crafts, next to my hut. Jambo!, they say first, before propositioning for a massage. Jambo! Mambo! Hello, how are you? Poa. I'm cool. Massage? Maybe today. Maybe tomorrow. or, not today. Asanti. Thank you. Hakuna Matata, no problem.

A few steps away is free coffee and a simple breakfast included in our hut price - a small banana, which is about half the size of the ones we get at home, half of a mango still on the skin offering itself in turned inside out in squared sections, a small oily crepe, and another piece of bread - sometimes a square fried donu, or a piece of white bread. there is a spread that is not called butter or margarine, called Blue Band, and strawberry jam that is almost hot pink in color called Al Diwan, with Arabic writing all over the label, and coffee which is best if you make it like this: mix a spoonful of powder milk, half a spoonful of sugar with a little water to get a milky consistency, then add a bit of instant coffee, then add hot water to the top of the cup. this way it eliminates the chunks of coffee stuck together. sometimes I sit and write, or have conversation with the girls that can stretch into the hot part of the day. There is swimming anytime. as it gets later, the sun can get so bright that you cannot see and it makes sense to retire to the girls hut where we listen to music on the ipod dock that Ghada bought in Johannesberg.

It is hard to avoid cliches to say things like this, but to sit in the hut and listen to music brings such simple pleasure - step out of the heat, stretch out on the floor and just listen, or sing... Mercedes Sosa's voice floats through the afternoon, as she sings Gracias a La Vida, what can you do but smoke cigarrettes and stare through the half open door and feel your heart open and break, close and open and break over and over again. Ghada lays down on the bed and closes her eyes. Teah and I sit on the floor, legs stretched, sections of sunlight catch the smoke as it lifts itself through the air of the hut and rolls out the door.

At some point in the day I like to clean up my little room and sweep it out, refold any clothes from the night before, straighten the sheets, and organize my camera equipment so I can recharge batteries when and if the generator comes on in the evening. When appetite comes in the mid afternoon it is cheapest to go outside of the beach - walk up through other little places and out onto the dirt road behind all the hotels which the tourists forget about as soon as they pass through the gates of vacation. It is 5000 shillings for seafood curry with rice, or a masala dish, coconut curry, things like this, 1000 shillings for a big bottle of water, a little more for a beer. As lunch is being made in the Kinjiji Cafe kitchen I realize that my body is ready for every meal, I feel hunger. It is different than in the last week or so in South Africa, where our road trips forced meals at gas stations, chips and sweets only, and generally there is an abundance of this kind of food . hunger doesnt come the same like this, empty food brings emptiness.

I wonder how it is that a sunset here can make me sad at all, but some of them do. I guess the way the day plays out like this routinely and quietly I can hear everything inside of me. after sunset, we put on clothes, change the spirit with local maize vodka or whisky, and then begins the music, the dancing, the moving.


Thanks to life, which has given me so much.
It gave me laughter and it gave me longing.
With them I distinguish happiness and pain—
The two materials from which my songs are formed,
And your song, as well, which is the same song.
And everyone's song, which is my very song.

Thanks to life
Thanks to life
Thanks to life
Thanks to life