Time to unpack my safari hat, cargo vest, and binoculars

This weekend I may take Friday and Monday off from work and go on a four day safari to Amboseli and Tsavo West National Parks. I'm still working on the details, but hopefully the trip will work out. Tomorrow night Mary Beth (the other intern) and I are going to an FGM advocacy reception--supposedly a "sharing forum." Let's hope that I'm not asked to share anything. Let's also hope that there will be food. Thursday morning we're going to a UN report launch--"A Situation and Response Analysis of Violence Against Women and Girls in the Era of AIDS in Kenya." Again, not sure what to expect, and hoping for free food.

So this is a pretty full week as far as events go. My work is moving along slowly. Basically they asked me to research gender issues in the upcoming UN reforms. Also, I'm supposed to contact NGOs throughout Africa and compile their updates on the "Campaign on Ratification, Domestication and Popularization of the Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa" into one document that will be published later this summer. So, the work is interesting but it takes a while because of slow internet connections.

This past weekend was pretty boring. I stayed in Nairobi, saw "Poseidon" (which was terrible but the only new movie in the theaters), and spent a lot of time reading in Java House. Weekends in this city are always boring. I did manage to make the famous crazy man who always tries to rip off tourists scream incoherently at me for like 10 minutes. At the hostel I stayed at when I first got here, there was a sign hanging up about this guy, basically "Watch out for the really tall man with no front teeth. He is a criminal. He will come up to you on the street and pretend like he knows you from your hostel and works there." Then people had written down the dates on the sign when they'd encountered this guy. EVERY SINGLE TIME I go downtown this guy manages to find me and tries to pull the same stunt. So Sunday when he tried it I pulled off my headphones and yelled "I SEE YOU EVERY WEEK..." That's as far as I got before he went nuts and started screaming and running around like a maniac for a while. No one else on the street even turned around to look. Stupid city.