Launching Into the Unknown

Dear Harriet,

A year before leaving for Kenya, I had the chance to meet several Kenyans who were living in the U.S. They mentioned that most African Americans were from West Africa. I asked how they knew. They told me they could tell by the body shape. I didn’t understand, but tucked that bit of information away in my head for later. After arriving at Jomo Kenyatta Airport, I understood what they meant. East Africans look significantly different from West Africans. It’s hard to describe, but I remember the thought hitting me forcefully.

We rode through the streets of Nairobi, Kenya in amazement. The city was more developed than Cameroon. Of course, Mekomba wasn’t comparable, we had seen little of Yaoundé, and none of Douala. Nairobi was full of skyscrapers and wide four-lane avenues. Flame trees, related to our mimosa, lined many of the streets. The flowers are brilliant red and they bloom just before the rains come. I saw plants I thought of as houseplants that were the size of a house! Poinsettias were eight feet high. There were bottlebrush trees, so called because the flowers look like colorful red bottlebrushes tipped with gold. The colors were startling. Plants grew everywhere, and I took great interest in photographing them because I felt color-deprived. Butterflies and birds provided more awesome color, and I wished to spend my entire day sitting in the garden.