My trip to Diani, a little beach town on the southern coast of Kenya, was a one-hour Matatu ride. This ride was studded with observations that are followed by a usual question: why? Why is this cow here? Why is this guy collecting dirty draining water in a bucket? I saw so many wonders that I don’t know how to document here. Seeing Africa or India or countries with some significant amount of Chaos is something that can’t be replaced by stories.
I headed to the backpacker’s lodge called “Stilts”, which is located in the forest. As soon as I entered, I started seeing black-and-white colobus monkeys everywhere. They looked elegant and were around the whole place. I have initially booked a tent (see photo below) as a new experience for me. I have camped in my youth several times in the desert. Camping in a forest is novel to me. Jenny at the reception welcomed me and in the process asked me if I was “sure about the tent”? They also have tree houses. They showed me both options. While I was making the tour, I heard snakes. “Bakari, are these snakes?”, “yes, but they are the green ones, they are not dangerous”. Given the circumstances, I opted for a treehouse. Back to the reception where Jenny said “you don’t look like a tent person”. This is true. Not in a forest where all these animals can play tag with me. Well, I also discovered later, that the green snake is called the “eastern green mamba” and has a rapid-acting venom.
I would have slept there (Photo from booking.com) 
but I slept here (Photo from booking.com) 
because I was afraid of this guy (photo: wikipedia) 
Colobus Monkey in the forest (photo from internet) 
I took this photo
I spent the afternoon at the beach, mainly reading and interacting with the locals. I got twice the same comment that they were happy I was talking to them like a friend since many white guys completely ignore them. To be honest, I also understand the white guys. If you are asked 10 times in 100 meters if you want to buy coconut or souvenirs, you would also not be nice all the time. However, I spent around one-hour bargaining with Frank on the price of a coconut. Frank knew I wouldn’t buy it, I knew I wouldn’t. But I got the feeling that people here appreciate good fun.
At 7 pm daily, the Stilts backpackers feed bushbabies (Galago). What are these? They are some weird nocturnal animals, that have super-cute big eyes. They come every day at 7 pm for their usual meal, which are some bananas offered by the hostel and its guests. This was one of the cutest things I saw in a few years. However, we came to know that they pee on their hands. I am happy I didn’t touch them!
The night continued with me getting in touch with Hasani and Keisha, which I met in Nairobi. They told me about some beach party in the Soul Breeze Resort. I arrived earlier than them and was approached by Luciana, I think she was a prostitute. She asked to sit with me, gave me a couple of compliments and asked where I was staying. I said, “in a treehouse”. Do you want to show it to me later? I said “no”. After she was leading the conversation like a green mamba, I interrupted her stating that I was uncomfortable with this conversation and that she had to leave my table. I was soon rescued by Hasani and Keisha.
There we had dinner and bounced on the tunes of Afrobeats and came to meet more and more friends. After the party, we moved to another hostel for an extended party, where Hasani and I were literally the last men standing at 3:30 am. I think Afrobeats is included in my DNA.
During this night, I had the pleasure to encounter Theo, a Kenyan psychiatry resident on holiday, showing Diani to his visiting Nephew. Once Theo knew about me being a neurologist, we had a looooong conversation about the human brain and what makes us human. This was Theo’s specific question, actually. This very interesting conversation extended to free will, consciousness, and divinity. As Theo says: “choose a delusion and stick to it”. Theo told me about the difficulties of the healthcare system in Kenya. There are in total around 4000 doctors in the country, which is 1 doctor per 10,000 people! Just for comparison, Switzerland has 40 doctors per 10,000 people. We exchanged contacts, and hopefully, we will meet again in Nairobi before I leave Kenya.
The next day I left the Stilts backpackers to a 5-stars resort :D, I know I combine contradictions in my traveling as I do in life in general. But for me, everything makes sense. I spent Saturday as another beach day. Probably the highlight was playing a beach football game with some local tribesmen mixed with a few tourists. We agreed to meet again tomorrow.