So my Best friend, my God-daughters and her husband have
finally set foot in Kenya.
I just can’t tell you how excited I was that they were
finally here! In KENYA!
In my house, in KENYA!!!
Like anyone who visit Nairobi, there is so much to do and
we only had 2 full days to see it. I sat
and made numerous lists every few weeks, adding places, switching places and
then re-adding again. I wanted to show
them where I worked, take them to the orphanage, take Shane to my gym but as
usual, there was just not enough hours in the day and we finally set on a 2 day
itinerary to maximize what we could.
The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust is a Kenyan
wildlife conservation charity founded in 1977 in memory of David
Sheldrick by his widow Daphne
Sheldrick. It assists and advises the Kenya Wildlife Service and manages an
orphanage for elephants and rhinos.
This trust is reintegrating orphaned elephants back into the Kenyan wildlife and
is a World Elephant Day associate. The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust is a small
flexible charity, established in memory of David
Sheldrick, a famous Naturalist and founder Warden of Kenya's giant Tsavo East
National Park in which he served from 1948 until 1976. Since its
inception in 1977 the Trust has played an extremely significant and important
role in Kenya's conservation effort. At the heart
of the DSWT’s conservation activities is the Orphans’ Project, which has
achieved world-wide acclaim through its hugely successful elephant and rhino
rescue and rehabilitation program. The Orphans’ Project exists to offer hope
for the future of Kenya’s threatened elephant and rhino populations as they
struggle against the threat of poaching for their ivory and horn, and the loss
of habitat due to human population pressures and conflict, deforestation and
drought. To date the David Sheldrick
Wildlife Trust has successfully hand-raised over 150 infant elephants and has
accomplished its long-term conservation priority by effectively reintegrating
orphans back into the wild herds of Tsavo, claiming many healthy wild-born
calves from former-orphaned elephants raised in their care.
Just after 11am the procession
of baby elephants came out of the bushes at the back of the clearing.
There were 22 of them all in a single file following each other until they saw
the bottles of milk and then their little legs started to run in the
anticipation and it was the cutest thing I have ever seen. All the
visitors were lined around the rope fence in an L shape and the elephants all
ran to bottles where they were fed by the keepers and when the bottles were
finished they were put into a wheel barrow, which the babies knew they were
finished and then they played with each other, chewed branches that had been
left lying around and they were left to their own devices for the remaining 30
minutes of ‘play’ time. The babies were encouraged to come to the rope so
that we could pat them and say hello and to feel them was amazing. Shane
took the girls further up the rope to get a better view and they even got
sprayed by mud from one of the babies!!! They were mortified, but I told them it could
have been worse and been something else (poo).
The babies were so prickly and there was one of the larger babies that
had a lot of people touching him and one person was using a flash for photos
and he didn’t get spooked at all by all the attention. Even though they
were babies (6 months-24 months old) you could see that they could still do
some damage to some-one if you weren’t paying attention, and one of them even charged
some of us, which got people a little nervous.
One of the keepers had a
microphone and introduced the elephants as they played and also about the
programme, but to be honest it was a little distorted and hard to hear what was
being said, then like a miracle, the battery of the microphone went flat and
that was the end of the mumble. It is a
shame, as they do give you a lot of information about the elephants and the
trust. We were also joined by 2
ostriches at one point that the orphanage had take in when they were
babies. They aren’t babies anymore and they
scared the hell out of me, as I have always been taught that they will peck at
anything shiney, and when a bird is BIGGER than you it can be a little
daunting!!!!
After all the milk and branches
had been consumed it was time for the babies to head back to the nursery and
then an older group was bought out to say hello. As always, I got some AMAZING photos, and my
mottos is ‘you can never have too many elephant’ photos. At 12 noon the older elephants were lead away
and it was time for us to leave. As we
were waiting for the crowd to leave, we spotted 2 giraffe to the side of the
clearing, so we got to get some photos of one of my favourite animals while we
were there. It was a great start to the
day and I know I will be back AGAIN.
So it was lunch time, and we
had to decide where to go. There are so
many good places on the Karen side of town, and I wanted to go somewhere I hadn’t
been before, so I chose Tamambo with the idea that we could do the museum
afterwards, as it was another thing that I had not done since. Tamambo Karen Blixen Coffee Garden is
located in a beautiful peaceful setting on Karen Road, near the Karen Blixen
Museum. It is the site of the original
farmhouse which was the Blixen property. The restaurant and function
areas are situated in the midst of one of the largest and oldest formal gardens
in Kenya and include huge jacaranda, candelabra cactus, bottle brush and other
trees and over 200 species of blooming flower varieties. It was a beautiful
setting, sitting under the shade of the old trees, wondering if they could talk
what stories that could be told of the Blixen time. There was an artist there painting as we ate
and it really was a magic setting for lunch.
I think the Elkins were starting to see that Kenya had a good side to
her, with good food that may not be one of the first things you think about
when you picture Kenya.
Having
done the elephant/giraffe combo before, I knew that it was not a wise move to go
straight from the elephants to the giraffe center, as that is what ALL the
people and tour groups do and the giraffes get swamped by people and it is hard
to get one on one with them. So after
lunch to give us a little more of a buffer from the ‘tourists’ instead of going
to the Karen Blixen Museum, I figured the girls would be more interested in the
Flip Flop Recycling Factory. They do tours on demand, and they are free so
not even 5 minutes after arriving we started our tour of the small local ‘factory’ so we could see every step of the
fascinating process that turns recycled flip-flop waste into stunning works of
art and crafts. Like many Kenyan ‘factories’ the term is used loosely
with most of them small buildings or sheds, with plastic chairs and tables for
the workers and none of this massive industrial buildings you have pictured in
your head when you think of factories. Today was no different and we got
a tour of the main 7 sites that each process an important part to get the final
product. So how do you turn dirty old flipflops recovered from beaches
and surrounds into art? The BIG question is where do the flipflops (I’m
loving that word) come from? The old flip-flops and the now more
ubiquitous Crocs, are gathered from Kenyan beaches where they wash up as
plastic waste. Teams of mostly local women working for the Flip-Flop
Recycling Company collect the flip-flop refuse to help clean up the
beaches and stop animals and fish from getting sick or even dying if they
ingest this waste. Bundles of flip-flops are then trucked to the workshop at
Marula Studios in Nairobi. Where did the idea come from? If you
have travelled to a developing country you will see that children are always
creative in turning washed up refuse and trash into toys. Everywhere you
go in Africa you'll see recycled materials turned into cars, soccer balls,
planes and motorcycles. Julie Johnston, who born and raised in Kenya, was
working at the Kiunga Marine National Reserve on Kiwayu Island, in the Lamu
Archipelago. She noted the environmental hazards of plastic flotsam and jetsam
polluting beaches and blocking the path of newly hatched sea turtles trying to
reach the sea. She also observed local children using the plastics to create
amazing toys. Julie, together with Lamu community activist Tahreni Bwanaali,
launched the Flip-Flop recycling company in 2005. They now sell their
end product at the Marula studios and export to stores all over the world. The
company employs more than 100 women to collect discarded flip flops from
Kenya's beaches and inner cities.
What an
AMAZING idea huh!!!!
So the next
question is how does a dirty broken flip-flop transform into a beautiful
sculpture of a giraffe? As we toured the workshop we were shown each step
that was simply laid out for all to see.
·
We started the
journey watching the evolution of trash into treasure. We saw the collection
process that sees the company pooling in a variety of recyclable waste.
·
Then the flip
flops are washed, dried in the sun, and then sorted by colour.
·
The flip-flops
are then cut into blocks roughly the same size and glued together based on set
colour schemes.
·
The colourful
blocks are then carved using basic kitchen knives into animal shapes, Christmas
decorations, key chains, bottle holders or whatever has been custom ordered.
It's amazing to see what can be delicately carved by the artists with just a
simple knife.
·
Once the shape
is as close as you can get using just a knife, the pieces are given a final
smooth sanding using a simple wheel/sanding machine.
·
The last stage
is the final wash to get the last of the sanding particles off the product and
to let the amazing colours shine through.
·
The finished
product is then taken next door to be sold at Marula studios, or shipped
worldwide.
After seeing
the whole process it gave me an appreciation for the price tag that was
swinging from the giraffe I liked in the gift shop. To make something the
size of the giraffe I was looking at, takes 3 days, but I forgot to ask how
many things make up that particular sized giraffe, but a lot of work and many
hands later, they certainly earn the cash asked. It was great to visit
Marula Studios and if you get a chance it is well worth the stop. It can
be done easily of you are visiting the Kazuri Bead Factory, Purdy Arms and the
Karen Blixen Museum as they are all within a 5 minute drive and even the
Elephant Orphanage is also in the vicinity, so there is no excuse to not stop
at this amazing little place making a difference to the future and for future
generations. It's a fantastic way to benefit the environment by cleaning
up the beaches; it also creates local employment, and offers the visitor a
colourful choice of gifts to delight anybody’s taste and budget.
From here
we were now off to our last stop of the day, the Giraffe Centre. It took
us around 20 minutes to drive to the centre and I always enjoy coming here. I love going to these places, especially when
I get to pay 200KSH as a resident, where the Elks had to pay 1000KSH each! Once we had paid, as soon as we walked in
there were 3 giraffes at the feeding platform. WOO HOO. It can be hot and miss if the giraffes will
come and say hi, I have been lucky that only one time out of six that the
giraffes have not been interested and stayed away. There is a risk coming so late in the
afternoon that they are full from being fed all day, but we were lucky there
weren’t a lot of people around and we got a lot of one on one time with the
giraffes and everyone was respectful of letting people have their time with the
animals. You are given small pellets to
feed the Giraffes and there are unlimited refills. Hand feeding the
giraffes is just an AMAZING experience and I am pretty sure an activity that
you would not get an opportunity to do anywhere else in the world and is an
education in itself. You will see, close at hand, how they use their long,
prehensile tongues to remove the pellets from your hands and wrap their tongue
around the pellet if you hold it out for them to retrieve with their long, and
I mean long, bluish and saliva packed tongues.
There was also a kissing giraffe where you put a pellet, the size of a
bullet in your mouth and the giraffes tongue would take it from your
lips! It would have been cool to do, but after feeding them the pellets
with our fingers, they are a salivery bunch and the thought of an animal’s
tongue on your face was just too much to process for me and we decided to not
do it. This is the definitely the closest that you will be able to get to
the giraffes in Kenya and I would go as far and say the
world.
Originally
the Giraffe Centre was started by Jock Leslie-Melville, the Kenyan grandson of
a Scottish Earl, when he and his wife Betty captured a baby giraffe
to start a programme of breeding giraffe in captivity at their home in Langata
- home of the present centre. Since then the programme has had huge success,
resulting in the introduction of several breeding pairs of Rothschild Giraffe
into Kenyan national parks. In 1979, Leslie-Melville added an education
centre to his (then still private) giraffe sanctuary. By 1983 he had raised
enough money to establish the Giraffe Visitor's Centre as a tourist destination
in Nairobi. The Giraffe Centre then started as a rehabilitation project
to rescue the Rothschild Giraffe in order to protect the endangered Rothschild
giraffe that is found only in the grasslands
of East Africa. The giraffes breed naturally in an approximate 120
acreage of land and the young calves born at the centre are introduced back
into the wild at the age of 2 years. The giraffes at the centre are closely
observed and monitored by AFEW staff and when need be their natural diet is
supplemented with Lucern Grass, salt blocks and carrots. Ever since the
breeding started, the centre has handled over 50 Rothschild Giraffes and most
of them have been introduced back into the wild in selected Kenya’s protected
areas.
Nairobi
Giraffe Centre tour gives a completely up close and personal interaction where
guests have the opportunity to view giraffes as well as feed them. It is
the coolest thing is that you are able to stand on a purpose made platform and
stand eye to eye with the Giraffes. In
addition, inside the platform there is an auditorium where visitors are given
comprehensive talks about the centre’s activities, conservation and giraffes. It
was the first time that I took the time to sit with a staff member and get a
bit more of the low down on these incredible animals. We even got the chance to hold some of the
bones and they were heavy!!!!
We had an
incredible experience with the 3 giraffes for the hour that we spent with them
and to spend them with my most favorite people in the WORLD, with one of my
most favourite animal in the world life cannot get any better at this moment.
It is always one of the highlights of my day when I come here and one of the
most amazing experiences I have had the pleasure to be part of in all my
travels to date. It may also have something to do with the giraffe being
one of my most favourite African animals and to be able to interact with them
on such a personal and one on one experience was a dream come true. They
truly are magnificent and gentle animals and we got to take so many photos that
I will be able to look back on them time and time again and get a good laugh
from them. It will be a place I will definitely come back to and one I
recommend to all visitors that come to Nairobi should experience.
Day one of
16 done and dusted. Welcome to Nairobi
Elkins!!!!
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