Best December ever. This blog is going to take the form of a timeline.

November 29-December 1: I arrive in Nairobi. I was jumping-up-and-down-excited to see David when I got off the airplane. We spent a couple days in Nairobi, which is a lot like America. Shopping malls, Christmas decorations, chain coffee shops, sushi, heaven.

December 1-7: We drove to the Mara (that’s what the cool kids call it) where David does his research. If you ask David, he’ll tell you he camps out in the middle of the bush and you’re supposed to feel real bad for him. There are tents, yes, but there’s also a Philoman, the amazing chef they stole from a resort to cook for David and his campmate, Jeff. Philoman makes the most amazing salads with roses carved out of tomatoes as garnish. We also had chicken fingers with dipping sauces, calzones and garlic cheesy bread. Clearly, I was a little bit obsessed with the food. There were animals too. I went along for morning and evening hyena observations, which were awesome. David and Jeff schooled me in the ways of the hyena, the smartest animal ever. We also saw lions, elephants, giraffes, hippos and tons of antelope type things that I can totally differentiate between now. My time in the Mara culminated with a rocking Christmahannakahkwanza party. Including an amazing and carefully selected dance mix, jello shots made in the water quality researchers’ new sample freezer, and a photo shoot Tyra would be proud of, some have called it ‘the bush party of the year.’

December 7-15: Sad to leave Kenya, but excited for the rest of our trip, David and I took the overnight bus to Kampala, Uganda. There, we went white water rafting on the Nile. I didn’t really put much thought into this before doing it; I think if I had had a clear understanding what ‘Class 5 Rapids’ really meant, I might have backed out. Our raft flipped over like 4 times (when we practiced getting back in the raft pre-trip, I thought this was a precautionary safety drill, but no, quite a practical skill). So that was terrifying. Then we went to the Budungo forest because we wanted to go chimp trekking. Through some bad information from Sharon, the crappy travel agent, we ended up out of money in the Budongo. With some begging from me, and attempted sweet talking from David, we got to go chimp trekking. You don’t always see chimps, but we were determined to. After 3 hours of walking around with no poop, calls or anything, the guide turns to us and she’s like ‘are you guys ready to go back?’ David: ‘we’re fine!’ She looks at me, ‘are you getting tired?’ David: ‘we never get tired!’ Even with that kind of dedication, still no chimps 4 hours later. It’s a good thing I never get tired. After that, we went to Entebbe, a small town on Lake Victoria. It was beautiful and we ate at the best Chinese restaurant where you could lounge on lawn chairs and sing Christmas music at the top of your lungs. If you’re ever in Entebbe, New Chinese Garden. Look it up.

December 16-18: The 14 hour bus ride seemed soooo much longer during the daylight. Back in Nairobi, we spent the last couple days just chilling out. We went to a movie theater (oooohh and awww here!), ate really good Ethiopian food, went market and souvenir shopping, and revisited the sushi restaurant. My last night, we hung out with some friends, played some cards, and overall behaved ourselves. J SO many great memories made and incredible sites seen. Thanks, DSG!

Are you still reading? Because my December-o-fun has not ended just yet!

December 18-30: My aunt Terry flew into Maputo the same time I flew back from Kenya, so we met up at the airport. Such a great feeling seeing her bright smiling face! We spent a couple days in Maputo before heading back to my site. I’m going to skip over the hellish details of our transport on this particular journey, because it got worse. In Chicuque, Terry got to meet and fell in love with my favorite constantly dirty neighbor kid. We were only at my site a couple of days, but it was great being able to show her what my life is sort of like. For Christmas, we headed to a really nice beach resort in Vilanculos. It was beautiful and relaxing and a wonderful way to spend Christmas. Con: We had a really nasty Christmas Eve buffet. I don’t know who was doing the buffet planning menu, but all of the dishes had fish and potatoes and cream. But the host was nice so we had to pretend to like it. Terry is really good at lying through her teeth. Not to mention sneakily making unwanted food disappear. Our last fun adventure was Swaziland. Terry got a real taste of traveling in Mozambique at its worst. We got on a bus at 3 in the morning. I noticed after we started moving that the sides of the bus would shift going over every bump in the road. Upon closer inspection, the vehicle was barely hanging together. The windshield was cracked all over, and on the super bumpy road, was shifting back and forth a good 3 inches each way. To ameliorate the dilemma, the bus guys started shoving rolled up newspaper in the ‘problem areas’ and taping the windshield together. Now on top of that add chickens, a worm, body odor and hacking crying babies and you can imagine how excited we were when we arrived in Swaziland 17 hours later. Once in Swazi, we stayed in the Manzini Nature Reserve, one of my favorite places ever. You can walk around and see zebras, impala, and tons of other smaller animals in the most gorgeous lush setting. We also went on a day safari in another park where we saw tons of rhino, elephants, giraffes and hippos. And I’m not supposed to tell anyone how 2 young gentlemen tried to pick us up one night. That never happened.

And so concludes my Best December Ever. It would have been wonderful to go back to the States and spend Christmas with my family, but I’m really happy and appreciative that I was able to take this time and travel and see more of this spectacular place. The annoying girl on the rafting trip said it best: “Africa is the coolest country ever!”