by Shel Arensen | Apr 19, 2012 | Shel Arensen
I just got back from a road trip in Tanzania, where the roads were pleasantly paved. Our 20-year-old Land Cruiser performed well without so much as a puncture. On my return to Kenya I found a comment on my Old Africa blog asking for a photo of the Volkswagen car my...
by admin | Apr 11, 2012 | Only in Africa
During World War II we sometimes saw black and white newsreels with moving pictures of how the war was progressing. We kids enjoyed watching the tanks clank across the screen firing rounds of ammunition. Sometimes the newsreels also showed other news. One time we...
by Christine Nicholls | Apr 5, 2012 | Christine Nicholls
I was in London last week, at the annual general meeting of the East Africa Women’s League (UK). There was a fascinating talk by David Arathoon, an English GP, about his recent return, with his brothers and sisters, to their old farm in Kenya, where they grew up. As I...
by admin | Apr 5, 2012 | Only in Africa
In 1949 Col George Jazman was driving his 10 cwt Fordson panel van on the Kiganjo-Mweiga road from his house between Monte Carlo Ranch and Steep (now Aberdare Country Club) when he heard a huge thump in the back of the car. When he looked around he saw a rhino in his...
by admin | Mar 29, 2012 | Dick Hedges
My story concerns Christmas on the Kenyan coast in 1963. Despite the atrocities committed by the Mau Mau during their uprising and equal atrocities that have recently come to light associated with its suppression, race relations in Kenya have been surprisingly good...
by admin | Mar 28, 2012 | Only in Africa
Getting out into the bush was the best thing about going to school at Rift Valley Academy for me. We had a huge playground – the wild out-of-doors. Once we hiked a few miles northwestward along the railway to climb Kijabe Hill. We found heavy old tires near the top...
by Shel Arensen | Mar 26, 2012 | Shel Arensen
I rode in the back of our white Volkswagen beetle, registration KCY 434, from central Kenya to northeastern Congo in 1968 when I was 12 years old. My father had to speak at a conference at Rethy. We drove through Eldoret, into Uganda and Kampala before driving...
by admin | Mar 22, 2012 | Elaine Barnett
Being only three years of age on this epic voyage to East Africa via ship, my childhood memories are sometimes confused. I know we stopped in Naples, Italy, but remember nothing of the stopover except the visible evidence of World War II. Large, rusted hulks of bombed...
by admin | Mar 20, 2012 | Only in Africa
While attending the Highlands High School at Eldoret, we were taken to a wattle farm belonging to an elderly German. Wattle trees where grown and the bark used for the leather tanning industry. We were told how the trees were planted and harvested and finally to our...
by admin | Mar 6, 2012 | Only in Africa
When living outside Naivasha on the edge of the Rift Valley in a somewhat lonely and rugged place, we didn’t have too many wild animals, but we did have snakes. One morning Ezekiel, our mpishi and the chap who totally ran the household, rushed in to say Jezebel, one...
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