“It doesn’t seem like Christmas” was a refrain that one of my grandmas came out with every year, the upshot of which was that it did in fact seem just like Christmas to the rest of us! I have to say though that there are times here in Nairobi that I find myself echoing Grandma White’s sentiments. As we enter fully into the hot dry season, the clouds disappear leaving a strikingly blue sky, temperatures rise, windows are wide open, and it’s time to spend afternoons whenever possible at, by and in(!) swimming pools.
Christmas creeps up on me here every year, partly because my head is down in year-end accounts in the months approaching, but also because the mass commercialism that you get in the UK, doesn’t exist in the same way. There are signs of it creeping in though, with the Coca-Cola ads mentioned previously, purple-clad Santas in supermarkets promoting Cadbury’s chocolate, green-clad Santas on billboards advertising a bank, the logo for which is green,…. There’s nothing in the way of Christmas packs of toiletries, chocolates and novelty items such as you’d get an amazing array of in shops in the UK, though this year one of the supermarkets has started selling plastic baskets filled with staple groceries such as cooking fat, flour, sugar and tea, presumably designed as Christmas gifts. Shops stock tinsel and baubles all year round, although I did notice an influx of fresh stock about 2 weeks before Christmas. Shopping Centres are decorated, the lights generally going up very early to coincide with Divali. Some do have a Santa’s grotto, or at least a chair in the midst of Christmas trees (artificial of course), where children can sit on Santa’s lap and have their photos taken (and presumably tell him what they’d like for Christmas). You can buy small poinsettias, though I rather prefer the ones over 10 feet high in people’s gardens!
Our (Karen Vineyard Church’s) evening Carol Service was held in the gardens of the Karen Blixen Museum this year, rather than at Hillcrest School where we usually meet on Sundays. It was a beautiful setting. Everyone had candles, which were lit during ‘Silent Night’. From where I was standing on the ‘stage’, it looked amazing, as everywhere else was enveloped in the darkness of an African night. Afterwards, in very traditional British Christmas fashion, we had mince pies and mulled wine – not that the mulled wine was needed for warming purposes!
Christmas Morning, we had a small service in the garden of one of the leaders of the church. It was the nicest Christmas Day service I’ve ever been to. There were about 80 of us in warm dappled sunshine in a glade amongst eucalyptus trees and bamboo, and by a moat (yes, really!) with the occasional sounds of fish lazily plopping in the water. Carols were accompanied by flute and guitar; passages from the Gospel of Luke were read by various people in the congregation; we took communion together; and a short message was given. Very simple but very focussed on the One whose birth we were celebrating. Despite the very different setting, that really did seem like Christmas.The rest of the day followed suit with a lovely time spent with friends and colleagues, enjoying a roast turkey with the trimmings, a Christmas pud, and even a Dr Who Christmas Special (admittedly from 2 years ago!)! And to end a thoroughly enjoyable day, I got to spend some time seeing (and talking with) my family courtesy of the wonders of Skype!
Traffic in and around the city centre was in chaos this afternoon and evening, following a fire at a major supermarket downtown. We first got news of it just after it had happened at 3pm, as warnings came to avoid going into town. Looking out of the office window towards downtown Nairobi, the city skyline was enveloped in a thick dark cloud of smoke. As I drove home, I could hear sirens. A couple of small emergency vehicles passed by, driving off-road to get passed the line of traffic. A helicopter hovered overhead. Four hours later as I left orchestra rehearsal to return home, traffic jams still stretched for miles (thankfully for me, mostly in the opposite direction). The news gave reports of the supermarket having been completely gutted resulting in the loss of millions of shillings. Whilst there are reports of injured workers, it’s not yet known if there were any fatalities. What came across 
clearly was that whilst the fire fighters fought the fire valiantly, they were woefully unprepared and untrained, and chaos reigned. It apparently took half an hour to respond, despite the city council fire brigade being located just a street away from where the fire was! Only one fire hydrant produced any water, water hoses burst, and water simply ran out. Curious onlookers endangered themselves, gathering in large numbers dangerously close to the inferno. All in all, a reminder that whilst Nairobi may have some of the appearances of a modern city, many of its services fall way short of standards found elsewhere in the world.
