So, last night we got some beers! I bought Biatuk a bottle of Pilsner as well – turns out Luca got him 2, I feel quite bad about it now! Anyway, we got back to the Pastoral Centre we went through our usual routine of showering and getting into some comfy clothes. Usually I’m the first person out, so I decided to kick back and relax on my bed and read for a few minutes first. I carried on reading a few pages of The Social Contract but it’s so complicated! I decided to give up on that and begin reading The White Masai (Corrine Hoffman) and it’s turned out to be an instant favourite within the camp – everyone loves hearing about Corrine’s crazy life on holiday in Kenya! We all sat around in the veranda and Katie read out a few pages to us as we all cracked open our beers and ciders – Peter kindly bought a bottle opener, so my lighter trick is no longer needed. We decided to do the CM4K quiz that Katie hosted last year, she once again acted as quiz mistress – it was such a fantastic evening! I came second with 29 points and Angel won with 30, but as she had done the quiz before, I’m claiming the victory! I think I definitely could have done better, I blame the Kenya Cane!

When we woke up this morning, it was clear that everyone (bar Katie) had been poorly during the night, including myself. We’ve blamed a mixture of the sun and the hot samosas that were left on the bus yesterday lunchtime and the baking sun that we have been out in for the past 2 days – no mention of the alcohol that we drunk last night… Unfortunately, Hafsah was too sick to join us in University today, so she stayed at the Pastoral Centre – hope you feel better soon! I felt that it could only get better from here on, and boy did it! We arrived at university to see that the kitchen staff had prepared eggy bread and scrambled egg for breakfast – it was delicious! For a short period it took away the pain of my cramping stomach, but it soon returned as we prepared to edit in the lecture room.

Everyone was so drained and it really showed today, the moral was low and the normal buzz of the lecture room was so silent you could hear a pin drop. Instead of beginning to edit the documentary, I decided to just help Angel out with the editing of the small vignettes. It took a few hours, but was nowhere near as straining as I imagine the documentary will be. Luca finished his work in the morning, and still wasn’t feeling quite right so he returned back to the camp just before lunch. Once again, the cooks really outdid themselves – fried chicken! It’s such a shame that everyone wasn’t there to enjoy it. Lunch was extremely late today, it finished around 3:30pm and as we were heading back to the lecture room we were told that dinner was planned for 5pm. We all let out a slight groan as nobody had an appetite at all.

Back at the lecture room I had finished all of the editing, so instead of sitting around feeling sorry for myself I decided to catch up on some of the online conversations that we have on student central. Katie and I joked about how cheesy we all are on them, but I still think it’s great that we can keep it light hearted and still learn great information from each other.

Thankfully dinner wasn’t served until 6:30pm, we were still not very hungry but I managed to force down some soup. We felt the storm coming in and the wind blew the power to the university, so we ate in darkness. Suddenly the heavens opened and the thunderous sound of rain echoed through the canteen, not only were we blind, but we could no longer hear. The rain got lighter after about 15 minutes and we discussed how the Rongo students had to walk home in the rain – I feel so sorry for them, it’s so much heavier than the English rain that I am accustom to. Eventually the rain was light enough for it to be safe to drive home, so we packed a plate of food for Hafsah and some fruit for Luca and headed off home.

I honestly thought this blog would have been very short today, as I planned to get an early night because we are back out in the field tomorrow morning, but once again, I seemed to have droned on a bit, so I will leave it here. I hope we all feel a lot better tomorrow. Goodnight.

Sam 🙂