"We talk"

This morning we slept in with breakfast beginning at 830.

After breakfast we gave all of our dirty laundry to our hotel with the promise it would be finished that afternoon and we headed to the bank that allows you to withdraw US dollars so we could pay for our safari.

Next up was a brief stop at an Internet cafe to take care of some business (like a blog post).  Then a stop at the grocery store for snacks and water and an appetizer for dinner.

I decided I was going make guacamole for our dinner with our Kilimanjaro guide tonight. I picked out cucumbers and breadsticks to dip in it because there weren't any corn chips to be found. This is curious because corn is everywhere. When I say everywhere it is growing on the side of the road. It is beside random houses. It is the main flour they use and seems to be served in some form at every meal. Another thing that makes this odd to me is that these people have fryers that they are in no way afraid to use and per their snack aisles a deep love of chips of every variation. 

After the grocery store we went to the pharmacy for omeprazole (anti-reflux medication) and tums. The omeprazole cost 50 cents for two weeks and the Tums 2 dollars for 16 (which seemed a tad steep). 

On to Simba house via daladala we went to pay for the safari. We understood that we needed to be there in 5 minutes which we accomplished. An hour and a half later the lady we needed to pay arrived. Hakuna matata though, I have been repeatedly told that you can only accomplish on thing in Africa a day. We had already accomplished at least 4. 

When we met with the safari lady we found that we would be joined by two other people. After our safari meeting ASL and I head out to the Arusha snake park and TG went with Enock to shop.

The snake park was great in a respect the bush and don't go stomping through the grass kind of way. It showcased all of Africa's poisonous snakes including black and green mambas, all kinds of Cobras, and a boomslang (which is the most poisonous with no available antivenom. The good news with this one is his fangs are small and in the very back of his mouth so it is unlikely he will get you.). Our guide was extremely knowledgeable. He told us stories of various snake bites including all of the Masai boys who herd cattle that get bitten while walking through the grass. He showed us a python that swallowed a man. Apparently the way you are most likely to get swallowed by a snake in Africa is you take a nap in a field (read while on the job). There were multiple newsarticles of incidences of this happening.

The snake park also has birds that they are nursing back to health, crocodiles, monitor lizards and turtles.

At the end you get to hold an olive grass snake.

After our tour we ate an egg salad sandwich which we may or may not have been poisoned by.

Let's just say about 24 hours later Cipro was used. 

Back on the dala headed towards town I got passed a note by a gentleman who would not stop staring at me. It was his phone number and "We talk".

ASL blamed my vneck shirt (which was in no way scandalous by western standards (it was not a deep V more like a notch.) According to the women I met the next day I may be lucky I wasn't stoned. He said he didn't say anything because he figured it was my only clean shirt, which it was ). Shortly after that the dala dropped us off at not our stop in town. The good news was A knew where we were and we could walk to the next dala stop. 

Enock then met us at Sakina Oil and took us to his house for dinner. Our Kili cook, Eric was there preparing food. I made my guacamole. We then ate family style: ungali (rice flour that is prepared so you can roll it into balls), spicy vegetable dip, whole fish, banana beef stew, and guacamole. Dinner was very good and Enock seemed excited that he got to keep the leftovers.  After dinner Enock presented us with our climbing certificates and then we took a cab home.

At the hotel We asked where our laundry was and told we couldn't have it until the next afternoon.

Since we were promised it that evening, we pushed on them and after some protesting our laundry magically arrived folded and ready in about 2 minutes. At that point It was late so I didn't look through it. I just went to bed.