Back again....

I am spending a few weeks in Nairobi, Kenya. This is my second time.

I was here last in 2006 and worked for a period in a slum clinic. This was located in a place called Kangemi.

Kangemi is on the western side of Nairobi and estimated to have approximately 150,000 people on the 2x2km Sq area of land. Unfortunately it is also home to everything humans bring with them.

From Typhoid to HIV, muggings to murder, the slum is not a place you ever wish to live.
These streets lined with corrugated iron huts, and trenches filled with foul odours are also filled with people.

Most are trying to earn enough to live, to eat, and to sleep in a 1 room tin hut.

Most struggle to do even that and a fair amount of people have to live without a door (a punishment distributed by the landlord for not paying the rent that week). If they are lucky they will make it through the week without getting stolen from and then will earn their door back for the next 7 days.

I have been staying in Kangemi for the last week. Coming back has shown me how quickly one can forget. I forgot the vile stench, the masses of people the flies and dust.

Don't get me wrong the place isn't devoid of anything good, just that you struggle to find it amid the desperate poverty.