Nairobi Airport, Diplomatic Incidents, and the Round of 16

Trying to find a TV to watch the game in the Nairobi airport (one of the worst big airports I've seen) was a harrowing experience.  We arrived just as the USA-Algeria game was kicking off, and found that the 3 TVs in the international terminal were all tuned to the England game, as though people might care about that.  Luckily, we discovered the "first class lounge" and negotiated a discount rate of $20 each to get in the door.  Despite promises that the USA game was on the TV, it wasn't.  I worked to get the game put on one of the two TVs (bringing the total in the terminal to 5) and nearly started a diplomatic incident with a Malawian guy who was slumped in a chair watching the game.  Thankfully, we resolved it peacefully and were able to finally watch most of the second half.  


What a win!  


I'm offering a free place to stay for any friends flying in for Saturday's round of 16 game.  If you hope on a plane tomorrow, you can be here in plenty of time!


Garrett

USA-Slovenia

Hi all,

One more quick picture dump.  We spent the day Friday watching USA beat tie Slovenia.  The stadium in Johannesburg was awesome, and the American fans were out in force.  It wasn't even too cold.

This was our group from Swaziland before the game.  It's not quite the whole group, but it's close.  Johannesburg is about a 4-hour trip from Mbabane, more or less depending on the border crossing.  We left at 8 a.m. and made it to the "park and walk" by 1 or so, after a few stops for essentials.

American fans outnumbered the Slovenia fans by a large margin.  The Johannesburg residents were out as well watching the crowd go by.  This kid just wanted to play.

We talked to an Al Jazeera reporter on the way in.  I hope it didn't air, because I'm certain it was embarrassing.  Everybody still loved Cooper's suit (to my right, hidden by the microphone a bit).  To my left is my colleague Jara, who's been in Swaziland for about 8 months.

The view from our seats.  Unfortunately, all the goals were scored in the other end.  All 5 of them.

Finally, A Zebra!

It may have taken 6 weeks, but I've finally seen a Zebra!  And it wasn't the most interesting thing we saw today.

I extended a trip to Nairobi by a day to get a chance to explore the city, and took off early this morning (6 a.m.) to go on a "game drive" through Nairobi National Park.  The park is an amazing place, right in the middle of the city, with widely varying terrain and a huge variety of animals.

Some highlights:

This Black Rhino is (according to our guide) very rare to see.  It even had a bird on its back like you'd see in National Geographic.  You can tell from this picture how close the city of Nairobi is, just across the savanna from where we were stopped.

A Masai Giraffe, framed by the tall buildings of downtown Nairobi.  Apparently the Masai Giraffe is distinguishable by its lack of "socks" as compared to the Somali Giraffe.

The Impala were a dime a dozen in the park, but their horns are awesome.  Of all the horns in the park, these were my favorite.

We saw three of the so-called "big 5" game today, Hippopotamus, Cape Buffalo, and Black Rhino, but didn't see a leopard or lion.  A herd of cape buffalo wandered by our truck -- totally harmless as long as they're not alone, apparently -- and stopped to check us out by sniffing the air, watching us, and generally showing interest.  This guy has a nice little part in his hair.

And finally...Zebra!  I don't understand why they have stripes.  Aside from the enormous ostrich everywhere that look like big black bushes on the horizon, even from miles away, the Zebra were the easiest to pick out by far.  It is awesome to look at.

So who's ready to come visit?

Garrett

P.S. on the Kenya Airways flight from Johannesburg to Nairobi they played the K'Naan song (waving flag), Shakira song (Waka Waka) and the Ricky Martin song from 1998 (copa de la vida) on loop.  I heard each one at least 5 times.  Thank goodness they're so awesome.

USA-England Pictures Part II

I am not so good at choosing interesting pictures for this blog.  Here are a few more, since the internet seems to be working today!

A British fan is not happy with having to drink Budweiser. Not that it stopped him.

A good-looking American fan.

The English Flags far outnumbered the US flags along the top of the stadium. They are clearly more practiced at this. That said, there were a lot of "American" flags that weren't the stars and stripes. in this picture you can see a "don't tread on me" flag and a Wisconsin flag, among others, so it's not quite as bad as it looks at first glance.

This kid was awesome. 2010 is his year.

USA-England Game, A Few Pictures

I managed to snag a last-minute ticket to the USA-England game, so we made the trip to Rustenburg on Saturday from Mbabane. I have many great pictures and a handful of stories that I'll try to tell soon, but here's a few pictures before a longer post tonight or tomorrow.

In short, the game was a blast, the crowd was awesome, and the trip was well worth the 6-hour drive each way. That USA managed a draw is amazing (I've been told, in truth it was sort of difficult to see the game), and hopefully means that next Friday's trip to Johannesburg to see the USA-Slovenia game will give us cause to celebrate again.

A few pictures (Picasa/Blogger limits me to four, but maybe there's a way to change that?)

Cooper, another American Swazi expat, ordered the bolt of fabric you see here and had it made into a business suit. It's not hard to see why he was a fan favorite, for English and American fans alike. The USA Vuvuzela was a big hit, as well.

Erin (a doctor working for Baylor University's clinic(s) in Swaziland) and I in our seats about an hour before kickoff. Our relatively more subdued outfits, compared to Cooper at least, included a flag and a USA scarf for me and a wearable flag, regular flag, and USA Vuvuzela for Erin. The Budweiser--exclusive beer of the World Cup, which the Brits weren't too happy about--in my hand was the most expensive beer I've purchased in Africa at 30 Rand, or ~$4. Usually beers top out at about 10 Rand. We made up for it later at a local township bar on our way back to the car -- where we got 12 beers for 110 Rand for the group.

The view from our seats. You'll notice a dark square in the middle on the opposite side. Our best guess is that that was supposed to be a scoreboard, possibly with the time, maybe the score of the game, and potentially some other information. In reality it was just blank, except for a brief stint at the start of the second half where they showed the score. It's not like it's the world cup, or the game that sold out the fastest of all. They did announce how much injury time was left at the end of each half, so that was nice. The stadium was pretty packed, but is relatively small capacity of 44,000 compared to Johannesburg and others which hold 70,000-90,000 people.


The road from the Johannesburg airport toward downtown was lined with flags for several miles.  We stayed in Johannesburg for the night, which was about 2 hours from the game.

More to come, I have a few posts that are written already but that I haven't found time to put up, along with some more pictures.

Garrett

World Cup Update

Tickets are in hand!  Going to the USA vs. Slovenia game on Friday the 18th in Johannesburg.  Still trying to figure out what other games I'll be able to see in person, but even if I only go to one it will be great.

USA-England is sold out, but to give you a sense of how into it people are here, this is from an English member of the Swaziland ex-pat community:

Now that the tickets are in hand, it's time to find some over-the-top USA gear.