Christmas in Nairobi

on christmas eve we went to the local mall, and saw "harry potter." we actually have a pretty cool mall walking distance from our house. the first thing that's cool about it is that it's indoor and outdoor, not just an indoor concrete box, like most malls in the the US. plus, in addition to the usual stores, it has fun shops that sell local jewelry, clothes, beautiful glassware, and a gallery space that rotates interesting merchandise such as sturdy wood furniture. plus the mall has a movie theater (thus harry potter), miniature golf, water park, and a little kids play area with a mock race track where they can drive around in little jeeps! here are some pics of the decorations at the mall:

on christmas day, we drove about an hour away to a place called "whistling thorns" for christmas lunch. as meryl streep would say, we were at the foot of the ngong hills. it was kind of like a ranch in the countryside, with the back lawn set up with tables for eating. the ambiance was nice...the food was so-so...the customer service was terrible. we're finding that nairobi is not really a culinary mecca, and that customer service is often a foreign concept. but we had a good time. we went with some neighbors, one of whom is kenyan. in the car he kept joking that we were heading to a "mazungu" (white person) place...but we were the only white faces there. so i suppose that was a kenya-y thing to do. santa made an appearance, driving a small tractor around the grounds!

on boxing day, we went over to a friends for drinks/games/hanging-out. plus i sunned myself in the back yard and took a dip in the pool. i love being able to swim for christmas!