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Showing posts from November, 2011

Mellow in Mombasa

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On my 3rd day in East Africa, I witnessed one of the odder race demarkations I would see in the course of my stay.  I arrived at the Nairobi railway station, surprised to see a line of people standing to one side of the entrance, animatedly screaming at the passing commuters.  A closer glance revealed they were selling train tickets!  No counter, no computerization, just a bunch of people waving ticket stubs and yelling.  Concerned, I turned to the cab driver and asked him if I had to go get my ticket from them.  He smiled and said "No, the white people go to the office inside on the right".  I did as he said and entered the office that was officially designated for long distance travel.  Sure enough, there was an unmistakeable consistency in skin tonality.  We were all lily white and were all there to board the Jambo Kenya Deluxe  overnight train to Mombasa. After receiving our cabin assignments, we were sent to a roped off part of the platform that had about 50 white