A month since my last entry, time flies when you’re having fun I suppose. The last month seems to have exclusively consisted of swimming, partying and eating. Not a bad way to spend time I figure, but it seems every time I meet a new person, I end up having to dictate my entire Sudan experience with them. Last night was no different. Maybe I need to have a new adventure just so I don’t have one story in my repertoire. Still, the addition of a fan in my room and the mysterious disappearance of the cat have both contributed to my improved sleeping habits. There was a rumour recently that the neighbour found a dead animal in their well. Well I suppose depth-perception is a little difficult with one eye...
Rumours of a job working with Andre are flying around, namely working in the block factory in South Coast. It would be a nice change, South Coast is a peaceful area, but with the option of tourist-filled bars when the mood takes me. Problem is transport, I’m not too keen on taking a Matatu all the way there, being as I now have a new found respect for my own wellbeing.
But more pressingly, talk of Christmas and New Year is also starting to emerge. Christmas, for me, will likely be spent in the UK and Ireland, but I hope to get back here for New Year as it sounds like a blast.

I didn’t used to be this groggy in the morning unless I’d been on the Powers a little too heavy the night before. Maybe it’s Andre’s sleeping pills he gave me last night that kicked in a little too late. Perhaps I just needed coffee, who knows. The reason behind the pills was still my dire need to get a decent night sleep through lack of ventilation in my room. Pills should be a last resort but stemming from my increased distrust for the cat and already well established reasons for avoiding mosquitoes, I decided to give them a go. Besides, the state Andre was in 10 minutes after taking his convinced me they work wonders. Specifically, our conversation started off like most evening chats that can easily linger on to the wee hours on topics such as politics, transportation networks or cheese. Last night however he went almost catatonically tired, unstable on his feet, slurring all his words into one and was almost dropping his cigarette into his tea every time he went to tap it in the ash tray. ‘I want whatever he took’ I thought. Well they don’t work that well on me it seems. I was awake for 2 hours longer and started writing a diary. Sleeping pills my arse.

What a fantastic morning to wake up to. Sun shining high in the clear-blue sky a cool breeze blowing through the window freshening the room, birds singing to the monkeys running over the rooftops. Well it would have been perfect had I not woken sticking to my sheets after a long night of restless sleep. It seems the cooling breeze during the day is slightly different to the one at night and to get any effect from it one has to open all windows and doors in the room. Not only does this invite in Mosquitoes, but also lets in a fouler creature, one born from the very bosom of Satan. I refer, of course, to the one-eyed and slightly retarded cat that Andre’s daughter has ‘rescued’. It seems no matter where I go in this house it is always near me, meowing in the most irritatingly pathetic of fashions. Andre’s reason being that ‘it loves me’, for it may be true, owing to the fact that no matter how many times I throw/kick/drag the bastard out of my room, it will always be waiting behind the next door I open ready to rush in. So today, in fairness to the animal, and in the spirit of our shared inquisitive minds, I decided to let the cat stay in my room, just to see what it wanted. In what turned out to be one of the poorer decisions of my life I am now left with a definitive yet disappointing answer to my curiosity, that and a bathtub full of cat shit.

In Mombasa, curiosity will most definitely kill the Cat.

Today I was feeling much improved over the last week. It seems whenever I come to Mombasa I end up being ill. Granted this time it was just a stomach bug and not a bad case of Malaria, but the feeling of waking up at 1am knowing you have diarrhoea only to find the bathroom light bulb is missing and the only toilet paper is stilling in a puddle of water leaking from the toilet cistern. Happy days. Plus, now that I’m feeling better I can at least drag myself out of the house in the mornings to go to watch some construction work at Vipingo. Something about just being on a construction site of any kind makes me happy right now. I miss my old job quite a bit it would seem.