When Jane and I get nostalgic for those years in Kenya, these are some things we remember:

     Putting our hands on the windscreen as another car approaches to prevent the glass from shattering if it gets hit with a rock.

     Sitting in silence as rain pounds onto the tin roof since there is nothing else you can do.

     Having students stand at attention when we come into the room. (And they were never late for class).  Something I do not miss is the time I glared at a student for failing to stand up, only to realize he had a broken leg and could not rise without help.

The unspoken fear as you drive that you will hit one of the women walking along the road with her basket of food or large stack of kindling on her back.

     Using words like fundi, n’gombe, and Kikuyu grass and having everyone know what you mean.

     Listening to Dick Estelle read books out of East Lansing, my home campus.  (And listening to Book at Bedtime, from the BBC in London).  Hoping you can stay awake until 10:30 when these book readings end.  

     Listening to Kujifunza Kiswahili with the ever-encouraging Walter Mbotella (and his  ever-so-proper Mombasa version of that language).

     Listening to Big Ben ring at noon on BBC News and knowing you were not completely separated form the rest of the world.

     Listening (not very often) to Simplified English stories on the Voice of America.

Having all of our American friends over to listen to an early-morning breakfast featuring round-by-round summaries of the Mohammed Ali comeback fight with Joe Frasier.

The smell of sweat and charcoal mixed together.

     Listening to singing commercials on Voice of Kenya radio.  My favorite was “Gilby’s Gin is good for you, so don’t say gin, say Gilby’s.”  This would be prohibited in the US because it was false advertising, but who cares.

     British prep school terms such as head boy, old boy, school cert, Cambridge examination, first form, fifth form, prefect, headmaster.

     In pineapple season, trying to get an extra pineapple for a shilling from the young boy vendor on the roadside, hoping to unload them before they rotted.  (Only later did I read Orwell’s short story about an Englishman making a hard bargain with a poor child trying to sell a trinket.  Somehow my story of getting an extra pineapple did not seem quite as victorious as it did at the time after reading that).

     Watching the monsoons come right on schedule over the Iveti Hills.

     Getting purple sunsets at exactly 6:00 every night.  It helped me understand why in Swahili referring to 8:00 as saa mbili made sense.

Using local sugar crystals (much cheaper than granulated sugar).

Street vendors selling roasted corn cobs.

     Using retread tires, which were so much cheaper than new ones.  (Also seeing strips of tires on the side of the road and wondering if it was a false economy).

     Greeting the “kuku man” who came around to sell chickens.  He would ask which one I wanted, and I would always take the one that was fighting the most, assuming that it was very healthy. Since I remembered plucking chickens as a boy and what an elaborate process it was, involving boiling water, burned fingers, the intricate removal of feathers, and singing away hair with burning newspaper, I could never figure out how he plucked them to perfection on site in minutes.

     The feel and smell of sharp, clear, crisp high-altitude morning air.  It’s like sex.  If someone hasn’t experienced it, you can’t explain it to them.

     Being in Mombasa where a street vendor will take a coconut in his hands and hack an opening with his panga.  You could then drink the coconut water, which is a unique experience, refreshing beyond words.

     Saying to a friend in the U.S. embassy, “Did you hear that the St. Louis Cardinals won the world series?” and having him reply, “I did.  Did you hear that Khrushchev was overthrown?”

     Having mulberries delivered to our back door by a traveling salesman.  We never figured out where those things were grown since we never even once saw a mulberry tree.

     Discovering decades later what I wrote in my journal at the time:  “There is nothing as black as an African night.”  True, true.