Sushi in Nairobi with Abigail

This week, I was invited to a conference in Nairobi. I don’t get out much, especially to bigger cities, so I was pretty excited about this one.  Usually, when I go on work trips, I sleep in health posts in the middle of nowhere, and I get to eat gazelle meat, because that’s the only thing available on the menu.  When you live in a place where you don’t have much access to the usual elements of American life, you tend to yearn… obsessively …  The exact definition of these yearnings is pretty indiscriminate, and in my experience, depend entirely on the person.   For me, Nairobi is the big city, so when I woke up the night before with something threatening the chances of making my trip to the land of plenty, I was pretty freaked out.

The night before we left, we all went to Matias’ cousins’ graduation party, and I must have eaten something…  really, I have no idea, but I woke up in the middle of the night, and the whole left side of my face was swollen.  There was no pain. Allergy?  But I have never had an allergic reaction to anything in my life.  Stress? Hives?  Maybe.   The left side of my face swelled up so much that  it looked like I had cached a gigantic gumball in my left cheek 24/7.  It was pretty bizarre.  But, as usual, Matias was not worried.  Há de passar.  This is the Mozambican answer to every problem.  ‘It will pass.’  When I woke up in the morning, it was at least getting better and not worse, so I decided to go to Nairobi.  I took an antihistamine, prescribed by Matias’ cousin… everything is bought over the counter here (valium included), turned into a zombie on the plane, and arrived in Nairobi pretty much a-ok. 

And tonight I was having sushi at the West Gate mall with Abigail.  Imagine.  Abigail is the Maternal and Child Health Specialist for PSI (Population Services International) in South Sudan, and she and I ended up enjoying salmon and avocado rolls, and salmon sashimi over a nice glass of wine in the mall in Nairobi.  My Mozambican colleagues were talking about going out for chicken, and had even discussed a trip to Carnivore, the Nairobi restaurant where you can eat ANYthing (ostrich, alligator, gazelle, kudu) and I just couldn’t stomach it.  I felt like another dose of chicken and chips would be the knife in my heart. I told them I was sorry to be a non-conformist, but I had to have sushi.  Sorry.  Over dinner, we found out:  Abigail grew up in a military family just like me, and her parents now live in Germany, where I also have family.  She’s the oldest of four, like me, and her sisters live in Utah, where I was born… not many people are from Utah.  We shared all of this over our sumptuous Nairobi sushi (a critic would scoff at calling sushi sumptuous, but its true).  The food was like going to heaven and back, but the best thing was just talking with Abigail.  Sometimes the most comforting thing in life is finding someone who has something in common with you.