We arrived in Kilifi yesterday evening, and life has suddenly taken a turn for the luxurious. We have a little house with its own small swimming pool under an immense baobab tree. Just above the pool is a wide veranda with a couple of sofas and a dining table, so this is probably where we will work from Monday. From our front door, the path leads down into a small green valley which opens into Kilifi creek, a very wide and swimmable inlet with mangroves around it, thousands of crabs, and small islands with many birds. It’s a quiet place, green, and the houses are far apart. Occasionally one sees a dhow sail past. We’re told the water has bioluminescence late at night.
The sand is grainy and brownish rust coloured, so far from the very fine white powder in Diani. But so far no one has hassled us angily about buying a coconut, so that is something. We also don’t have an air conditioner (or rather, we do, but it’s billed separately), but I don’t think we’ll need one.
There is a cook, who is currently gone to buy the day’s catch from one of the fishermen. Even though he does not do dinner as he finishes at 4, he does wash the dishes in the morning which is most of the annoyance sorted. He also bakes, which makes up for the inconvenience of being several kilometres down a dirt road from the nearest cake shop.
While my family has always had a cook in Pakistan, and I’ve often been responsible for directing him, this is the first time I’ve had one for myself. There are still constraints on ordering meals, as the GF’s diet is restricted, and of course I am feeling my way to what is expected of and by domestic workers in Kenya compared to those in Pakistan, but still better than juggling the preferences of my father, siblings and all the servants themselves, not to mention how much food to cook, whether it’s a meatless day, what is in season and what is not, the right balance of rice and roti, etc etc.