It was my sisters surprise birthday party today. I took her with Granddad out to a shop to buy a board game and when she got home a bunch of her friends popped out of their hiding spots and scared the living daylights out of her. Of course this was followed by presents, pizza and cake!

 And tomorrow its one of my sisters friends bar mitzvah where more food and cake will be available… I cant wait!

 I think I might get into stocks and investing. I opend an account with a online brocarage (Ing Direct Share Builder), and I guess im just tesing the waters. I have no idea what to expect, how to go about investing but I want to get involved. After all it will help the economy right?

 Right??

It is unacceptable that people are being treated like this and we need to protest and work towards change. Violence against anyone is a crime.

These 16 days are going to be eventful for Kenya, with World Aids day on the 1st of December, the International Day for Disabled Persons on the 3rd, Human Rights Day on the 10th. Also COVAW (Coalition Of Violence Against Women) plan to launch their National Campaign Strategy within the 16 days. This year also marks the 10th anniversary of the United Nations formal recognition of November 25th as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

What can you do?
There is so much ordinary people, people like you or me, can do to help us move a little closer to a world free of violence against women.

• Wear the White Ribbon to show people you don’t support violence against women and raise a little awareness.
• Find out about local events and activities hosted for the 16 days of activism and participate!
• Volunteer for Non-governmental Organizations or community groups who support abused women and children. A lot of the organizations that help victims and survivors of abuse need assistance form the public.
• Donate some money to organizations working to end violence against women and children. You could make a donation to the Foundation For Human Rights, or find a more local organization.
• SPEAK OUT against woman and child abuse. Encourage victims to challenge and report abuse. Raise awareness, tell your friends, family, colleagues…
• Blog about it, Facebook it, Tweet it! find out what can be done in your local community and tell your neighbor.

We can put an end to woman and child abuse.

Links
Heres some stories, information, and videos on woman abuse and the 16 days of activism against it.

• A news report on violence against women in the Congo by Peter Greste
• COVAW (coalition Of Violence Against Women)
• A true story of domestic violence against a kenyan woman by Amina Mohammed
• Information on what South Africa is doing for the 16 days and how you can get involved. and events in south africa.
• Stories related to the 16 days of activism.

Tags: Diamonds, Sapphires, birthday, sister, sisters, NewHampshire, giftideas, Thanksgiving, jewelry, AmericanGirlDoll, silverearrings, budget

The Chumby Is a cute little gizmo that is like a cross between an alarm clock and a computer. It is designed to be versatile and hackable but that does not mean you have to be a computer genius to work it close to its full potential. The Chumby, put simply, is your window into the internet.

There are two Chumbys – the Chumby Classic (picture above) and the Chumby One (picture below).

The Chumby connects to your domestic Wi-Fi signal and is similar to a little customizable computer, that has all your internet “needs” readily available at your fingertips. You download Widgets and navigate to them on the Chumby’s touch screen. There are over 1500 widgets available for the Chumby, form Email, stocks and weather to Facebook, internet radio (and a FM radio on the Chumby one), and google- all free. You can have all the information; News, Blogs, flicker, Facebook, myspace… Everything! without any distractions, except maybe form the music from Pandora playing in the background.

Sadly, my little sister wants an American Girl Doll, and not a Chumby… looks like I am going to have to save up for something twice as expensive that is completely useless!

The Chumby classic goes for just under $200 and the better but boxier Chumby One goes for just under $100.

You can buy a Chumby here. And i found a very good, detailed Chumby One review here.

 $80 on snowshoes? psh! I have spent more on worse… i guess this is what happens when you give a “responsable” 17 year old money… I guess this is what happens when you give me money.

 I figured winter is coming soon, so why not now rather than later? Im also getting my paycheck on Friday and i have over a hundred dollars in paypal. The fact that I owe family money did not cross my mind… rent was covered, food was covered, so i guess im good as gold. I cant wait to get out onto the snow and try these babys out! They came all the way form cannada!

 Enough! i guess you have figured, Im terrible when it comes to money, but I am better than I was before I started this adventure… Ill write about this “adventure” in more detail later, the fact is its 11.00pm and i have a long day tomorow. Ill just have to write more when I have more time. Just trying to get a post in every day and try to make this a habbit.

 Poker night and meeting my recruiter and work is what happend today, the biggest shocker:- I lost $15. My fault for buying in three times and being reckless with my money.

 There will definitely be more on this, more on Poker Wednesday when I get more time to write about this.

Peace

 Thats all i guess,

 I wont exhaust myself with one huge post, I will just keep building slowly by slowly with shorter ones, hopefully every day, and then, maybe when im “finished,” I may have a extensive record of what goes on in my life! That would be interesting to reflect upon.

=]

After eventually leaving the house, dodging truckers on the highway and navigating the treacherous spindly road down the escarpment of the rift valley, we were finally making good headway towards where we hoped Mt Suswa was. Armed with a small section of 1:250’000 map and a compass I could at least direct Peter to drive in its general direction. Hopefully i can attribute the fact that we were given next to no information about how to get to the conservancy as the reason to why we got lost! We stopped to ask a policeman who told us exactly what we had been told earlier: “take any dirt road before Suswa town, and if you get lost ask a Masai.” I was beginning to wonder if anyone knew how to get there… We took the advice and turned off the highway at the first dirt road we came across, and sure enough, after a few turns here and there, checking the compass, and following with my finger what looked like a dirt road on the map, we came across a battered old sign wit flaking green paint. It read Mt Suswa Conservancy ⇒ 5km. It didn’t matter that it was old and decrepit, or even that one of the chains had rusted through so the arrow now pointed up at the sky. What mattered was that we had found it, Mt Suswa. One of Kenya’s most amazing geological features, one of her most under appreciated treasures.

Details about suswa
I was unable to find any geological information on suswa, or her caves (lava tubes). Apparently 15km of caves have been explored and over 30 entrances found. However, without a doubt there are much more. Any caver/splunker who seeks adventure and the unknown should visit this magnificent volcano.

Poser

Caving
The caves were incredible. We had arrived quite late in the afternoon and a conservancy “scout” (a young Masai and his dog) showed us a nice camping spot very close to one of the cave sites. Apparently they were the most popular caves, and when we finally mustered up the courage to plunge into the darkness, we discovered why.

An earthy smell filled the caves, we noticed it from the moment we entered, and felt it grow softly in intensity as we delved deeper and deeper into the darkness. The ground was soft and cool, so cool in fact it seemed to permeate through my boots and send shivers down my spine… yet it was not cold. The first thing i noticed was green, quite deep in the the cave. I had discovered small shoots searching for light, little figs with their big broad leaves, probably planted by the bats above. The second thing that startled me was when we scared a bat nest. Hundreds of bats poured out of a single hole in the roof, a seemingly never ending stream of black wings filled the cavern  with flutters and shrieks. In awe we stared until the last one fluttered away. We explored the caves with cheap torches form Nakumat and one headlamp, and resultantly it was hard to see anything that was not close. In one of the caves I luckily spotted a hole in the floor leading to the cavern below. We realized we were not necessarily walking in a cave, but a caved-in section of roof! Also at another time in our exploration our steps became hollow, and the ground vibrated when we walked.

Hiking
Suswa is definitely a hidden gem. She seems so unimpressive compared to her smaller sister Mt Longonot, but when you drive into her outer crater, her massive size truly is overwhelming. The outer crater edge stretches all around you, and the inner crater stands proud before you, almost like a little Longonot. We parked the car on the edge of the inner crater, about two hours of hiking from the peak, and left it with one of the “scouts” because of rumors regarding safety. The hike was not hard, and quite adventurous because there were no established trails. Following animal tracks we slowly, but surely made our way to the top. Finally, drenched in sweat, we had made it over the perilous rock formations, a bubbling sea of molten lava frozen in time. We sat at the peak for a while, savoring our achievement along with cheese and avocado sandwiches, looking out across Kenya, glad we had not chosen to visit Longonot instead!

Geocaching
I placed two geocaches on Suswa, but sadly not one at the peak. I forgot to carry the kit! However there is one at the entrance to the caves we visited and another at the viewpoint. Both are great places to camp.

To be honest, we did not know what to expect when we went to suswa. We had herd rumors that the volcano was dangerous… you can fall through hidden/overgrown cave entrances, or that the Massai in that area are generally not helpful, harassing and dangerous. Its one of the reasons why we took two of our dogs. The fact is that we discovered the opposite. The Massai were more than helpful and were much nicer than anywhere we have ever visited. We made friends with a young Massai boy and shared stories. We heard hyenas at night though, and were told they had raided a Boma (Massai village) under cover of darkness.

We all loved Suswa, and know that anyone who visits her will love her too.

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By now I had called my mum because I did not know how to contact the police or an ambulance. Slowly walking away from the scene, fearing maybe an outbreak of mob justice which i have observed on more than one occasion, I described what had happened and what was happening. As I gave the registration of the mat (KAB 066P) I saw that the injured man had been propped up. With a pained expression on his face his lips moved. He was awake, alive.

The crowd was outrageously huge, the turn boy, maybe fearing the crowd would turn violent, bundled the injured man into the matatu. This is where my observation ends, not wanting to get caught in an angry mob i hurriedly left, confident that the police would be able to stop this mat and the man would be able to get the medical attention he needed. It took me 20 minutes to get to my mum’s office. They were still trying to contact the police.

I am glad that that crowd never turned violent. It happens too often in this country, and innocent people are hurt, or even killed. I don’t know what happened to that man who was hit, if he ever made it to a hospital. But the thing that angers me most is that we were not able to contact the police. For two hours we tried but none of the emergency lines worked. If traffic laws were enforced, if a zebra crossing was painted at that busy intersection, that man would not have been hit. It scares me that i have to cross that road nearly every day and not only have i seen two pedestrians hit there, one of them was only meters behind me. It could have been me being bundled into that matatu.

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