BLOG DAY 3 - 'Little Mogadishu'

Shortly after my arrival in Kenya, my friend Mohamed told me that I had to visit Eastligh County in Nairobi to get a picture how Somalis were living there.

People call this county 'Little Mogadishu'  because there are Somalis everywhere - chatting in the street, walking around and doing business. I heard that you're likely to meet old friends there so I agreed with Mohamed to go there.

When we arrived I saw how Eastligh looked like and found it neglected, because there was a lot of rubbish dumped on every corner. The roads were in a bad condition. Our car got stuck in a hole in the middle of the road. Young boys gathered around us and I felt unsafe. They were yelling. I couldn't understand the situation but my colleague was calm.  When I asked him why they were yelling, he told me that it was normal in a situation like this for them to help you get the car out of the hole in order to earn some money. We gave them 200 shillings and they helped us to drive further and eventually park the car.

[related-articles]

The streets were full of people. Car horns were hooting and we were talking but I couldn't hear what my colleague was saying. Suddenly I heard someone calling for me and it was my old high school class mate Halima Hassan. She had a small table at the corner of the street. I couldn't recognize her immediately but she recognised me. We had a chance to talk a bit about our lives and she told me that she had 9 children and her husband died three years ago. She had just come back from the refugee camp in Dadaab, because she found life hard there.

I was listening, but also imagining her situation. I took her mobile number and made an appointment to visit her at home and meet her kids. She was very happy to see me and so was I.