SECOND INTERLUDE III

ONE FEWER THAN THE SIXTH POWER OF TWO

It had been decades since I last wandered the streets of London alone and without an agenda; I had never been there in midwinter, although during several May and September visits it had seemed that cold; and I most definitely had never stopped there before to celebrate my birthday. On the seemingly interminable flight from Seattle, British Air had shown itself to be decidedly human; only the check-in procedure had been up to standard, and I waited ridiculously long for that. Were my predecessors at the counter still awaiting issuance of their passports, or were the computers down, or was the staff totally asleep after a day’s work?

At the other end of the flight, however, British immigration procedures proved once again to be very civilized even for those of us in neither the Commonwealth nor the Common Market, and I was very quickly London bound in one of those fabled, traditional taxis, which also still operate in Nairobi. The driver was taciturn, totally and happily unlike the woman sitting next to me on the plane, but his trip consumed one hour and fifty dollars. The Waldorf is a bit beyond even my regular excesses, but special winter rates reduced its impossible price to the exorbitant level I customarily pay in big-city hotels, and it is very conveniently located near the theater district. Jet lag afflicted me for the first time in a decade of foreign travel–I blame this on BA–so I squandered the afternoon and evening, leaving my room only once to explore the hotel and to eat a light meal in its pub, the Aldwych Brasserie, to sustain me during the night. I dozed in two-hour spurts early in the night but finally around two fell sound asleep for six full hours.

It was after ten when I stepped out onto the street, also named Aldwych, in full sunshine and a brisk breeze, and turned left, passing first the hotel’s pub and then the Aldwych Theatre, where Miranda had booked seats for the next night’s performance of J.B. Priestley’s An Inspector Calls. Up ahead I saw a building reminiscent of St. Paul’s Cathedral, and gratifyingly even without changing course I was soon on Fleet Street. Dr. Johnson’s House then appeared and practically next-door to it, Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, a favorite haunt in decades past. After circumnavigating the cathedral and noting unhappily that there would be no organ recital this Friday noon, I retraced my steps, showing unusual judgment in choosing a course that changed only the side of the street. From this view the towers of the Royal Courts of Justice appeared beautifully illuminated by the morning sun.

Shortly after passing the hotel again, I came to the Strand and encountered a few more familiar names: Simpson’s, the Savoy, and Charing Cross. It was encouraging to look left and see the Thames paralleling my route. Then just ahead I saw the Portrait Gallery and Nelson’s Column. A right turn at St. Martin-in-the-Fields and I knew where I was, but if I wandered much farther, could I find the hotel again? St. Martin’s was doing a candlelight concert this evening, but the program by Handel and Mozart was too familiar–nah. A little farther on the National Opera advertised Fledermaus, but I would much rather drink Champagne than hear songs about it, and the Royal Opera wasn’t doing opera at all. I had learned earlier that the Royal Ballet was still presenting the Nutcracker and that most theaters were playing musicals, so I decided then and there to spend another evening in my room. Had I realized that Diana Rigg was starring in Medea, I very likely would have attended that instead.

After all that exploring I was very hungry and quite cold, so I began thinking seriously about lunch. It had been quite disappointing to read earlier at 1 Fleet Street, now the location of the Royal Bank of Scotland, “Site of the Devil Tavern demolished in 1787.” This led me briefly to consider Paradiso e Inferno Ristorante, but I strolled on. The Royal Bombay Chef next held my interest until I noticed a sign in its window, “open only a few days,” never a recommendation in my experience, so I finally settled on the Pelican, a French restaurant, where I thoroughly enjoyed a coarse terrine served with fresh greens and a pistachio dressing, confit of duck on a bed of green lentils, a bottle of 1985 Fixin, assorted sorbets, and espresso. A stop at my hotel’s elegant wood-paneled Club Bar for some 1970 Graham’s and a Cuban cigar ended the active part of a civilized, albeit short, day.

The Waldorf’s basic restaurant, the Palm Court, is an elegant affair set down a few steps from the hotel’s main level and surrounded by a narrow band of tables on all four sides at that main level. It does have palm trees, is brightly lighted, and during afternoon tea, at least, features live music–my first day a harp, the second a piano. At breakfast there on my day, which I had to come all the way to London to learn was also the fortieth anniversary of the short-lived marriage of Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio, I tested the old English adage that “a gentleman’s hotel is his home” by ordering Champagne and found that it still applies. “Absolutely sir, you’re a resident,” said the senior hostess. That it took some time to arrive and was not very cold when opened seemed immaterial; it was the principle, and the day, that mattered. My only real problem was an overzealous young waiter who had been trained to serve a rasher of toast the moment a guest appeared and to return with coffee every five minutes. Naturally, an hour later when I did finally want some coffee I couldn’t get it.

The second full day in London was even better, again clear, chilly, and windy. Confident now of my inability to get totally lost, I wandered into the Covent Garden area to see what remains of that former market. Filled with a variety of shops and fast-food outlets, it appears to be thriving, although early on this winter morning it was hardly overrun with clients. I followed a circuitous route through the theater district, ultimately coming to Regent Street quite close to where Swallow Street leaves and re-enters in celebration of its one-block existence. Bentley’s, a favorite stopover for oysters, downstairs, and then Dover Sole upstairs, when I worked for several weeks in London, appeared unchanged except for grossly elevated prices–I would have passed it by even had it been time to eat. Back on Regent Street I noticed that Austin and Reed was having a sale, so I looked in. Overcoats were half-price to be sure, but having started at $1500, they still seemed a bit dear for one afternoon of warmth. Anyway the stop served to warm me a bit, and it was soon time to return to the hotel.

It was fun to see Miranda again. She is dividing her time between studies and work and seems to be enjoying both. During my earlier walk I had located quite a few interesting restaurants on Catherine Street, adjacent to the hotel, and we looked at two in particular. The Italian one had no clients, so we decided the better alternative was to accept one-half of the only unbooked table left in the French one. It was more than adequate, and the salmon from Scotland was very nice.

But the play was the main attraction of the evening. The Aldwych is old and very steeply pitched, so it seemed to me, but I had advanced one year in age that day. Although seated quite high, we had a good view, and the sound level was more than adequate. I can do no better than quote from the theater’s flyer: “Written at the end of the Second World War, and set before the First, An Inspector Calls is a brilliantly compelling and haunting thriller.... When Inspector Goode calls unexpectedly on the prosperous Birling family, his startling revelations not only shatter the very foundations of their lives, but challenge us all to examine our consciences.” It has received rave reviews and numerous awards, and in my opinion it certainly deserves them all.

Then it was D-day, time to depart for Africa again on what is likely my last flight from Heathrow to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. I was still very nervous about returning, decidedly so. The morning’s weather seemed a bit warmer, but drizzly, and the cabbie was typically taciturn, unhelpful, and therefore untipped. BA did little to improve its image right at the start. The airline has over one hundred check-in stations at Heathrow, and of these, at 7:45 a.m., exactly one was staffed to serve Club World clients, and that by a pleasant but inexperienced young woman dealing with another traveler who was carrying too many pieces of oversized luggage, or so she feared. While awaiting judgment from higher authority, which came about the time a second station finally opened, she periodically apologized to the rapidly lengthening queue behind me. I immediately took over second place in the new queue and was served efficiently and promptly, particularly so because the man before me had nothing to check. As I departed, the young woman next door was still affixing tags to all the bags brought by the first guy.

This is the only time I’ve left London for Nairobi in daylight, and my careful scheduling was rewarded when the clouds broke as we neared the Alps. Just as I began wondering if the body of water ahead might be Lake Geneva and the mountain beside it Mont Blanc, the plane banked steeply, and a voice from up front announced that we had a gorgeous view of those two and the Matterhorn, but from the other side of the plane. By the time I finished reveling in my own view–I had a window seat, and the woman assigned to the aisle seat chose instead to use the empty center section–and crossed over, none of the three was still in view. But never mind, the mountains were gorgeous on both sides. From then on the scenery alternated between water and land, but I was unable to identify anything else. All in all it was a good flight, one that restored my confidence in BA. The 747-400 we flew was certainly a contributing factor; for my money it’s the best equipped of all planes to ensure passenger comfort on long hauls.

My sixth arrival at JKIA taught me something I hadn’t fully realized before: the best approach is not to have a visa. Typically only a handful of passengers on BA need one, and particularly if one flies business or first class, it’s easy to be among the first two or three in line. This time I was second, but only because a Frenchman went to the temporarily unstaffed visa booth to fill out his application form, a technique I consider most unsportsmanlike, but his efforts were judged incomplete, so I was served first anyway and also received my usual five-dollar discount. I’ve since discovered that this is the standard price at the airport. Why there are two different rates, one for land, the other for air, I do not know.

That finished I walked right past the other three hundred passengers and down to the baggage-claim carousel, where my two new bags emerged promptly and undamaged. There are five lanes through Customs, but only one, far to the right, has a green light and is labeled “nothing to declare.” Walk nonchalantly through this one, looking straight ahead, and don’t stop at the interior windows of either bank; their queues outside are shorter, and presumably Customs won’t call you back from there. Change cash–it’s quicker–wander over to the nearby “London-style taxi” window, and you are soon on your way. My taxi bore the motto “It’s only Jesus that satisfy [sic], not much money or fame,” so I felt safe and assumed that no tip was necessary. Nairobi cabs are not metered, but their fares are standardized; from JKIA to town the cost is 608 shillings, about nine dollars. I was the first one to reach the Norfolk and was getting my nice PC discount when the first load of tourists came in. The dining-room steward called to me as I passed, so my table for the next night was booked right on the spot.

The next morning I arose late and dull, ate a huge, early lunch, and was lounging half asleep on the bed when Joellen called from the Windsor Golf and Country Club–my California friends really travel in style. She had the rest of Sunday and all of Monday free, as did I, so we decided to get together and compare the two hotel dining rooms. That night the Ibis Grill was superb. Its service was impeccable despite the absence of my favorite waiter, who told me in November he would be on vacation when I returned, and its food the best in many visits. And when it rained for a few minutes midway through dinner, the fragrance from outside was so fresh and delightful that we joined the staff in its exultation. “Sir, it hasn’t rained since the last time you were here; thanks for bringing it back with you.” What a sweet thing for the waiter to tell me.

Joellen came back to the city the next morning, and we met downtown to go shopping; well she shopped and I looked. I walked from the Norfolk as usual, and I hope that a brief discussion of my route will put our shopping tour in a better perspective. The hotel is on Harry Thuka Road, and town is to the left as you emerge; the road divides the University of Nairobi campus, and you soon reach University Way, where what amounts to a traffic ellipse presents the toughest barrier between hotel and town. It is best I take you by the hand, as I did Joellen on our walk back to the Norfolk, but since I cannot, I urge that you cross diagonally, making use of the central island. If you continue walking away from the University in a direction perpendicular to University Way, you will be on Muindi Mbingu Street. In about six blocks–it’s hard to know just what alleys to include in the count–you reach Kenyatta Avenue, a boulevard really, which is the main drag downtown and parallels University Way. On the way you pass, at about two-block intervals, a useful branch of Barclay’s Bank–change money upstairs–and the City Market, “a colorful fruit and vegetable market with other stalls selling a selection of artifacts, baskets, carvings and paintings,” to quote from my city map.

The three streets on which I conduct most of my window-shopping are across Kenyatta and run parallel to it; in order they are Standard, Kaunda, and Mama Ngina Streets. This morning we started on Standard since I think it has the most interesting variety of shops. We happened past an exhibit of which Joellen knew, the works of Dan Eldon, so we first stopped to view them; what an incredible young man he must have been. After popping in and out of several Standard Street shops, we quickly walked past the many bookstores, travel agencies, and airline offices on the other two streets and then returned to Kenyatta Avenue to visit African Heritage, a “gallery featuring African art, craft, jewelry, clothing and original ethnographical artifacts from more than twenty African countries.” This is a must for all visitors, in my opinion, whether shoppers or not.

On our return walk we stopped at the craft stalls of the City Market and then walked a few yards past the Norfolk to Kijabe Street, which doubles back toward town right behind the hotel. Here are located the two most interesting shops in the city for my money: the Spinner’s Web, whose name adequately describes its contents, and just across the street a somewhat more arty shop named Kichaka. Two or three blocks farther down Kijabe is the Text Book Centre, which, despite its mundane name, is the best all-purpose bookstore in the city. These three shops plus the African Heritage are my favorites. I’m not much of a shopper’s tour guide I’m afraid, but Joellen did seem to spend her available cash easily and happily.

By now we had pretty healthy appetites, and the most appealing remedy was to give the Ibis Grill a second chance. We ate in the covered verandah overlooking the garden and again enjoyed superb service and fine food. The verandah lunch is my meal of choice in the Grill; both the regular dinner menu and a set meal offering several choices for each course are offered. We chose from the latter as I have always done before. The Lord Delamere Room has a similar verandah that provides an ideal location for breakfast on a fresh, sunny morning.

After a short rest we were off by taxi to the Windsor, where Joellen had made arrangements to showcase its virtues. I had never been that way before and was very impressed by the large, modern residences we passed; the Club itself looks huge, even by American standards. It offers its guests a swanky swimming pool, an eighteen-hole championship golf course, and horseback riding, among other amenities, but our activity of choice was the regular afternoon bird walk–there is one each morning as well–this day led by Jeremy, an Englishman with an insatiable love for and inexhaustible knowledge of that life form. He and a partner also operate their own tour company; “We don’t advertise for clients,” he gently turned aside my hint of applying to join one. “We can walk along either side of the course,” he suggested. “We will see more birds by going to the right, but walking on the other side will take us into a very special forest.” We chose the latter route.

Right next to the hotel is a small lake, on and beside which were a dozen species, including my first new one of the afternoon, Speke’s weaver, a bird I had sought unsuccessfully two months earlier on the walls of Ngorongoro Crater. A little later we identified two more new ones, the yellow flycatcher-warbler and the white-bellied tit, both of which we saw again several times. On returning past the lake nearly three hours later, I was delighted to see a pair of giant kingfishers, that amazingly large bird I finally first saw at Victoria Falls. On a clear evening, which this was almost but not quite, Mt. Kenya can also be seen from here, Jeremy informed us.

Surprisingly varied and numerous though the bird life was, the forest provided my greatest joy. Paralleling the course and centered on a small stream at the bottom of a rather steep ravine, it has remained essentially untouched despite being only three miles from a voracious metropolis of several million people. He called it a newtonian forest, not after the person but after a tree that takes root practically in the stream itself. It is home to seventy-two bird species, genets, civets, honey badgers, porcupines, aardvarks, Sykes monkeys–the only mammal we saw except for the odd golfer–and several species of rats. Jeremy also asserted, and I have to believe a man with his credentials, that a leopard lives here; he has seen it on four occasions. The forest also produced my fourth and last new species for the day, the yellow-whiskered greenbul, thus pushing my tentative Africa count past the half thousand mark by a tenuous pair.

The golf course was being manicured for the second annual J&B African classic, scheduled to start the next day, and Jeremy proudly announced it would also be the site of the Senior Master’s in November. Like the hotel, it had been open to the public for only two years. Originally a troop of some eighty olive baboons lived in the forest we visited, but those rascals quickly developed the habit of lying in wait along the fairway and scampering off with a driven ball long before the golfer could reach it. So a small clearing was made in the woods–it was there that he told the story–and twenty baboons were trapped and kept in an enclosure for two weeks, during which their still free companions brought them food. When these twenty were then released in nearby Nairobi National Park, the others followed and none has returned, although Jeremy turned more than a little pale when he announced that he thought he had just heard one call nearby.

The walk left us barely enough time to wash and dress for dinner; for me this amounted to little more than wiping off my walking shoes and putting on a necktie. In the lobby I noticed pictures of other Windsor properties and finally realized why the name was so familiar; they operate the Ngorongoro Crater Lodge and have an office in Arusha. Dinner was excellent, and I don’t think it detracts from the dining room’s quality to suggest that both the style of service and the menu are modeled on the Ibis Grill. But with only two years’ experience compared to the Norfolk’s ninety, it is hardly surprising that the Ibis Grill was our clear favorite. The Club apparently maintains its own rather elegant fleet of taxis–in the darkness they looked to be London in style but painted white–and after only a fifteen-minute delay to locate a driver, I was comfortably on my way back to the city.

Before joining Joellen for her shopping spree, I had carefully reconfirmed my seat on the shuttle to Arusha for the next morning. On the taxi ride back from the Windsor I wondered what crisis in the Peace Corps or emergency at home could force me instead to go elsewhere. Perhaps a message would be waiting for me back at the hotel, and sure enough, when I walked into my room, there it was, an envelope from the front desk imprinted “Emergency” and lying atop the suitcase I must finish packing before departure. Trembling a bit now, I sat down on the edge of the bed and opened the envelope. The letter inside began:

“To: Dalgliesh Marshall Johnson

Subject: Norfolk Hotel- Nairobi

Alterations & Extensions

Guest Rooms - Electrical Switches & Sockets”

and then concluded “Proceed with alterations at an additional cost of Kshs 79,525.00.”

Not everyone applauded my decision ten years ago to start using my middle name instead of the old nickname, Will. One brother even suggested, facetiously I’m sure, that by so doing I was forsaking association with the likes of Will Rogers and Will Shakespeare. Now Dalgliesh Marshall Johnson has a nice ring to it, and I could handle that without difficulty, but the monetary sum mentioned, the equivalent of just over one thousand dollars, would be of little use in resuscitating my moribund savings account, so I took the letter back to the front desk and foreswore any association with the project. The night clerk, a young woman who has always treated me courteously and efficiently, and I shared a good laugh before I returned to the room to prepare for departure and then to sleep.

The number of my room, 417, had seemed significant when I first checked in, and ultimately I realized it was not for arithmetical reasons, but rather because that same number had appeared in my letter, never to be mailed, to Margaret. The ride south next day was routine, and even the various denizens of Namanga ignored me since the van contained a half-dozen other Americans who were far bigger patsies than I. They chatted with the Maasai, took photos of them without permission and then refused to pay, fell victim to one or another of the ambient currency scams, and even changed money illegally in plain sight of everyone. We lost quite a bit of time there but surprisingly no passengers.

A bird I commonly see near Namanga, particularly on the Tanzanian side, belongs to the turaco family–louries they’re called to the South. They were superabundant this day on both sides of the border, flying back and forth across the highway and perched in pairs atop roadside trees. Their common name, white-bellied go-away bird, coined I suppose to describe both their appearance and song, in some mystical way suggested to me a counter argument to the constructive connotation of the number 417. Should I finish my teaching assignment, or should I simply do some more traveling and then return home?

It’s strange how the mind, at least mine, can imagine significance in such trivia, but I did make it back to Arusha and then to Ilboru on schedule.

W. Vance Johnson

19 Jan 94