Mathare slum

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ON MY FIRST FULL DAY in Nairobi (Sunday, 6/22/08), I went with my cousin David Rochkind, who's a widely published photojournalist. He's been doing some projects in Mathare slum, the second largest slum in Nairobi. Housing there is mostly corrugated tin shacks with dirt or cement floors. There are a few apartment buildings. Sewage runs in open troughs in the middle of the dirt paths that run through the slum. It was laundry day, so clothes were hanging on clotheslines between houses throughout the slum. We met some Mathare residents whom David knows. They took us to a Protestant church, where 20 people (including David, me, and two women David knows) fit into an approximately 8 foot x 8 foot room for a rousing church service, complete with Bible readings and songs accompanied by percussion. Most was in Swahili (or Luo?), so I was pretty lost.

Others in the slum were at church, working (selling various things, washing clothes, making moonshine), or playing (including Ludo, a backgammon-like game [I bought a board; a photo of one is below, but the handmade ones are much cooler]).

In light of the poverty and issues with hygiene (at least by developed-world standards), you might think it would be a grim place. Quite the opposite, however, is the case. People were incredibly friendly and hospitable. Lots of smiles and laughing. That might be because they knew David. Or because that's the normal response to seeing a devilishly handsome bald dermatologist. Hard to tell.

Anyway, that's David with the kids of a couple of the women he met, in one of their apartments. (We went into a few apartments; again, incredibly hospitable there.) The other photos are of me in front a small shop that sells, among other things, Kensalt.