John and I returned to the Karen Blixen Coffee Garden today to see a different artist that was exhibiting his work. Eric is a wonderfully tall, friendly and welcoming chap. He is the artist who painted the lioness with the cub on her back that I was eager to buy. Thankfully it was still there and I had just managed to buy it before others were showing interest!
It was a beautiful day the warmest so far with blue skies and the odd bright white cloud overhead I wondered whether I should of applied some sun cream! Eric was eagerly listened to my ideas and plans and enthusiastically agreed to doing a video interview which will be available once I get back to the UK. After about 40 odd minutes of various video takes John and I settled down to some lunch. The food here is fantastic! John and I ordered the Burger and chips and I must say that these were the best chips/fries ive tasted. Perhaps its the variety of potato they use but they were gold in colour, crispy on the outside and wonderfully fluffy inside.
We washed it all down with a bottle of White Cap afterwhich which John read on his phone of the terrible news that the westage shopping mall in the westlands had been attacked by armed terrorists. We had been to the shopping mall just two days ago which really brought the situation home. With reports that 10 people had died and many more injured my heart sinks. I just hope no more die. It is also strange to think that we are only 1.5km away from the mall.
We get back to the hotel and immediately put on the news to see what's happening at the mall. We hear choppers overhead and learn from the news that the death toll is much higher now with reports coming in of 20-30 dead and hundreds injured. The images and videos are depressingly saddening with people escaping desperately running to safety some covered in blood and some clutching their young children.
A slightly shaken chap, named Warner, appears at my open door where John and I are watching the news. He greets me with an English accent and I learn that he is from Brighton (Not far from Worthing). He explains he had just got back from the mall (time is now 5.30pm) where he had been hiding in a pitch black cinema for 3 hours. Luckily they were on the second floor when the terrorists charged in with grenades and indescrimenatly shooting civilians. He was visibly shaken and I offer him a beer because by god the man needed one. His girlfriend was with him at the time. He explains that they were on the ground floor just twenty minutes before the terrorists stormed in however, in a stroke of luck, his girlfriend was hungry so they ventured upstairs to get a pizza. They never managed to get the pizza as the sound of pop, pop, bang rattled round the mall with glass shattering and people screaming and running not knowing what to do they followed others into a cinema where they barricaded the door. After 30 minutes the manager moved them to another room but Warner decided to move away from the crowd so they ran behind the cinema screen and found a ladder which rises up to rafters obove the screen. They both scramble up the ladder where they laid up for 3 hours in complete darkness. They had a vantage point where eventually after three hours of horror they saw police and army come in rescuing other people who were hiding behind cinema seating.
I listen in horror at how things could of turned out for him. We have a few drinks and eventually go down for dinner a strange sense of normality for him after his ordeal today.
A truly sad day for many people and for Nairobi and all of Kenya.
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