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enya • Uganda Sustainability

Side Trip• The Determination of a Mosquito• Better Naked than Dead

Mt Kenya in the DistancePhoto Earle

The K

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Nanyuki

PRACTICE • LEARN • SHARE

�KMs Travelled: 800km on bicycle, plus more in matatus, buses and trucks...�Plastic Water Bottles consumed: 2L�Highlight: Between Mombasa and Nairobi, bordering Tsavo national parks, has some beautiful views and exposure to wildlife. A wonderful ride.�Lowlight: Deciding not to cycle the hard-going and banditry prone road from Isiolo to Moyale due to safety reasons.

beettCaptain Clum falls for beetionaire host Robert Worst and Dork is in awe of Michael Knight. They watch

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Robert Worst has the BEeTRoUtE team members Aukje Van Gerven and Jon Earle reporting live from Kenya!

Raw journey and the Best of... photos. Kenya: Cuts & grazes, dead hyenas, exhausting rides, the top of a mountain and ancient crafts in Uganda...

The beetroute team investigates . It takes them to Uganda, Nairobi and the Tharaka region...

BEeTology: Bike-maintance

Prizes to be won...

footage

The Kikapu Story

What is ?A slow journey to:�Practice being true�Learn about sustainability�Share this knowledge with others

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"In many African cities, thieves are dealt with through mob justice, and lynchings are not uncommon throughout the continent"*.

I had never heard of mob justice in my life, until I listened to Georgia's story. She is a Canadian who volunteered in East Africa for the last 6 months. She had been threatened with a broken glass bottle and even took a few hits. Needless to say, she screamed out for help. It happened to be that a Kenyan guy called Moses and his friends were playing soccer at the same beach. They heard her scream, ran up and saved Georgia from her attacker. They also, in Georgia's words, 'beat the shit out of the attacker'. When talking to Moses about this, some time later (Moses and Georgia became good friends after the incident), he simply said that the police don't do anything and someone needs to make sure justice gets done. Hence mob justice: people taking matters into their own hands.

Unfortunately, mob justice often fails to discriminate between the guilty and inncocent. Who is to make sure the actual committer of the crime gets punished (we all know that eye witness accounts of the exact same crime almost always differ from person to person), and what is a suitable punishment for what crime? I am a firm believer of ' innocent until proven guilty', but how much do I really understand of a society where the law doesn't have the same authority as it does back home? Am I really going to judge Moses when he was trying to do something good? Is there such a thing as doing the wrong thing for the right reasons? And where to draw the line? Is it one thing to beat someone but what happens if the beating turns into killing?

I'm leaning towards an Ugandan alternative. Some of Africa's capitals are notorious for muggings and robberies, but Kampala in Uganda has a slightly better reputation. There they opted for something a little less final and a little more humiliating - stripping thieves down to their ‘Adam's suit’ or ripping all their clothes off in public. Several cases of these mob strips are reported each day in Kampala's newspapers*. Better naked than dead!

* Lonely Planet East Africa, edition 2006

photo Earle, a nap after a lunchbreak on the road

It never fails to impress me that something so small can cause so much unrest. This is a story about one sleepless night due to one insect that is smaller than your fingernail. Even from my perspective from inside the net, the mosquito was determined to find a way. I was it's only chance of survival, to sustain itself and a new generation of mosquitoes. One would think that something so small could irritate something so big in comparison, such as a human, but for 5 long hours this mosquito probed, landed, searched, explored, landed over and over again. It's distinct sound, audible for metres around, often striking fear or irritation. I had time during this 5 hours of unrest to think about the characteristics that it was displaying, and I thought admirably of it's persistence, determination and just plain failure to give up.

So the next time you hear or see a mosquito, sandfly, spider or any other heeby-jeeby that has found it's way into your space, stop have a think about what it could teach you, before you seek the nearest newspaper to roll up, toxic aerosol or shoe.

There is much to be learned from nature, and even the smallest, most annoying, and potentially fatal things such as the mosquito, with an 'outside the box' viewpoint, there is inspiration and learning for all. One small thing can make a difference.

Better naked than dead - Aukje The Determination of 'the Mosquito' - Jon

photo Van Gerven, road between Tala and Thika

Sustainability Sidetrip to Uganda!

What a journey! - Jon and Aukje

When in Nairobi, the beetroute team was introduced to The Kikapu Company which produces sustainable, traditional East African baskets. Looking for a subject for our first Sustain-a-BEeT episode, this was a perfect match! It took us to Uganda, Nairobi and the Tharaka region.

...The road to Chuka took more than two hours, and the rough dirtroad to Tharaka another two. We got out of the car, sweaty and dusty, at 3 pm. We skipped lunch, filmed what we needed and were on the road to pick up the baskets again at 4 pm. We hoped to make it back to Nanyuki that evening. We then loaded the baskets. Stack after stack was put on the truck, higher and higher. At the loading zone we got a puncture and the tire needed to be changed, which we were well used to. We left at 6 pm, the pick-up stacked high with baskets, the driver and three of us plus all our luggage in the front cab. 30 minutes on the dirtroad, another puncture! And not another spare tire....

Photos: Van GervanTop Left: A Ugandan man 'beetling' barkcloth Middle: The Kikapu SealTop Right: Kids selling fish at the side of the road Bottom Right: Crammed together Bottom Left: Strapping down the Kikapu's... in the pick-up

"Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced”

- Kierkegaard

www. 08.blogspot.com beetroutebeetrouteinfo@gmail.com

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Next Issue ... Ethiopia...

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