Our Apartment

As promised (a long long time ago) here's what we've done with our apartment.

First, this is the reason we relented to take an apartment without running water (we have it delivered in six 20 liter jerry cans every few days ). This isn't quite the full panorama, but its a nice sample of our view over the water.

The doors open up to the balcony patio - mainly we do our laundry out there, but its also nice and cool to sit there in the evenings. We had the curtains custom made (material and all) for about $40. You can also see my oud and a plate wall-hanging we recently picked up in Lamu.

Here's our office/den/parlor/sitting room. Please ignore the clutter. The fan has a long enough cord for us to move it anywhere in the room when its a bit hot. For now we're sticking with plastic chairs, but we may splurge on something nicer if we decide to ship things home. The couch and table were inherited from the previous occupants. We couldn't get rid of them if we wanted to do - they are HEAVY! The Table is made from tree halves instead of planks.

Our favorite wall hanging from Lamu - its the one in the office.

stove, fridge, fruit... 

coconut milk strainer, 70 liter water tank, plastic under fruit bowls to protect against termites

 

Another view of the kitchen.

Looking back across the room - we picked up the woven mats from a tourist shop by the market - BAD IDEA. They overcharged us by about 60%! That's after bargaining DOWN to $120 for the two large rectangular mats and the large round one, plus the two smaller rectangular mats for the kitchen floor.The other flooring option was linoleum (or leaving the hard tile and buying furniture).

 

The bathroom. Without running water, we keep a reservoir (50 liter tank) to fill the tank over the toilet after every flush. The sink is just about worthless, and the picture just barely cut out the 5 liter jug with holes in the bottom that we use as an emergency shower when we can't make it to the gym. (Want some incentive to go to the gym? Turn off your water at home, or at least the water to the shower.)

This is our breakfast table. The grapefruit is actually the best I've ever had - though they cost a pretty penny here. The pillows (we have six) were about $100 to have made. It was impossible to find anything that large pre-made in any of the stores. Labor is so cheap that almost everyone just has things made to fit whatever they need.

A few more wall hangings and a stool we inherited from the previous owners - its very heavy and not too steady. Another similar stool holds our drinking water tank (see above).

Our moving picture frame. If you move around the room the picture in the window changes. This is the Bhora Mosque that's our near neighbor (there's one other property between us). The Bhora are a group of Muslim Indians, or is it Indian Muslims? In any case they've lived in Mombasa since the 1900s (the earliest Swahili settlements in Mombasa are at least from the 13th century). This was built in the 1980s replacing an earlier mosque built on the site in the 1910s. They've recently updated the molding, fixtures and such.

A final look back out our apartment. The square box in the back is our 'bedroom'. The partitions are made from bamboo or the bark of some other tree - I'm not exactly sure. We can roll them up when cleaning, but its nice to have our bedroom enclosed a little bit - and it helps keep privacy when we have visitors. (Where else are you going to throw dirty socks in a hurry? - not that we wear socks mind you, sandals are the way to go in Mombasa.)

So that's our apartment. Its one of those places that oddly looks BIGGER when its full of stuff. As you can see, we don't have a guest room, but we're still up for anyone who wants to visit. Hope you enjoyed it, we sure are.