Day Eight

So last night I managed to fall down the stairs on the way to the kitchen to get a glass of water. I accidentally missed one of the steps and stumbled down the last two. Thankfully there’s a big metal gate thing at the bottom of the steps which at night is partially closed, so I managed to catch myself on it. If it hadn’t been there I’m certain I would have broken my little toe. Instead, I just sprained it very badly. In fact, I’ve sprained it so badly that I have to hobble around the house. I’ve had sprained ankles and pulled muscles and whatnot before, but this is easily the most painful. I can still move the toe with relative ease (and extraordinary pain), so I don’t think it’s broken, but I can’t even set the foot on the floor without it being painful, which means another day of not being able to get much of anything done. I’m beginning to feel like The Comically Hapless Foreigner.

I really needed to go to the Centre today to finish the filing, but now all I can do is sit in my room and try to entertain myself. At least the power (and fan) is on. Hopefully my toe will be better by Monday, otherwise I’ll just have to suck it up and hobble down to the daladala. Of course between now and then who knows what else I’ll have done to myself.

One good thing is that last night we had a wonderful dish. Mrs. Sabet has been asking a lot of questions about what Southerners eat. After I explained, her son said, "That sounds like a heart attack waiting to happen." I had no choice but to agree. So anyway, last night we had some beef filet and vegetable dish...with gravy! We had some of the leftovers this morning for breakfast and I was sure to finish off the gravy. Mrs. Sabet seemed pleased. She explained that she'd asked the girls (the domestic staff) to leave the juices instead of draining them before plating the dish. Although it didn't come close to what you'd get at home, it's probably the closest thing I'm going to get here (it's not like there's a Mama Bahati's Soul Food Kitchen down the road). I felt it was very thoughtful on their part to do that for me.