Furniture shopping

Saturday 29.01.11

Today we were up early again so the fundis could begin work.  Then we headed straight into town as we had a lot of furniture shopping to do.  We first headed to Tusky’s as we thought it would be cheapest.  We had come across some very cheap furniture in Ukwala in Nairobi, but they don’t have Ukwala in Mombasa.  Unfortunately, Tusky’s seemed to cater only to the upper class and hence the furniture was very expensive.

We then decided to look at second hand furniture and called our new friend Yasin, the tuk tuk driver.  We had met him yesterday when he drove us to White Sands and he was very knowledgable of the area and had good english.  We asked if he would be interested in being hired for a few hours to drive us around to second hand furniture shops and he said he knew just the place.  He took us to his friend Sharif who dealt in second hand lounges but hand made new wooden beds.  He is a muslim and has a massive beard but made jokes about Osama Bin Laden and looking like a terrorist and told us not to be scared of him.  He was hilarious and had great great english and treated us very well.  The beds were great, of a good quality and price and Tammi was happy with both the double and the bunk set.

Then we were showed a second hand sofa set that had come in as a trade in and he said he could reupholster it in our chosen fabric.  Tammi chose a dark blue vinyl and Sharif organised that we could have the whole package including beds and sofa for about $650 which is remarkably cheap!  He then invited us inside for lunch with his wife which was very generous.  It was definitely an experience to dine in a muslim house in Mombasa, and also an honour to be invited in like that.  We left with assurances that the furniture would be delivered Sunday afternoon and also some quotes for cots that Tammi will need in the coming months.

Yasin then offered to take us cliff-top fishing with him.  He explained the amazing views and how they have to haul the fish up the cliffs once caught.  We were tempted to join him, until he explained that he would be gone the whole night.  Considering we were busy the next day we needed a lot of sleep so had to decline.  Also, I was thinking the whole situation just didn’t feel quite right so I’m glad we gave it a miss, just incase!

Once home we had pasta for dinner and the water and power has been turned on to the whole house which is amazing so we were able to see what we were doing and have a nice shower.  The only downside was that we still couldn’t use the kitchen as the light bulbs had blown, half of the taps and toilets didn’t work and the shower had no shower head.  But after what we had been living in the past two days even that was enough for us!