Days 1-10 (What in the Travel Mania is going on here?!)

Ezus Jesus! True story: In our first conscious/sober hours of 2009 (which began at 9pm New Year's Day), we rented a car in Miami, hauled ass to Jacksonville, almost missed our flight, almost forgot the cell phone in the rental, DID forget the laptop at security, flew to New York, took three trains and two trams to New Jersey, rented another car, and drove to Cleveland. Took it easy a few days in Ohio in the freezing cold, and then jumped in the rental car (which we weren't supposed to take past the Pennsylvania border), and drove back to Jersey to drop it off. Stayed the night in New York and flew out on the 7th. Landed in Amsterdam, and within a half hour of walking out of the train station into the city center, I was so fucked up I wasn't physically able to stand up. I'm not a weed smoker, so the itty bit that I did smoke put me over the edge. I scared the shit out of Kristin. <-------Sean. Kristin-------> now i have to take over and tell all of you what happened in amsterdam because sean probably can not recall the 6 hours after he hit that joint. we were stuck in the first coffee shop for hours because he didnt think, as he specifically stated, that he was capable of putting one foot in front of the other if he could get up at all. so we hung out watching tennis on a t.v. that made everything purple and lime green. finally when he got the courage to face the outside world we left the first coffeeshop and went out into the most intense cold i have felt outside of ohio. gay. so we are wandering the streets of the central part of the city drinking shit loads of coffee, enjoying the high, and wondering what we are going to do next... Sean----->So I finally had my shit together, and it was ridiculously cold, and we found the weirdest section of any town I'd ever been to in my life- The Red Light District. There's prostitutes in windows just waiting for guys to knock on the doors and go bang 'em. Some buildings, you'd walk by, and it was all fat black girls! Take your pick! They were probably the cheaper ones. Ha ha. Just kidding. Then we went into a peep show. 2 Two Euros for two minutes. What a deal! Then we went into theater and watched a sex show. Super weird. This super ugly Asian lady picks a member out of the audience to wear a strap-on on his head and .... Gross. I ate a lamburger! A hamburger made from lamb! I didn't even order it that way. We ate some mushrooms, but Kristin was super hesitant due to my reaction to the weed earlier. Then we drank a Heineken about a block from where it was brewed. Oh. And I don't know if it's a Dutch thing or what, but in a bunch of the urinals, there's a picture fly (yes, a housefly) printed on the inside of the bowl into which you are pissing into. At first, I thought it was a real fly. Then I saw it on every toilet in the bathroom. Even at the airport!
Kristin----> anyways, back to the tripping part. we didnt just drink a heineken, it was my first legal beer! and we were tripping with a hash joint in my pocket and i was falling in love with this city more every minute. its the weirdest feeling walking into a cafe and seeing a menu with all kinds of weed from N.Y. diesel to white widow to afghan shit. its like a stoners paradise. and not only are you surrounded by millions of things that we could never do or even think of seeing back home, but the actual people living here are super laid back... and constantly riding bikes! its the coolest vibe ever and by far one of the prettiest places i have seen. we just wandered around until like 3 in the morning noticing every little thing we could about the place.
Sean-------> Whew. So that was Amsterdam. As you can imagine, we were super-exhausted at ten o'clock the next morning after the already long week we'd had and then twenty something hours of this city. We boarded the next flight (third in a week) to Nairobi. The overall theme of the past seventy-two hours has been more or less, "I can't believe we're here!" I think that's been said a hundred times. People were trying to hustle us the minute we got off the plane for rides to the city. We found an honest dude and he gave us a good price and knew all about the city. Our hotel is badass! We even have a balcony. They kept the whole retsaurant open a few extra minutes for us. They're super nice. Everybody here is super polite and friendly, except the ones trying to hustle you. These two guys who run this little market talked us into buying a few souveniers. They were big Obama fans. When I asked how much it would cost, he told me in Kenyan Schillings the equivelant of 175 bucks! I talked him down to eight dollars. It was ridiculous! The city center here is CRAZY! Aside from the cars driving on the wrong side of the road, there's people everywhere! I figured there would be a few tourists here and there, but we were the only white people for most of the day in downtown. When we ordered a beer at this super cool balcony cafe, he asked if we wanted it hot or cold. Oh SNAP! The coolest thing ever! We were just walking back to the hotel about an hour ago, and we looked down at the sewer and a MONKEY came out! Like a block from the hotel! Smack in the middle of a huge city! He was eating something. I think it was bread. Hmm. What else. Kristin is asleep on my lap. We're in the internet cafe. There's a gecko on the wall right in front of me inside the cafe! He has no tail and he's really good at sneaking up on mosquitos and eating them. Speaking of mosquitos: Malaria pills were super expensive when I was looking at buying them back home. I figured they'd be easier to find here, which they were and cheaper! We found a place that sells them. A month's supply for about four bucks each! Good deal. We're about to get something to eat and pass out, because super early tomorrow morning, we jump in a bus down to Tanzania to the foot of Kilimanjaro, where we'll spend the next week climbing. I'm gonna try to figure out how to put pictures on this thing. Bye.
Kristin------->so perks of being in kenya the computers are irritatebly slow and downloading pictures is a nightmare...coming attraction!