Staying Positive
To this point we have been very lucky. Gallivanting the world, we have been generally careful about COVID, but not crazy. We have worn masks, not been in enclosed spaces with strangers (mostly), and basically followed the rules. I confess a certain smug satisfaction as I heard more and more of our friends (and healthily recovered from) the Omicron variant at home while we dodged it on the adventure so many called crazy.
These whom the gods would smite, the first make proud.
As we were leaving on safari, Theresa got a bacterial infection and started taking meds that made her sluggish, her stomach queasy. Then Sophia and Papa started coughing – but probably all the dust from the road. Plus anti-malarial meds mess with your sleep. Of course, we are all tired.
Paul wasn't eating much, but the food was strange, and even I wasn’t chowing down in my usual fashion.
So we were not particularly worried as we took our 12th COVID test of the trip so we could get a QR code that would let us in to Egypt.
We should have been.
Theresa and all the kids tested positive. Fortunately my Mom and her friend Mona tested negative, despite being in a Safari truck with the kids all week, so they left. We spent a frantic half day trying to get retested (with broken machines, crazy traffic, and the general chaos/tension of potentially missing our 7:00am next day flights).
We were, yet again, amazingly supported by our local friends - guides Peter and Fr. Jacob.
Alas, only Sophia retested negative, so the next day, she left for Egypt with Theresa's folkks Bill and Angela, and we moved from the bustling retreat center to a downtown hotel, blessing our Marriot points all along the way.
It's been bittersweet. Egypt is bucket list for both Theresa and I, and the pictures of Sophia the Granos are amazing. We're mostly feeling fine, Paul is still sluggish, but not really sick.
The hotel has been amazing. They gave as a suite with an adjoining room, have gotten to know our names, and have given us free breakfasts, suggestions for local restaurants, and regular resupplies of water - coffee. There's a rooftop pool and a couple of on-site places to eat with reasonable food and prices.
We've been treating it as a spa - yoga and workouts every day, healthy food, and not much alcohol. We had already hit almost all the Nairobi highlights, so there's not much pressure to experience more.
In many ways it is reminiscent of the kids and my time in Sicily: them working on school, me doing work t blogging & writing. We break for meals, cards, and night-time movies.
It is a statement about how far we have come on this journey that I'm not more anxious about the Grano's and Sophia in Egypt without us. They have a solid local guide, (found through Airbnb) Mahmoud, and he seems to be leading then around happily enough.
We tested again this morning. We have now spent a stupid (and unbudgeted) amount on tests, which I hope all be to last. We have decided that whatever combination of adults and kids test negative will move on be Jordan to meet Theresa's cousins there.
Trying to stay positive and hoping to test negative.
Post-script (or mid-script):
Alas, it was not to be. Theresa and Ava came back negative and are currently en route to Jordan via Istanbul.
Paul and I came back positive and will continue to enjoy a Kenya hospitality that Ava appropriately coined "awkwardly nice." Flights are rescheduled for three days from now, with tests a day before that.
Prayers appreciated.
