Sooper Guest House

Sooper (pronounced super) guest house is the kind of place that deserves its own post. According to our original plan sooper guesthouse (at $14/night) was going to be the place were would stay for the next three nights. We had to find a cheap place to offset the $225 we just blew on the Naivasha Country Club disaster.

When we arrived in Kisumu, the third largest city in the country. We found it to be a bit dirty, very polluted air and like any large city in a developing country; without someone to show you around there isn't much to do. We drove around a bit until we happened upon the guest house which we almost missed. It was nestled between a paint shop and a car parts store. There was one small blue sign hanging which read "sooper guest house." Both our lonely planet and rough guide books said this was one of the best places to stay in Kisumu so even though Justus wrinkled his nose we decided we were going to check it out. Five street boys were hanging out by the door and asking for money. It was getting dark so we wanted to hurry upstairs to check in and then head out to a grocery store or restaurant to buy some food. As we walked up the narrow, dimly lit hotel we had a few reservations but again decided to withhold judgement. The reception staff were nice as we found their desk nestled in a little nook in the lobby which appeared to be a construction site.

A young man grabbed our suitcases as we said goodbye to Justus and headed to our room. We walked up a rickety stair case then down another one until he opened a door under one of the staircases directly across from a very foul smelling bathroom. We walked into the room with two tiny single beds, a small window overlooking an old elevator shaft that now housed construction refuge (wheelbarrow, pieces of iron, lots of dirt and dust). We pulled back the sheets to discover that several hairs (from at least three different heads judging by the length and texture) were resting on the pillow cases. Instead of mattresses the beds were a series of folded up wool blankets and pieces of fabric with a sheet wrapped around them. The bathroom was basic, mostly clean with someone's old mismatched flip flops in the shower - were they for us to use we wondered?

We decided to walk around to see what else was there in the hotel. As we said there was a construction site taking up part of the hotel which was built on top of other stores. There was a series of stairs leading to various makeshift floors. We were trying to find the famed terrace which the guidebooks said was such a cool place to hang out on. As we reached the third set of stairs, each more trecherous than the last, Jessie refused to climb the final one which was made of old plank boards and thin metal. Mer, the daredevil, climbed up to the top to a tarred roof with one chair which served as the terrace. We passed the communal kitchen on the way down which was a windowless room with a lightbulb hanging from the ceiling. The place was filthy and we decided we wouldn't be cooking our own dinners there tonight!

Now was the moment that we realized we were no longer 19 year old college students. Sure this was acceptable if we were traveling on a shoestring budget and without a nice grant from the Fund for Teachers, but we were almost 30 and had become accustomed to certain things, like mattresses and clean sheets. This was not going to cut it for us.

We debated just sticking it out the night but when we looked outside into the dark, industrial area outside we thought our chances of finding a place to eat or a store would be slim. We called Justus to come pick us up and we found a hotel that was more in line with our needs.

We ended up having to spend $65 to stay at the famed Sunset hotel. Had we started out there we might have been disappointed at the rooms given the price (our sliding glass door was missing two inches of glass and left a big hole for bugs to come in and the bathtub was elevated while the shower head was lowered forcing us to shower in crouched warrior yoga pose in order to wash our hair). However, we were so happy to find that our pillow cases were clean that we agreed there was no complaining in order. We headed downstairs for one of the best meals we've had yet, ugali, greens and chicken!

Reflection on money and value in Kenya: In the US we've stayed in hotel rooms for $70 a night that were just fine so its hard to imagine how $60 in Kenya are hardly comparable. However, when you think about the cost of importing (and producing) some of the materials, electronics, televisions, etc you can understand how hard it is. Most of the places are suffering from lack of repair and maintenance but though the fees are high money doesn't go far here. It has helped us to understand better why it is so difficult to modernize without huge capital investment AND how even these comforts that we take for granted are largely still reserved for very few people in Kenya. We feel like we aren't getting our money's worth but this is largely compared to what we'd be able to get in the states for the same amount and not in the Kenyan context.