the norfolk fairmont

http://www.fairmont.com/norfolkhotel


After a week in the Tana Delta in humid tropical temperatures, I was looking forward to 5 star accommodation -- mostly because I was looking forward to having a blow dryer in my room. Vanity, I know...

Nairobi in April is moderate during the day with lots of sun and quite cool at night. One morning, at breakfast, it was so cool, I had to go back to my room to get a jacket.

Alas, when I checked in to room 520 there was a long-awaited blow dryer in my bathroom. The bathroom was a circa 1920-1930 restored to its full past glory. The 6t foot bathtub had its original chrome hardware, perfectly restored. I rarely bath in hotel and prefer to shower...something about sharing bacteria with past guests...

I dropped my bags, did not unpack, and ran a bubble bath. It was sparkling clean so I could barely wait to get enough water into this gargantuan bath tub to immerse myself. I waited only to get 3 inches of water into it and lay down in this bath tub, head to foot stretched out, with 1/2 a foot to spare. I gloated in this luxury of bubbles and space....the bath robe which was left for me was perfect -- new and plush.

The 4 poster bed was furnished with luxurious Egyptian cotton - something that felt like 1000 thread count cotton! The feather bed which was covered in these linens was thick and enveloped me. This bed became my base for rest and work for the next 5 days. Such comfort.

I frequently called room service at all hours of the night for coffee ( of, the Kenyan COFFEE!) and another internet key. Always friendly, efficient and polite. With meetings during the day, I frequently worked at night.

The dining room was large with an open-air patio feel in the very front of the hotel. It was a a delectable part of this paradise with very friendly staff, the comfortable and genuine greetings of "Karibe!" from everyone which means welcome. The menu was vast with enough selections to comfortably suite a vegetarian (with fish) like me. The breakfasts started at 6:30 and were immense buffets in the same open dining room. The advantage to the breakfast buffet was the cool morning air and absence of diesel exhaust which pierced the evening air in the dining room.

The courtyard is huge...with perfect flower beds and lined with tall 100-yr. old trees lining the perimeter, palm trees, banana trees and magnolia trees. Even the work out facilities were top notch, readily belying the poverty with which this hotel is surrounded by.

The hallways and foyers were where my reality changed...with the previous patrons of the '20's & 30's who stayed here while taking in safaris. The black & white photos adorning the lengthy hallways display skins of leopards, zebras and other magnificent Kenyan animals. The foreground of some of these photos displayed tusks that appeared longer than the height of an average European male of the day. The elephant tusks looked more like stripped tree logs than ivory tusks. I could only hope that the animals who bore these majestic coats died quickly and painlessly. The tusks....well, I shudder to think that the elephants were still alive, possibly, without their tusks.

The hotel is fading my my memory...the black and white pictures remain very clear -- even today, 7 months later.

It wasn't just the aristocratic patrons of the past who clearly inflicted unimaginable brutality on this country...it is the realization that only 1% of the cost of my daily room fee goes to the bar maid who served me 6 days out of 6. Upon further questioning, I discovered she had a degree in hotel management and this was a prized job for her. Unemployment is 95% in Nairobi. On her meager salary, she supported her tribal family of mother, grandmother and 5 siblings younger than her. It was easy to leave North American sized tips (although we were advised no to do so) for this lovely young woman.

On the 4th day of our stay (we were a team of 10 people) traveling on business, the hotel hosted a party to finally mark the completion of the renovations and upgrades of the previous year. Champagne flowed freely (which were cut - chopped- open with a huge Machete by a beautiful young woman in a red cocktail dress!) and there were many glamorous theme rooms. The one that remains most clear in my memory is the ice room lined entirely with huge blocks of ice in which they served vodkas from all over the world. The take-home gifts were recycled metal corkscrews forged locally and packaged in perfect, square latched boxes made of brown banana leaves.

The coffee in Kenya is to die for...until you try the locally grown tobacco hand rolled into cigars. We indulged in a few of these on the patio overlooking the courtyard over fine brandy and port wine.

After all this frivolity and fun, back to my room...down the same hallways lined with these haunting black & white photos. If those were my relatives, I would have made it my mission to go and remove every one of those photos. Even with much indulging in international vodkas, fine cigars and port...it was difficult not to be overcome by the sobriety-inducing effect of the immense animal skins in the photos.

Perhaps it is just my own 2009 sensibility - in which it is fashionable to be a vegetarian, to advocate for peace and equality....but even 60-80 years ago, these people knew that these are mammals just like us, albeit, not quite as intellectually evolved as a homo sapien...but mammals none the less.

The hotel, the service, the meals....everything was top notch, 5-star quality. I just could not overcome the haunting images of dead animals which were slaughtered for sport by rich Europeans on this alive and all-knowing continent.

I have yet to meet a Kenyan who is not soft-spoken and polite, so polite that they will never utter a negative word about any of these inequalities or injustices which are so evident and all around.

During the entire stay at the Fairmont, I left only once and that was to go shopping at a large 5-storey mall about a 10-minute drive away. i was driven and escorted by a driver hired by the hotel which cost me less than $1200 Kenyan Shillings for 2 hours. I purchased a red/orange leather purse - which remains my favourite purse to this day - for about $3800 KSh - less than $50 US at the time.

I think often about the leather in my purse, where it came from and what kind of animal sacrificed its skin for it. I am grateful for this lovely bag and will keep it for all my life. So much soul searching and reality came to my awareness in the presence of this purse - at the magnificent Norfolk Fairmont.

For nostalgia, I will go to the expedia site which has the pics I did NOT take but will take me back...especially the dining room. So many memories and so much thinking I did there. http://www.expedia.com/pub/agent.dll/qscr=dspv/htid=8123/crti=4/hotel-pictures