Meeting More Cousins

This past week, I've been spending a lot of time exploring around downtown Vancouver. I'm pretty sure I can get any where now, without getting lost.

Vancouver is an amazing city. There is so much to do, and so many things to see, I barely have time to do anything! Last week, my aunt was working a lot, so I had a chance to hang out with a lot of my other family. I met up with my cousin Salina, who, if y'all remember Sabrina from Arusha, is Sabrina's older sister. She is my age and we had a great time at this delicious dessert place called True Confections. They have the biggest and best cake slices I've ever had. Every time I go, I always get the toasted almond cake slice.

Toasted almond cake and a white chocolate martini! What more could I ask for?!

Salina ordered a flour less Belgium chocolate cake with hazelnut and a Bailey's hot chocolate. Yummy!!

She and I had a great time together. It is so nice to have a cousin who is the same age as me and living just a 10 minute walk away!

On Thursday (March 20th) I spent the entire day with my cousin Tamiz. He picked me up in the morning and took me out to breakfast.

Salmon eggs benedict. 

Then we went to tour the UBC campus. Oh my gosh. It is huge! It's a city within itself! And such a gorgeous campus. It seems like a great place.

 While we were in his office, he showed me all the records he has. Look what I found...

I may or may not have freaked out. Way too cool!!

After he showed me the ins and outs of being a professor and all of UBC, we went to hang out at the beach. It was such a nice day (which is pretty rare since this is the season for rain) and we couldn't let it go to waste. I got some gorgeous pictures of the beach and the scenery. Vancouver is such a beautiful city. But it's hard to appreciate all the beauty when the sky is grey and the entire city is drowning in rain.

It is crazy to think that only three months of the year, do people really come out to enjoy the beach.

After spending the day at the beach talking and catching up, we headed back to his condo to have dinner with his wife Jamila and their cute son Zak.

The last time I had seen Zak he was only a couple months old. Now he is 3 and so big!

He is almost as big as me! And only 3 years old!

He is such a cutie! And I am now known as "Auntie Kash", hehe!

We had a great dinner, and I was so happy to meet up with my cousins and see Zak!

Chill Day

In one of my earlier posts from Kisumu I made a mistake that I would like to fix. There was this fruit that I had thought was called jambura...apparently I had misheard the word. It is actually known as zambarau which means purple in Swahili. Sorry! Hehe. 

The reason I am clarifying is because Romaana and I went downtown today to run some errands and we stopped at this juice place called Naeem's. I saw that they had the zambarau and so (of course) I ordered it! 

It looks just like pomegranate juice...and it's almost as good...almost. 

Then, Sophie (Romaana's friend) picked us up and took us to Oyster Bay (the beach) to have mohgo and chips. 

There is nothing in this world quite like street food. I don't care where you are from, if you try food from the street vendors or food from a 5 star restaurant I guarantee you'll pick the street food every time! It's just amazing. And cheap so what's not to like? 

There is the guy frying the mohgo. 

A view of the sea from Sophie's house. 

Then we went to Sophie's house and just hung out, had chai, and I watched the sunset. 

Just a gorgeous color. The photo doesn't do it justice. 

Overall it was a chill day, but I just wanted to blog about the food because it was delicious and I don't think I have blogged about really good food (besides yesterday) in a while. 

The Weekend in Kilifi Part 2

Today, Sunday (17th), was our last day in Kilifi. We went to this beach resort called Mnarani Club. They have this deal where you pay $1,200 (shillings y'all! Not dollars!!) for access to their private beach all day and lunch included. 

It was beautiful. Today was also very relaxing. We had a delicious buffet lunch and then spent the rest of the time swimming in the ocean and the pool. We got an even better group photo all at the beach! 

From left to right; Tara, Melissa, Tyler (my fellow American!), Tabi, Michael, Yvette, Nicole, Inuche (I highly doubt I spelled that right..), me and Jen. We are such a hot group, eh? -hehe they were all tryna get me to say "eh" and I accidentally did one time...at Tusky's (a grocery store) and no one heard me! But I've gotten Tara to say "y'all" all the time now!! 

And then Tabi and I decided to have some more photos together to prove to our family that we have been hanging out. 

And my favorite one...

Pure happiness! 

And soon enough it was time to part ways. I was going to Mombasa and, thankfully, Inuche was going also so we shared a cab. I originally wanted to take the bus like before with all the others and get off at Mombasa but the ticket guy wouldn't let me. He wanted me to pay the full price (which was ridiculous) and I refused. But it all worked out in the end! 

I had a wonderful time with everyone and I truly hope we all stay in touch. I've invited everyone to Texas...so hopefully they show up!