Its been an interesting and eventful month since I last posted. Filled with both good and bad. Lets start with the good though… For the last month I have been swimming with Whale Sharks several days a week. For anyone who knows me and my love for marine life you can imagine how big of a deal this has really been. After swimming with a shark for the first time, the closest thing I can compare it to is catching your first wave. I was just so stoked and about to explode with energy and excitement. The first several trips where just for research and documentation. Our crew consisted of world renown under water photographers and an award winning film maker. And then of course me for some reason… regardless of my undefined role at the time I quickly began to prove my self useful, with my general boatmanship and knowledge of marine life. During these first couple of trips a documentary was filmed about the tagging expeditions we were doing and I am very excited to say I will be featured in it. Truly a dream come true for me. Our recent whale shark expeditions have been paid tours for the general public. We take people out and if we are lucky enough to find a shark they get to swim with it. This helps finance future pure research expeditions. The person who founded The East African Whale Shark Trust and who heads all these expeditions had a child last week and I was have been entrusted with running these tours by myself while he is away. I was of course very happy to help and honored he had the confidence in me to do so. Socially I have been very busy it seems every weekend there is a party, unfortunately many of them have been goodbye parties….This brings me to the bad.

Recall the friends important enough in my life that I felt the need to mention them by name in my previous blog? Well Malti, Jack and Dash have left. Adrian, Ben and all the rest of the Navy guys will be gone by the end of April. So yea that leaves just me Bash and Nick. On a lighter note however, I have met someone new that I very much enjoy spending time with; but we will save that for another time. Malti leaving came as no surprise and we had plenty of goodbye parties for him. Jack and Dash however, received less than 24 hours notice that they had been reassigned and where to ship out. Unfortunately I was not even able to say goodbye to them in person. We assume they are on their way to Libya but obviously they could not disclose that. I wish all those boys all the best and a safe return. Moving on, remember my water project I was so proud of? Well its all but dead. The water is more seriously contaminated then I originally thought and my school is completely apathetic when it comes to trying to fix it. I have been telling them exactly what needs to be done for weeks now. Initially they planned on ignoring the problem and wanted me to continue to sell it. Obviously, I sternly told them I would not be involved in any distribution until the problem was fixed. My only small victory as of late has been that I have finally convinced them that the water is too contaminated to sell and they have ceased production. They tell me things like “be patient” and ‘we are waiting on some money to come in” but the truth is that I have clearly outlined for them the necessary steps needed to fix our issues and it really seems like they just don’t care. It’s a shame really, the project had so much potential but lack of proper planning and lack of motivation by the school have shut it down.

All right enough bitching. That is just life in Peace Corps, something I was well prepared for. A few months down the line I will begin a new project hopefully with better results. If nothing else I did learn a lot from the experience and that’s what life in the Peace Corps is all about; experiences. On that same note, I do and will continue to miss my friends. This will be an interesting first weekend without any roll dogs but I am sure it will be fine. The truth is I am incredibly happy and loving life right now! I live in a beautiful incredible place filled with beautiful incredible people. Oh yea, that reminds me…. with the assistance of my new friend I was able to REALLY surf yesterday. She has a 6’6” roundnose with a tri-fin setup. Pretty much a mini long board. It was really fun and the waist high waves were perfect for it. With surfing back in my life I literally could not be any happier right now. Miss and love everyone, start planning trips to see me!

Dino

Hey everyone. The last two weeks have been tons of fun. Super Bowl weekend was a mess, I saw the sunrise three consecutive nights. Saturday my friends had a house warming party. The party consisted of beer pong, flip cup (its amazing how I never lose my competitive drive when it come to drinking games, as you can imagine I was quite the spectacle for the Europeans), Jell-O shots and a blender making tasty cocktails all day and night. I even managed to meet myself a nice Kiwi girl. This all day house party obviously resulted in us being the last ones to leave bar, walking home with the sun up. Sunday (Super Bowl) involved me and a few others attempting to cook for 30 people while being incredibly hung over. We made hot dogs, Mexican dip, wings and burrito stuff. What more could you ask for to watch football? Super Bowl here started at 2:30am but we still had a loud and rowdy crew of American with a couple international observers who seemed more entertained by our cussing and drunken antics than the game itself. We watched the game at 40’s, our trusty beach bar. At about the start of the 4th quarter the sun began to rise and I was able to watch the game and simultaneously see the sunrise over the Indian Ocean without even moving my head. All in all and amazing night/weekend!! Work wise I am having major problems with the water project. What a difference a week can make, but such is life in Kenya. Theres a problem with the filters and the water is coming out benignly contaminated. We are unable to pinpoint the problem and as a result can not produce or sell. On the lighter side I actually did some very exciting work with the Whale Shark Trust. The sharks should be migrating through our area within the next month, therefore we are now going on expeditions to try and locate them. This past Tuesday I went up in a Micro Light (picture a hang glider with a fan attached to the back of it) to try and spot them. We went up to about 2000 ft and patrolled up and down the coast in search of the giant fish. Unfortunately we have yet to find any but I did see some dolphin, turtles and truly breathtaking views. It was kind of like parasailing but 10 times cooler. Once we finally spot some sharks will be when the real fun begins, as I am promised to get some water time with the giant creatures. Something that is likely to be the highlight of my time in Kenya. No plans yet for this weekend I guess it depends on if I get paid today or Monday. As much as I love it here not a day goes by that I don’t miss America and all of you! Talk to you soon.
Love,
Dino

Um, yes I am aware its been 3 months since my last post and I apologize. Those of you who have not herd from me since should be happy to know I am still alive and doing fine. General recap of the last three months….. Work wise up until recently much to my dismay, I did next to nothing. All my projects dried up at pretty much the same time. This left me bored, agitated and feeling without purpose. However, this is a common occurrence in the life of a Peace Corps Volunteer and I am happy to say I have successfully mentally navigated these difficult times and am now working and accomplishing things. (more specifics to come) Socially, I love it here! I love Diani Beach! In all honesty if I found a well paying job here, I am pretty sure I could live here long term and be very happy (don’t worry folks as the chance of me finding a well paying job in Kenya outside of Nairobi is slim to none). In the past couple months I have made what I consider to be life long friendships with a small but amazing group and friends and have met countless other awesome and interesting people. Once again, as beautiful as it is here my favorite thing about Diani continues to be the people I meet. One last thing I want to touch on and that is the value of money. I assumed Peace Corps service would devalue money in my eyes, make me want it less, make it less significant to me. They say you never realize what you have until its gone, I guess that’s a big part of the problem. Living in a tourist environment on a volunteer budget SUCKS! I realize that I signed up for this, and I honestly never dreamed of having the social life I do and for that reason I’m not complaining as much as I’m trying to make a point. My Peace Corps service has made me want to go out into the real world, work my ass of and make money. Probably not a common side effect from Peace Corps service but I don’t live the “common” Peace Corps life and I’m not a “common” Peace Corps volunteer. I don’t consider myself materialistic but what I want is money to travel, explore and do fun things. I constantly meet people who have been traveling for months and sometimes years, and yea it sometimes makes me jealous. Here I am living half way around the world surrounded by amazing and exotic places but unfortunately travel is not in the budget of a volunteer. Those of you who might argue the value of money, yes I am aware that my pursuit of money is motivated by travel and fun but try telling my neighbors who can not afford to send their children to school that money isn’t everything. I realize those are polar opposite ends of the spectrum, but my point is that money has definite value to everyone and the pursuit of money is a good and natural thing. OK, sorry for that rant but it was something I needed to get off my chest. Now I will highlight the last couple months….

November

November is really when my work began to really slow down. I did however go to a couple different primary schools and give a Whale Shark Conservation lecture. As a side project, I do work for the East Africa Whale Shark Trust but there really has been very little work to do. November I guess was the month I met and formed lasting friendships with whom I consider to be my core group of friends. Nick has been my best friend since Peace Corps training but I just noticed I have not mentioned him so there’s that. He’s from Arizona, fun and the only person in Peace Corps almost as crazy as me. The first person I met in Diani was Ben. He’s a Kenyan raised Brit who works as a mercenary. He came to Diani for a month last year and has been here for almost a year now. This seems to happened a lot here. Ben goes out pretty much every night and is good fun (wow “good fun” yea apparently I speak and think in British slang now). Next there’s Malti, he’s on his gap year from Luxembourg. He’s only 19 but is hysterical and was one the first real friends I meet in Diani. Malti even came out to celebrate Thanksgiving with us. Then there’s Bash. Bash is Nick and I’s “big sister”, she’s amazing and does everything for us. She’s from South Africa but lives and works in Diani now. Bash knows everyone and has been integral in assimilating me into the Diani Beach community. Aunt Pam, I even found Bash to be a worthy recipient of your Care Bear and explained to her the story behind it. Towards the end of November I met a bunch of US Navy guys living here in Kenya they are awesome and a blast to hangout with. Specifically there’s Jack and Dash. Jack is from the same place in Arizona as Nick (small world). I spend a lot of time hanging out at their hotel and they have been great to me. Dash is a surfer from Hawaii so obviously we get along great. He even brought his SUP over from the states and lets me use is whenever. Both of them are great guys who would give you the shirt off your back. Lastly is Adrian. He’s from the UK. He’s awesome, smart as shit and the captain of our quiz team. Lately he has been great in helping me get my water project marketed in Diani. Like everywhere else I have lived, I am incredibly fortunate to have an amazing group of friends.

December
December was even slower work wise so I decided to start my holiday early. My last day of work was around the 18th and spent the rest of the month living it up in Diani. Christmas consisted aside from me being really hung over, of a beach BBQ at a beautiful secluded river mouth beach spot. It was an awesome truly Kenyan way to celebrate the holiday. On Boxing day (the 26th of December to us Americans) Forty Thieves had its annual camel races. People sign up to race camels on the beach and everyone else bets on them and drinks. We all participated in the races and I came in second to Malti. The week between xmas and new years was drunken mayhem. I was told Diani gets crazy for new years and that was an understatement. The entire bar and 200 yard area of beach in front of it was packed with people every night. During the week was the Kenya Cup, a big Kitesurfing completion with people coming in from all over the world. Even though I don’t particularly like or respect kitesurfing it was cool to watch. Forties Thieves’ New Year’s party dubbed The Psychedelic Seaside Circus was entirely organized by Bash and accurately named. A bunch of South Africa’s biggest DJ’s who were all good friends of hers came to perform. We got to hang out with them the week leading up the party. New Years itself was fuckin crazy!! From 9-12 Nick and I volunteered as bartenders. I missed being behind the bar and had fun doing it, and we were allowed to drink the whole time which was nice. We were a big hit as you can imagine and everyone especially the ladies remembered us for the rest of the night. After our shift was over we partied are asses off dancing to sick ass dubstep on the beach literally till 1 in the after noon the next day. I saw my first sunrise of the new year come up over the Indian Ocean out of my mind dancing to dubstep. Hell of a way to kick in the New Year!!

January
The first week in January aside from detox, was our advanced Kiswahili training. A trainer came in to Diani and taught us for a few hours a day. It was nice to expand my language a little and get back in a learning mode. After a week or so my water project finally got its license from the Kenya Revenue Authority to begin selling water. HOORAY!! Since then I am happy to say I have been busy. In review, my school is producing and selling purified bottles of water as an income generating activity. Me, myself am in charge of all marketing, selling, accounting and logistical aspects of the company. Right now most my time is devoted to trying to market and sell the water in both my village and in Diani. It is a slow process as Kenyans are very advert to change but we are beginning to see positive results and I am very optimistic. Digoland (the name of my water company) is even the sponsoring next months quiz night at forties. So that’s it, we are caught up now. Looking forward, I am very excited for this weekend Malti and Adrian just moved into a new really nice place and are having a house warming party. Being Super Bowl weekend they decided to make it a American themed party with a keg, beer pong, flip cup and jello shots. As for the game itself we rented out a bar with a big HD projector. They are going to keep the bar itself open for the game and I am going to make a bunch of classic football food for everyone. Happy Super Bowl weekend everyonce I miss and love ya!!

Oh yea, I have now been here 9 months now. No visitors yet, understandable…. However the only thing I have received via mail from any of you guys (family excluded) was Brendan’s xmas card, unacceptable!! Step it up folks I love getting mail. I live in Kenya and have minimal contact with the western world its all I have to look forward to. (Wardo, Alex I specifically talking to you two)

OK so where to begin…. Last month I was in Nairobi for two weeks of training. It was the last time all the volunteers from my group will all be together again. In all honesty training was minimal while fun was in no short supply. Highlights included frequenting the casinos, visiting an animal orphanage and even a Peace Corps “prom” ( that’s what those ridiculous pictures of me dressed up and posing behind a cardboard limo are from). The animal orphanage was awesome. It was pretty much a zoo but with orphaned and rehabilitated animals. Unlike American zoo’s however the zookeepers are more than willing to let you into the cages of dangerous animals for a kitu kidogo (small bribe). I did just that and was able to pet and get licked by a full grown cheetah. Nairobi was a lot of fun and I was actually quite lonely for the first time when I arrived back at site. An emotion very common among Peace Corps volunteers I am quite lucky to just now be feeling it 5 months into my stay. After I arrived back I was very eager to begin work only to find that there had been major setbacks to my bottled water project during my absence. There have been financial as well as technical issues and I strongly suspect some “misallocation of finances” something unfortunately very common in Kenya. For now this project is on hold. As of late I have trying to find some new projects to work on and have begun designing a website for my school and in the process have been teaching my self how to build a website. I have also been in contact with several wildlife organizations and have a meeting set up with a whale shark conservation group for next week. I really hope that works out as it would be an absolutely perfect passion project for me. Socially my site is amazing I have literally met people from ALL over the world. Diani is full of tourists, backpackers, expats, locals and volunteers from just about everywhere. On the weekend I stay at a little backpackers retreat on the beach and consistently meet new people to party with. I have also made good friends with a pretty wild group of locals. Most of which are Europeans born and raised in Kenya or tourists that never left. They honestly remind me of the St Auggie crew back in the day. At times I get frustrated and wish I could hit the bars with them every night but its cool to have people to chill with when I have the time and money to do so. Last weekend was Diani Beach Music Festival and I totally forgot how much I missed live music. They had a big ass stage set up right on the beach overlooking the Indian Ocean with a couple 1000 people. Music was sick too mostly more traditional african music with some western influence, a lot of heavy drums and percussion. I cant wait to go again next year. Something definitely worth planning a trip around (hint hint). That’s really it for now. I can honestly say I feel pretty settled here. Kenya is my home for now and its pretty freaking sweet! If anyone has any specific questions about my day to day life or anything else let me know. Oh yea I recently discovered everything I miss from America begins with the letter “F” friends, family, football and food. Love you guys!!

Dino

I know, I know I have been slacking on this thing but between being a peace corps volunteer during the week and tourist on the weekends I don’t have much free time. The week after I arrived here I was evacuated to another beach town on the north coast called Kilifi because Kenya was having a major election on a new constitution. Kenya does not have a very good track record with elections as the last one ended up with near anarchy and the withdraw of all PCV’s. I am happy to report though, that this one went very smoothly. A great sign for the Future of Kenya and its people.
Work wise, I have pretty much just been getting settled and familiar with my community. I am compiling a community needs assessment right now so pretty much that is the bulk of my job. Our bottled water production facility is about to become operational and that will be my main assignment while I am here. They refer to me as the “marketing manager” which is well and good for now but not in terms of sustainability, I will have to work on training a predecessor. Socially I am not exaggerating when I say I am pretty much a tourist on the weekends. I go snorkeling, hit up the casino and drink frozen cocktails on the beach…. (hate away other PCVs). Also I have been mingling with the plethora of British tourists who come here for their “gap year” or “gaap yaah”(think British accent). Gap year is when rich Brits come to Kenya for 1-3 months to help save the world before they start college. They do a couple hours of volunteer work during their stay to help justify this necessary excursion to their parents but mostly they just hang out on the beach and get wasted ( i.e. Cancun). Honestly though, its awesome to have other westerners to hangout with, something no one else in the peace corps has at their disposal. Hopefully this is enough to motivate you guys to come visit, oh yea and I see monkeys everyday on the walk to the beach. One last thing I have a knew address and do love to receive packages lol.
Michael Paladino
Ukunda Youth Polytechnic
P.O. Box 62
Ukunda 80400
Kenya
AFRICA

Miss everyone!!

Dino

Where to begin….. So I am officially a Peace Corps Volunteer. We were all in Nairobi last week for swearing in. It was a lot of fun. I frequented the casino they have in the Westgate Mall (yes there is a casino in the mall and its awesome!) I got pretty hot on the black jack table and my luck must of carried over because some how I found a Ronnie Brown jersey at some random store to blow my winnings on. Growing up I could not even find a Dolphins jersey in New York, but somehow I find one in Kenya? Swearing in was at the Ambassadors house and I officially want to be a Ambassador now. His house was ridiculous even for American standards. The highlight of the ceremony was when a monkey jumped on his roof during his speech. He did not appreciate the distraction but I got some sweet pics. That night we hit up the clubs in Nairobi with some current volunteers making my 10 hour journey the next day even more miserable.
OK now the important stuff. I love it here, Diani Beach is the shit!!!! The best way to describe it, is that its like being in the Bahamas, only I live in the sketchy place right outside the resorts they tell tourists not to go to. The best of both worlds for sure, after all I am in the Peace Corps. My job assignment seems pretty cool too. I will be marketing furniture and bottled water produced by the school. The furniture is made from palm wood and is really nice. The water is from our brand new water treatment facility given to us by my man Ambassador Ranneberger. Now back to the beach, amazing beautiful turquoise water and full of European tourists. It seriously looks like Cancun or something. My favorite bar / place on earth is called 40 Thieves . Its right on the beach first of all, and I don’t mean on the beach like Hatties. I mean I could lifeguard from my bar stool. They have great food, plasma TV’s, pool, fosse ball, darts, and the most amazing view of the Indian Ocean…oh and they have Tanqueray and real ice cubes ( the first place I have found Tanqueray in Kenya and ice is a real treat for us PVC’s). That’s it for now folks start making travel arrangements everyone seriously needs to check this out. Love you guys!
Dino

Last week in Loitokitok. I would use the term bittersweet but the truth is I am craving independence and cant wait to be on the coast. Everyone I talk to has nothing but good things to say about my site. I have done some research and found some potentially good breaks using Google Earth. Also, I have found out that there is a golf course and a casino within 40 minutes of my house. I know, I know it keeps getting better. This week I met my closest volunteer. He is about 40 min south of me and cool as shit. I’m excited to check out Mombassa with him, it’s a bummer though he leaves in December. It is cold and incredibly dusty here (it has rained once in the two months I am here and this is the “wet season”) making me more and more anxious to get to my hot sandy home. I have been busy lately as you can tell from my infrequent posts. Last weekend we had a party at a camp site on the base of Kilimanjaro for the 4th of July. We got a couple kegs delivered and roasted a goat over a fire. An interesting mix of cultures. We played beer pong and I ran the table most the night; nice to know I still have it. In other eventful news I slaughtered my first chicken or any animal for that matter this week. I was excited to do it as a kind of right of passage type of thing but did not intend on doing it again. However today I was asked by my family to slaughter another chicken. As it is a great honor, I could not decline but am happy to say it went smoother the second time around. I am mildly concerned about the chicken haunting me in my sleep though. The anti-malarial drugs we are on give us disturbingly vivid dreams so unfortunately this is not out of the realm of possibilities. Wednesday is my big language examination. If I pass I will swear in as a Peace Corps Volunteer on Saturday. We are having our ceremony and after party at the Ambassadors’ House it should be pretty interesting. My Kiswahili is coming along pretty well and am fairly confident I will pass. That’s it for now I am in need of an afternoon cocktail. Oh yea, Wardo and Alex that sketchy phone number you keep ignoring is me trying to call you so answer your damn phone one of these days. PEACE
Dino