Coffee and TV.

Facing of one of the buildings at University of Nairobi.

Nairobi, Kenya – As we sat down to breakfast this morning, several Kenyan military vehicles sped past, with one stopping to unload in front of the hotel.

There’s nothing like an AK-47 with your morning coffee.

Osama bin Laden’s death has brought heightened security throughout the city, particularly for potential Al Quaeda targets. It makes sense given that bombings at embassies here and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in 1998 first brought bin Laden into the American consciousness.

Despite the commotion, today was spent preparing for tomorrow’s launch of The Africa Institute at The University of Western Ontario, being held at the University of Nairobi. In the morning, we visited the campus – conveniently located a zebra crosswalk away, directly across the street – to scout locations and to take photographs. At one point, we were questioned to see if we had permission to do so, and were escorted by an older man with a cane to the security office we had just visited. Confident there were would be no issues, we dropped the Vice-Chancellor’s name during the walk back and awaited his verdict.

Of course, by this point, we had already amassed all the photos we needed, but we were given the okay to continue.

The afternoon was spent preparing marketing materials for the event, and my floor was quickly littered with empty plastic bags from the lapel pins I speared into business cards. I looked like a drug dealer with an abundance of dime bags. As time progressed, my fingers numbed from repetitively opening and closing the clasps, but the pins look good, and will be a nice token of appreciation for our guests.

With all of our team members in town, we held a team dinner at the hotel restaurant, Tatu (no longer just a Russian pop group). As my stomach rumbled, my plate arrived with tandoori spiny lobster and truffled Parmesan French fries.

Need I say more?