We haven’t posted much about our place here in Diani Beach so today we thought it would be good to share one of the benefits of staying here. Actually not just this place, but all the rental houses in Diani Beach (AirBnB, VRBO whathaveyou) seem to come with a staff included in the rental rate. Housekeeper, gardener and frequently, a chef! This has not been our experience anywhere else (and certainly not how we live at home) so it took a little getting used to. We’re managing.
Our housekeeper Janet is kind and patient with our stuff everywhere and over six days we’ve settled into a routine of when she can tidy our rooms etc. She looked scandalized when we started inquiring about laundry facilities and emphatically (but very politely) said, ‘I do the laundry.’ So she has. Better than we do it too.
For cooking, we continue to do breakfast and lunch ourselves so we have more flexibility during the day. But our chef is named Jacob and he has cooked chicken, beef, beans and seafood dinners for us in our first 6 nights here so far – mostly in African style and all delicious. He takes us shopping and knows where to go for meat, vegetables and fruit at local prices.
Today, Brian and Jacob went about 800 meters from the house to the premises of a fishmonger to buy our featured dish for dinner. There are 3 freezers in his 3 square meter (32sqft) shack on the beach.
This is Ali and he’s holding what is to become a couple of our meals. It’s a 3 kg (6.5 lb) Dorado (aka Mahi-Mahi) that cost the Adventurers 1350 Kenyan shillings (~$12).We suspect it had been out of the ocean 2-24 hours at most. For the 15 minutes that we spent with him, he transacted 3 buys from fishermen and 2 sells to customers.
While we waited, Ali cleaned and fileted the fish. We also added a kilo of prawns to go with dinner tonight. Not too long after, Chef Jacob got to work in the kitchen cleaning the prawns and preparing tonight’s feast.
The Adventurers on the other hand were lazing by the pool enjoying a unique treat. There are a number of coconut trees on the property and we were able to sample and compare 2 different varieties of the water that the nuts held. The gardener Alex comes by at least once a week and offered to climb to grab a few for this “taste test”.
The coconut water was sweet and warm. The meat was surprisingly tasty too.
We ate like royalty tonight (again). The boys had 3 or more servings of grilled fish which we were amazed by. Sauram did her usual amount of damage on the shrimp (which was significant). Sorry we remain terrible food bloggers and have no pictures of the fantastic food. But here’s a good one of the guy who makes it.
5 Adventures Together 