RUnning men

On Sunday I decided I would be brave and go for a run. I’ve wanted to run since I have been here, but I didn’t think it was a good idea to run around here. I have been thinking though that it isn’t very dangerous, so off I went. I left the neighborhood and was going to run down the main road, as far as I could go and the come back. As soon as I started on the road, three men started running after me, fully dressed. I thought they would run a few steps and then stop, but they didn’t. After a couple minutes, as cars started to slow down to a stop for men to talk to me and the guys behind me still hadn’t stopped running, I turned around and ran back home. The guys still followed me, but not into my neighborhood. As I entered the neighborhood though, a very drunk (or maybe just unbalanced) man held his arms out towards me, but I ran by. I ran around the apartment buildings a little bit, and then decided maybe it would be better to just do some sprints in the area between buildings. On the second sprint, some people on the first floor opened up their curtains and windows and were watching me and laughing and saying things. Ugh…I wish so badly sometimes that I could blend in just a little more.
Speaking of running, the Cross Country World Championships were on Saturday and were held in Mombasa. I watched them on TV and they were actually really interesting. It was extremely hot there, as Mombasa usually is…about 90 degrees and humid. The first race was the women’s juniors (under 18). A group of 4 Kenyans were in the lead, followed by 3 Ethiopians. Apparently Kenya and Ethiopia have a huge running rivalry, as both are really strong in the sport. Anyway, 3 of the leading Kenyans and all of the 3 Ethiopians thought that their second to last lap was their last, so they sprinted to the finish and stopped. But there was still one more lap! The 4th Kenyan kept running, and ended up winning. The Kenyan who was in first, tried to catch back up, but ended up passing out on the track and had to be carried off. It was a crazy race! Also, they showed the finish line as each girl crossed, and every single one of them collapsed from heat exhaustion immediately after finishing and had to be carried off. I really felt bad for the North Americans and Europeans who have been used to cold weather for the past couple months.
Then in the men’s Senior (over 18) race, this guy Bekele from Ethiopia was neck and neck with this Eritrean guy for a lot of the race. Then Bekele took the lead, but later slowed down as if to let the Eritrean guy (sorry I don’t know his name) catch up. Then they were neck and neck again, but a few minutes later the Eritrean guy took off and gained a HUGE lead. As his lead increased, Bekele (who has apparently won a ton of medals in cross country and set many records) just stopped and walked off the track! The announcers said later that he had stomach cramps. So the Eritrean won! Wow, I have never found watching running so exciting before : )