I come around the bend of the dusty, mesquite lined road to work and three very tall and very thin men cross my path each wearing a different colour of loosely wrapped head scarf, a short sleeved dress shirt and a ground-length piece of brightly patterned cloth wrapped around their waist like a towel. This is the typical dress of most of the (Somali) men in the area.

Behind them in one corner of the intersection is the neighbourhood garbage dump. All that remains are plastic bags and containers and some cloth. The suitcase that was there yesterday has since been picked up and any food scraps which may have been dumped had long been eaten by passing animals - usually the giant marabou stork. The two goat hooves and skin that appeared two weeks ago - evidence of a party or celebration in the neighbourhood - apparently aren't to the taste of the marabou.

This bird makes a loud whooshing noise with it's wings and when it passes overhead the shadow it casts is so big it makes me look up every time. People always talk about how ugly it is, and when you see it up close you'd have to agree. It is a scavenger and can be seen around any garbage dump eating almost anything. It keeps the food in it's neck and you can see if it really had a good fill of garbage by how low its neck hangs.

Just past the intersection were three donkeys slowly coming down the road towards me, presumably to get a snack at the dump. I still can't figure out how their owners keep track of them as they seem to be allowed to wander anywhere they want with no owner in sight. When I go in to the commercial district of town I occasionally see errant sheep, goats, and an occasional cow with no apparent owner in sight. Somehow, though, in the end they always manage to keep track of their livestock. Even when herders bring their animals to a watering point and hundreds of animals are intermixed, they are always able to leave with those which belong to their herd.