This has been an amazing weekend. I had had a mildly stressful week. Everything just ganged up on me and tried to drag me down; the bicycle breaking repeatedly, the last time hopefully for good so I can have an excuse to get a new one, the desert getting even hotter than normal which is totally not fair, having guests and a new neighbor coming over to my house twice a day all week thereby destroying any semblance of privacy I used to pretend I had, and one of my fellow volunteers ET-ing (going home) making me sad and just a teensy bit jealous. I also talked to my sisters for the first time in almost a month and I realized just how much I miss them. Darn them for being so supportive, funny, sweet, and amazing! So anyway, I was tired of constant attention so I decided to take a tip from a friend and go to town to check myself into a hotel. I wanted to pamper myself with clean sheets, hot showers, no cooking, no dishes, no neighbors, no desert, and no worries. I came to town on Saturday morning as usual and instead of scrambling to get shopping done and checking email so I would have a few minutes to chug a cold beer before having to go home, I leisurely called Curtis, my fellow PCV who lives in town, and made him stop doing laundry and come take me to The Crater. I had heard about the crater, and seen it from the air but had never hiked up there. The road to get there is long, five kilometers long, and awfully annoying; all along it there are kids who yell “HOW ARE YOU!” as loud as they can in a horrible, high-pitched voice designed to poke a hole through every neuron in a mzungu brain. They start yelling a few seconds before they actually can see you, the echo of the previous group of screaming kids having served as an advanced warning system, and do not cease until you are nearly weeping from the effort to restrain yourself from responding with a stream of words that would be full of asterisks. The road leads out of town, past the airstrip, down a dusty road where the green hills start, and finally leaves the kids behind when you come to the bright blue slaughterhouse. You know for sure that it is a slaughter house because of the hundred or so macabre-looking vultures waiting outside and the smell which is like that of a normal farm mixed with what I can only assume is the smell of innards. Then there is more walking down dusty roads until you get out into the desert. The land starts to drop off and become full of ravines and hills where herds of camels are scattered. We passed the rock quarry on the edge of the open desert. The men working there were chipping out large squares of stone using mallets and chisels in the heat of the desert sun. After we passed them, it was only a matter of some minor rock climbing to get to the top of a ridge. But when I stumbled over that last boulder and was hit by that first gust of wind and glanced down with my stomach dropping, the only thought in my head was “wow”. It was a big crater. A really, really big crater. I am terrible at judging distance but this thing must be miles across. I looked down past the sheer cliffs and saw tiny bushes which turned out to be large trees and a herd of cows that were so small I couldn’t tell they were cows. It was like looking out of an airplane window; everything was so tiny and far away that you could have said they were mice or double decker buses and I would have agreed with you. We stood on the edge of this crater, trying to not get blown in, for a few minutes. It was the kind of place you could sit for hours if you had a picnic, a good book, and an ipod. I had none of those things so after ten minutes of staring at the majesty in front of me and throwing some rocks to see how long they took to get to the bottom, I decided it was time for a cold beer. Unfortunately, we had to walk another 5 km through the irritating child gauntlet to get to the bar.
I spent Saturday night in my hotel room watching movies, listening to some drunk guy vomit loudly in the hallway, and eating what passes for junk food here in Mars. I had Digestive Tasty Wheat Biscuits (High in Fibre!), a can of fruit cocktail, and blackcurrant yogurt. The last two items were imports from someplace amazing and provided at a steep price by my friends at the Indian store. I fell asleep on the pillow, that I am pretty sure was made out of wood, slightly nauseous and happy.
I woke up Sunday leisurely at six AM. I was going to have banana pancakes with honey for breakfast (I was going to have to make them, but that’s okay) but it was Sunday and all the stores were closed for church. I settled for a cup of strong black coffee and then Curtis and I went off on an adventure to find elephants. We called our usual taxi driver and had him come pick us up and take us to Marsabit Forest. The last time we went we stopped at The Lodge which overlooks a crater. We saw only baboons. So this time we were going all the way to Lake Paradise. We started driving through the park and 2km in we passed the overlook to the crater near the lodge. Lo and Behold! ELEPHANTS! There was a whole herd, 5 dusty brown adults and two beautiful calves. After gazing lovingly at them as they swished their tails and flapped their ears, we went on. We traveled deep into the forest startling large, reddish brown deer-things, and seeing lots of baboons. We traveled up onto a ledge overlooking Lake Paradise, now only a green clearing thanks to the drought. Despite there not being water in the lake, there was a lone zebra grazing. It was too far away to tell if it was actually a zebra, or just an escaped donkey. So we got back in our car and drove down onto the green patch. When we got there, our zebra (or donkey) was gone, but on the other side of the clearing was a whole herd of actual zebras! There were even a few babies, very very adorable babies. We watched them for awhile then continued back up through the forest. We were driving along when all of a sudden we spotted elephants. They were walking along the road not even ten feet from us. By the time our driver reacted and stopped the car, I was halfway out my window trying to remember how to use my camera as I mumbled ‘wow’ over and over. The elephants were as startled to see us and paused in the forest. Then Dad, with huge curving tusks, jumped out to defend his family. He came out of the forest with his ears spread wide. Anyone who watches the Discovery channel knows that is a precursor to charging. Me, being incapable of recognizing danger, climbed further out my window. Fortunately, our driver realized what a full grown, angry bull elephant could do to a taxi. He calmly said, “he’s coming towards us. That’s not good” and he hit the gas. As soon as the elephant saw us retreating, he and the rest of his family thundered across the road back into the forest. It was absolutely amazing.
We arrived at the Lodge and decided to stay there and relax and watch the grazing elephant herd for the afternoon. Curtis and I ate PB & J sandwiches and gazed at the elephants as they wandered in and out of the forest. It was a cool, almost chilly, breezy afternoon. I napped, read a book, listened to the elephants occasionally trumpeting, and stayed wrapped up in a shawl for hours. Eventually, we had to leave and we called the taxi to come pick us up. We drove away feeling extremely satisfied with our day, when all of a sudden ELEPHANT!! This one was the biggest one I have ever seen in my life, and he wasn’t in a zoo, or behind a fence, or far away in a crater. He was gigantic and only three elephant steps away from our car. I was so excited I nearly peed myself. Again, I attempted to climb out the window, at the same time checking with our driver that I wouldn’t be killed. He assured us that the big guy was alone, and therefore had to one to protect. That was good because if this guy wanted to attack, there is no way we could escape, he would be standing on the hood of the car before our driver touched the gas pedal. But he didn’t want to attack. He stayed right where he was and browsed, turning his head to us to make sure we weren’t doing anything dumb, like climbing out car windows. His tusks were unbelievably long and old looking. His wrinkly eye watched us, and his ears gently flapped. He was the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen. After a few minutes, he got bored with our staring and moved off, breaking down trees as he ambled away through the forest. It was an amazing end to an amazing day.
After that wonderful weekend, I was ready to go back to school. It was guaranteed to be an extremely exciting time. I heard there were mzungus coming from a school in Minnasota to spend three weeks learning about Marsabit. They were staying at St. Pauls and they were only there for one day before I couldn’t wait anymore and went to visit. My Kenyan friend, Leah, was excited for me; she said, “You are here alone. Seeing an American must be like seeing your own brother,” and she was right. I wanted to run to them and give them a big hug while gushing about how happy I was to see them. I forgot, of course, that they are used to seeing Americans, and they are living with Americans while here, and they just came from America so who cares. And while I have been away for a while, I am pretty sure it is still weird to hug strangers in America. I didn’t care though. I went to their house in the morning and greeted them. They were very nice, though much less enthused to see me, and told me I could come over any time. I warned them that I would take them up on that (I saw a jar of Ragu spaghetti sauce on their kitchen counter!). They said they had brought American treats with them and would give me some. The orgasmic look on my face must have shown how much I would love that. I left them, too soon for my tastes, but I could see them losing interest. It was alright though, they are here for three whole weeks and I am going visit them nearly everyday. Maybe I’ll even get to use sarcasm!
Parents day for St. Pauls is this weekend and I am invited. Brother Boniface first said “you are not a guest,” and I was surprised but said okay. He then said , “you are one of us, you have to be there”. Aww! I wouldn’t miss it. Besides the mzungus, Leah, the Brothers (who become more like family every time I see them), I hear there is going to be local tribal dances and entertainment. It sounds like an awesome party. I will certainly tell you all about it next week. Have a good day!
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Back in the Swing of Things
It is Wednesday, halfway through the week, halfway through the month of May. I cannot believe how time is flying. I am kinda happy about this. When I first got back from Nairobi, I was cranky for about two weeks. I was tired, overworked, stressed, and missing the nearly America life that I had while on vacation. I was frustrated with the lack of cell service, it is so hard to get used to not speaking with any friends or family, and the awful sexism I experience was, all of a sudden, intolerable. It took me a day off to recover mentally, and a few days of pampering myself, to be back to normal. And by pampering, I mean I let myself not do dishes, not do laundry, not cook. After the few days I, and my house, were filthy. But, I made it through the rough patch, and hopefully, but not likely, it was one of the last. This week I feel much better.
At school, things are going very well. My Peace Corps training has kicked in and I really feel like I know what I am doing. Looking back on last term I have to admit that I sucked as a teacher. I had no clue what I was doing, and I feel very bad for my students. Though they love me, I am sure they did not learn much. But this term, everything is different. I have new respect for every teacher I have ever had. Preparing for lessons is a lot of work! Turns out, you can’t just show up and read out of the book. I am coming up with more activities, more interactive ways of teaching, more homework, more quizzes, etc, etc. I am incredibly busy, and I think my students think I am nuts, but it is already paying off. My form ones are my trouble makers. They are angsty teens and getting them to do anything is painful for all of us. But I made a lot of changes, and they are already getting better. They have less attitude and less resistance (a very little less), though they still have no clue how to work independently. My form twos are my pride and joy. They know for certain that I am nuts and they love me for it. Yesterday, I wanted to do a lab activity, and as per usual, almost no one understood what to do. I took the five girls who did understand and had them be leaders and teach small groups of students. For the first time ever, each group got together quietly and efficiently, they all listened attentively, they all did the work, and every student did the activity. It was the first time, probably in the history of the school, that students were able to work in small groups without the teacher holding their hands. It was amazing. It really gave me hope that, however painful it is, my students are making progress and they will get there eventually.
A few days ago, on the high of my students doing well, I went home to work on my personal project of making paper mache furniture. I finished a three-shelf unit for my kitchen, and am working on a bigger spice rack. So I am sitting on my floor in the early evening, my hands covered in goo, when that darn mouse that makes a rukus all night just walks into the room. He didn’t even care that I was sitting right there! I tried to scare him away but he just ran into my bedroom. A friend of mine recently was bitten by a mouse who climbed into her bed, so I was a little freaked out by him being in my bedroom. When my 12 year old neighbor, Lokho, came over for her nightly English lesson, I complained to her about the mouse. She told me, very seriously, that she would catch it and kill it for me. So we went mouse hunting. We cornered it in the bedroom and would try to scare it from under the bed. When he ran out, we would both squeal like the girls we are and whack the poor thing with my ‘broom’, which is just a bunch of stiff grass tied together. Each time the mouse ran out, we would frantically jump around trying to hit him, and also trying to escape. I ended up on the bed, and Lokho was wedged in the corner, both of us bent over in laughter at our fear. Finally, we tired the mouse out and Lokho caught him in the bristles of the broom. She took him outside, and I asked her not to kill him, just set him free far away. Now my house is pleasantly mouse free. Now I only have cockroaches, scorpions, and ants. I can deal with those. Though I still hate those freakin’ ants.
The reason for my passionate, unwavering hatred of those tiny black ants will become clear when I tell you about last night’s debacle. I was at home, I wanted to work on my paper mache, so I slid to the floor to begin work. I checked to see if there were ants under me, and didn’t see any. Clearly, I didn’t look hard enough because as soon as I sat down I felt a sharp stab on my left buttock. I gasped and quickly leaned to the right to brush off the ant. Then I felt a sharp stab on my right butt cheek. Cursing I jumped up, but it was too late. Those damn tiny black ants! When they bite it feels like a wasp sting; it hurts way more than it should. And the bite burns for hours. The bites make the skin swell up so I had two large distinct bumps on my rear end. It hurt so bad I couldn’t sit down; I had to stand and apply cool cloths to the area for half an hour before I was able to sit without whimpering. Once the burning faded, about 4 hours later, the itching started. It is about 8,000 times as itchy as a mosquito bite. It wakes me up from a dead sleep and keeps me awake. Anti-itch cream only dulls the itch. And the best part is that the itch lasts for days. Like 5 days. So now I have a massively itchy rear that I nearly cannot keep from scratching, even in class. Its awful.
That was my night last night, so I woke up this morning feeling overtired. But I dragged myself out of bed and made coffee. Thank you, Julie, for your care package full of instant coffee and vanilla powdered creamer. After my caffeine fix, I headed to school. I was pleasantly coasting along on my bike when I saw the big hill up ahead. It is a very large hill; going top speed on my bicycle it takes a good while to get to the bottom. I was halfway down, there are lots of loose rocks and they make me nervous, so I started to apply the brakes. I slowed a teensy bit and then, SNAP, and my brakes broke off. Just broke right off. I heard them hit the dirt behind me and I had the thought, “well, that’s just wonderful” followed by a few seconds of “well, now what?” There really is only one solution I could think of, and crashing at top speed into the rocks at the bottom of the hill was not it. So I grabbed both the front and the back brakes and squeezed as hard as I could. Since there was only metal contacting the bike wheels it made a horrible screeching noise, and I like to imagine sparks flying. I only slowed a little and had to apply my heels to the dirt. I did eventually stop in a large dramatic cloud of dust. Fortunately, no one was around to laugh at me. I had to walk the rest of the way to school, riding the bike only when the ground was flat, which was never. I ended up being late to school. I ran in to my first class winded, dirty, sweaty, and unprepared. My students paid the price though, I didn’t have time to do the lesson I had prepared, so I gave them a pop quiz.
I am still in a good mood though, despite my itchy rear end and my 13 year old, no brakes, janky chained, perpetually flat tired bicycle. I think the reason is because I’ve decided that tomorrow I am inviting myself over to the Brothers of St. Paul’s house for dinner; Thursday is pizza night! They are great guys and will have cold beer, American TV, pizza, and sarcasm. I would go over every night if I didn’t feel so imposing. They tell me its okay, but its just so odd. My American upbringing tells me it is not okay to just show up at someone’s front door without notice and expect to be fed.
Last weekend the Brothers had a party, and as usual, it was great. I danced to my favorite Kenyan songs with Leah, my beautiful Kenyan friend, while the men danced terribly around us. Some of the guys showed me their dances, which made me laugh myself nearly to incontinence. None of their dances had names, so I made them up in my head. There was the ‘duck shuffle’ where you put your elbows out like wings and flap them while bobbing your head and shuffling your feet side to side. There was the ‘fainting lady’ in which you put the back of your hand on your forehead while looking dramatically at the ceiling and sway your hips downwards. I saw the ‘man with limp’ which is similar to the ‘duck shuffle’ but you have arms outstretched and lean to the side so you end up shuffling yourself in a small circle. The ‘compact boogie’ looks like you are trying to be invisible at a high school dance; you put your arms tight to your side, scrunch your shoulders, bend your knees, and groove. And lastly, the ‘butt-kick running man’ that involves drastic, seizure like movements of the body that make you appear to be running in place while kicking your heels up high enough to kick yourself in the rear. I tried all of the dances and succeeded at all but the ‘butt-kick running man’ when I was finally laughing too hard to coordinate a full body seizure and kept falling over. My friend who was teaching me said that now I was prepared to dance to any genre of music in the world. I really, vehemently disagree.
For food, there was nyama choma, grilled goat meat, which was delicious as always. I commented before eating that I was starving and one man said “you do not look like you are starving” while staring pointedly at my Kenya pudge. Darn blunt Kenyans. I ate a hyena sized portion anyway and then spent the rest of the night trying to hide the food baby growing in my belly.
While eating, a group of us got to talking about local names and I mentioned that I did not have one. So they thought about it and gave me the name Njeri. When I heard it I laughed out loud. I thought it was hilarious that my parents gave me a boy’s name at birth and now, here, I get the name “Jerry”. But they assured me it was a girl’s name and told me the story behind it. There was once a woman who was traveling while she was pregnant and she happened to give birth on the road. She named her daughter ‘Njeri’ which means ‘one who likes to travel far’. The men, my friends, sitting around me decided it was a perfect name for me, and I agree. And if pronounced correctly, with a distinct ‘N’ and a nice roll on the ‘R’, I think it is a beautiful name.
Continuing with my Kiswahili education, someone taught me a new phrase today. “Ninakupenda kama ua la bonda. It means “I love you like a flower in the desert”.
Update: Today is Thursday. Last night the mouse repaid my generosity in saving his life by sneaking back into my house. I spent another evening hunting, though without Lokho’s help I was unsuccessful. My teachers chastised me for letting him live. Now the mouse has to die. If I can catch him.
At school, things are going very well. My Peace Corps training has kicked in and I really feel like I know what I am doing. Looking back on last term I have to admit that I sucked as a teacher. I had no clue what I was doing, and I feel very bad for my students. Though they love me, I am sure they did not learn much. But this term, everything is different. I have new respect for every teacher I have ever had. Preparing for lessons is a lot of work! Turns out, you can’t just show up and read out of the book. I am coming up with more activities, more interactive ways of teaching, more homework, more quizzes, etc, etc. I am incredibly busy, and I think my students think I am nuts, but it is already paying off. My form ones are my trouble makers. They are angsty teens and getting them to do anything is painful for all of us. But I made a lot of changes, and they are already getting better. They have less attitude and less resistance (a very little less), though they still have no clue how to work independently. My form twos are my pride and joy. They know for certain that I am nuts and they love me for it. Yesterday, I wanted to do a lab activity, and as per usual, almost no one understood what to do. I took the five girls who did understand and had them be leaders and teach small groups of students. For the first time ever, each group got together quietly and efficiently, they all listened attentively, they all did the work, and every student did the activity. It was the first time, probably in the history of the school, that students were able to work in small groups without the teacher holding their hands. It was amazing. It really gave me hope that, however painful it is, my students are making progress and they will get there eventually.
A few days ago, on the high of my students doing well, I went home to work on my personal project of making paper mache furniture. I finished a three-shelf unit for my kitchen, and am working on a bigger spice rack. So I am sitting on my floor in the early evening, my hands covered in goo, when that darn mouse that makes a rukus all night just walks into the room. He didn’t even care that I was sitting right there! I tried to scare him away but he just ran into my bedroom. A friend of mine recently was bitten by a mouse who climbed into her bed, so I was a little freaked out by him being in my bedroom. When my 12 year old neighbor, Lokho, came over for her nightly English lesson, I complained to her about the mouse. She told me, very seriously, that she would catch it and kill it for me. So we went mouse hunting. We cornered it in the bedroom and would try to scare it from under the bed. When he ran out, we would both squeal like the girls we are and whack the poor thing with my ‘broom’, which is just a bunch of stiff grass tied together. Each time the mouse ran out, we would frantically jump around trying to hit him, and also trying to escape. I ended up on the bed, and Lokho was wedged in the corner, both of us bent over in laughter at our fear. Finally, we tired the mouse out and Lokho caught him in the bristles of the broom. She took him outside, and I asked her not to kill him, just set him free far away. Now my house is pleasantly mouse free. Now I only have cockroaches, scorpions, and ants. I can deal with those. Though I still hate those freakin’ ants.
The reason for my passionate, unwavering hatred of those tiny black ants will become clear when I tell you about last night’s debacle. I was at home, I wanted to work on my paper mache, so I slid to the floor to begin work. I checked to see if there were ants under me, and didn’t see any. Clearly, I didn’t look hard enough because as soon as I sat down I felt a sharp stab on my left buttock. I gasped and quickly leaned to the right to brush off the ant. Then I felt a sharp stab on my right butt cheek. Cursing I jumped up, but it was too late. Those damn tiny black ants! When they bite it feels like a wasp sting; it hurts way more than it should. And the bite burns for hours. The bites make the skin swell up so I had two large distinct bumps on my rear end. It hurt so bad I couldn’t sit down; I had to stand and apply cool cloths to the area for half an hour before I was able to sit without whimpering. Once the burning faded, about 4 hours later, the itching started. It is about 8,000 times as itchy as a mosquito bite. It wakes me up from a dead sleep and keeps me awake. Anti-itch cream only dulls the itch. And the best part is that the itch lasts for days. Like 5 days. So now I have a massively itchy rear that I nearly cannot keep from scratching, even in class. Its awful.
That was my night last night, so I woke up this morning feeling overtired. But I dragged myself out of bed and made coffee. Thank you, Julie, for your care package full of instant coffee and vanilla powdered creamer. After my caffeine fix, I headed to school. I was pleasantly coasting along on my bike when I saw the big hill up ahead. It is a very large hill; going top speed on my bicycle it takes a good while to get to the bottom. I was halfway down, there are lots of loose rocks and they make me nervous, so I started to apply the brakes. I slowed a teensy bit and then, SNAP, and my brakes broke off. Just broke right off. I heard them hit the dirt behind me and I had the thought, “well, that’s just wonderful” followed by a few seconds of “well, now what?” There really is only one solution I could think of, and crashing at top speed into the rocks at the bottom of the hill was not it. So I grabbed both the front and the back brakes and squeezed as hard as I could. Since there was only metal contacting the bike wheels it made a horrible screeching noise, and I like to imagine sparks flying. I only slowed a little and had to apply my heels to the dirt. I did eventually stop in a large dramatic cloud of dust. Fortunately, no one was around to laugh at me. I had to walk the rest of the way to school, riding the bike only when the ground was flat, which was never. I ended up being late to school. I ran in to my first class winded, dirty, sweaty, and unprepared. My students paid the price though, I didn’t have time to do the lesson I had prepared, so I gave them a pop quiz.
I am still in a good mood though, despite my itchy rear end and my 13 year old, no brakes, janky chained, perpetually flat tired bicycle. I think the reason is because I’ve decided that tomorrow I am inviting myself over to the Brothers of St. Paul’s house for dinner; Thursday is pizza night! They are great guys and will have cold beer, American TV, pizza, and sarcasm. I would go over every night if I didn’t feel so imposing. They tell me its okay, but its just so odd. My American upbringing tells me it is not okay to just show up at someone’s front door without notice and expect to be fed.
Last weekend the Brothers had a party, and as usual, it was great. I danced to my favorite Kenyan songs with Leah, my beautiful Kenyan friend, while the men danced terribly around us. Some of the guys showed me their dances, which made me laugh myself nearly to incontinence. None of their dances had names, so I made them up in my head. There was the ‘duck shuffle’ where you put your elbows out like wings and flap them while bobbing your head and shuffling your feet side to side. There was the ‘fainting lady’ in which you put the back of your hand on your forehead while looking dramatically at the ceiling and sway your hips downwards. I saw the ‘man with limp’ which is similar to the ‘duck shuffle’ but you have arms outstretched and lean to the side so you end up shuffling yourself in a small circle. The ‘compact boogie’ looks like you are trying to be invisible at a high school dance; you put your arms tight to your side, scrunch your shoulders, bend your knees, and groove. And lastly, the ‘butt-kick running man’ that involves drastic, seizure like movements of the body that make you appear to be running in place while kicking your heels up high enough to kick yourself in the rear. I tried all of the dances and succeeded at all but the ‘butt-kick running man’ when I was finally laughing too hard to coordinate a full body seizure and kept falling over. My friend who was teaching me said that now I was prepared to dance to any genre of music in the world. I really, vehemently disagree.
For food, there was nyama choma, grilled goat meat, which was delicious as always. I commented before eating that I was starving and one man said “you do not look like you are starving” while staring pointedly at my Kenya pudge. Darn blunt Kenyans. I ate a hyena sized portion anyway and then spent the rest of the night trying to hide the food baby growing in my belly.
While eating, a group of us got to talking about local names and I mentioned that I did not have one. So they thought about it and gave me the name Njeri. When I heard it I laughed out loud. I thought it was hilarious that my parents gave me a boy’s name at birth and now, here, I get the name “Jerry”. But they assured me it was a girl’s name and told me the story behind it. There was once a woman who was traveling while she was pregnant and she happened to give birth on the road. She named her daughter ‘Njeri’ which means ‘one who likes to travel far’. The men, my friends, sitting around me decided it was a perfect name for me, and I agree. And if pronounced correctly, with a distinct ‘N’ and a nice roll on the ‘R’, I think it is a beautiful name.
Continuing with my Kiswahili education, someone taught me a new phrase today. “Ninakupenda kama ua la bonda. It means “I love you like a flower in the desert”.
Update: Today is Thursday. Last night the mouse repaid my generosity in saving his life by sneaking back into my house. I spent another evening hunting, though without Lokho’s help I was unsuccessful. My teachers chastised me for letting him live. Now the mouse has to die. If I can catch him.
Sunday, May 15, 2011
There and Back Again
There and Back Again
Right now, I am typing this in a hotel in Nairobi. I am fresh from a hot shower, utlilizing the free wifi, and waiting until it is time for the free dinner. At this moment, I do not miss my village at all. If they tried to make me go back right now, I would not be able to do it. Even though I enjoyed my term, and miss my home, physically and emotionally, I feel I need more time to recover. I am free from April 3rd to May 3rd, and I am going to live it up. So far, I have had a wonderful vacation with my PIC (Partner in Crime), Cindy, and now I am here for Peace Corps Training with my 31 other best friends. I have had more than 31 hugs and, like a drug, I can’t go back to the village without at least 31 more.
The first week of my vacation was spent with Cindy on the coast. I was so desperate to escape my village and see the real Kenya that I did not plan my vacation. Cindy and I just decided to meet in Nairobi and fly by the seat of our pants from there. I met her in Nairobi on Saturday; I had been there for a few days, sharing beds with other PCVs to save money. There we met Sarah, who is a volunteer on the coast in a small town called Kilifi. Cindy and I told her of our plan to just take a bus to Mombasa and figure out where to go from there and Sarah generously offered her house to us. It was the best gift she could have given us. We drove to the coast on a large, uncomfortable bus. Cindy and I had seats over the wheel and the ride was similar to driving over train tracks for 7 hours. It was not pleasant.
We got to Kilifi in the evening and took a tuktuk, which is an adorable, three-wheeled vehicle, to Sarah’s house. If this was America you would think her house was pretty run down and had far too many creatures running around for it to be an enjoyable stay. But this is Kenya, and to me, Sarah has a gorgeous 5-star house. She has a running shower, 3 burner stove, huge stocked pantry (with real Heinz ketchup!), two full bookshelves, and bright, tropical colored painted walls. She also has mice, frogs, and 5 inch long centipedes. And her house is about a thousand degrees all day and all night long. She does have a fan, but sweating 24 hrs a day is just unavoidable. Cindy and I were determined to keep our vacation unplanned and so woke up every morning, picked a town on the map, and just went there. The first day we stayed in Kilifi; we went to Sarah’s fresh squeezed juice stand and had avocado shakes. Then we found our way to the beach and swam around in the shallow, urine-warm water. It was too hot to be refreshing but we floated around until we discovered a baby man-o-war jellyfish. We chased him around for awhile before going to find dinner. We went to a bar overlooking the Indian ocean and had cold beer while watching the sun set and the men in dug out canoes paddle out to fish for tuna. While sitting there, watching the monkeys run around, a coconut fell from heaven (or the tree above us) to land at our feet. Cindy had been wishing for one, she had never had fresh coconut, and so it was fate that brought us this outrageously hard to open, yet delicious, snack.
The next day, we woke up and it was hotter than the surface of the sun as usual, and the one thing we wanted to do was to go snorkeling. So we had a phone number of a guy who we thought would have a boat. He answered the phone like a true Kenyan, “Sema? Yeah, I have a boat. How many are you? Two? Meet at 11.” And then he hung up on me. We showed up to the meeting point, the bar on the ocean from the day before, and waited until he called us. His name was Captain Issa and his boat was a run down, pirate-looking dhow complete with chipped and faded paint and a black flag. We were joined on our trip by 6 surly looking Germans who turned out to be chain smokers and big meanie-heads (I am keeping this rated G for my younger readers). I spoke with Captain Issa in kiswahili to determine a good price, and because of our filthy, ragged clothes and fairly good understanding of the language, he knew we were not tourists and said he would “give good price! You are Kenyan, not like Germans, I give you good price. But don’t tell.” He gave us a price of 2500 KSH, which is about 30 USD. We waded through the bath water warm Indian ocean with our bags on our heads (we are true Kenyans, remember) and climbed on this boat. The Germans did not talk to us, introduce themselves, smile, or even speak in English. This is despite Cindy and my attempts at small talk. We even pretended to be normal so as not to scare them off; that’s no easy feat. Captain Issa pulled us aside later to say, “They are sh*t Germans, you ignore them. They are rude, we will have a good time. They are sh*t germans!” Apparently, the German man, with the 8-month old beer baby growing inside him, was angry because he thought this was a private tour for him and his friends. Captain Issa explained to him, in German, that his boat was there to make money.
After sailing around the ocean near the shore for awhile, passing kids swimming and men in their dugout canoes, we sailed to this deserted strip of beach. The sand is white powder and the water is teal blue. There were some overhangs of rock where we sat while the crew prepared lunch. The only people on the beach were some local women tenderizing dead octopus against the rocks. I have no idea why and only had the courage to ask her, “Ningependa kupiga picha, iko sawa?” She let us take a picture, but she didn’t look too pleased about it.
When lunch was ready, we all sat in the sand to eat. The spread was fanatastic. There was lobster, tuna, coconut rice, bananas, mangoes, watermelon, and some sort of spicy, amazing stew. Captain Issa gave us a lesson in how to eat like a Kenyan, with your hands. The rule was you had to smush up a banana with your fingers, grab a handful of coconut rice with the stew and stuff the whole thing in your mouth with a chunk of fish. The Germans didn’t look too pleased and refused to try it that way, they also seemed afraid of the stew with the unknown ingredients, actually running away with their plates like large four year olds. It was some of the most delicious food I have ever tasted in my life. Just amazing. After lunch, we all waded back to our mini pirate ship and sailed out to the reef. We got on our snorkel gear and jumped in. Of the 6 germans, only two got in the water, and they only stayed in for 5 minutes because, and I am just guessing the reason, they were cranky. Cindy and I snorkeled for a couple hours and saw all sorts of cool stuff. It was beautiful. The boat circled us while we swam, and finally dropped the germans off before coming to get us. They took us to the beach entrance of a resort, since we were way too scruffy to go in the front door. We took pictures with the crew, and got a ride back to town. Captain Issa offered his house for showers, offered to be our tour guide, and said we could call him any time. I love that Kenyans are so darn friendly!
The next day, we picked Malindi as the town of the day and the Vasco de Gamo monument and the Gede ruins. The monuement was easy to find, and with our resident cards, cheap to get into. We also got a free private tour guide. He taught us all about the rock formations and the coral reefs, which I knew all about since I studied that in college. But we made it into a quiz, him asking me questions like, “what causes scurvy?” while telling us the history of Vasco De Gamo. It was a lot of fun. We then asked him where else we should go that was touristy. He said, “the falconry” and Cindy and I were hooked. I just couldn’t leave without seeing a falconry!
The falconry was maybe my favorite part of the trip. Again we got a private tour guide. The place was a conservation and rehabilitation center for some of the local endangered or endemic species. They had an Alabara tortoise named Mzee (It means “old person”) who was 118 years old (he is a famous tortoise for befriending a baby hippo. Google it). We got to feed him bananas and give him scratches on his leathery neck. I loved him from the top of his wrinkly head down to his giant feet. If he walked any faster, I would have kidnapped him. The falconry also had vicious baby nile crocodiles, snakes, owls that you could pet, owls that looked like gremlins, and falcons that you could hold on your arm.
After the falconry, we found our way to the gede ruins. The tour guide there cost money, and we, being cheap, decided to skip it and wander around the woods. The whole place looked like a videogame with zombies. There were signs in front of each pile of stone with ominous names like “the mosque of the three pillars” or “the house of the seven baths”. We kept saying ominous ‘last words’ type things like “even the monkeys don’t come here” and “do you think anyone will see if I pee behind this tree?” We found out later that the ruins were from an unknown ancient civilization that vanished thousands of years ago. OOoooOO… ominous.
That day we also found the greatest Italian food in Kenya. Malindi, by the way, is big on Italian. Some of the street signs are even written in Italian (at least I think it is Italian). So we went to this place called “I Love Pizza” and had amazing pasta. I had some seafood dish that tasted like they put a lobster in a blender with some cheese and then poured it over ziti. It was amazing. Best food I’ve ever had (I realized I’ve already said that in this blog, but my tastebuds are very easy to please)
The next day we were running out of towns on the map that were close enough to take a cheap matatu, so we picked the Arabuko Sokoke forest, which was a large green square on the map. We climbed in the matatu, crowded as usual, and took off at breakneck speeds. We were speeding along, we something literally jumped in front of our vehicle. It flew out of the forest on the left and its hooves didn’t even touch the ground before we blasted through it. And I mean, blasted. I looked behind us and only saw a small chunk of something. Cindy and I were in complete shock. The matatu slammed on the brakes and reversed to see what we had hit. The animal was gone, because some local had already dragged it off the road for dinner. Our driver jumped out to claim his catch and then dragged it back to the matatu. Cindy and I sat with our jaws in our laps and our stomachs in our throats and the men just tossed the dead deer in the back of the matatu, with no tarp under it, and no barrier from the smell. The whole matatu was cheering, “NYAMA!!” (meat!) and we continued on our way, slowing the vehicle occasionally to yell the good news to other matatus. Cindy and I took the rest of the trip in silence, trying not to vomit.
We got to the Arabuko Sokoke forest and met an American couple at the entrance. They were the nicest people ever! I love Americans! They lived here in Kenya and were just traveling around the area like cindy and I were. The mom treated us like her children. “You didn’t bring water? Here have mine. Do you need more sunscreen? Make sure you girls don’t walk around at night, its not safe. I don’t want to read about you on the news tomorrow.” She reminded me of my mother, in the best way. They were both sarcastic and hilarious, and us four made snide comments to each other during the guided tour, which they generously paid for because we “are not trust fund babies tooling around on daddy’s credit cards.” The husband was a goofball and even climbed halfway up a tree just because we said he couldn’t do it. We saw the endangered golden rumped elephant shrew that only exists in this one forest in Kenya. Or something like that, I wasn’t paying attention being too busy making sarcastic comments behind the guide’s back. Then at the end of the day, Mom and Dad bought us all big, cold sodas, and gave us a ride to Malindi, warning us, again, to be safe. I do not remember their names and we will probably never meet again, but if they are out there, reading this, I just wanted to say, “Thanks. You made my day”.
After another stop at I Love Pizza for pasta, Cindy and I went shopping. There is a tourist market in Malindi that has the most beautiful paintings. The locals just sit in the market all day and paint. There are thousands of paintings in many different shops, and every painting is different. I saw elephants in the river, masaai women dancing, baobab trees in sunset, giraffe silhouettes, and grass huts at twilight. I wanted to buy them all. Cindy and I spent a couple hours chatting with the market women, bargaining and making friends. Cindy is the best person in the world to go bargaining with. She is a hard ass, sarcastic, cheap, and hilarious. She always gets the best price and always leaves the Kenyans laughing. I am a push over so I stood back and let her do the work, just translating the Kiswahili for her (she is a deaf education teacher and learned Kenyan sign language). Her routine is amazing. They say, “I give you good price.” And she gets in their face, puts her hand on her hip, points her finger and says sternly, “I am teaching your children!” Then she raises her voice so it is soft and high pitched, “I teach the deaf ones with their teeny, tiny hands,” batting her fingers, like eyelashes, in their faces. And “Bam!”, price drops by a thousand bob. She also enjoys telling them, “What?! You should rename your shop. You should call it ‘highway robbery’” I got out of there with too many paintings but don’t worry, they were all ‘a good price’.
That was the end of our trip. We did more, but it is not interesting enough to write about. Just laying on the beach, making macaroni and cheese with cut up hotdogs, making colored sand art, and sweating all the freaking time. We headed back to Nairobi on a bus, and my awful luck in traveling continued to follow me on the way. Our bus driver was high on miraa, a chewable leaf that is very popular here. Because of the miraa, the driver was more insane than usual. First, while careening down the road, weaving amongst the traffic, we were attempting to pass another bus too close, and just grazed the side of it at 60 km an hour. It was okay, we only lost a sideview mirror, but it was scary as all heck. Then had we continued on our way when we hit a speed bump, at 60 kph. Kenya has this thing. They, Kenya, have horrible traffic problems and no traffic laws. So their brilliant idea was to put speed bumps on the highways, just for fun, to slow down the traffic. It’s a great idea that usually works, when your driver is sober. When we hit the bump, Cindy and I were crammed in the aisle of the back seat with four other adults and a child. We flew out of our seats and slammed back down, compressing spines and rearranging organs. Or as Cindy put it, “after this ride, I’ll need a map to find my kidneys”. The bus full of groaning Kenyans continued on for a half hour or so before we stopped for a break and to pick up more people. There was no room on the bus…excuse me, there was room, just not in seats. So after some rearranging, Cindy and I were crammed against the window, and more passengers were put on Coke crates in the aisles. Us in the back row were privileged enough to sit next to a guy who might tapika (vomit) at any moment. It adds suspense to the next part of the story. So Cindy and I are in the back, Cindy loudly complaining, “If he tapikas on me, I am not going to be happy! I think everyone in the back row should get a discount! I only have one buttcheek on the seat, I should only pay for half a seat!” We continued speeding down the road, when what a surprise, we hit another speedbump. This time, being crowded near the window, Cindy and I smacked our heads on the ceiling, and our faces on the seat in front. This time, the whole bus was yelling, Cindy loudest of all. If I smacked my face as hard as Cindy did, I would have been crying, but she just continued her disparaging comments, making the entire bus full of injured Kenyans laugh. When we got off a half an hour later, the Kenyans asked us to stay. Cindy said, “No! This thing is a death trap!” and the Kenyans laughed again, then asked us to pray for them. P.S. Mr. Tapika never tossed his cookies.
I started writing this on my first night in Nairobi. Then my friends started coming in and I was too distracted to touch my computer until now, two weeks later. Now I am back in Kubibagasa, sitting in my staffroom, listenting to the kiborana swirling around and getting frustrated already. Why won’t they speak English?! *sigh*
Anyway, I am back home and thinking fondly of my time in Nairobi. I drank a lot, ate a lot, talked a lot, and remembered my sarcasm. I ate American, Italian, Ethiopian, Lebanese, Thai, Japanese, and Chinese. I got to know my fellow PCVs better, and had a great time. There was a lot of hugs, tons of laughing, a few sleepovers, some sing alongs, a little dancing, and not much sleep. It is strange how close I am to these people despite not knowing them for very long. At one point during the week we went on a field trip to the International School of Kenya and met 6 RPCVs who worked there. They had all been volunteers a long time ago, and they mentioned that they still talked to so-and-so from their group, ended up godparents to so-and-so’s kids, was maid of honor at so-and-so’s wedding, etc. Their Peace Corps friends are their friends for life. And that is exactly how I feel. I cannot imagine leaving here and never seeing these people again. On those hard days when it would be so easy to go home to America, I remember that I have this great support system helping me and the thought keeps me here. Don't worry, America friends, I still love you and miss you every day. Only 20 more months and I’ll be home.
So, yes, I am here in Mars. The homecoming was nice. So many people came up to give me hugs, kisses, or handshakes. People I didn’t know in town greeted my extremely enthusiastically. My adorable neighbor kids took one look at me and then ran in my house. When I left, they only spoke kiborana, they are only about 3 years old, and so when they ran to me with hugs and said “how are you?” I was shocked. It was so adorable and, for the first time, I did not hate hearing that phrase. Little Abusu showed me that she remembered the things I taught her, to cover her mouth when she coughed and to blow kisses when you say goodbye. Galgallo cuddled up next to me on the couch and sang the days of the week in English. The next day, on the way to school, I passed the borehole and saw the little toddler who can barely walk and cries hysterically when I wave to her. She cried out when she saw me. When I turned to look, she took two steps towards me and waved, no trace of tears. The Borana woman who I greet everyday, grabbed my hand and spoke rapid kiborana while I stood there smiling. She eventually hugged me, laughed at my not understanding, and walked away. I think they thought I was never coming back. It warms my heart to know they are happy I did.
That is all for now. I have been gone for a long time and now I am back. Hopefully soon I will get back into my routine and write more regularly. I know some of you have been missing my updates (okay, maybe just you, Mom). Have a good week!
Right now, I am typing this in a hotel in Nairobi. I am fresh from a hot shower, utlilizing the free wifi, and waiting until it is time for the free dinner. At this moment, I do not miss my village at all. If they tried to make me go back right now, I would not be able to do it. Even though I enjoyed my term, and miss my home, physically and emotionally, I feel I need more time to recover. I am free from April 3rd to May 3rd, and I am going to live it up. So far, I have had a wonderful vacation with my PIC (Partner in Crime), Cindy, and now I am here for Peace Corps Training with my 31 other best friends. I have had more than 31 hugs and, like a drug, I can’t go back to the village without at least 31 more.
The first week of my vacation was spent with Cindy on the coast. I was so desperate to escape my village and see the real Kenya that I did not plan my vacation. Cindy and I just decided to meet in Nairobi and fly by the seat of our pants from there. I met her in Nairobi on Saturday; I had been there for a few days, sharing beds with other PCVs to save money. There we met Sarah, who is a volunteer on the coast in a small town called Kilifi. Cindy and I told her of our plan to just take a bus to Mombasa and figure out where to go from there and Sarah generously offered her house to us. It was the best gift she could have given us. We drove to the coast on a large, uncomfortable bus. Cindy and I had seats over the wheel and the ride was similar to driving over train tracks for 7 hours. It was not pleasant.
We got to Kilifi in the evening and took a tuktuk, which is an adorable, three-wheeled vehicle, to Sarah’s house. If this was America you would think her house was pretty run down and had far too many creatures running around for it to be an enjoyable stay. But this is Kenya, and to me, Sarah has a gorgeous 5-star house. She has a running shower, 3 burner stove, huge stocked pantry (with real Heinz ketchup!), two full bookshelves, and bright, tropical colored painted walls. She also has mice, frogs, and 5 inch long centipedes. And her house is about a thousand degrees all day and all night long. She does have a fan, but sweating 24 hrs a day is just unavoidable. Cindy and I were determined to keep our vacation unplanned and so woke up every morning, picked a town on the map, and just went there. The first day we stayed in Kilifi; we went to Sarah’s fresh squeezed juice stand and had avocado shakes. Then we found our way to the beach and swam around in the shallow, urine-warm water. It was too hot to be refreshing but we floated around until we discovered a baby man-o-war jellyfish. We chased him around for awhile before going to find dinner. We went to a bar overlooking the Indian ocean and had cold beer while watching the sun set and the men in dug out canoes paddle out to fish for tuna. While sitting there, watching the monkeys run around, a coconut fell from heaven (or the tree above us) to land at our feet. Cindy had been wishing for one, she had never had fresh coconut, and so it was fate that brought us this outrageously hard to open, yet delicious, snack.
The next day, we woke up and it was hotter than the surface of the sun as usual, and the one thing we wanted to do was to go snorkeling. So we had a phone number of a guy who we thought would have a boat. He answered the phone like a true Kenyan, “Sema? Yeah, I have a boat. How many are you? Two? Meet at 11.” And then he hung up on me. We showed up to the meeting point, the bar on the ocean from the day before, and waited until he called us. His name was Captain Issa and his boat was a run down, pirate-looking dhow complete with chipped and faded paint and a black flag. We were joined on our trip by 6 surly looking Germans who turned out to be chain smokers and big meanie-heads (I am keeping this rated G for my younger readers). I spoke with Captain Issa in kiswahili to determine a good price, and because of our filthy, ragged clothes and fairly good understanding of the language, he knew we were not tourists and said he would “give good price! You are Kenyan, not like Germans, I give you good price. But don’t tell.” He gave us a price of 2500 KSH, which is about 30 USD. We waded through the bath water warm Indian ocean with our bags on our heads (we are true Kenyans, remember) and climbed on this boat. The Germans did not talk to us, introduce themselves, smile, or even speak in English. This is despite Cindy and my attempts at small talk. We even pretended to be normal so as not to scare them off; that’s no easy feat. Captain Issa pulled us aside later to say, “They are sh*t Germans, you ignore them. They are rude, we will have a good time. They are sh*t germans!” Apparently, the German man, with the 8-month old beer baby growing inside him, was angry because he thought this was a private tour for him and his friends. Captain Issa explained to him, in German, that his boat was there to make money.
After sailing around the ocean near the shore for awhile, passing kids swimming and men in their dugout canoes, we sailed to this deserted strip of beach. The sand is white powder and the water is teal blue. There were some overhangs of rock where we sat while the crew prepared lunch. The only people on the beach were some local women tenderizing dead octopus against the rocks. I have no idea why and only had the courage to ask her, “Ningependa kupiga picha, iko sawa?” She let us take a picture, but she didn’t look too pleased about it.
When lunch was ready, we all sat in the sand to eat. The spread was fanatastic. There was lobster, tuna, coconut rice, bananas, mangoes, watermelon, and some sort of spicy, amazing stew. Captain Issa gave us a lesson in how to eat like a Kenyan, with your hands. The rule was you had to smush up a banana with your fingers, grab a handful of coconut rice with the stew and stuff the whole thing in your mouth with a chunk of fish. The Germans didn’t look too pleased and refused to try it that way, they also seemed afraid of the stew with the unknown ingredients, actually running away with their plates like large four year olds. It was some of the most delicious food I have ever tasted in my life. Just amazing. After lunch, we all waded back to our mini pirate ship and sailed out to the reef. We got on our snorkel gear and jumped in. Of the 6 germans, only two got in the water, and they only stayed in for 5 minutes because, and I am just guessing the reason, they were cranky. Cindy and I snorkeled for a couple hours and saw all sorts of cool stuff. It was beautiful. The boat circled us while we swam, and finally dropped the germans off before coming to get us. They took us to the beach entrance of a resort, since we were way too scruffy to go in the front door. We took pictures with the crew, and got a ride back to town. Captain Issa offered his house for showers, offered to be our tour guide, and said we could call him any time. I love that Kenyans are so darn friendly!
The next day, we picked Malindi as the town of the day and the Vasco de Gamo monument and the Gede ruins. The monuement was easy to find, and with our resident cards, cheap to get into. We also got a free private tour guide. He taught us all about the rock formations and the coral reefs, which I knew all about since I studied that in college. But we made it into a quiz, him asking me questions like, “what causes scurvy?” while telling us the history of Vasco De Gamo. It was a lot of fun. We then asked him where else we should go that was touristy. He said, “the falconry” and Cindy and I were hooked. I just couldn’t leave without seeing a falconry!
The falconry was maybe my favorite part of the trip. Again we got a private tour guide. The place was a conservation and rehabilitation center for some of the local endangered or endemic species. They had an Alabara tortoise named Mzee (It means “old person”) who was 118 years old (he is a famous tortoise for befriending a baby hippo. Google it). We got to feed him bananas and give him scratches on his leathery neck. I loved him from the top of his wrinkly head down to his giant feet. If he walked any faster, I would have kidnapped him. The falconry also had vicious baby nile crocodiles, snakes, owls that you could pet, owls that looked like gremlins, and falcons that you could hold on your arm.
After the falconry, we found our way to the gede ruins. The tour guide there cost money, and we, being cheap, decided to skip it and wander around the woods. The whole place looked like a videogame with zombies. There were signs in front of each pile of stone with ominous names like “the mosque of the three pillars” or “the house of the seven baths”. We kept saying ominous ‘last words’ type things like “even the monkeys don’t come here” and “do you think anyone will see if I pee behind this tree?” We found out later that the ruins were from an unknown ancient civilization that vanished thousands of years ago. OOoooOO… ominous.
That day we also found the greatest Italian food in Kenya. Malindi, by the way, is big on Italian. Some of the street signs are even written in Italian (at least I think it is Italian). So we went to this place called “I Love Pizza” and had amazing pasta. I had some seafood dish that tasted like they put a lobster in a blender with some cheese and then poured it over ziti. It was amazing. Best food I’ve ever had (I realized I’ve already said that in this blog, but my tastebuds are very easy to please)
The next day we were running out of towns on the map that were close enough to take a cheap matatu, so we picked the Arabuko Sokoke forest, which was a large green square on the map. We climbed in the matatu, crowded as usual, and took off at breakneck speeds. We were speeding along, we something literally jumped in front of our vehicle. It flew out of the forest on the left and its hooves didn’t even touch the ground before we blasted through it. And I mean, blasted. I looked behind us and only saw a small chunk of something. Cindy and I were in complete shock. The matatu slammed on the brakes and reversed to see what we had hit. The animal was gone, because some local had already dragged it off the road for dinner. Our driver jumped out to claim his catch and then dragged it back to the matatu. Cindy and I sat with our jaws in our laps and our stomachs in our throats and the men just tossed the dead deer in the back of the matatu, with no tarp under it, and no barrier from the smell. The whole matatu was cheering, “NYAMA!!” (meat!) and we continued on our way, slowing the vehicle occasionally to yell the good news to other matatus. Cindy and I took the rest of the trip in silence, trying not to vomit.
We got to the Arabuko Sokoke forest and met an American couple at the entrance. They were the nicest people ever! I love Americans! They lived here in Kenya and were just traveling around the area like cindy and I were. The mom treated us like her children. “You didn’t bring water? Here have mine. Do you need more sunscreen? Make sure you girls don’t walk around at night, its not safe. I don’t want to read about you on the news tomorrow.” She reminded me of my mother, in the best way. They were both sarcastic and hilarious, and us four made snide comments to each other during the guided tour, which they generously paid for because we “are not trust fund babies tooling around on daddy’s credit cards.” The husband was a goofball and even climbed halfway up a tree just because we said he couldn’t do it. We saw the endangered golden rumped elephant shrew that only exists in this one forest in Kenya. Or something like that, I wasn’t paying attention being too busy making sarcastic comments behind the guide’s back. Then at the end of the day, Mom and Dad bought us all big, cold sodas, and gave us a ride to Malindi, warning us, again, to be safe. I do not remember their names and we will probably never meet again, but if they are out there, reading this, I just wanted to say, “Thanks. You made my day”.
After another stop at I Love Pizza for pasta, Cindy and I went shopping. There is a tourist market in Malindi that has the most beautiful paintings. The locals just sit in the market all day and paint. There are thousands of paintings in many different shops, and every painting is different. I saw elephants in the river, masaai women dancing, baobab trees in sunset, giraffe silhouettes, and grass huts at twilight. I wanted to buy them all. Cindy and I spent a couple hours chatting with the market women, bargaining and making friends. Cindy is the best person in the world to go bargaining with. She is a hard ass, sarcastic, cheap, and hilarious. She always gets the best price and always leaves the Kenyans laughing. I am a push over so I stood back and let her do the work, just translating the Kiswahili for her (she is a deaf education teacher and learned Kenyan sign language). Her routine is amazing. They say, “I give you good price.” And she gets in their face, puts her hand on her hip, points her finger and says sternly, “I am teaching your children!” Then she raises her voice so it is soft and high pitched, “I teach the deaf ones with their teeny, tiny hands,” batting her fingers, like eyelashes, in their faces. And “Bam!”, price drops by a thousand bob. She also enjoys telling them, “What?! You should rename your shop. You should call it ‘highway robbery’” I got out of there with too many paintings but don’t worry, they were all ‘a good price’.
That was the end of our trip. We did more, but it is not interesting enough to write about. Just laying on the beach, making macaroni and cheese with cut up hotdogs, making colored sand art, and sweating all the freaking time. We headed back to Nairobi on a bus, and my awful luck in traveling continued to follow me on the way. Our bus driver was high on miraa, a chewable leaf that is very popular here. Because of the miraa, the driver was more insane than usual. First, while careening down the road, weaving amongst the traffic, we were attempting to pass another bus too close, and just grazed the side of it at 60 km an hour. It was okay, we only lost a sideview mirror, but it was scary as all heck. Then had we continued on our way when we hit a speed bump, at 60 kph. Kenya has this thing. They, Kenya, have horrible traffic problems and no traffic laws. So their brilliant idea was to put speed bumps on the highways, just for fun, to slow down the traffic. It’s a great idea that usually works, when your driver is sober. When we hit the bump, Cindy and I were crammed in the aisle of the back seat with four other adults and a child. We flew out of our seats and slammed back down, compressing spines and rearranging organs. Or as Cindy put it, “after this ride, I’ll need a map to find my kidneys”. The bus full of groaning Kenyans continued on for a half hour or so before we stopped for a break and to pick up more people. There was no room on the bus…excuse me, there was room, just not in seats. So after some rearranging, Cindy and I were crammed against the window, and more passengers were put on Coke crates in the aisles. Us in the back row were privileged enough to sit next to a guy who might tapika (vomit) at any moment. It adds suspense to the next part of the story. So Cindy and I are in the back, Cindy loudly complaining, “If he tapikas on me, I am not going to be happy! I think everyone in the back row should get a discount! I only have one buttcheek on the seat, I should only pay for half a seat!” We continued speeding down the road, when what a surprise, we hit another speedbump. This time, being crowded near the window, Cindy and I smacked our heads on the ceiling, and our faces on the seat in front. This time, the whole bus was yelling, Cindy loudest of all. If I smacked my face as hard as Cindy did, I would have been crying, but she just continued her disparaging comments, making the entire bus full of injured Kenyans laugh. When we got off a half an hour later, the Kenyans asked us to stay. Cindy said, “No! This thing is a death trap!” and the Kenyans laughed again, then asked us to pray for them. P.S. Mr. Tapika never tossed his cookies.
I started writing this on my first night in Nairobi. Then my friends started coming in and I was too distracted to touch my computer until now, two weeks later. Now I am back in Kubibagasa, sitting in my staffroom, listenting to the kiborana swirling around and getting frustrated already. Why won’t they speak English?! *sigh*
Anyway, I am back home and thinking fondly of my time in Nairobi. I drank a lot, ate a lot, talked a lot, and remembered my sarcasm. I ate American, Italian, Ethiopian, Lebanese, Thai, Japanese, and Chinese. I got to know my fellow PCVs better, and had a great time. There was a lot of hugs, tons of laughing, a few sleepovers, some sing alongs, a little dancing, and not much sleep. It is strange how close I am to these people despite not knowing them for very long. At one point during the week we went on a field trip to the International School of Kenya and met 6 RPCVs who worked there. They had all been volunteers a long time ago, and they mentioned that they still talked to so-and-so from their group, ended up godparents to so-and-so’s kids, was maid of honor at so-and-so’s wedding, etc. Their Peace Corps friends are their friends for life. And that is exactly how I feel. I cannot imagine leaving here and never seeing these people again. On those hard days when it would be so easy to go home to America, I remember that I have this great support system helping me and the thought keeps me here. Don't worry, America friends, I still love you and miss you every day. Only 20 more months and I’ll be home.
So, yes, I am here in Mars. The homecoming was nice. So many people came up to give me hugs, kisses, or handshakes. People I didn’t know in town greeted my extremely enthusiastically. My adorable neighbor kids took one look at me and then ran in my house. When I left, they only spoke kiborana, they are only about 3 years old, and so when they ran to me with hugs and said “how are you?” I was shocked. It was so adorable and, for the first time, I did not hate hearing that phrase. Little Abusu showed me that she remembered the things I taught her, to cover her mouth when she coughed and to blow kisses when you say goodbye. Galgallo cuddled up next to me on the couch and sang the days of the week in English. The next day, on the way to school, I passed the borehole and saw the little toddler who can barely walk and cries hysterically when I wave to her. She cried out when she saw me. When I turned to look, she took two steps towards me and waved, no trace of tears. The Borana woman who I greet everyday, grabbed my hand and spoke rapid kiborana while I stood there smiling. She eventually hugged me, laughed at my not understanding, and walked away. I think they thought I was never coming back. It warms my heart to know they are happy I did.
That is all for now. I have been gone for a long time and now I am back. Hopefully soon I will get back into my routine and write more regularly. I know some of you have been missing my updates (okay, maybe just you, Mom). Have a good week!
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Leaving My House to the Bugs
I have finished the first term. It seemed so long while I was going through it, but now that it is over, I cannot remember any time passing. I feel like I have been in Kenya for a week, not six months. I know that the first term is supposed to be the hardest, and so I really feel like I can make it through the rest. Right now though, I am not thinking about the next 20 months, I am think about the next 2 weeks. Yesterday, I said goodbye to my house and my village. I realized the last day, that I would actually miss the place. I said goodbye to my students, and the Borana women at the bore hole. I cleaned my house as well as I could to avoid ants. And then yesterday I headed to Nairobi. I am in awe of Nairobi but I can’t stop thinking about my house. I am worried that I left something perishable that will grow into something horrible while I am gone. I am worried that the ants will take over or the place will be filled with scorpions. I don’t want to come home to millions of dead moths, or zillions of spider nests. The bugs in my house have been pretty ridiculous lately and I have not yet complained to you about them. I will take that opportunity now.
Everyone knows Africa has bugs. Lots of bugs, all the time. But no one tells you what kinds will be the ones to drive you insane with annoyance. In my house I have the usual number of bugs for a Kenyan household; I estimate that number to be around 20 billion. And they are all so annoying that I sometimes imagine myself burning down my house just to kill them all. Some of the pests are the type you would think would bother me, or scare me, or gross me out, and they don’t. and then there are the type which are innocent, harmless, and tiny. Those are the ones who will make me go insane. The insanity causing ones are flies and ants. I know what you are thinking, “geezus, Ryan, do the dishes, pick up the food off the floor, and take out the trash, you slob”. And you are right, my house is not clean by Kenyan (or American) mama standards, but its not that bad. I do the dishes when I need them, which is every few days, and I take out the garbage when its full. I learned very quickly how bad things start to smell. And even if you could ignore the smell (which you can’t), more than three days and you have a fly nursery (aka maggots). So my house has ants and flies and it is not because I am unclean. There are three types of flies. The really big ones are shiny, iridescent green with big red eyes and the buzzing of their wings sounds like a wasp. These guys live in the choo and gross me out because I just imagine them covered in choo germs. There are medium sized flies that just hang out in my house all day landing on my toes, which tickles, on my food, or on my face. These are the ones that will fly in your mouth if you are panting up a hill. And if you think you can just pant with your mouth closed, nope, they will fly up your nose. Im not kidding, it happens to me almost daily. Then there are the tiny fruit flies. These are newcomers to the party, they just appeared a couple weeks ago. My brain’s store of Useless Knowledge tells me that fruit flies only live for 2 hours. From birth to death in 120 minutes. Well, that is too long for these bastards. They not only attack my trash, but also my fresh fruits and veggies. They get trapped inside my plastic wrapped loaves of bread. They will land on my freshly opened cans of tuna and die in the oil, while I am trying to fish their bodies out. If I take the lid of a pot of spaghetti, they are there before my spoon can serve the food. And if there is no food, they will attack anything moist. Like my face cloths, towels, and clothes that are hanging to dry. All will have a moving, black cloud surrounding them. I hate them.
Flies are bad, but worse are ants. There are lots of types of ants in my house too. And they are also impervious to all my attempts at annihilation. There are the little black ants that belong at picnics. They do not care about my dirty kitchen, they want the crummies on my floor. And if I sweep daily, they will just find corners that I cannot reach or wander around aimlessly until crummies appear. The little kids next door once walked in on me during an ant killing frenzy with a flipflop, and now know to come over every day to smush ants with their hands. I found the anthill outside, and I dump my dirty water on it every day to drown them. Then they made a tunnel in my walls, coming out where the wood of my door meets the cement. So I filled in the gap with hand lotion (that’s the only thing of paste consistency that I had). That stopped them for awhile, but they are still coming. I have taken to dumping water on the floor in front of my door, killing some and creating a temporary barrier for others. But this is a heinous waste of water in a drought ridden country, and while watching ants drown is satisfying, I feel guilty.
Those are the small ants. At night, the big ants come in. These are the half-inch long ones with visible pincers. These are the ones that hurt like a snake bite when you get bitten. The bites burn and make me gasp in pain for almost an hour, then they itch like chicken pox for, literally, weeks. They come in at night to eat the tiny ants. My tiny ant killing spree brings in the big suckers to clean up. I have to keep my feet off the floor in the evening to avoid getting bitten. With the big black ones come the big brown ones. They are a very pale brown, they might even be termites rather than ants, but they come in just to look around. And they are probably eating my doorframes to make new homes for the tiny ants. It’s the ant circle of life.
So ants and flies are the insects that, in my opinion, earn a special place in hell. The other creepy crawlies that I share my home with are the ones that should freak me out, but I welcome them with open arms. Okay, maybe not, but I at least don’t attempt to attack them with flip flops. First one: cockroach. These bad boys live in the choo, and while that is gross indeed, they are frightened away by light and then leave you in piece. Even if they are in my house, they are high in the corners trying to run away from you. No problem; I can handle that. Then there are the big spiders. I was not afraid of spiders in America, and I am not frightened here. But I probably should be. These suckers are huge! And everywhere. I sweep and the next day there are new spider webs in every corner. I do not mind because I get to watch those big green flies get caught in them; its like the Discovery Channel. But the big spiders are very big, over two inches long. They are dark brown with yellow racing stripes and they run like lightening. The other day, I saw a particularly odd spider, he looked like the same type, yellow stripes, but his back looked all fuzzy. It was very strange so I got my camera and scooched in close to him. As my camera zoomed in and focused, I realized what the “fuzzy” was. It was not a ‘he’ spider, it was a ‘she’ and the fuzz was hundreds of baby spiders hitching a ride on mommy’s back! *shudder* That even freaked me out. I took the picture, and then glanced back at ‘mom’, but she was gone. I swear to God, she had disappeared. Obviously, she sprinted to a crack in the wall to save her babies, but it was so quick I did not even see her go. So there is a family of two inch long racing spiders having flocks (what do you call a group of spiders? Herd? Bevy? Pod?) of babies in my house. That’s okay though, maybe they will team up and start a war with the ants.
PS. I decided that if there is not already a name for a group of spiders, we should call it a “charlotte”. After all, Charlotte was the one who had hundreds of babies that flew in the wind to populate the world. And Peacocks get an “ostentation”, Owls get a “parliament”, spiders should have their own. So there is a charlotte of spiders living in my house. And I hope they stay forever. Maybe they will protect the house from the rest of the bugs while I am gone.
Everyone knows Africa has bugs. Lots of bugs, all the time. But no one tells you what kinds will be the ones to drive you insane with annoyance. In my house I have the usual number of bugs for a Kenyan household; I estimate that number to be around 20 billion. And they are all so annoying that I sometimes imagine myself burning down my house just to kill them all. Some of the pests are the type you would think would bother me, or scare me, or gross me out, and they don’t. and then there are the type which are innocent, harmless, and tiny. Those are the ones who will make me go insane. The insanity causing ones are flies and ants. I know what you are thinking, “geezus, Ryan, do the dishes, pick up the food off the floor, and take out the trash, you slob”. And you are right, my house is not clean by Kenyan (or American) mama standards, but its not that bad. I do the dishes when I need them, which is every few days, and I take out the garbage when its full. I learned very quickly how bad things start to smell. And even if you could ignore the smell (which you can’t), more than three days and you have a fly nursery (aka maggots). So my house has ants and flies and it is not because I am unclean. There are three types of flies. The really big ones are shiny, iridescent green with big red eyes and the buzzing of their wings sounds like a wasp. These guys live in the choo and gross me out because I just imagine them covered in choo germs. There are medium sized flies that just hang out in my house all day landing on my toes, which tickles, on my food, or on my face. These are the ones that will fly in your mouth if you are panting up a hill. And if you think you can just pant with your mouth closed, nope, they will fly up your nose. Im not kidding, it happens to me almost daily. Then there are the tiny fruit flies. These are newcomers to the party, they just appeared a couple weeks ago. My brain’s store of Useless Knowledge tells me that fruit flies only live for 2 hours. From birth to death in 120 minutes. Well, that is too long for these bastards. They not only attack my trash, but also my fresh fruits and veggies. They get trapped inside my plastic wrapped loaves of bread. They will land on my freshly opened cans of tuna and die in the oil, while I am trying to fish their bodies out. If I take the lid of a pot of spaghetti, they are there before my spoon can serve the food. And if there is no food, they will attack anything moist. Like my face cloths, towels, and clothes that are hanging to dry. All will have a moving, black cloud surrounding them. I hate them.
Flies are bad, but worse are ants. There are lots of types of ants in my house too. And they are also impervious to all my attempts at annihilation. There are the little black ants that belong at picnics. They do not care about my dirty kitchen, they want the crummies on my floor. And if I sweep daily, they will just find corners that I cannot reach or wander around aimlessly until crummies appear. The little kids next door once walked in on me during an ant killing frenzy with a flipflop, and now know to come over every day to smush ants with their hands. I found the anthill outside, and I dump my dirty water on it every day to drown them. Then they made a tunnel in my walls, coming out where the wood of my door meets the cement. So I filled in the gap with hand lotion (that’s the only thing of paste consistency that I had). That stopped them for awhile, but they are still coming. I have taken to dumping water on the floor in front of my door, killing some and creating a temporary barrier for others. But this is a heinous waste of water in a drought ridden country, and while watching ants drown is satisfying, I feel guilty.
Those are the small ants. At night, the big ants come in. These are the half-inch long ones with visible pincers. These are the ones that hurt like a snake bite when you get bitten. The bites burn and make me gasp in pain for almost an hour, then they itch like chicken pox for, literally, weeks. They come in at night to eat the tiny ants. My tiny ant killing spree brings in the big suckers to clean up. I have to keep my feet off the floor in the evening to avoid getting bitten. With the big black ones come the big brown ones. They are a very pale brown, they might even be termites rather than ants, but they come in just to look around. And they are probably eating my doorframes to make new homes for the tiny ants. It’s the ant circle of life.
So ants and flies are the insects that, in my opinion, earn a special place in hell. The other creepy crawlies that I share my home with are the ones that should freak me out, but I welcome them with open arms. Okay, maybe not, but I at least don’t attempt to attack them with flip flops. First one: cockroach. These bad boys live in the choo, and while that is gross indeed, they are frightened away by light and then leave you in piece. Even if they are in my house, they are high in the corners trying to run away from you. No problem; I can handle that. Then there are the big spiders. I was not afraid of spiders in America, and I am not frightened here. But I probably should be. These suckers are huge! And everywhere. I sweep and the next day there are new spider webs in every corner. I do not mind because I get to watch those big green flies get caught in them; its like the Discovery Channel. But the big spiders are very big, over two inches long. They are dark brown with yellow racing stripes and they run like lightening. The other day, I saw a particularly odd spider, he looked like the same type, yellow stripes, but his back looked all fuzzy. It was very strange so I got my camera and scooched in close to him. As my camera zoomed in and focused, I realized what the “fuzzy” was. It was not a ‘he’ spider, it was a ‘she’ and the fuzz was hundreds of baby spiders hitching a ride on mommy’s back! *shudder* That even freaked me out. I took the picture, and then glanced back at ‘mom’, but she was gone. I swear to God, she had disappeared. Obviously, she sprinted to a crack in the wall to save her babies, but it was so quick I did not even see her go. So there is a family of two inch long racing spiders having flocks (what do you call a group of spiders? Herd? Bevy? Pod?) of babies in my house. That’s okay though, maybe they will team up and start a war with the ants.
PS. I decided that if there is not already a name for a group of spiders, we should call it a “charlotte”. After all, Charlotte was the one who had hundreds of babies that flew in the wind to populate the world. And Peacocks get an “ostentation”, Owls get a “parliament”, spiders should have their own. So there is a charlotte of spiders living in my house. And I hope they stay forever. Maybe they will protect the house from the rest of the bugs while I am gone.
Saturday, March 26, 2011
The Scorpion and the Goat
I am tempted to start this blog with the same phrase as always, “Nothing much happened this week so I do not have much to write…”, but I know that as soon as I start typing, my brain will take over and fill the pages with my rambling. So I will just say “good morning,” and let my brain do the rest.
There was a scorpion in my house last night. I had heard they were here in Kenya, and plentiful in my desert, but I had not seen any so I thought maybe I would be spared that one pest. But it was not to be. I found the little bugger coming under my front door. When I say “little” I mean he was three inches long and a shiny black. I poked him with a stick, you know, for fun, and he ran towards me. Man those suckers are fast! As punishment for startling me with his speed, I smushed him with a shoe. Now I am on full scorpion alert; I check all my shoes before putting them on, and no more walking around the house in the dark. The Peace Corps medical handbook I have says that scorpions are not deadly, just painful, and I would be fine if stung. But I do not believe them one bit, I am staying far away with things that have stingers, poison, AND claws. My house no longer is a safe zone. I have already experienced cobras in the desert, the packs of wild dogs who roam around my school, the hyenas that laugh during the night, the civet on my porch (which looks like a panda bear, but probably eats human flesh), the wasp family that lives in my choo, the rabies-full bats in my rafters, and herds of deadly camels that look at me with the evil eye like they are waiting for an opportunity to trample me with their dinner plate-sized feet. My home was the only place I could relax and not be on the lookout for danger. But that is gone now; it started with the moths, those pesky beige butterflies that crash land into my dinner. The moths brought in ants to carry away the bodies of their fallen brothers. And now the scorpion has arrived. I am not sure why. What does he want? Dead moths? Ants? Me?
Last Sunday, my school threw a party for absolutely no reason. We invited some local teachers, slaughtered two goats, and stayed out all day. We had it at my school, down in the desert under this big scraggly tree that was growing over some big boulders. It was shady and cool because of the desert breeze. I got a little sunburnt, my first since coming to Africa. I wanted to see the slaughtering of the goat but I came too late. Since there is no refrigeration here you have to kill and eat the same day. I arrived as they were cutting everything into pieces. I have never seen so many flies in all my life. I once saw the dead body of a cow three days after it had been sitting in the sun, and there were fewer flies on it than I saw on this day. When I commented on it one guy said “desert flies don’t have bacteria, there is nothing in the desert to get bacteria from”. In America, I would have gagged and then thrown the meat out. But TIA, and we just waved at the flies until we could see what we were doing. Everyone had a job, Hassan, a fellow teacher, would bring over a huge chunk of meat, like the spine, or the shoulder. Mugambi (teacher) cut it into manageable pieces with a dull knife. Manageable pieces means anywhere there is a bone, so he separated ribs, vertebrae, tibia, etc. My job was to take the manageable pieces and cut them into bite sized morsels. The large bones were put over the coals to cook. The meat was suspended over the coals by a grill made of a frame of large sticks with a open wire grid on top. The smaller pieces were put in a sufuria (cooking pot). The outside of the pot was smeared with mud to prevent it from getting black with soot, and the pot was placed on the coals. In addition to butchering, I also played waitress and served everyone drinks, poured water for handwashing, and served the food. One of the teachers said that he had a great time simply because he was served by a mzungu. The meal was very large, it had five courses. All of it was eaten Kenya style, you pick up some chunks with greasy fingers and stuff it in your mouth along with whatever side dishes are there. Its messy and delicious, and leaves you with a nice sheen of grease on your face. The appetizer was goat ribs and the chunks of slightly burned fat from the big pieces. Second course was a bowl of meat eaten family style; everyone’s hands in the bowl grabbing the juiciest bits. For the third course, they cooked some of the small meat chunks with a tomato paste, green pepper, onion, water mixture. It turned out so amazingly good, it tasted like real American barbecue! The BBQ meat was served with a pile of the plain nyama choma (grilled meat), ugali, rice, potatoes and tomato/onion salad. Fourth course was another bowl of meat with the large bones available for gnawing. I know it sounds odd, but the large bones are the best tasting; like a dog, I could chew on them all day. The fifth course was “soup” aka goat juices and goat fat in a mug. I was full after course number 2 but I ate everything and loved every bite. Now I have a double chin. I did skip the mug of goat fat, but I got a lot of flack for it. Everyone kept telling me how healthy it was for you. One man told me that you could drink a mug of it and then run a marathon without getting tired. My principal said “if you are newly married, drink this... And that’s your son!” The men thought that was hysterical. One added “drink a glass and a half and you’ll get twins!” I stayed far away from the mug of fat.
If you are wondering what happened to the rest of the goat, i.e. the head and innards, you will be pleased to know that it did not go to waste. At the end of the party, after I had left, the remaining teachers ate all the organs. My principal got the eyes, and everything else was shared out. I was asking how they decided who got what, and I got some very interesting insights. They said that in their culture there are many superstitions that determine those details. For example, a first born cannot eat the kidney. We decided that this was because there are two kidneys and could be divided among the less important children leaving the spleen, which is healthier, for the first born. Also, never eat the tongue unless you want to have a child that talks a lot. Men should never eat the bladder or they will become sterile. I am not entirely sure if it is good for anyone to eat bladder. This discussion led to an explanation of all the strange superstitions the locals have. “Don’t sweep your house at night.” “Do not go to the choo at night or you will be attacked by a demon who will spray water on you.” That one was created to keep kids safe from animals that would hurt them. Though I don’t know why they had to make up a crazy story to convince kids. There was one that said “never milk a cow from behind or you will have bad luck”; I think your bad luck will involve you getting kicked by a cow. They say “men should never carry small children on their laps because they will get the child’s fear in their heart”; the reason for this one had something to do with not being able to run from enemies. “Don’t stand with your back to the fire or you will go blind.” Actual reason: you might fall in the fire or get burned. My favorite was “if you pee in the river after circumcision, you will have extreme pain”. It was to keep the drinking water clean. It reminded me of the American myth, “if you pee in a swimming pool, it will change color and everyone will know”. There were more myths but I cannot remember them all. My teachers said that they did not believe any of these superstitions but that many, if not all, of the local people do. Very interesting stuff.
Alright, I will end there for today before I continue to ramble on. This is the last week before exams and it is crawling by. I cannot wait until end of term when I can go to the coast and relax on a beach. It is so close, I can taste it. Next week is exams, and right now I am off to class to play “Physics Jeopardy!” for review. The prize for the winner: a real American dollar bill!
Thanks for reading and have a good week!
There was a scorpion in my house last night. I had heard they were here in Kenya, and plentiful in my desert, but I had not seen any so I thought maybe I would be spared that one pest. But it was not to be. I found the little bugger coming under my front door. When I say “little” I mean he was three inches long and a shiny black. I poked him with a stick, you know, for fun, and he ran towards me. Man those suckers are fast! As punishment for startling me with his speed, I smushed him with a shoe. Now I am on full scorpion alert; I check all my shoes before putting them on, and no more walking around the house in the dark. The Peace Corps medical handbook I have says that scorpions are not deadly, just painful, and I would be fine if stung. But I do not believe them one bit, I am staying far away with things that have stingers, poison, AND claws. My house no longer is a safe zone. I have already experienced cobras in the desert, the packs of wild dogs who roam around my school, the hyenas that laugh during the night, the civet on my porch (which looks like a panda bear, but probably eats human flesh), the wasp family that lives in my choo, the rabies-full bats in my rafters, and herds of deadly camels that look at me with the evil eye like they are waiting for an opportunity to trample me with their dinner plate-sized feet. My home was the only place I could relax and not be on the lookout for danger. But that is gone now; it started with the moths, those pesky beige butterflies that crash land into my dinner. The moths brought in ants to carry away the bodies of their fallen brothers. And now the scorpion has arrived. I am not sure why. What does he want? Dead moths? Ants? Me?
Last Sunday, my school threw a party for absolutely no reason. We invited some local teachers, slaughtered two goats, and stayed out all day. We had it at my school, down in the desert under this big scraggly tree that was growing over some big boulders. It was shady and cool because of the desert breeze. I got a little sunburnt, my first since coming to Africa. I wanted to see the slaughtering of the goat but I came too late. Since there is no refrigeration here you have to kill and eat the same day. I arrived as they were cutting everything into pieces. I have never seen so many flies in all my life. I once saw the dead body of a cow three days after it had been sitting in the sun, and there were fewer flies on it than I saw on this day. When I commented on it one guy said “desert flies don’t have bacteria, there is nothing in the desert to get bacteria from”. In America, I would have gagged and then thrown the meat out. But TIA, and we just waved at the flies until we could see what we were doing. Everyone had a job, Hassan, a fellow teacher, would bring over a huge chunk of meat, like the spine, or the shoulder. Mugambi (teacher) cut it into manageable pieces with a dull knife. Manageable pieces means anywhere there is a bone, so he separated ribs, vertebrae, tibia, etc. My job was to take the manageable pieces and cut them into bite sized morsels. The large bones were put over the coals to cook. The meat was suspended over the coals by a grill made of a frame of large sticks with a open wire grid on top. The smaller pieces were put in a sufuria (cooking pot). The outside of the pot was smeared with mud to prevent it from getting black with soot, and the pot was placed on the coals. In addition to butchering, I also played waitress and served everyone drinks, poured water for handwashing, and served the food. One of the teachers said that he had a great time simply because he was served by a mzungu. The meal was very large, it had five courses. All of it was eaten Kenya style, you pick up some chunks with greasy fingers and stuff it in your mouth along with whatever side dishes are there. Its messy and delicious, and leaves you with a nice sheen of grease on your face. The appetizer was goat ribs and the chunks of slightly burned fat from the big pieces. Second course was a bowl of meat eaten family style; everyone’s hands in the bowl grabbing the juiciest bits. For the third course, they cooked some of the small meat chunks with a tomato paste, green pepper, onion, water mixture. It turned out so amazingly good, it tasted like real American barbecue! The BBQ meat was served with a pile of the plain nyama choma (grilled meat), ugali, rice, potatoes and tomato/onion salad. Fourth course was another bowl of meat with the large bones available for gnawing. I know it sounds odd, but the large bones are the best tasting; like a dog, I could chew on them all day. The fifth course was “soup” aka goat juices and goat fat in a mug. I was full after course number 2 but I ate everything and loved every bite. Now I have a double chin. I did skip the mug of goat fat, but I got a lot of flack for it. Everyone kept telling me how healthy it was for you. One man told me that you could drink a mug of it and then run a marathon without getting tired. My principal said “if you are newly married, drink this... And that’s your son!” The men thought that was hysterical. One added “drink a glass and a half and you’ll get twins!” I stayed far away from the mug of fat.
If you are wondering what happened to the rest of the goat, i.e. the head and innards, you will be pleased to know that it did not go to waste. At the end of the party, after I had left, the remaining teachers ate all the organs. My principal got the eyes, and everything else was shared out. I was asking how they decided who got what, and I got some very interesting insights. They said that in their culture there are many superstitions that determine those details. For example, a first born cannot eat the kidney. We decided that this was because there are two kidneys and could be divided among the less important children leaving the spleen, which is healthier, for the first born. Also, never eat the tongue unless you want to have a child that talks a lot. Men should never eat the bladder or they will become sterile. I am not entirely sure if it is good for anyone to eat bladder. This discussion led to an explanation of all the strange superstitions the locals have. “Don’t sweep your house at night.” “Do not go to the choo at night or you will be attacked by a demon who will spray water on you.” That one was created to keep kids safe from animals that would hurt them. Though I don’t know why they had to make up a crazy story to convince kids. There was one that said “never milk a cow from behind or you will have bad luck”; I think your bad luck will involve you getting kicked by a cow. They say “men should never carry small children on their laps because they will get the child’s fear in their heart”; the reason for this one had something to do with not being able to run from enemies. “Don’t stand with your back to the fire or you will go blind.” Actual reason: you might fall in the fire or get burned. My favorite was “if you pee in the river after circumcision, you will have extreme pain”. It was to keep the drinking water clean. It reminded me of the American myth, “if you pee in a swimming pool, it will change color and everyone will know”. There were more myths but I cannot remember them all. My teachers said that they did not believe any of these superstitions but that many, if not all, of the local people do. Very interesting stuff.
Alright, I will end there for today before I continue to ramble on. This is the last week before exams and it is crawling by. I cannot wait until end of term when I can go to the coast and relax on a beach. It is so close, I can taste it. Next week is exams, and right now I am off to class to play “Physics Jeopardy!” for review. The prize for the winner: a real American dollar bill!
Thanks for reading and have a good week!
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Vacation is Coming up!
Another week down, two more to go until vacation. I have started my Nairobi shopping list and it is all food items. Mostly spices, I am tired of food without flavor. Next term I was to start a small herb garden next to my house. My neighbors have one, though theirs is just full of sukuma wiki. The growing season is long here, I never have to worry about winter destroying my plants. There is a danger that goats will get to them, but I can make a fence out of acacia branches. The inch long thorns will keep anything away. Hopefully, if my food is more flavorful, I won’t have to eat so much just to feel satisfied. It is amazing how my appetite has grown. I no longer fit into half my wardrobe, anything that is not a loose, flow-y skirt is now in a can’t-fit-over-my-butt pile in my spare room. I don’t really mind the weight, I don’t have a mirror and no one here will notice, but I have no place to go to replace my diminishing wardrobe. I can’t run down to walmart and pick up some new jeans. I am going to try to get in shape, and I’d like it if that shape was not a circle. You’d think that walking 6 km a day through a desert would be effective for working off the pounds, but you’d be wrong. Either I am walking too leisurely, though I think I might sweat to death if I try harder, or I am really just turning into a gigantic pig who eats everything she sees.
Last weekend, Curtis, my fellow mzungu teacher who lives in town, finally was able to come to my village for a visit. The Brothers of St. Paul who run the school next to me have a vehicle and they invited him for dinner. It was the first time he has been able to come here. I felt a silly sense of pride when showing him around. I really feel like this is my place now, it used to be just the place I was staying. But now it is home. And it is mine. My little house, my little goat neighbor, my oceanic view, my camels, my desert. Curtis was also properly awed with the distance I have to walk to school everyday, the remoteness of the open desert, and the beauty of the scrub brush dotted with thatch huts. I am looking at my tiny town and my huge desert with new appreciation and love.
The term ends in two weeks and I am planning my trip away from here. I have been aching to escape for weeks, but as the days count down, I am starting to think about leaving and I think I will really miss it. So many times in the last two months I have been unsure if I could really do this. Living here has been so hard and many times I was just holding on to the thought of vacation. There were times when I wanted to go home so badly I had to argue with myself and force myself to stay. But now, I feel stronger and more able to do this. I think I can do it. I can live here with no internet, terrible cell service, and no cheese. I have gotten used to seeing more camels than cars, and now the alternative is what seems odd. The thought of Nairobi and all the stuff that it offers is very exciting and a little scary. I am nervous about the culture shock even though I have only been here for 3 months. Marsabit town seems loud and too busy for me; I can’t imagine how Nairobi is going to freak me out. I go to town once a week and I am starting to not enjoy it. I like the unlimited internet, and the cold beer. But I do not like shopping, or walking around. Everyone is calling to me, there are too many places to buy vegetables, and too many stores to go to. I always end up forgetting something because I am too uncomfortable to bargain with the women and keep track of my grocery list. Actually, I had not even thought how much I disliked town until I wrote it down just now. This revelation kinda freaks me out. How much have I changed in the last three months? Am I really that uncomfortable? I guess when I meet my American friends for vacation, they will let me know how weird I have become.
As of March 13, I have been in Kenya for 5 months. This is so close to the 6 month milestone. Before I left America, I told myself that if I absolutely hated it, I could come home after 6 months. 6 months seemed like a decent amount of effort and an acceptable stopping point. Now that I am getting close, I am so certain I can make it through my whole service. The first 6 months is supposed to be the hardest. Once that is out of the way, the rest will go by so fast. Training in Loitokitok for 3 months seemed like it lasted an eternity. The first two months here in Marsabit seemed faster, but they still crawled by. I feel like I can remember every single day of the first two months at my site. But this last month has started to pick up the pace, the days are starting to blur together. I just know I can make it through the remaining 22 months, and I know that it will go by too fast for comfort.
Again, I start writing thinking to myself that I have nothing to say. The week has been slow and nothing interesting has happened. I sit at my computer and somehow my brain takes over and fills up the page with things I did not even know I was thinking about. I always plan on writing only a few paragraphs, and I always end up with a much longer diatribe. Anyway, I am going to make myself stop now, I can feel my brain has more to say, but I need to go write my exams and eat a gigantic, carb-full lunch. And then maybe I’ll try to sew myself a skirt that will fit me.
Last weekend, Curtis, my fellow mzungu teacher who lives in town, finally was able to come to my village for a visit. The Brothers of St. Paul who run the school next to me have a vehicle and they invited him for dinner. It was the first time he has been able to come here. I felt a silly sense of pride when showing him around. I really feel like this is my place now, it used to be just the place I was staying. But now it is home. And it is mine. My little house, my little goat neighbor, my oceanic view, my camels, my desert. Curtis was also properly awed with the distance I have to walk to school everyday, the remoteness of the open desert, and the beauty of the scrub brush dotted with thatch huts. I am looking at my tiny town and my huge desert with new appreciation and love.
The term ends in two weeks and I am planning my trip away from here. I have been aching to escape for weeks, but as the days count down, I am starting to think about leaving and I think I will really miss it. So many times in the last two months I have been unsure if I could really do this. Living here has been so hard and many times I was just holding on to the thought of vacation. There were times when I wanted to go home so badly I had to argue with myself and force myself to stay. But now, I feel stronger and more able to do this. I think I can do it. I can live here with no internet, terrible cell service, and no cheese. I have gotten used to seeing more camels than cars, and now the alternative is what seems odd. The thought of Nairobi and all the stuff that it offers is very exciting and a little scary. I am nervous about the culture shock even though I have only been here for 3 months. Marsabit town seems loud and too busy for me; I can’t imagine how Nairobi is going to freak me out. I go to town once a week and I am starting to not enjoy it. I like the unlimited internet, and the cold beer. But I do not like shopping, or walking around. Everyone is calling to me, there are too many places to buy vegetables, and too many stores to go to. I always end up forgetting something because I am too uncomfortable to bargain with the women and keep track of my grocery list. Actually, I had not even thought how much I disliked town until I wrote it down just now. This revelation kinda freaks me out. How much have I changed in the last three months? Am I really that uncomfortable? I guess when I meet my American friends for vacation, they will let me know how weird I have become.
As of March 13, I have been in Kenya for 5 months. This is so close to the 6 month milestone. Before I left America, I told myself that if I absolutely hated it, I could come home after 6 months. 6 months seemed like a decent amount of effort and an acceptable stopping point. Now that I am getting close, I am so certain I can make it through my whole service. The first 6 months is supposed to be the hardest. Once that is out of the way, the rest will go by so fast. Training in Loitokitok for 3 months seemed like it lasted an eternity. The first two months here in Marsabit seemed faster, but they still crawled by. I feel like I can remember every single day of the first two months at my site. But this last month has started to pick up the pace, the days are starting to blur together. I just know I can make it through the remaining 22 months, and I know that it will go by too fast for comfort.
Again, I start writing thinking to myself that I have nothing to say. The week has been slow and nothing interesting has happened. I sit at my computer and somehow my brain takes over and fills up the page with things I did not even know I was thinking about. I always plan on writing only a few paragraphs, and I always end up with a much longer diatribe. Anyway, I am going to make myself stop now, I can feel my brain has more to say, but I need to go write my exams and eat a gigantic, carb-full lunch. And then maybe I’ll try to sew myself a skirt that will fit me.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
No Matter How Big the Crocodile, It Is Hatched From An Egg
I don’t feel like I have much to write today. It has been a slow week. I took a mental health day on Thursday and skipped school. I sat around my house and read books. I attempted to make skillet cupcakes and doughnuts. The doughnuts didn’t turn out that great, but the skillet cupcakes were delicious. Who says you need an oven?
Here in Mars, there has been a change of season. If this was America, I would call it spring. They do not have spring here, it is just nearing the end of the dry season. The branches on the tree outside my window have budding leaves. The local birds are pairing up and making nests. The local feral dogs are now fighting amongst each other and joining into packs. I am seeing more and more baby goats, cows, camels, and donkeys. Last week I saw a cow give birth right on the road, and the day after I ran into a herd of cattle that was all babies with no adults. The biggest change is the moths. I do not know where they have been, but now they are everywhere. I keep my windows closed starting at sunset so I won’t get a bunch in my house, but they find a way in anyway. They creep under my door and head straight for my fluorescent light. When I was in America I had an irrational fear of moths. Something about them getting into my hair and dying there just creeps me out. You would think that a hundred strong flock of the beasts flying chaotically around my living room would send me into a panic. But TIA, and I have bigger problems. When I go to the choo, there are 4 inch flying cockroaches trying to get between my feet. When I go outside at night, bats confuse me with a tasty meal and swoop towards my face with a screech. There is something that lives in my house that I can’t see but it keeps stinging me and leaving a painful stinger and burning welt behind. The mosquitos in my house are so numerous that their buzzing can keep me awake at night. In light of all that, I will happily tolerate some moths. They are annoying for sure, though. They find a way to dive spectacularly into my Nalgene while I am drinking. They land on my laptop keys, get their tiny feet caught and require me to delicately rescue them. They also really seem to enjoy landing softly on my face. They flutter their wings as they walk lightly across my cheeks, giving literal meaning to the phrase “butterfly kisses”. Like eyelashes, they tickle and I brush them delicately away, freeing them to careen wildly around the room, crashing their tiny bodies violently into objects with a painful “ping”. The crowd outside trying to get in the window makes a cacophony that sounds like rain tinging on my tin roof. Many of them do not make it through the night, and every morning I get to be the moth undertaker and collect and dispose of their bodies.
Yesterday, I rescued my neighbor’s baby goat from a painful death. My neighbor had tied him to a small tree outside my living room window and then left him to graze. She went back to her house and could not hear his cries. After about an hour happily munching on the few leaves, he got himself very tangled and the rope wrapped around his little neck and started to strangle him. I heard his little cries and ran outside to help. He was lying flat on the ground with his tiny black hoofs splayed out; he could not breath and his little pink tongue was sticking out as he bleated weakly. I tried to untangle him but I could not, so I ran back into the house and grabbed a knife. I had to cut the rope in three places just to get it off him and the whole time the poor baby was laying still and not breathing. I have not been that scared in a long time. I didn’t realize how attached I had gotten to that baby goat. I had even named him Chakula because I think that will be his fate. Chakula means ‘food’. After I cut the rope, he just laid there. I picked him up and gave him a hug as he recovered. He is normally afraid of me but he let me hold him. After a few minutes he was fine and happily munching on the frayed end of his rope. I tied him to my laundry line and went to tell my neighbor. She only speaks kiswa and I do not know enough to say “Your baby goat got tangled in the rope and almost strangled to death. I cut the rope and he is fine. Here is your rope, sorry I had to cut it, your goat is tied to my tree so do not worry.” So instead I said, “mbuzi yako, ili…” then I mimed wrapping the rope around my neck, “Nilihitaji kukatakata, mbuzi ikosawa sasa” That translates to “your goat, he was… I needed to cut, goat is fine now”. I only got out “your goat…I needed to cut” before my neighbor panicked and ran to find her goat. I think I scared her with my miming and coming to her with an apology, a knife, a piece of rope, and no goat. But all is well, and Chakula is back to bounding around on the rocks and coming into my house to stare at me with his square pupils.
I have been doing a pen pal type exchange with a high school in Vermont. They have written letters to my students and my students have written to them. I told my girls that they could write about anything they wanted and encouraged them to ask questions. All the letters I sent are wonderful, inspiring, thoughtful, and funny. I do not know if my girls intended to write them that way. One letter was a complete physics quiz, she was testing the Americans to see if they learned more than Kenyans. (I will tell you, Kenyans learn more, Americans learn better.) Another girl asked if there were any guys whom she could marry. One girl just made up a bunch of knock-knock jokes. All the girls thanked God for the opportunity to talk to an American, and all of them wrote as if they were talking to their very best friend. Each letter is full of advice, poems, and inspirational sayings. Some are full of praise for me, which embarrasses me, but makes me feel loved. I can’t write all of the great stuff so I took one letter and transcribed parts of it here. I corrected the spelling so you could understand, but the words and thoughts (and bad grammar) all belong to Halima Godana, unless she plagiarized.
Little keys can open big locks
Simple words can express great thoughts
Big problems have a small solution
Hope my simple wish can make you great
Be smart, get a job
When God gave friends, He tried to be fair
When I got you, I got more than my share
You’re a treasure
Given to me without measure
I love you so much
Advice:
Be yourself
Remain second to none
Put ones shoulder to the wheel
Turn over a new leaf
Pick someones brain
Make ones mark
Look for a needle in a haystack
Have heart and soul
Have the game in ones hand
Have a go at everything
To be a better person in future (eg like Miss Ryan) do you have the ability?
Education is like an ocean
Beginning as a mountain spring
Becoming a stream
A river and the sea
Then becoming oceans which
Never dry
No matter how big the crocodile, it is hatched from an egg
Receive my warmest greetings which is sweeter than honey, brighter than stars, deeper than pacific ocean, and valuable than gold.
If you ever feel lonely, look to the sky always know that I’m somewhere beneath that sky wishing you the best.
Here in Mars, there has been a change of season. If this was America, I would call it spring. They do not have spring here, it is just nearing the end of the dry season. The branches on the tree outside my window have budding leaves. The local birds are pairing up and making nests. The local feral dogs are now fighting amongst each other and joining into packs. I am seeing more and more baby goats, cows, camels, and donkeys. Last week I saw a cow give birth right on the road, and the day after I ran into a herd of cattle that was all babies with no adults. The biggest change is the moths. I do not know where they have been, but now they are everywhere. I keep my windows closed starting at sunset so I won’t get a bunch in my house, but they find a way in anyway. They creep under my door and head straight for my fluorescent light. When I was in America I had an irrational fear of moths. Something about them getting into my hair and dying there just creeps me out. You would think that a hundred strong flock of the beasts flying chaotically around my living room would send me into a panic. But TIA, and I have bigger problems. When I go to the choo, there are 4 inch flying cockroaches trying to get between my feet. When I go outside at night, bats confuse me with a tasty meal and swoop towards my face with a screech. There is something that lives in my house that I can’t see but it keeps stinging me and leaving a painful stinger and burning welt behind. The mosquitos in my house are so numerous that their buzzing can keep me awake at night. In light of all that, I will happily tolerate some moths. They are annoying for sure, though. They find a way to dive spectacularly into my Nalgene while I am drinking. They land on my laptop keys, get their tiny feet caught and require me to delicately rescue them. They also really seem to enjoy landing softly on my face. They flutter their wings as they walk lightly across my cheeks, giving literal meaning to the phrase “butterfly kisses”. Like eyelashes, they tickle and I brush them delicately away, freeing them to careen wildly around the room, crashing their tiny bodies violently into objects with a painful “ping”. The crowd outside trying to get in the window makes a cacophony that sounds like rain tinging on my tin roof. Many of them do not make it through the night, and every morning I get to be the moth undertaker and collect and dispose of their bodies.
Yesterday, I rescued my neighbor’s baby goat from a painful death. My neighbor had tied him to a small tree outside my living room window and then left him to graze. She went back to her house and could not hear his cries. After about an hour happily munching on the few leaves, he got himself very tangled and the rope wrapped around his little neck and started to strangle him. I heard his little cries and ran outside to help. He was lying flat on the ground with his tiny black hoofs splayed out; he could not breath and his little pink tongue was sticking out as he bleated weakly. I tried to untangle him but I could not, so I ran back into the house and grabbed a knife. I had to cut the rope in three places just to get it off him and the whole time the poor baby was laying still and not breathing. I have not been that scared in a long time. I didn’t realize how attached I had gotten to that baby goat. I had even named him Chakula because I think that will be his fate. Chakula means ‘food’. After I cut the rope, he just laid there. I picked him up and gave him a hug as he recovered. He is normally afraid of me but he let me hold him. After a few minutes he was fine and happily munching on the frayed end of his rope. I tied him to my laundry line and went to tell my neighbor. She only speaks kiswa and I do not know enough to say “Your baby goat got tangled in the rope and almost strangled to death. I cut the rope and he is fine. Here is your rope, sorry I had to cut it, your goat is tied to my tree so do not worry.” So instead I said, “mbuzi yako, ili…” then I mimed wrapping the rope around my neck, “Nilihitaji kukatakata, mbuzi ikosawa sasa” That translates to “your goat, he was… I needed to cut, goat is fine now”. I only got out “your goat…I needed to cut” before my neighbor panicked and ran to find her goat. I think I scared her with my miming and coming to her with an apology, a knife, a piece of rope, and no goat. But all is well, and Chakula is back to bounding around on the rocks and coming into my house to stare at me with his square pupils.
I have been doing a pen pal type exchange with a high school in Vermont. They have written letters to my students and my students have written to them. I told my girls that they could write about anything they wanted and encouraged them to ask questions. All the letters I sent are wonderful, inspiring, thoughtful, and funny. I do not know if my girls intended to write them that way. One letter was a complete physics quiz, she was testing the Americans to see if they learned more than Kenyans. (I will tell you, Kenyans learn more, Americans learn better.) Another girl asked if there were any guys whom she could marry. One girl just made up a bunch of knock-knock jokes. All the girls thanked God for the opportunity to talk to an American, and all of them wrote as if they were talking to their very best friend. Each letter is full of advice, poems, and inspirational sayings. Some are full of praise for me, which embarrasses me, but makes me feel loved. I can’t write all of the great stuff so I took one letter and transcribed parts of it here. I corrected the spelling so you could understand, but the words and thoughts (and bad grammar) all belong to Halima Godana, unless she plagiarized.
Little keys can open big locks
Simple words can express great thoughts
Big problems have a small solution
Hope my simple wish can make you great
Be smart, get a job
When God gave friends, He tried to be fair
When I got you, I got more than my share
You’re a treasure
Given to me without measure
I love you so much
Advice:
Be yourself
Remain second to none
Put ones shoulder to the wheel
Turn over a new leaf
Pick someones brain
Make ones mark
Look for a needle in a haystack
Have heart and soul
Have the game in ones hand
Have a go at everything
To be a better person in future (eg like Miss Ryan) do you have the ability?
Education is like an ocean
Beginning as a mountain spring
Becoming a stream
A river and the sea
Then becoming oceans which
Never dry
No matter how big the crocodile, it is hatched from an egg
Receive my warmest greetings which is sweeter than honey, brighter than stars, deeper than pacific ocean, and valuable than gold.
If you ever feel lonely, look to the sky always know that I’m somewhere beneath that sky wishing you the best.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Part of the Community
I am physically and mentally exhausted this week. My life is starting to get very busy. I am actuallynglad of this, it makes me feel like part of the community. Previously, I would go home from school as soon as I was finished and hide in my house to avoid talking to my neighbors. Weekends were spent in town shopping alone, surfing the internet, alone, and hanging with Curtis at Pale Pale, the bar. And on Sundays I did laundry in my house, to avoid the neighbors. The last two weeks have been completely different. Saturday I spent with fellow teachers, and Curtis, at Pale Pale having a good time. I went shopping with Peter, my favorite Brother who is in training to be a priest. I visited the Sisters and had chai, talked to the teachers from the primary school, and ate breakfast on Sunday at the Father’s house. During the week I am very busy as well. I used to come home as soon as I could to hide in my house. Now I have to stay at school all day. This week I am helping to grade midterms. I also have two or three counseling sessions every day with students. I have finally gotten my bicycle fixed, so I ride home at about 6 pm, it is uphill the whole way and I almost blacked out the first time I tried. I get home all sweaty, dirty and disgusting and take a nice cold bucket bath. Then I sit on my porch, rehydrate, and greet the neighbors. I have become friends with Galgallo, the 2 year boy, the adorable little girl whos name I keep forgetting, and Lokho who is 12. Lokho wants to learn English, so we meet every day for about an hour to read the Princess Bride for practice. I also help her do her school work. In return she teaches me new Kiswahili and kiborana words. I have restarted my Kiswahili practice in earnest; I am starting to get embarrassed by how little I use it. It is just too easy to answer in English, I always know how to answer in kiswa, I just don’t for some reason. I need to stop that. I study kiswa for about half an hour, then make dinner. While cooking, I clean my house, anyplace maggots might want to spawn. Then I eat dinner while watching something lighthearted on my laptop. After dinner, I attempt to grade more papers or make lesson plans. I am exhausted and ready to go to bed at about 8pm, but I never get finished before it is near 11. I go to bed and sleep until my bladder wakes me up at 5:30am. Then up with the sun, Blue Band and Zesta sandwiches for breakfast, chug a cup of coffee, and I can coast off to school on my bicycle. Its all downhill so I can arrive fresh and only slightly sweaty for the 7am assembly.
Yesterday, on my bicycle, I had to ride down this narrow path on my way to school. It has some mud huts on one side and a fence made of acacia bushes on the other side. It was very sandy and I was afraid I was going to fall over. I was being careful and watching the ground when I almost ran into a camel, literally. It was the largest herd of them I have seen here. There were 17 of them and they were way too close to me; after being kicked by one a few weeks ago, I am more wary. I can not get over how big they are close up. They are at least as big as moose, maybe bigger. I was nervous to be riding down this small path with all these camels looking at me. Because of the sand, I had to weave in between the camels like they were slow cars on a highway. It ended up being super fun and I did not fall over or get kicked. The local kids who were running after me thought it was hilarious; I think they would have enjoyed it more if I had been injured.
Last week I wrote about Fatuma and her problem with falling asleep in all her classes. I had her write me a letter as to why. Yesterday, Fatuma came and gave it to me. It was a great letter. She opened it by saying “Dear caring mother,” and then thanked me for my concern. Fortunately, she did not mention witchcraft; I would not have known what to do with that. She said the problem was stress and discouragement, which is what I thought it was. She was worried about her poor family at home and how they had had to sell everything they owned to send her to school, leaving her other siblings at home, and the pressure that put her under to do well. She was failing all her classes and became depressed because she doesn’t feel she can catch up. She has trouble sleeping at night because she feels she is letting down her family, she spends all her free time copying notes from friends because she doesn’t understand in class, and then during class she falls asleep because she doesn’t know what is going on and she is exhausted. Then when the teacher leaves class, she said she sometimes cries because she feels so bad. She feels terrible for letting down her teachers who are only trying to help her and her parents who love her so much they sent her to school so she could have a better life than theirs. I am very limited in what I can do, I offered to be her tutor and help her in her classes. I do not have the knowledge to teach her in every subject, but I am hoping to teach her some skills to help her learn. I am going to teach her reading comprehension, English vocabulary, study skills, and active listening. I have to download information on how to do that, since I never studied in high school and am still not quite sure what active listening is. But if I can show her some things, maybe she will give herself a break and not worry so much. If she will be less stressed, maybe she can sleep at night, and maybe stay awake in class and take her own notes, then use her free time to actually study.
Yesterday, one of my students fainted in class. I did not find out until lunch time, when she had been completely unconscious for 4 hours. I asked to see her; they had put her outside under the shade of a tree with her feet slightly elevated. She was completely non-responsive and her only movements were when she cringed in pain and her spine bent backwards and she held her clenched fists to her chest. Her only sounds were wimpers of pain. She had something wrong with her kidneys and had been in pain for awhile. This was not the first time she has fainted, the last time she passed out she was prescribed medicine for epilepsy, without being tested. After I sat with her for another 3 hours, the school was finally able to find a vehicle to come and take her to the hospital. It was just in time too, she had begun to have small seizures. She did wake up a little when the car arrived, she could nod her head when spoken to, and knew where she was. They took her to the hospital where she will finally get tests. I am afraid that she will not be able to afford it, she was already having financial trouble. I am going to keep track of her and I hope that she will be okay.
Yesterday, on my bicycle, I had to ride down this narrow path on my way to school. It has some mud huts on one side and a fence made of acacia bushes on the other side. It was very sandy and I was afraid I was going to fall over. I was being careful and watching the ground when I almost ran into a camel, literally. It was the largest herd of them I have seen here. There were 17 of them and they were way too close to me; after being kicked by one a few weeks ago, I am more wary. I can not get over how big they are close up. They are at least as big as moose, maybe bigger. I was nervous to be riding down this small path with all these camels looking at me. Because of the sand, I had to weave in between the camels like they were slow cars on a highway. It ended up being super fun and I did not fall over or get kicked. The local kids who were running after me thought it was hilarious; I think they would have enjoyed it more if I had been injured.
Last week I wrote about Fatuma and her problem with falling asleep in all her classes. I had her write me a letter as to why. Yesterday, Fatuma came and gave it to me. It was a great letter. She opened it by saying “Dear caring mother,” and then thanked me for my concern. Fortunately, she did not mention witchcraft; I would not have known what to do with that. She said the problem was stress and discouragement, which is what I thought it was. She was worried about her poor family at home and how they had had to sell everything they owned to send her to school, leaving her other siblings at home, and the pressure that put her under to do well. She was failing all her classes and became depressed because she doesn’t feel she can catch up. She has trouble sleeping at night because she feels she is letting down her family, she spends all her free time copying notes from friends because she doesn’t understand in class, and then during class she falls asleep because she doesn’t know what is going on and she is exhausted. Then when the teacher leaves class, she said she sometimes cries because she feels so bad. She feels terrible for letting down her teachers who are only trying to help her and her parents who love her so much they sent her to school so she could have a better life than theirs. I am very limited in what I can do, I offered to be her tutor and help her in her classes. I do not have the knowledge to teach her in every subject, but I am hoping to teach her some skills to help her learn. I am going to teach her reading comprehension, English vocabulary, study skills, and active listening. I have to download information on how to do that, since I never studied in high school and am still not quite sure what active listening is. But if I can show her some things, maybe she will give herself a break and not worry so much. If she will be less stressed, maybe she can sleep at night, and maybe stay awake in class and take her own notes, then use her free time to actually study.
Yesterday, one of my students fainted in class. I did not find out until lunch time, when she had been completely unconscious for 4 hours. I asked to see her; they had put her outside under the shade of a tree with her feet slightly elevated. She was completely non-responsive and her only movements were when she cringed in pain and her spine bent backwards and she held her clenched fists to her chest. Her only sounds were wimpers of pain. She had something wrong with her kidneys and had been in pain for awhile. This was not the first time she has fainted, the last time she passed out she was prescribed medicine for epilepsy, without being tested. After I sat with her for another 3 hours, the school was finally able to find a vehicle to come and take her to the hospital. It was just in time too, she had begun to have small seizures. She did wake up a little when the car arrived, she could nod her head when spoken to, and knew where she was. They took her to the hospital where she will finally get tests. I am afraid that she will not be able to afford it, she was already having financial trouble. I am going to keep track of her and I hope that she will be okay.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Counselor
I have been the school counselor for a few weeks and I have not really done much. Last week that changed. I do not even know how I feel about all that has been revealed this week. I sat down today to write this blog because my brain doesn’t know what else to do. I have been thinking almost non stop about the issues I am going to tell you about and I have no helpful reaction. I wish I knew what I was supposed to do.
On Wednesday I was having a mini counseling session with five of my form one students. One girl asked me for advice on how to say no to a persistent guy who was pressuring her. She said he told her he loved her and that he would take care of her. The student knew that being in a relationship at her age was difficult and she was afraid her school work would suffer. She also said she knew he was only saying he loved her so she would have sex with him. This smart student wanted to wait until she finished school before she got into a relationship. I gave her some advice. I told her to just be direct and tell him no, don’t let him promise you the world because the risks (HIV, pregnancy) are too high for a girl her age. She said she had tried that and he would not leave her alone. Then she told me that if a girl says “no”, the man will just beat her up. My mouth dropped open and I said, “Is that true?” Her friend who was sitting next to her chimed in and said yes, the men here will not be said no to. I told the girls that that was very wrong of the men to do that and said they have to be prepared, if he tries anything to try and fight back. Kick them in the groin, scream, run away. Then another girl spoke up, “Then they will come back, and they will bring all their friends”. I was in total disbelief. What was I supposed to say to that? I got very angry and I told them that that was unacceptable. No man has a right to treat them like that. But what practical advice can I tell them? Everyone knows about this problem and no one talks about it. These girls have been dealing with this since primary school. I asked when the men start harassing them and I was told that kids as young as 10 are forced or convinced to be a relationship with a much, much older man. The men tell the young girls that they will give them free rides on their motorbikes. This is a very, horrifyingly common situation. Of the form one class, only 3 of the girls were not in a relationship of this kind, and those three were in front of me asking for help. Once you have agreed to a relationship in exchange for a ride, the men spend their time trying to get you to do more. The girls who were sitting in front of me were the only ones who were not getting free motorbike rides. They knew the risks. One of them told me what would happen in the best case scenario; if you did not get AIDS or pregnant and the relationship ended. When the time came for you to get married, a man would pay a very large price for you. The dowry could be as high as 100,000 shillings, some cattle, and eight large bags of clothes. If the husband was happy with you he would even pay more after the wedding. But when he found out that you were not a virgin, he would be extremely angry. And he would pay nothing for you. You would be shamed and your family might starve.
That same day, I was walking home from school when I saw one of my students sitting by the side of the road. Her name was Fatuma, and she was crying. I asked her why and she said that she was being sent away from school to go get her parents. She owed a thousand shillings in school fees and could not afford to pay. If she could not come up with the money, she would not be able to return to school. She was in Form 3 and only had one more year to go. If she dropped out now there would be no future for her. Just like in America, if you do not have a high school diploma there are very few jobs for you. And here, where everyone is poor, there is no such thing as a minimum wage job. If you do not have a degree, you do not get a job, ever. Fatuma was crying because she knew that it was pointless, she would go and get her parents and they would not have the money. I walked her home, gave her a hug, and a piece of candy. I wanted so badly to give her the money, I have it, and I can afford it. But then what would I say to the other 120 students who are poor and need help? I could not give Fatuma the money and I felt terrible. One thousand shillings is thirteen American dollars. This girl’s entire future depended on her finding $13.
Thursday I came to school and was approached by one of the teachers to have a counseling session with a girl named Jillo. She was having a problem in all her classes, she could not stay awake. As soon as a teacher walked in the room, she would be asleep. During her prep times and during breaks, she was a bright active girl. I was requested to talk to her to find out what the problem was and if we could fix it, she is failing every single class and the teachers are concerned. I sat with her and talked for awhile. She said that she did not know what the problem was, she couldn’t help it but every single class put her to sleep. I asked if she was sick, if she was not sleeping at night, if she was stressed, or discouraged, or bored, or if she hated every single class. She said it was none of those reasons but she would not say what she thought the problem was. I gave her a piece of paper and told her she had until Monday to write me a letter telling me why. I said it would be anonymous and I would not even tell the other school counselor. I left and went and spoke with the other counselor and told him my plan to find out the problem. He said that he knew what she was going to write. She thought she was bewitched. He meant that literally and with no sarcasm. Jillo thought that someone had put her under a spell. Her parents also thought that was the case and wanted to take her to a witch doctor who could break the spell. The counselor convinced them that we should wait and try talking to the girl first, a witch doctor was too extreme at this stage. I have until Monday to find out what the problem is and then I have to fix it. And I have no clue what I am going to do.
When I got here I thought my job was to be a teacher. I was going to teach biology and physics and be a good friend to these students. Now I have no idea what to do. This whole week has changed my perspective on things. I feel like there are so many huge problems that I will not be able to even touch no matter how long I am here or how much I want to. I want a hundred cans of mace that I can give out to every girl, I want to give Fatuma $13 dollars, and I want Jillo to have a future that is far away from ignorance and witch doctors. Even if I were able to do all these things, the problems are still here. On the days when I think “what am I doing here? I could be eating a cheeseburger in a bar enjoying all the luxuries America has to offer,” I think about what I would be leaving behind. I could never go home to where life is easy and be able to sleep at night knowing the students are dealing with problems that I could never imaging dealing with. I may not be able to help these girls fix the problems, but I can stay for two years and listen to them.
On Wednesday I was having a mini counseling session with five of my form one students. One girl asked me for advice on how to say no to a persistent guy who was pressuring her. She said he told her he loved her and that he would take care of her. The student knew that being in a relationship at her age was difficult and she was afraid her school work would suffer. She also said she knew he was only saying he loved her so she would have sex with him. This smart student wanted to wait until she finished school before she got into a relationship. I gave her some advice. I told her to just be direct and tell him no, don’t let him promise you the world because the risks (HIV, pregnancy) are too high for a girl her age. She said she had tried that and he would not leave her alone. Then she told me that if a girl says “no”, the man will just beat her up. My mouth dropped open and I said, “Is that true?” Her friend who was sitting next to her chimed in and said yes, the men here will not be said no to. I told the girls that that was very wrong of the men to do that and said they have to be prepared, if he tries anything to try and fight back. Kick them in the groin, scream, run away. Then another girl spoke up, “Then they will come back, and they will bring all their friends”. I was in total disbelief. What was I supposed to say to that? I got very angry and I told them that that was unacceptable. No man has a right to treat them like that. But what practical advice can I tell them? Everyone knows about this problem and no one talks about it. These girls have been dealing with this since primary school. I asked when the men start harassing them and I was told that kids as young as 10 are forced or convinced to be a relationship with a much, much older man. The men tell the young girls that they will give them free rides on their motorbikes. This is a very, horrifyingly common situation. Of the form one class, only 3 of the girls were not in a relationship of this kind, and those three were in front of me asking for help. Once you have agreed to a relationship in exchange for a ride, the men spend their time trying to get you to do more. The girls who were sitting in front of me were the only ones who were not getting free motorbike rides. They knew the risks. One of them told me what would happen in the best case scenario; if you did not get AIDS or pregnant and the relationship ended. When the time came for you to get married, a man would pay a very large price for you. The dowry could be as high as 100,000 shillings, some cattle, and eight large bags of clothes. If the husband was happy with you he would even pay more after the wedding. But when he found out that you were not a virgin, he would be extremely angry. And he would pay nothing for you. You would be shamed and your family might starve.
That same day, I was walking home from school when I saw one of my students sitting by the side of the road. Her name was Fatuma, and she was crying. I asked her why and she said that she was being sent away from school to go get her parents. She owed a thousand shillings in school fees and could not afford to pay. If she could not come up with the money, she would not be able to return to school. She was in Form 3 and only had one more year to go. If she dropped out now there would be no future for her. Just like in America, if you do not have a high school diploma there are very few jobs for you. And here, where everyone is poor, there is no such thing as a minimum wage job. If you do not have a degree, you do not get a job, ever. Fatuma was crying because she knew that it was pointless, she would go and get her parents and they would not have the money. I walked her home, gave her a hug, and a piece of candy. I wanted so badly to give her the money, I have it, and I can afford it. But then what would I say to the other 120 students who are poor and need help? I could not give Fatuma the money and I felt terrible. One thousand shillings is thirteen American dollars. This girl’s entire future depended on her finding $13.
Thursday I came to school and was approached by one of the teachers to have a counseling session with a girl named Jillo. She was having a problem in all her classes, she could not stay awake. As soon as a teacher walked in the room, she would be asleep. During her prep times and during breaks, she was a bright active girl. I was requested to talk to her to find out what the problem was and if we could fix it, she is failing every single class and the teachers are concerned. I sat with her and talked for awhile. She said that she did not know what the problem was, she couldn’t help it but every single class put her to sleep. I asked if she was sick, if she was not sleeping at night, if she was stressed, or discouraged, or bored, or if she hated every single class. She said it was none of those reasons but she would not say what she thought the problem was. I gave her a piece of paper and told her she had until Monday to write me a letter telling me why. I said it would be anonymous and I would not even tell the other school counselor. I left and went and spoke with the other counselor and told him my plan to find out the problem. He said that he knew what she was going to write. She thought she was bewitched. He meant that literally and with no sarcasm. Jillo thought that someone had put her under a spell. Her parents also thought that was the case and wanted to take her to a witch doctor who could break the spell. The counselor convinced them that we should wait and try talking to the girl first, a witch doctor was too extreme at this stage. I have until Monday to find out what the problem is and then I have to fix it. And I have no clue what I am going to do.
When I got here I thought my job was to be a teacher. I was going to teach biology and physics and be a good friend to these students. Now I have no idea what to do. This whole week has changed my perspective on things. I feel like there are so many huge problems that I will not be able to even touch no matter how long I am here or how much I want to. I want a hundred cans of mace that I can give out to every girl, I want to give Fatuma $13 dollars, and I want Jillo to have a future that is far away from ignorance and witch doctors. Even if I were able to do all these things, the problems are still here. On the days when I think “what am I doing here? I could be eating a cheeseburger in a bar enjoying all the luxuries America has to offer,” I think about what I would be leaving behind. I could never go home to where life is easy and be able to sleep at night knowing the students are dealing with problems that I could never imaging dealing with. I may not be able to help these girls fix the problems, but I can stay for two years and listen to them.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Back to School
So Sunday, I was lying around my house and I decided to drag myself off the couch where I had been lying like a corpse since I got out of bed. It was like, 2 in the afternoon, and I thought, about time for breakfast. I decided I would make some French fries. I went to my box of potatoes and dumped the whole thing on my floor to look for the biggest ones. This was a horrendous mistake. One of the potatoes had rotted, silently, and was now filled with something that only belongs in nightmares. Even the word gives me the heebily jeebilies. Maggots. There were maggots all over my kitchen floor! I have never been so grossed out in my life and I have seen some pretty gross stuff. But the sight of their tiny, white bodies, writhing on the floor… bleearrgghh! I dropped the potato I was holding and did the ‘ohmyGOD theyrealloverme!!’ dance for a few minutes. Then I took a deep breath, grabbed a plastic bag and stepped back in the kitchen. One glance and I ran out of the kitchen and did the dance again, this time trying to control my pesky gag reflex. Once more, deep breath and into the kitchen, this time using two plastic bags as gloves and a stick to push all the potatoes back in the box, then I ran out and threw it down the choo. I wanted to disinfect my entire house. But TIA (This Is Africa) and I have no bleach or scrub brush or 409; so I had to settle for spreading some hot water all over the floor and rubbing it with a Sham Wow. Now my imagination is creating maggots all over the house. Stray rice grains, escaped bread crumbs, the invisible nothing that is absolutely everywhere and looks just like a maggot. I had graphic dreams about maggots last night, damn mefloquin, they were friendly, inch-wormy maggots. Now my hatred of flies has escalated. I don’t hate flies; hate is too mild a word. I loathe flies with the fire of a thousand suns. I want to punch one in its face, and I try, but they are too darn fast. Does anyone know a way to kill flies? Some tried and true, housewives trick? Can I light them on fire or drown them?
On Monday, since there were maggots all over my house, I thought I would go visiting. I was doing my best to be anti-antisocial. I even allowed myself to be attacked by the preschool kids. They cannot pronounce my name, it sounds adorably like “Lion”, and they tried to strip me naked. Forty of the little scamps surrounded me and distracted me by poking me in the…chest, (yeah, I don’t know why) and while I was fending them off, they had undone the tie on my wrap skirt! Iko sawa, I think they were too little to be scandalized. Next I visited with a form 3 student (that is Junior year) named Halima who lived nearby. She showed me her photo album; it was falling apart and had Leo DeCaprio from Titanic on the cover. It was full of blurry photos of her many brothers and sisters as they were growing up in a village near Lake Turkana. There were pictures of her mother and sisters in traditional Rendille or Samburu (I can’t tell the difference) dress. In the photos of her brothers at their circumcision ceremonies the boys look a little pained because the picture was taken immediately after the procedure, the circumcisor (guy who does circumsicions?) is still kneeling between the boys’ knees. Halima also told me about her mother who passed away on Christmas, at four pm. She said her mother had been sick for years but was doing better and talking completely normal right before she passed. In the tradition of her people, Halima shaved all her hair off in remembrance of her mother. Halima told me all this with a smile on her face. She is a much stronger person than I am.
Now midterm break is over and it is back to school. Today is Wednesday and it is the first day back. I am starting to understand why the majority of our students are failing; this school has such a different way of running things that I just do not see as conducive to learning. We opened today, and some students have not come back from break. Classes are supposed to start at 7:20 am, my first one is at 8 am. I was totally unprepared so I went to school early to make up a lesson. But when I arrived, all the students are still outside cleaning. Then they had an assembly. Classes didn’t actually start until 8:20 so I only got to do half a lesson. In addition, three quarters of my form ones (that is Freshman year) were not in class because they were being punished for being late or for wearing flip-flops (not part of the uniform). So the punishment for being late to class is to be sent outside to spend the day in the blazing sun picking up acacia thorns from the dusty clearing they call the football (soccer) field, and the student will miss a whole day of classes. I felt that it was pointless to cover new material when three fourths of the students were missing, so I just did a review of last week. It was very boring and redundant. But what can you do?
I have been asked by some of you at home about what you can do to help my students. I spoke with the deputy principle and what this school needs is “Stuff”. They have no library, a shortage of textbooks, no internet access, not enough supplies for lab practicals, not enough paper, few notebooks, no visual aids, no reference books, etc, etc. So if you have a stack of old Nat Geos lying around, need some Karma points, or want to help me look like a rockstar to my school, here is a list of some things the school needs:
-Books for students to read recreationally (anything teens, or younger, would like to read to practice their english)
- notebooks, paper, flashcards (so they can study for exams)
-Rewards for good work (stickers, pencils, toys, candy)
-National Geographic or similar magazines (make science interesting!)
-Study guides for English, math, bio, chem., geography, history, physics, health, agriculture
-books of review problems (so I can have students do that for an alternative punishment)
-Bill Nye the Science Guy! (if those still exist, or other educational videos/documentaries)
-educational posters, or poster paper so I can make some
-markers, crayons, colored pencils
And for those with boatloads of cash, every school could use expensive technology: microscopes, digital cameras, and laptops. If you do want to sponsor a girl’s tuition, one year costs about 20,000 Kenyan Shillings, that’s around $260. If you want to give part of that, I can put it in a scholarship for the neediest students.
Alright, that’s enough of my begging. Thanks for reading. I am going to close my blog today with the food item I have been thinking about all week. A large, juicy hamburger with big chunks of brie melted on it, topped with avocado, tomatoes, and ketchup; served with a side of macaroni and cheese with cut up hotdogs. Man, I’m hungry. Have a good week!
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Yay for midterm break!
am in a better mood this week. Last week I was in the middle of a dip of the Peace Corps roller coaster. Today I feel good because I am on midterm break until Wednesday. I told everyone I was leaving town and now I am free to do whatever I want for five whole days. It’s gonna be great. Lately, I have been getting some flak for not spending more time with the people in my village. It is not really fair of them to say that since I am followed by people yelling mzungu from 6 am when I leave my house till 7pm when I can shut my door and pretend to be busy. Of course the neighbor kids come in my house to laugh at me, and my other neighbors always want a quick chat, so by the time I climb into bed, I am never really relaxed. And if I step outside, I will invariably meet someone who will ask me why I am so anti-social. It is not my fault if Kenyans are ridiculously friendly! Its exhausting. Anyway, now I am free! I am hoping to go into Marsabit forest and see some elephants. That would be awesome. If not, I’ll just do my regular shopping, continue the quest for a cell phone that will work in the network black hole I live in.
On another topic, I have been observing people in my village and despite living here for a couple months, I still feel out of place. I think it is the clothes I wear, but I am too lazy to go to Town and buy a more modest outfit. I am sticking to my knee length skirts, scandalously short sleeves, and uncovered hair. But in case anyone wants to visit, and fit in, I thought I would give you a quick lesson on how to dress to fit into my town. Ladies: First, put on a pretty dress. Something bright, colorful, and fun. Like neon pink. Make sure the dress goes all the way to your feet, for modesty’s sake. Then take another dress, this one must be a muted, un-fun color. Like brown, or black. Make sure this dress is long sleeved and also goes to your feet, again for modesty. Put this dress on over the first dress. Now take a scarf and wrap it tightly around your head to cover your hair. Now take another scarf, make this one brightly colored and throw it jauntily around your head like the fashionista you are. Now you are fit to go anywhere, whether it’s the bore hole to fetch water, or to church. Now men, yours is more complicated so pay attention: Go to your closet. Pick anything. Put it on. Voila! Whether its dirty or clean, ugly burmuda shorts or a suit, a well put together outfit or (more commonly) a random organizational disaster, you’ll fit in.
Speaking of clothes, for those of you who donate clothes to Goodwill and wonder “who will ever want this faded high school football team t-shirt?” I have wonderful news for you. It somehow arrives here in Africa. Never fear that your favorite local business t-shirt that you got for free when they opened is at the end of its life. Donate it to Goodwill, and it will be reborn to a local man who will put a suit jacket over it and wear it to church. Last week, I saw a Washington Mutual T-shirt. A month ago there was a bright orange State Penitentiary shirt. And I could play sports team bingo with the number of logo hats there are in my town. This place is the afterlife for clothes. The secretary at my school has a favorite outfit she loves to wear. It is a shiny, maroon, mermaid-style, poofy shouldered, prom dress from someones past. Its great and she wears it twice a week. I should have brought my old prom dress, I would fit in perfectly if I wore that, under a black dress of course.
I know I have been talking about clothes up to this point, but I am going to completely change the topic because I just realized what the ‘meat’ I have been eating for lunch for 6 weeks reminds me of. I think it is cow stomach. Its either that or octopus. I can see its little sucker feet! I am not very familiar with identification of cow anatomy, so if someone knows what part of the animal has small circular structures that look like octopus suckers, please let me know. I am going to stop staring at it and just eat it anyway, cause it’s the only meat I get. And don’t worry, it actually is delicious if you don’t chew it and chase it with rice. We have a really good cook at my school. I don’t think I could turn unidentifiable chunks of cow into something an American would call edible, let alone delicious.
Alright, I have grossed you out enough for one day. I am going to go post this and then see what is going on in the rest of the world. And by that I mean I’ll be checking Facebook.
On another topic, I have been observing people in my village and despite living here for a couple months, I still feel out of place. I think it is the clothes I wear, but I am too lazy to go to Town and buy a more modest outfit. I am sticking to my knee length skirts, scandalously short sleeves, and uncovered hair. But in case anyone wants to visit, and fit in, I thought I would give you a quick lesson on how to dress to fit into my town. Ladies: First, put on a pretty dress. Something bright, colorful, and fun. Like neon pink. Make sure the dress goes all the way to your feet, for modesty’s sake. Then take another dress, this one must be a muted, un-fun color. Like brown, or black. Make sure this dress is long sleeved and also goes to your feet, again for modesty. Put this dress on over the first dress. Now take a scarf and wrap it tightly around your head to cover your hair. Now take another scarf, make this one brightly colored and throw it jauntily around your head like the fashionista you are. Now you are fit to go anywhere, whether it’s the bore hole to fetch water, or to church. Now men, yours is more complicated so pay attention: Go to your closet. Pick anything. Put it on. Voila! Whether its dirty or clean, ugly burmuda shorts or a suit, a well put together outfit or (more commonly) a random organizational disaster, you’ll fit in.
Speaking of clothes, for those of you who donate clothes to Goodwill and wonder “who will ever want this faded high school football team t-shirt?” I have wonderful news for you. It somehow arrives here in Africa. Never fear that your favorite local business t-shirt that you got for free when they opened is at the end of its life. Donate it to Goodwill, and it will be reborn to a local man who will put a suit jacket over it and wear it to church. Last week, I saw a Washington Mutual T-shirt. A month ago there was a bright orange State Penitentiary shirt. And I could play sports team bingo with the number of logo hats there are in my town. This place is the afterlife for clothes. The secretary at my school has a favorite outfit she loves to wear. It is a shiny, maroon, mermaid-style, poofy shouldered, prom dress from someones past. Its great and she wears it twice a week. I should have brought my old prom dress, I would fit in perfectly if I wore that, under a black dress of course.
I know I have been talking about clothes up to this point, but I am going to completely change the topic because I just realized what the ‘meat’ I have been eating for lunch for 6 weeks reminds me of. I think it is cow stomach. Its either that or octopus. I can see its little sucker feet! I am not very familiar with identification of cow anatomy, so if someone knows what part of the animal has small circular structures that look like octopus suckers, please let me know. I am going to stop staring at it and just eat it anyway, cause it’s the only meat I get. And don’t worry, it actually is delicious if you don’t chew it and chase it with rice. We have a really good cook at my school. I don’t think I could turn unidentifiable chunks of cow into something an American would call edible, let alone delicious.
Alright, I have grossed you out enough for one day. I am going to go post this and then see what is going on in the rest of the world. And by that I mean I’ll be checking Facebook.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
I love being white and super ric h
We Americans are very lucky; it is pretty cool how every one of us has glowing ivory skin and pockets full of cash. Well, that’s what America means to a Kenyan. Lately I have been wishing for only one thing: to not be white. I am getting really tired of people asking me for money. I have started to not be polite when they ask. I know that I have white skin, and most white-skinned people who come here are wealthy, and they are apparently very generous to every person they meet. But I have no money and even though I have never had biscuits or pens or 5 shillings or sweets or tuition money since I got here, I still get asked every single day. I want to say, “You know me, we are neighbors, you know I don’t have spare shillingis”. Kenyans do not use the word “please” like we do in America. It is not considered rude to say, “Give me money” even though it drives me bananas. When little kids say it, I tell them “Hapana, mimi si banki, mimi ni mwalimu” (No, I am not a bank, I am a teacher) or I just tell them, “tabia mbaya” (bad manners). When adults ask me, they do it without preamble. The other day I had a conversation with a neighbor that went like this:
Me: Habari Yako? (How are you?)
Him: Ninahitaji shillingi mia moja tu. (I only need a hundred shillings)
Me: Sema tena? (Say again?)
Him: Nipa shilling mia moja. (Give me a hundred shillings)
Me: (pause)… Nina hakuna pesa, pole. (I have no money, sorry)
Couldn’t he even say hello first?
On Monday, I taught the form ones for the first time. At the end of class, one girl came up to me and said she wanted to ask me something but was afraid of me so she wrote me a letter. The letter was her life story; she has 6 brothers and sisters, her father had died, her mother had to make illegal home brewed alcohol and charcoal just to feed the family. She was the only one in her family going to school, and she would have to drop out because she had no money for tuition. Could I please pay for her schooling? This one is harder to deal with because I feel bad, even if her story sounds too awful to be true, I want to help her. But again, I do not have money. And even if I was wealthy, after all, I do have more money than they do, I still could not help everyone. When I told her no, I felt like I kicked a puppy. So I told her I would look to see if she could get a sponsor. I don’t know why I said that, I don’t know how to find a sponsor. I know that one or two girls here have them, rich couples in America who fund their education, and now I have to try to find one for this girl.
When I am generous, I feel like the students are ungrateful. This is probably my American sense of manners influencing my perception again. I was doing Review Jeopardy for my physics class and I brought a bag of Hershey Kisses. It was the last of my Christmas candy from America, and I felt very magnanimous for giving it up to the girls. As soon as I handed it out, there were maybe 3 or four pieces left, the girls started fighting over it. “Give it to me!” “No, just for me”. I told them I did not have enough for the whole class so I was going to give it to the teachers. They said okay, but then a crowd followed me out of the class begging me for more. Not one person said thank you. And for the rest of the week, students keep approaching me asking for more. “You bring for me tomorrow” It makes me not want to give them things, even though I know they deserve it.
I wrote the paragraphs above earlier today while I was at school, I was frustrated that this kid who I see every day asked me for biscuits, again. I wanted to slap him; and when I told him no, he ran away mumbling something under his breath, that in my mind, was “Screw you, Lady”. But then on my way home from school, I passed the Kubibagasa bore hole again, and it hit me how bad the drought was getting. The past few days have been hotter than…well, it’s hot. The people here are suffering because the bore hole is drying up. The herders bring their animals to the bore hole, and wait from morning to night for the water to come, and when it does, it is too little to water all the animals there. Yesterday, a cow died at the bore hole, and they ‘processed’ it right there. I gave an upbeat “Habari!” to the guy holding a machete in one hand, and a cow leg it the other. The women and girls with their 20 liter buckets on their backs walk for hours in the sun to get here, and then they wait all day for water that is probably not going to come. The road home is crowded these days, yesterday I waded through a herd of 200 goats, because there is little food and no water in the desert so they are just migrating. The men, who normally only have guns at night, carry their huge weapons during the day now to protect their few animals from being stolen. Yesterday, an old man died in my village. My village is very, very small, so this was a big deal. Someone told me he died of an illness, but they think it was caused by malnutrition. Without water, there is no milk from the camels or goats; that is their main source of food. And the elderly cannot eat githeri, their other staple food, a tough mix of maize kernels and beans that hurts your jaw to eat. So the man got sick and died, and the drought is just going to get worse. The rains are not supposed to come until April. I am pretty good with heat, I like the desert, but even I have been complaining. I am drinking almost 15 liters of water a week, and I am sweating most of it out. I am so exhausted by the walk home, and I am thinking I can no longer do it while the sun is high, I’ll have to wait until after 6 pm.
Now I feel guilty for complaining about people asking me for things. If I had a starving family at home, I would beg rich people every day. It makes me wish that I was actually wealthy. It has gotten to the point where I do not want to drink out of my water bottle while walking to school because I know every person I pass would love to have my liter of water. So if you are rich, and you do come to Africa, please do not give candy and money to children. It turns them into money- grubbing little monsters. But if you are rich, please give to charity, or churches, or become a sponsor, or come here and volunteer.
See what I did there? I relieved my guilt and turned the tables around. Instead of people asking me for money, I am asking you for them. See how that worked out?
And now after that depressing note, I’ll leave you with something positive. I saw a couple dik-diks on my way to school yesterday. (Google it) They are Adorable with a capital A. And so are baby pundas (donkeys), and baby goats. Baby goats are so tiny! I just want to grab one and make a run for it, but the guys with the big guns would probably object. My neighbors got a tiny baby goat a few days ago and I think they are keeping it in their sitting room, I can hear it bleating to its mommy through my wall right now. There, now I ended the blog by talking about baby animals. Don’t you feel better?
Me: Habari Yako? (How are you?)
Him: Ninahitaji shillingi mia moja tu. (I only need a hundred shillings)
Me: Sema tena? (Say again?)
Him: Nipa shilling mia moja. (Give me a hundred shillings)
Me: (pause)… Nina hakuna pesa, pole. (I have no money, sorry)
Couldn’t he even say hello first?
On Monday, I taught the form ones for the first time. At the end of class, one girl came up to me and said she wanted to ask me something but was afraid of me so she wrote me a letter. The letter was her life story; she has 6 brothers and sisters, her father had died, her mother had to make illegal home brewed alcohol and charcoal just to feed the family. She was the only one in her family going to school, and she would have to drop out because she had no money for tuition. Could I please pay for her schooling? This one is harder to deal with because I feel bad, even if her story sounds too awful to be true, I want to help her. But again, I do not have money. And even if I was wealthy, after all, I do have more money than they do, I still could not help everyone. When I told her no, I felt like I kicked a puppy. So I told her I would look to see if she could get a sponsor. I don’t know why I said that, I don’t know how to find a sponsor. I know that one or two girls here have them, rich couples in America who fund their education, and now I have to try to find one for this girl.
When I am generous, I feel like the students are ungrateful. This is probably my American sense of manners influencing my perception again. I was doing Review Jeopardy for my physics class and I brought a bag of Hershey Kisses. It was the last of my Christmas candy from America, and I felt very magnanimous for giving it up to the girls. As soon as I handed it out, there were maybe 3 or four pieces left, the girls started fighting over it. “Give it to me!” “No, just for me”. I told them I did not have enough for the whole class so I was going to give it to the teachers. They said okay, but then a crowd followed me out of the class begging me for more. Not one person said thank you. And for the rest of the week, students keep approaching me asking for more. “You bring for me tomorrow” It makes me not want to give them things, even though I know they deserve it.
I wrote the paragraphs above earlier today while I was at school, I was frustrated that this kid who I see every day asked me for biscuits, again. I wanted to slap him; and when I told him no, he ran away mumbling something under his breath, that in my mind, was “Screw you, Lady”. But then on my way home from school, I passed the Kubibagasa bore hole again, and it hit me how bad the drought was getting. The past few days have been hotter than…well, it’s hot. The people here are suffering because the bore hole is drying up. The herders bring their animals to the bore hole, and wait from morning to night for the water to come, and when it does, it is too little to water all the animals there. Yesterday, a cow died at the bore hole, and they ‘processed’ it right there. I gave an upbeat “Habari!” to the guy holding a machete in one hand, and a cow leg it the other. The women and girls with their 20 liter buckets on their backs walk for hours in the sun to get here, and then they wait all day for water that is probably not going to come. The road home is crowded these days, yesterday I waded through a herd of 200 goats, because there is little food and no water in the desert so they are just migrating. The men, who normally only have guns at night, carry their huge weapons during the day now to protect their few animals from being stolen. Yesterday, an old man died in my village. My village is very, very small, so this was a big deal. Someone told me he died of an illness, but they think it was caused by malnutrition. Without water, there is no milk from the camels or goats; that is their main source of food. And the elderly cannot eat githeri, their other staple food, a tough mix of maize kernels and beans that hurts your jaw to eat. So the man got sick and died, and the drought is just going to get worse. The rains are not supposed to come until April. I am pretty good with heat, I like the desert, but even I have been complaining. I am drinking almost 15 liters of water a week, and I am sweating most of it out. I am so exhausted by the walk home, and I am thinking I can no longer do it while the sun is high, I’ll have to wait until after 6 pm.
Now I feel guilty for complaining about people asking me for things. If I had a starving family at home, I would beg rich people every day. It makes me wish that I was actually wealthy. It has gotten to the point where I do not want to drink out of my water bottle while walking to school because I know every person I pass would love to have my liter of water. So if you are rich, and you do come to Africa, please do not give candy and money to children. It turns them into money- grubbing little monsters. But if you are rich, please give to charity, or churches, or become a sponsor, or come here and volunteer.
See what I did there? I relieved my guilt and turned the tables around. Instead of people asking me for money, I am asking you for them. See how that worked out?
And now after that depressing note, I’ll leave you with something positive. I saw a couple dik-diks on my way to school yesterday. (Google it) They are Adorable with a capital A. And so are baby pundas (donkeys), and baby goats. Baby goats are so tiny! I just want to grab one and make a run for it, but the guys with the big guns would probably object. My neighbors got a tiny baby goat a few days ago and I think they are keeping it in their sitting room, I can hear it bleating to its mommy through my wall right now. There, now I ended the blog by talking about baby animals. Don’t you feel better?
Friday, February 4, 2011
Life Skills
I am starting to get a handle on this whole teaching thing. I won’t say I am a good teacher, there are many days when I am pretty darn crappy. I just do not know high school physics well enough to make it very interesting. But the students really love having me as a teacher and that makes me feel better after each lame lesson. The students beg me to stay after class and continue teaching, or to come during their breaks and teach. When I left the Form Four classroom the first time, they all burst into excited laughter. The Form Three girls gave me a round of applause, I did not know why and I made them stop, and the Form Twos always call me back as I am walking away, “Madame Ryan! Madame Ryan!” and when I turn around, “We Love you!!”
This week, I started teaching Life Skills and I am already feeling out of my league. I had it in my mind to be a fun, interactive class where the students could trust me and we could talk about issues that relate to them. I have only taught one class to each form and already it is a much bigger job than I anticipated. I feel like I need a degree in psychology to handle some of the questions the girls ask. I let them run the class the first day; they could ask me any question they wanted. This was a bad idea because I incorrectly assumed they would ask me about boyfriends, schoolwork, and friendship. They did ask me those questions but also added so much that I was unprepared to handle. It is like they have been saving up a lifetime of questions and only now are given a chance to ask.
We discussed abortion, racism, poverty, friendship, fear, self esteem, sex, why some people are shy and others are not, when they should get married, and many other topics in the short 40 minute period. Two of the classes even convinced me to sing “Stop in the Name of Love” in an acapella solo (it wasn’t pretty). When we spoke about whether it was appropriate for a secondary school girl to have a boyfriend or lover, one student asked what a person should do if she is in love with someone who treated her badly. I got the impression she was in a bad relationship but how can I advise her in a group of 30 other students? I tried to give her advice and get some information about the problem but she kept saying “But what if you love him?”, as if the love negated her need to take care of herself.
My form 2 students told me they are failing all their classes because they do not understand when the teachers speak English, it is their 3rd language. Out of the 130 students, there is only one girl with a B-, there are a few Cs, but nearly all the students are at D or below. The students are afraid of the teachers, they might get caned if they speak up. The teachers are convinced the students are “not serious” and lazy, and they do cane them.
My form 3 class asked me about homosexuality; they all agree that, as a sin, it is up there with incest. They are all very religious and I do not want to imply that the Bible or Quran is wrong, but I have to tell them how I feel about the issue and it is a direct contradiction to what they learn in their religion classes. And when my form 4 girls asked if I had been circumcised, every one of them has been, I could not stop my shudder. I did not know how to explain my opinion on female circumcision in a culturally sensitive manner with no preparation in the 5 remaining minutes of class. They live in a completely different world; I am not qualified to tell them how they should live but I have to say something and all I have is my American knowledge and opinions. I can only be honest with them but it makes me nervous to be molding these girls. I know that they trust me but I cannot give both sides of the issues and I think they really should have that.
As we were finishing up class, another girl asked me which I would become: a wife or a sister (nun). It is hard to comprehend that they see those as the only two options. I think they are trying to see the other choices. I left class with my mind full. I learned more about their culture, knowledge, society, expectations, and experiences than I ever expected. Just with the one introductory day, I have a whole years worth of topics to discuss. I talked with the deputy principal and the other teacher in charge of guidance and counseling about the girls’ need for a mentor. Next week, we are going to split the girls into small groups that will meet with a teacher every day. Hopefully, the girls will open up more and be able to talk about these issues. I also need to do some classes about sexual health. The students know almost nothing about their bodies and they really need to know that you cannot cure STD’s by washing with cold water.
This week, I started teaching Life Skills and I am already feeling out of my league. I had it in my mind to be a fun, interactive class where the students could trust me and we could talk about issues that relate to them. I have only taught one class to each form and already it is a much bigger job than I anticipated. I feel like I need a degree in psychology to handle some of the questions the girls ask. I let them run the class the first day; they could ask me any question they wanted. This was a bad idea because I incorrectly assumed they would ask me about boyfriends, schoolwork, and friendship. They did ask me those questions but also added so much that I was unprepared to handle. It is like they have been saving up a lifetime of questions and only now are given a chance to ask.
We discussed abortion, racism, poverty, friendship, fear, self esteem, sex, why some people are shy and others are not, when they should get married, and many other topics in the short 40 minute period. Two of the classes even convinced me to sing “Stop in the Name of Love” in an acapella solo (it wasn’t pretty). When we spoke about whether it was appropriate for a secondary school girl to have a boyfriend or lover, one student asked what a person should do if she is in love with someone who treated her badly. I got the impression she was in a bad relationship but how can I advise her in a group of 30 other students? I tried to give her advice and get some information about the problem but she kept saying “But what if you love him?”, as if the love negated her need to take care of herself.
My form 2 students told me they are failing all their classes because they do not understand when the teachers speak English, it is their 3rd language. Out of the 130 students, there is only one girl with a B-, there are a few Cs, but nearly all the students are at D or below. The students are afraid of the teachers, they might get caned if they speak up. The teachers are convinced the students are “not serious” and lazy, and they do cane them.
My form 3 class asked me about homosexuality; they all agree that, as a sin, it is up there with incest. They are all very religious and I do not want to imply that the Bible or Quran is wrong, but I have to tell them how I feel about the issue and it is a direct contradiction to what they learn in their religion classes. And when my form 4 girls asked if I had been circumcised, every one of them has been, I could not stop my shudder. I did not know how to explain my opinion on female circumcision in a culturally sensitive manner with no preparation in the 5 remaining minutes of class. They live in a completely different world; I am not qualified to tell them how they should live but I have to say something and all I have is my American knowledge and opinions. I can only be honest with them but it makes me nervous to be molding these girls. I know that they trust me but I cannot give both sides of the issues and I think they really should have that.
As we were finishing up class, another girl asked me which I would become: a wife or a sister (nun). It is hard to comprehend that they see those as the only two options. I think they are trying to see the other choices. I left class with my mind full. I learned more about their culture, knowledge, society, expectations, and experiences than I ever expected. Just with the one introductory day, I have a whole years worth of topics to discuss. I talked with the deputy principal and the other teacher in charge of guidance and counseling about the girls’ need for a mentor. Next week, we are going to split the girls into small groups that will meet with a teacher every day. Hopefully, the girls will open up more and be able to talk about these issues. I also need to do some classes about sexual health. The students know almost nothing about their bodies and they really need to know that you cannot cure STD’s by washing with cold water.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)