#9Kenya – The Silence before the Storm: Visitors Day

Friday truly was the silence before a huge storm. Saturday was supposed to be visitors’ day and all of Thursday afternoon the kids spent cleaning and scrubbing the entire house. The frenzy of that evening was a huge contrast to the stillness of the next day; for Friday after school all the kids headed off to their grandparents and the whole home was really quite – almost eerily so considering we’re generally used to 70 bodies running and rushing here and there. Yet even so, I by no means want to give anyone the impression that we were bored out of our minds with nothing to do. With all the visitors coming the following day there were endless preparations to make.
For most of the afternoon the staff had been getting things ready and one of the biggest jobs was sorting through the rice. They buy it in bulk here and it’s not the best quality rice hence needs to be picked through to make sure that all the empty husks are separated from all the rice. Normally, this is a big enough job for a serving for 70 kids, staff and volunteers. But now we had to go through enough rice to feed over 300 people. That means we had probably sorted through about 100kg (give or take) of rice. In the evening there was about 15 of us in the kitchen, each over a bowl or over a piece of counter going through all the rice. I truly have formed a new appreciation for this staple. It is so much work not only in growing and harvesting it, but also in preparing it.
Yet even with all the work that needed to be done, Friday was a bit odd. I prefer it much more when all the kids are here. There is always someone to chat with, to laugh with, to help, or to tickle. The rooms were silent and empty and it just didn’t seem quite right. But then Saturday definitively made up for it. Everyone slowly started trickling back in starting at about 9am. By 10am there were quite a few grandparents and family members sitting on the lawn outside the home. We were still in the back getting lunch ready. At this stage that meant pealing 50kg of potatoes and chopping up a huge pile of cabbage. Truly a team effort to get a meal for this many people ready. And keep in mind, it’s hard enough cooking for 300-400 people back at home, but it is so much more difficult when you take into account the fact that you are cooking over a fire. They don’t have stoves here. Not even propane ones. Everything is prepared in huge pots over firewood. We had about 3 or 4 fires going and them some charcoal ones as well. I was sitting and pealing potatoes with my hunting knife for about an hour when one of the kids grandmas came and sat down beside me, taking my knife away from me and proceeding to do the job twice as fast as I. With no more knives to go around all I could do was keep on passing her new potatoes when she was done pealing and throwing the pealed ones into a big kettle.
Lunch didn’t end up getting served until nearly 3pm but not due to a delay on our part, but rather because James, who was supposed to arrive at 10am, arrived in true African fashion 4 ½ hours later. So we all assembled in the field in front of the home (some of the grandparents and community members had been sitting in the sun for over 4 hours by now). The food was brought out in the massive pots and the first to line up were the community kids. You should have seen the line. It was massive, snaking back and forth across the field. We handed out plates and then they loaded up on potatoes, rice, cabbage and meet. By the time the grandparents and other adults lined up, we were out of plates. So they stood in yet another huge snaking line waiting as we meandered our way between the kids collecting their plates when they had finished to go rinse them off and hand them to the awaiting adults. This process was repeated over and over. All the volunteers were working as servers while the kids from the home entertained by singing and dancing and the James, his family and a number of other VIPs sat on comfy couches in the shade and were served on glass plates from their separate pots. By the time we got to eat we were absolutely starving.
It’s amazing though how many people we fed, especially when you keep in mind the huge portion that everyone here eats. The plates are not just topped off, but rather heaped off. The mound is probably about 3-4 inches high – and that’s not just for the adults, but also for the kids. I must admit though, that when I arrived here, all the staff were giving me weird looks every time that I put my three spoonfuls onto my plate. However, by now my plate consists of a heap probably as big as that of some of the smaller kids here. I can probably bet you that once again losing weight will be an impossibility.
After everyone had eaten it was time to introduce all the volunteers and address the big boxes that were piled up in the middle of the field. It turned out that one of the volunteers from last year, a girl named Linda from Ontario, Canada, had collected tones of things and shipped them all to James. There were probably 12 huge boxes filled with toys, clothes and books. All the kids from the community got 2 pieces of clothing and the rest went to the kids from the home. The library also got a huge boost in books – ranging from children dictionaries and encyclopaedias, to little kids books and even a collection of about 20 R.L. Stein Goosebumps books as well as the whole set of Anne of Green Gables. I’m personally ecstatic about the books because it will make our library look so much better and some of the kids have already signed out their first books. On top of these donations James had purchased a huge fridge. This will be great because it will help preserve all their food.
However, the afternoon went downhill from that point onward because a number of the VIPs were local counsellors and politicians that each took their time in making long speeches to the congregation of assembled grandparents. This meant that all the “visitors” were sitting in the sun until nearly 6:30pm. After all this it was time to clean up and by the end we were completely exhausted. Yet somehow the kids maintained an energy level that was out of this world. They kept on singing and dancing until nearly 11pm. How they do it I don’t know. I guess for them it was an amazing day. They got to see their families; they got to have a huge feast; they were given tones of presents/gifts; and they got to see their daddy (James). So I guess it’s not that surprising that they were filled with energy.

So that was visitors’ day. Not sure how often they have it, but based on the amount of work that goes into preparing it, I hope it’s not too often.

#8 – Kirengero and the Library (or rather our inspirational labour camp)

Well, the crowd here at Njaaga’s Children’s Home is slowly thinning. The group of 11 Canadians left on Tuesday. Robin left on Thursday for her Safari leaving me all alone. Well, not quite since I’m surrounded by 75 kids and another 13 volunteers. However, it’s nevertheless a strange feeling being separated. We’re honestly starting to feel like a married couple especially when you consider that we had almost all classes in common, studied for the exams together till the wee hours of the night for the last month of school and then spent every waking and sleeping moment for the last 3 weeks together. So yeah, I have a right to feel betrayed and deserted, don’t I? Seriously though… it’s not bad, just odd.

But I don’t think any of you guys are wanting to hear about how attached Robin and I have gotten ;). What I really meant to write about is the progress on things here in Kirengero and more specifically the library project that we’ve tackled.
As I mentioned in the short blog last time, Jane has left us. She was a lady that worked here at the home. She’s 24 and has a 2 year old daughter named Josephine (an absolutely adorable and brilliant sweetheart). We’ve gotten to become quite good friends with Jane and because she has to walk on crutches we’d walk her home every night (just about 500 meters down the path to where a number of the workers live in one long barrack-like building). We were happy for her because she was going to Mombasa hoping to start a new life there but simultaneously we were also worried and a bit sad. The thing is here at Njaaga’s Children’s Home the kids aren’t really orphans as orphans. They all have family of one sort or another. In most cases its grandparents. According to James Njaaga, most of their parents left them with the grandfolks as they themselves headed into the cities with the hopes of getting a job and making a living. I’m not sure but from what he said it sounded as if many of the parents (primarily just single moms) have passed away and the kids are left with the grandparents permanently. Quite often these grandparents are unable to care for the kids themselves, whether due to financial constraints or simply health and age. As a result the kids are often left fending for themselves and it is these kids that James has taken into this home (he himself was raised by his grandparents after his mom passed away when he was 10 years old).
In getting to know Jane we found out that she was an educated girl. She had finished highschool and was really bright. However, the father of her child was nowhere in sight and we didn’t want to pry inquiring about him. She did however have boyfriend in Mombasa to whom she was now going. First her intention was to leave Josephine with her grandma and head to Mombasa alone. It’s really odd – at least in my mind. You’re working in a place with kids who were left behind by their parents and yet you’re about to do the same thing. By no means am I saying that we thought that Jane wouldn’t come back for Josephine – but the possibility (or rather risk) was nevertheless there making us a bit uneasy about Jane’s departure. Thankfully (from one perspective), Jane decided to take Josephine with her since the little girl would be too big a burden on the grandma. It made me feel much better about the entire situation but then you have to keep in mind that this is a disabled lady (not meaning this in any degrading way, but the reality is that here in Kenya there is no special heed or accommodation given to people with disabilities making things much more difficult) heading to a new city with essentially just enough money to pay for the bus and nothing else. She’s heading to stay primarily with a boyfriend that might be happy to see her, but might not necessarily be as welcoming to immediately being a father to a 2 year old child. Starting a life in those circumstances on one’s own would be hard enough, but starting it with a little kid to care for would seem almost impossible. But as I said, Jane is a bright and strong woman and as we set her off on the bus to her new life, we had all the faith in her that she would manage somehow. Either way, her life there should be better than here, since here aside for family for support and a dark room with a dirt floor and no electricity, she had nothing.

Just wanted to write about that to give you a perspective on what life is like here. We’ve met many nice women, but honestly speaking we haven’t met their husbands or fathers. Same thing applied in Nairobi when we were staying at Mary’s and Kathrin’s house and same thing still holds true in Kirengero. There are all the women, all of them smart, all of them aware of the way life is like in Africa, and all of them either with kids already or else pregnant and yet there is no man in sight. It’s mind boggling because one would think that they’d know better, at least one would hope that they would know better, and yet they somehow, for one reason or another don’t. It truly makes me wonder when this cycle might be broken.


On a different note, the library is truly starting to come along. For the first week and a bit all the work we did seemed to produce no results. We were scrapping, scrubbing, washing, measuring, sawing and even putting up the first coats on the mouldings and yet none of this had any visible proof of our hard labour. But with all this grunt work done we were finally able to get started on work that had immediate effects, such as paiting the walls and finishing the three coats of white paint on the mouldings. Immediately the room took on a different appearance. Everyone started dropping by admiring our work and inquiring about what else we would be doing with it. (This could get a tad bit annoying since they never seemed to be satisfied with what was being done… there was always something more. Such as for example Rafael, a worker her, asking us to buy a grill for the window to make it secure, Beatrice asking us whether we’d be painting the filthy ceilings, or one of the kids inquiring whether we’d also paint the outside of the window.) As much as we would love to make the library this oasis-like retreat that is absolutely perfect in every way, we can only do so much. Not only is time an issue, but so are our financial resources as well as the tools with which we are doing the work. Keep in mind that we’re erecting built-in shelves in concrete walls without an electric drill, sawing through what still is essentially one or two live trees in the hope of creating semi-even/symmetrical shelves, painting with brushes and rollers that we can’t really clean because there is no running water and we only have a tiny jar of paint thinner and sweeping/mopping floors with twigs and rain water.
However, we’ll do our best and the whole room has truly become a labour of the heart for us. We want to make it perfect to the extent that we can and although it’s hard work (like Wednesday when we started at 9am and continued until after 11pm), we’re loving it. Robin has spent the last few days putting up the footprints poem over the fireplace mantel. I’ve nearly finished assembling all the shelves (while ‘silently’ nailing all the boards together as well as into the concrete walls – Robin kept on complaining that my nailing was hurting her ear drums) and began painting flowers on the wall. We bought material for curtains that need to be sown and purchased a reading lamp for the room. Adrienne and Malaika painted the three tables into a gorgeous dark green and we still intend on purchasing a plant, a mirror, an atlas as well as some books/novels for it. Another item on the list is a big cork board or something similar so that they could pin up postcards, pictures, letters that they might get from the volunteers. Since it’s impossible to nail anything into these stone walls, the cork board would be idea, but so far we haven’t been able to find one. And then the final project will be a big group photo that I want to take of all the kids, print it out poster size back at home, have it framed and send it to them to hang in the library. I think that would be a nice finishing touch.

If anyone has any further suggestions or wants to contribute in any way to this project or this home, let me know.

#7: Greetings from the White Minority

Just got a couple mintues to write a few words. Over the last couple days we've stocked up on an insane amount of souvenirs. My suitcase will definitively be going back full with Robin. Saturday we spent bargaining like crazy. I had some of my hardest and longest negotiating ever. Guy started at 2500 shillings and I at 200 and it kept on going down/up by 20ties.

Sunay was an incredibly long day that started at 5am and finished at 10pm with us driving to Kisumu and included me falashing people at the matatu station (with my camera), much more bargaining and Robin changing right in the middle of the Sunday market. All in all, although it was an exhausting day, we were pleased with what we accomplished. Oh and on the way back as we were waiting for our matatu we were called "white minority" by someone... really liked that.

Monday we finally finished painting the library. Been more challenging then expected and we were happy to be done with it plus not be covered in blue paint anymore. Came into town today to pick up some more supplies for the library and to take Jane (one of the workers) to the bus station since she's leaving for a new life in Mombasa.

So that's it... more details in the next post in about one weeks time.

Kasia

PS: we have worm-like thingees in our water but they're usually cooked when we ingest them (hopefully - you can never be certain though... and if not then it's extra protine in our diet).

#6 Kenya – The Library & Random Facts

Our project during our stay here at the orphanage is to make the library a truly warm and welcoming place as well as an educational one. This being said, we set out to clean it, paint it (as well as the baseboards and crownmouldings), decorate it, build some shelves and furnish it with some educational material. Now that doesn’t sound to complicated, does it? One would think that a budget of $150 US would be more than enough to accomplish this in Kenya. Yet, as already mentioned, never expect anything and never assume anything.
Turns out that wood in Kenya is super expensive. 14 dinky little boards, un-sanded, uneven and with chunks coming out of them (all supposedly measured but of different sizes) ended up costing us over $35 US. But before we get to the boards and the shelves lets start with the cleaning. Washing filthy baseboards and walls with cold rain water and a bar of soap isn’t exactly a walk in the park, especially when you can’t just keep on refilling your bucket with clean water. So one wipe with a rag turns the water brown and then you’re scrubbing with brown soapy water. After that, although you have a broom, you don’t have a dust pan so you’re using an old pane of glass to pick up all the crap. Next, there’s about 4 layers of old super glossy paint on all the mouldings and all the walls. We want to sand the stuff down, but not having sandpaper, we ended up having to use kitchen knives. We did all the fireplace mouldings but gave up on the baseboards. Now we’re committing the biggest sin possible by repainting all the mouldings and baseboards with super-glossy white paint.
We also had the local handyman come by to assist us with the construction of the shelves. Firstly he bragged about the fact that all the work round the orphanage was done by him – primarily the paint job. If I were him I would never have fessed up to that. The paint is uneven, the baseboards are painted pink and the pink smudges over an inch onto the wall. There are also tones of paint blobs all over the floor. So that being said, Mr. Handyman told us he would help us drill holes in the wall so that we could do a built-in book shelve. When he said this I thought he would show up with an electric drill to drill into the brick. Well, what essentially happened is he came with a hammer and a wedge and basically began hammering huge holes into the wall. We had drawn approximate lines of where we wanted the shelves – i.e. measured out the height at which we wanted them. I remember Robin commenting that hopefully he’d come with a leveller. I didn’t say anything, but figured that this was too much to hope for. Turned out I was right. He didn’t bother measuring anything so now we have two holes that are pretty level and then the third hole that is about 2 cm higher. And this holds true for all the other holes he did.
Another thing that we’ve been able to accomplish in the Library is the painting of the fireplace with Bermuda Blue glossy paint. That on its own was not much of a challenge. However, washing the rollers afterwards of the paint is a whole different story. Robin tried to rinse them in a tub of water and the paint would absolutely not dissolve in it. It would, however, come off onto her hands but then would get stuck to them. It was a hilarious sight considering that her hands matched her shirt and her shorts. We were laughing that instead of being called a mzungu she should be called a bluezungu. I’ve honestly never seen paint do that. It completely would not wash off in water. It was like glue
So this library is truly a “make-it-yourself” adventure where you’re only allowed one knife, an old saw and two horrible brushes. Luckily though we have two extra sets of hands helping us now. Adrienne and Malaika, two Canadian girls, arrived last night also through GVN and are helping us out. Hopefully now the work will go a bit quicker.
Other than that, with the 3000 Shillings that we got from GVN we’re going to buy a big world map and a dictionary as well as an atlas. We’re planning to have the kid’s handprints on the door and the Footprint Prayer over the fireplace. With Robin and me heading back to Kisumu to pick up more material we’re also planning to buy some for a curtain. So for now we’re keeping our fingers crossed that the end result will look good.

Now some other random facts:

— The highschool kids go to school for 5am and come back at 7pm and also have class until 1pm on Saturday
— The primary school has over 1000 kids.
— You can use a bicycle to sharpen a knife
— A five year old kid can eat as much ugali as my entire family can eat potatoes (there’s 4 of us).
— Wood costs 30 Shillings (50 cents) per foot
— Gas costs approximately 70 shillings per litre (1.05 cents)
— Avocados grow on trees and they are 3 times the size of avocados back home and cost 10 shillings (15 cents) for three.
— Kids here pinch and rub at our skin to see if the white comes off.
— Showering every 5 days is acceptable and the saying “if it’s yellow let it mellow if it’s brown flush it down” is mandatory.
— If your feet are dirty at night you just put on “bed socks” to keep the dirt on the inside of them rather than on the bed sheets.

#5 Kenya – Excursion to Kisumu and Lake Victoria

Lake Victoria is the largest Lake in all of Africa and is also the source of the Nile. It therefore seemed like a worthwhile destination for a weekend excursion. However, I have learned never to have any kind of expectations because you generally end up being disappointed. Yet nevertheless, it’s hard not to have something in mind when one things of the largest lake of Africa. As such, we headed to Kisumu, a port town right on the lake’s shore, with the intention to relax a bit on the waterfront while sipping a beer or a Pepsi and enjoying the beautiful views and maybe a magical sunset. You sort of can’t help it. Anywhere in the world, (at least that’s what I thought), when you have a waterfront area, it seems only logical to have access to the waterfront; in other words – to have a seawall, or a park, or even some restaurants or cafes right along the water. Well, logic unfortunately doesn’t prevail everywhere. Kisumu, although a port city, makes absolutely no use of the fact that it’s located right on the shore of such an amazing lake. There is absolutely no way to access the waterfront from town and you only get glimpses of the lake between some alleys, shacks or other buildings. However, before I get into any further detail about Kisumu and what we did there, let me begin with our journey.
We tried going to bed early on Friday, knowing that we had to get up still before sunrise the next morning. Now in Vancouver I would expect to be laughed at if I said that I wanted to go to bed early on a Friday night, but I did not expect to have the same experience here in Keringero. People here don’t go clubbing, dancing or drinking on a Friday night, so I figured it wouldn’t be difficult to just disappear in our room. Boy, was I wrong with that assumption. The kids, not having to do any homework for the next day, were just having a blast. And they definitively don’t need a DJ, loud blasting music or a dance floor. All it takes is a couple buckets, some sticks and a good butt. Honestly, these girls really know how to shake their bum. Two would be playing on the drums, the rest singing and then a whole bunch dancing on the steps – and by dancing I mean primarily wiggling their backsides at super-sonic speeds. So with a party in full swing – as well as a huge full moon in the sky – it was nearly impossible to call it an early Friday night. Yet somehow, by about 10pm, we managed to crawl under our covers.
The morning brought with it a strange experience, considering that we have never gotten up before anyone else here. This time round, with our alarm set for 5am, we were the first to rise and it was oddly silent in the whole house. The huge orange moon was just starting to disappear behind the horizon and the sun still hadn’t shown its rays. We hiked it up to the road, caught a matatu to Nakuru and there boarded on another one that would take us directly to Kisumu.
All in all we arrived in Kisumu at 11am – so about 5 hours of a bumpy, not-too-comfortable and slightly squished ride. However, the scenery along the way was amazing. In the morning all the countryside was covered by a layer of mist. But it’s not like fog at home where everything is enveloped in it. Here, the tops of the trees would be peaking out of the mist creating a kind of fairylike environment. Then, further along the journey, we passed by rolling green fields: just endless mounds of green carpet. It looked as if you could stroll right over it – but in actuality the green were bushes of tea so dense that they formed a solid mass. To my great surprise, Kenya is the third largest tea exporter in the world and tea comprises its largest export (20% of all that it exports). The area around Kericho through which we were driving, is essentially one massive tea plantation owned my small landholders. The tea leaves get picked every 17 days by the same group of workers. According to the Lonely Planet book, a good worker can pick up to 100 kg of tea in one day.

So after this bumpy ride we finally arrived in Kisumu, checked into the YWCA and headed out into town for some cheap local food. The food turned out to be expensive, not so local and not so good, but we didn’t let that stop our excitement. Kisumu, unlike the other cities in Kenya that we’ve seen (i.e. Nairobi and Nakuru), seems very laid back, cleaner and less chaotic. Its streets are wider and there’s just a different feel to it. So we figured we’ll soak in this great atmosphere with a nice cold drink along the waterfront. Having walked through the center of town and seen only glimpses of the lake we resorted back to my trusty Lonely Planet which informed us that there is a Kisumu Beach Resort (campground) 3.5 km out of town that has a restaurant and bar right along the waterfront. Since it seemed like this would be the only place (against all logical urban development planning) that would have access to the water we decided to head for it. So we set off. First I should mention that it’s much hotter in Kisumu. Being warned of this we brought appropriate clothing and were now dressed in short beach shorts and spaghetti strapped shirts.
Our walk started out innocently enough but within a few minutes we would ourselves in the industrial part of town. Now to describe what it was like for us I’m going to create an equivalent scene in Vancouver. Imagine two Italian girls (clearly tourist), dressed in their finery with a big camera strapped around their neck walking through the industrial part of East Hastings. Well just as out of place as these girls would be so were we. Not only were we basically the only girls in this area, but we were also dressed for the beach and not to mention the fact that as mzungus we stand out like sore thumbs without the first two factors. So after 30 minutes of walking past car repair shops, industrial paint supplies and huge warehouses we began having doubts as to whether we were even walking in the right direction. Eventually we emerged out of the industrial complex and found ourselves along a country road with the lake visible about 300 meters to our left. We walked and walked. 3.5 km my a**. The Lonely Planet should better check its distances. We must have walked for close to two hours – or probably the equivalent of 8-10km. Thankfully we did finally find this campground and to our great relief the Lonely Planet at least got it right that there was a restaurant and bar. So we plopped ourselves down on some chairs looking out over the lake and ordered a couple of cold Tuskers.
We had hoped to be able to take a boat back into town since there was no way that either of us wanted to repeat that walk again. Unfortunately after over two hours of waiting around for a boat to come we gave up on the idea and decided to head back to the road and hopefully get a taxi. We were in luck because as we were making it back we were passed by a little 3-wheeled motorcycle taxi and took us back into town.
In the evening we treated ourselves to a fantastic western meal comprised of steaks and mashed potatoes and then found ourselves in need to kill a lot of time. We finished dinner basically at 7pm and it was already pitch black outside. The last thing we wanted to do was to head back to our hostel and go to bed that early, but there really didn’t seem to be any other alternative. We’ve always been told not to be out after dark and there was nowhere really for us to go. I truly don’t know what we ended up doing, but we found ourselves in bed at 11pm – so somehow managed to kill 4 hours somewhere in the meantime.
That night it rained harder than I ever thought possible. Over the years I’ve gotten used to the fact that Vancouver is one of the rainiest cities in the world (well – not quite, but the stereotype does exist). However, I’ve never seen anything like what we had this night in Vancouver. I was worried that our Sunday would get ruined due to the rain, but luckily by morning the weather cleared up and we were able to hit the markets.
Kisumu is known for its huge Sunday market and that’s where we headed. For me it was the highlight of the excursion. I love markets like that. It sort of reminded me of a cross between the market at Otavalo, Ecuador and the market that I’ve seen in Haiti. They had everything there: veggies, meet, fruit, clothes, material, shoes, furniture, hardware supplies... well, like I said, simply everything. The great thing was that we were the only two mzungus there. I don’t think the people there were accustomed to seeing whites at that market. Sometimes we’d be greeted by curious glances, other times by welcoming smiles and shouts of karibu and then there would also be those times of hostile looks or shouts, especially when people noticed my camera. But the best part was when I attached my large lens onto my camera. Some of the people there must have assumed that I was doing photos for some newspaper or the TV because they would request me to take their picture. I could honestly loose myself in a market like that for hours upon hours. I don’t need to buy anything, just walking around, observing everyone, taking photos and enjoying the atmosphere is the best part for me. It’s great to find oneself in places where tourists are not common and where you’re not being continuously hassled by touts.
Unfortunately that’s about all the time we had in Kisumu. We needed to make our journey back to Nakuru and Keringero before it got dark so after the market we grabbed ourselves some lunch, bought some fish for Phillis, She-she and Jane (for which they had specifically asked us), and boarded the matatu for the long and uncomfortable ride back home.

As it turns out, this Sunday we’re probably going to be heading back there for a very long and arderous day trip. We were informed that the gorgeous materials available in Kisumu are only sold there and in Dar es Salam. Both Robin and I wanted to get more and thought we’d be able to get them in Nakuru or Nairobi. Since that is not possible, our only option is to head back there. So this weekend we get to look forward to a 5 hour journey along the bumpy roads there, 3 hours or so in Kisumu, and then the 5 hour journey back to Keringero. Life goes on though and the materials (gorgeous African patterns) will be worth the effort.

#4 Kenya: Hakuna Matata!

It’s Tuesday and a week has gone by since we’ve arrived in our little home at Keringero. Saturday ended up being a very busy but productive day. Shopping for shoes, shirts, and trousers for the boys on a budget and as mzungus (white people) was not an easy task. But eventually we got a couple Eddie Bauer shirts and a Ralph Lauren shirt all on a budget of $9 (for 8 shirts). So can’t complain.

We also decided to treat ourselves to a feast of a lunch. Steak, half a chicken, mashed potatoes, salad and veggies all for the huge amount of $15. But the best part of the entire meal was the fact that the restaurant had a bathroom with flushing toilets and running water. Today we packed with us some soap and a towel and are hoping to wash our feet and faces in one of the bathrooms. Definitively the highpoint of a visit to Nakuru.

Our ride home was phenomenal. We caught a matatu just as it was getting dark. We had music playing all the way and to our left could look out the window at the setting sky and the magical colors of the sky. Although I must admit that I couldn’t dedicate full 100% of my concentration to this beauty since my ass was slowly roasting away. I was sitting right above the transmission and therefore had my own personal heating system. In Canada you got to pay quite a bit extra to get seats that heat up. Here it was all included. When we finally arrived in Keringero the walk by to our home was equally amazing. The sky was filled with stars. The birds and insects were twittering away and all the locals could still spot the shiny white people and would come out to greet us. Just an incredibly peaceful and welcoming feeling.

And then the invasion started. Sunday we were informed that there would be 10 more volunteers coming to our peaceful abode. We felt cheated and betrayed. In the short few days that we had spent here, these had become our kids, our house, our responsibilities. Now to be invaded by 10 strangers that wanted to do everything that we did was simply uncalled for. Plus, they were setting up beds for these invaders in our library, the one room that we had hoped to completely transform.

Well... maybe we’re making this sound worse than it really was. No one should ever complain about the arrival of people who are willing to help. However, we did feel a bit sad and were only glad that it was us who had arrived first and already staked out our ground. So in the early afternoon when these “beings” arrived, we decided to brave it and put on smiles on our faces to greet them. The kids greeted them as well with the usual song and dance along with drama performances. Finally James (the owner) did his welcoming speech and we sort of addressed the different things that will need to be done. Robin and I proposed our idea of doing the entire library and James fully supported us with it. He said that on Monday all the beds would be moved out of there and those sleeping in that room would be relocated somewhere else. We would be the ones in charge of what we wanted done with the entire room. So at least this way Robin and I felt like we were not being outnumbered by all these newcomers.

Another beneficial thing that came out of this entire invasion was the fact that the girls here at the orphanage started relating to us more and approaching us to chat. A bunch of them wanted us to sleep in their beds with them (since the newcomers were sleeping in the upper bunks of their room). However, we weren’t really too keen on giving up our bedroom and the ability to have somewhere to retreat whenever we need peace and quite. But it was great chatting with the girls, tickling them, joking around with them and just feeling much more welcome than we had for the last 4 days. We’re feeling like we’re bonding much more now – and if that means that we need the occasional invasion of strangers to accomplish that, so be it.

So that was Sunday. Monday seemed to be a great start to the week (with the exception of a couple minor things). It was our first teaching day. After breakfast we headed to the primary school and were given a schedule – two 35 minute classes every day. But before this could be done we were mobbed by about 999 kids wishing to shake our hands (or pinch us really, really, really, really hard – to make sure that the white did not in fact come off). I truly know now what celebrities feel like. When I climbed up on a wall to take a few pictures of the giant crowd of black heads with Robin’s glowing whiteness somewhere in the midst of them, the scream and roar that went up was overwhelming. It sounded as if Brittnay Spears had arrived right into the midst of a crowd of teenagers, or like a Backstreet Boys concert.

So yeah – we taught two classes on Monday – Grade 7 Atlantic Ocean and Grade 7 Indian Ocean. Not any real and substantive material, but rather semi-social-studies where we tell them about Canada, our history, our geography, culture and just way of life. They loved Robin speaking in her Newfie accent and loved me pretending to be a beaver. We’ll be teaching two classes every day and hope to slowly cover the entire world – i.e. do a lecture on Central and South America, one on Asia, one on Europe and one on North Africa. With all our traveling/living/working experience we figured we’d have enough to tell them about. But I think the main attraction of the lesson is having two mzungu girls standing at the front of the class (plus looking at Canadian money). By the way – does Canada have a Vice Prime Minister? We were asked that today and weren’t 100% sure of the answer.

After coming back from school we hung out a bit, double checked some paint supplies and helped the girls out in some minor things. The new volunteers are a bit unhappy about their current sleeping arrangements and were wanting to move into our room, but we were told to wait for James so that he could sort everything out. However, due to a huge rain-storm James wasn’t able to make it so things are still a bit up in the air.

Tuesday was another two lectures and then the trip into town to buy all the supplies required for the library and to take care of a few more things... and that’s where we are at now.

PS: We’ve given up on eating the meat that they serve here. Robin after having to swallow ligament a number of times decided it simply wasn’t worth the effort and I fully support her in this decision. You know it’s bad when you chew it for 20 minutes, take it out of your mouth, put it down on the plate, and then 10 minutes later try again for another 20 minutes. And then there’s the awkward moment when you’re left with 5 huge chewed chunks on your plate and they ask you whether you’re hungry and you look them straight in the face and say “I’m finished everything” as the see all the “meat” still on your plate. So ugali it is for us – along with some veggies and hopefully the occasional chapatti.

PS: The newcomers asked for so much tea in the morning (didn’t even drink it all) that there was no milk left in the afternoon to make any more. How rude is that?

#3 Kenya: JAMBO

Jambo - or in other words "Hello" in Swahili.

We arrived at Njaaga's Childrens Home on Tuesday and it will be the place that we will call home for the next 6 weeks for me and 4 weeks for Robin. The greeting was incredible. We had all the kids run up to our car as we arrived and even before we were able to reach the buidling had probably shaken 50 hands and greeted 50 faces.

All in all we have 74 kids at the orphanage ranging for 4 years old to 19 years old. We made a valiant effort on the first day to issue all the kids name tags so as to enable us to learn their names. However, within hours the name tags were gone and the faces just became a collage of unidentifiable smiles. We haven't given up though. Hopefully over the next month we'll be able to name each one of our kids. However, the same hope is not extended to the school kids. On Thursday we went and met with the head teacher at a local primary school and were informed that the school has over 1000 students from grade 1 to grade 8. We've been invited to be "drop-in" teachers at the school - so in other words come by a couple times a week and share or worldly experiences - talk to them about different cultures, different places etc. - a kind of ad hoc social studies course.

For now though, they've had vacation and school will start again come Monday. We're scheduled to drop by the school at 10am that day and aren't really sure what to expect - but either way it should be great.

Other than that - we're incredibly glad to be out of Nairobi. The countryside here is just amazing and all the people are incredibly friendly. The last thing we would want is to be stuck in a big city all the time - even if that means having access to things such as showers or a variety of food. Those are sacrifices that we were more then willing to make. We have no running water - just a bucket of water that we use to flush our toilet and to wash ourselves in (as well as do laundry). I still haven't washed my hair so we'll see how that goes when the time comes. There is electricity so that's no problem - but that's about it. Food is generally a couple pieces of bread in the morning, rice and greens for lunch and dinner or else ugali - this mixture of corn, beans and potatoes that are mashed into a really dense mass - with the same vegetables. An absolute lack of variety and although the stuff doesn't taste bad - 3 days here has us already wishing for something else. But can't complain. The portions are huge and we're not going hungry. And as I already said - I'll take the lack of food selection any day over staying in Nairobi and being spoiled to death.

Other than that - we've already gone on a number of walks around the countryside. The weather has been quite nice - sort of like summer in Vancouver. Warm enough for shorts and t-shirt during the day and cool enough in the evening to require pants and a sweater or fleece. Phillis, the resident teacher at our children's home, has taken us out through the local valley and villages visiting all her friends' houses as well as her own. We'd be welcomed everywhere, greeted with a cup of tea and an endless array of smiles and little faces running after us. Truly friendly people. Yesterday we went on a longer hike to the top of a big hill from where we had stunning views of the surrounding Rift Valley and a number of nearby soda lakes.

Today is our first weekend - we've taken a local matatu into Nakuru to take care of things on the internet and purchase a number of items. We handed out my suitcase of clothes yesterday to all the kids. Everyone got at least one item. Since we didn't have enough things for boys we promised to pick things up in town so today we were given a list of who needs what and hope to hit the markets here.

On a final note - as welcome as we feel, we're still a bit lost and confused as to what is expected of us. The kids are really self-sufficient and aside for helping out with some of the meals or hanging around with the kids we haven't really found anything that we're needed for. They do however have a room set aside as a library. It essentially was a bare room when we came that had a couple desks and a really old laptop that someone once donated (still works - sort of - and the kids use it to play games - we're hoping to get a typing program on it). So I think our major goal will be to buy some book shelves (or have some made) so that there is somewhere to place to books that we brough, paint the room a bit and clean it up. We're also hoping to post up some educational posters - especially stuff about aids/hiv awarness on the walls. I think if we succeed in making that room a welcoming and cozy place we will at least have accomplished something that they can be proud of for a long time.


Ok... enough for now. Tones of other things for me to take care of. Keep in touch everyone.

Kasia

#2 Kenya: Greetings from Africa

I just wanted to let everyone know that we arrived safe and sound. The trip was long and tiring but eventually, after 27 hours we finally made it. Aside for KLM messing up with my baggage, the service was great (they told me I was able to take 32kg when we called to check on Wednesday, but at the airport they only let me take 23kg – thankfully Robin had room in her bag to fit everything that I had to take out). I had been so tired that I simply expected crash immediately upon getting onto the plane. Somehow though that didn’t happen. On the first 10 hour flight I might have slept around two hours so when we arrived in Amsterdam I definitively was not feeling refreshed.
But Amsterdam was amazing. We arrived just before 1pm their time and headed out into the city. Customs was hilarious. I have never seen such lackadaisical customs officials as there. Their only question to me was why I was wearing an orange shirt. When I said it was due to the Queen’s Day celebrations that were taking place the guy smiled, said that I gave the correct answer and could pass. Robin on the other hand, wearing a red shirt, had to stay behind. Eventually though he let us all go.
Amsterdam on the other hand was simply overflowing with orange. It was one giant party. Probably close to two million people were arriving in Amsterdam on that day just for the party and almost all of them wearing orange. It was a sea of orange; a sea of dancing orange continuously moving to the beat of music. We just roamed all the streets sandwitched amongst all the 2 meter (7 foot) Dutch people. I swear – we looked like midgets amongst all the Dutch. I thought I might be able to spot a Dutch friend of my since he was 2.04 meters tall but quickly realized that that was not the exception but rather the norm.
We were too tired to party too much so after 4 hours of roaming, some beer and a hotdog we headed back to the airport and awaited our next 9 hour flight. By now I was completely exhausted. According to Vancouver time it was nearly noon on the next day and I had slept just under 2 hours. Yet once again after we boarded the next flight I could not sleep. Ended up watching 2 ½ movies before being able to fall asleep for a few hours. We arrived in Kenya at 6am local time with no adventures. Were picked up and taken to our homestay family which is super nice. We’ve been spoiled rotten by them over the last two days. Tones of food and they’re always asking what we want to eat, what we like and preparing everything for us. But unfortunately we will not be staying here in Nairobi. Today we’re heading out to Nakuru and will be placed in an orphanage 30km outside of that city in a rural orphanage. There we will be staying directly at the orphanage rather than with a guest family. We’re supper excited about it since everyone keeps on telling us how beautiful Nakuru and the area is (it’s right in the Rift Valley).

Other than that there’s been absolutely no culture shock. If I experienced culture shock in Cairo then Nairobi so far has been heaven in comparison to that. Supper friendly people. Definitively dressed differently than what we dress like back at home and the look of the city is different too, but it’s not overwhelming. It’s just a big city with it’s own problems, high rate of poverty and bad roads.

I don’t know how often we’ll be able to email. Nakuru definitively will have an internet connection, however since we’ll be placed 30km outside of it, it’s unlikely that we’ll be driving out to Nakuru that often. So please don’t expect too much. We’ll do our best.


Take care,


Kasia and Robin