#13 Kenya: Random Comments and Facts
After a good night’s sleep I remembered a few more curious tidbits of information that I thought I might share with you guys.
1. Don’t assume anything is self evident. I recently had the teacher come up to me and ask me what thumbtacks are. She had never seen them nor did she know what they were for.
2. Adults that behave like children drive me nuts... but with them having little exposure to different and new things, they tend to approach something that is unfamiliar like a child that is just learning about it. Hence we have one gentlemen that always drops by the library whenever I just want some peace and quite. He’ll just stand there and ask a billion questions. What is this? What is that? Why do you have white spots on the walls (they’re clouds)? What is this stop sign for that’s lying here on the ground? And on and on and on. Then when we were doing handprints on the door and all the kids got to do it, he insisted on holding each child’s hand and placing it on the door where he wanted it to be placed. The kids had no freedom. However, after we allowed him to do his own handprint he was satisfied and left.
3. Robin had a dress tailor made. Firstly I need to describe the circumstances a little bit. She saw a picture of a nice summer dress in a magazine and bought some fabric for it. The dress is a typical summer dress for our western societies: low cut, short and with a bare back. Well, she didn’t get a chance to find a tailor in Nairobi so walked into this Muslim shop in Lamu and before we could weasel our way out of it, the people there said that they knew someone who could make it. So measurements were taken and Robin was told to come back on the next day. When she did, she picked up not a nice summer dress, but essentially what could equally well be a parachute. The dress went down nearly to her ankles (or at least halfway past her knees) and the top was so big that she could honestly fly away if she flapped it hard enough. Robin, you better try it on and take a picture in it before doing any alterations to it.
4. Eating breakfast while looking out over paradise is priceless. The view from our orphanage is just breathtaking and to sit on the front steps while sipping tea in the early morning hours is something that I will dearly miss when I leave this place.
5. Riding donkeys in first gear is quite pleasant. Jordan, I’m happy to inform you that our donkeys never left first hear. To clarify, Jordan and I got to ride donkeys when we were in Egypt in the Valley of the Kings. The ride was about 1 hour one way and 1 hour the other way. My analogy is that donkeys have three gears. The first is when they are just slowly trotting down the road and it’s a nice and smooth ride. The second gear is when they pick up pace and all their legs are moving separately. Second gear is incredibly shaky, bumpy and uncomfortable. My donkey in Egypt refused to get out of second gear. I had two hours of the most rattling ride in my life and thought my entire camera would fall apart and all the screws would come out of it not to mention the ‘shaken-baby syndrome’ that I must have suffered afterwards. Third gear is fine because that’s the gallop. They’re going fast, but at least their legs are moving simultaneously so it’s nice even bumps. So I’ve been reluctant to ever mount a beast like that again, but upon Robin’s insistence we gave them a go on Lamu and I was incredibly thankful that it was first gear all the way.
6. Some volunteer organizations are better than others. Do your research well. Find out exactly where your money is going. I’ll write up a spiel about my takes on my organization at some later point. Originally I was disappointed with it, but after having talked to James I’ve come to understand how it works and to appreciate the work it is doing. But not all organizations are equally deservant of such praise. KVDA (Kenya Volunteer Development Association) might be one such organization. I say might because I don’t have personal experience with them. However, almost all the volunteers that have come through this orphanage while I have been here have been through KVDA. An example of their operation is that for 11 volunteers staying three weeks at the orphanage they have a mere $100 for food to last them the entire stay. This supposedly got augmented later on by a further $100. However, even $200 is not much money to feed 11 people for three weeks. And one should take into consideration the fact that each of those volunteers paid at least $200US to KVDA directly and many of them much more money to their umbrella organization (with one girl paying nearly $3000US for two months). If you consider that out of that $3000 merely $10 or $20 made it to James who runs orphanage then there is something seriously wrong with these institutions.
7. Riding in a matatu is much safer than riding in a big bus. At least the center of gravity is closer to the ground.
8. Bargaining for suvenirs when there is a big truckload of tourists parked right next to it is useless. You keep on getting muzung prices even from people from whom you bought things two weeks earlier (such as negotiating for necklesses for which I paid 45 shillings before and them now quoting me 300 shillings because they're assuming that I'm from the same truck).
9. More info about the kids and the orphanage is available at www.njaagachildhope.or.ke
Ok... that’s all I can think of for now. Time to head off. Plenty more to do.
1. Don’t assume anything is self evident. I recently had the teacher come up to me and ask me what thumbtacks are. She had never seen them nor did she know what they were for.
2. Adults that behave like children drive me nuts... but with them having little exposure to different and new things, they tend to approach something that is unfamiliar like a child that is just learning about it. Hence we have one gentlemen that always drops by the library whenever I just want some peace and quite. He’ll just stand there and ask a billion questions. What is this? What is that? Why do you have white spots on the walls (they’re clouds)? What is this stop sign for that’s lying here on the ground? And on and on and on. Then when we were doing handprints on the door and all the kids got to do it, he insisted on holding each child’s hand and placing it on the door where he wanted it to be placed. The kids had no freedom. However, after we allowed him to do his own handprint he was satisfied and left.
3. Robin had a dress tailor made. Firstly I need to describe the circumstances a little bit. She saw a picture of a nice summer dress in a magazine and bought some fabric for it. The dress is a typical summer dress for our western societies: low cut, short and with a bare back. Well, she didn’t get a chance to find a tailor in Nairobi so walked into this Muslim shop in Lamu and before we could weasel our way out of it, the people there said that they knew someone who could make it. So measurements were taken and Robin was told to come back on the next day. When she did, she picked up not a nice summer dress, but essentially what could equally well be a parachute. The dress went down nearly to her ankles (or at least halfway past her knees) and the top was so big that she could honestly fly away if she flapped it hard enough. Robin, you better try it on and take a picture in it before doing any alterations to it.
4. Eating breakfast while looking out over paradise is priceless. The view from our orphanage is just breathtaking and to sit on the front steps while sipping tea in the early morning hours is something that I will dearly miss when I leave this place.
5. Riding donkeys in first gear is quite pleasant. Jordan, I’m happy to inform you that our donkeys never left first hear. To clarify, Jordan and I got to ride donkeys when we were in Egypt in the Valley of the Kings. The ride was about 1 hour one way and 1 hour the other way. My analogy is that donkeys have three gears. The first is when they are just slowly trotting down the road and it’s a nice and smooth ride. The second gear is when they pick up pace and all their legs are moving separately. Second gear is incredibly shaky, bumpy and uncomfortable. My donkey in Egypt refused to get out of second gear. I had two hours of the most rattling ride in my life and thought my entire camera would fall apart and all the screws would come out of it not to mention the ‘shaken-baby syndrome’ that I must have suffered afterwards. Third gear is fine because that’s the gallop. They’re going fast, but at least their legs are moving simultaneously so it’s nice even bumps. So I’ve been reluctant to ever mount a beast like that again, but upon Robin’s insistence we gave them a go on Lamu and I was incredibly thankful that it was first gear all the way.
6. Some volunteer organizations are better than others. Do your research well. Find out exactly where your money is going. I’ll write up a spiel about my takes on my organization at some later point. Originally I was disappointed with it, but after having talked to James I’ve come to understand how it works and to appreciate the work it is doing. But not all organizations are equally deservant of such praise. KVDA (Kenya Volunteer Development Association) might be one such organization. I say might because I don’t have personal experience with them. However, almost all the volunteers that have come through this orphanage while I have been here have been through KVDA. An example of their operation is that for 11 volunteers staying three weeks at the orphanage they have a mere $100 for food to last them the entire stay. This supposedly got augmented later on by a further $100. However, even $200 is not much money to feed 11 people for three weeks. And one should take into consideration the fact that each of those volunteers paid at least $200US to KVDA directly and many of them much more money to their umbrella organization (with one girl paying nearly $3000US for two months). If you consider that out of that $3000 merely $10 or $20 made it to James who runs orphanage then there is something seriously wrong with these institutions.
7. Riding in a matatu is much safer than riding in a big bus. At least the center of gravity is closer to the ground.
8. Bargaining for suvenirs when there is a big truckload of tourists parked right next to it is useless. You keep on getting muzung prices even from people from whom you bought things two weeks earlier (such as negotiating for necklesses for which I paid 45 shillings before and them now quoting me 300 shillings because they're assuming that I'm from the same truck).
9. More info about the kids and the orphanage is available at www.njaagachildhope.or.ke
Ok... that’s all I can think of for now. Time to head off. Plenty more to do.
posted by Kasia Koltunska at 2:47 AM
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