My Kenya Adventure

Finding My Way

2009-05-11T22:01:00.006+03:00

"To lose your way is to find it." When one of our trainers told us this Swahili proverb I thought it was one of the dumbest I'd ever heard, but all of a sudden, I kind of get it. That said, I have an announcement: I am leaving Peace Corps.

I have always been of the opinion that when you start something—make a commitment—you find a way to see it through. I knew coming into this that it would be hard, but I was committed to finding a way to get through it. Leaving early was not an option; it didn’t even register as a possibility. It was, as with most things in my life, all or nothing. My decision was that if I got on the plane to go to staging, I would be gone for two years.
Even in training, when I was starting to get an idea of what was coming, I conceded that I may consider leaving after I had fulfilled at least most of my obligation. I didn’t want to leave without making some sort of impact on my organization and community.

And then I just had a total mind shift after getting to site. I want to say that I have spent a lot of time and reflection ensuring that this is not just me running away because it’s hard. I was prepared for hard; that’s not what this is stemming from. I have a strong faith in God and try to live my life according to His will and follow His guiding. A lot of my decision comes from how I feel I’m being led in this regard. While this was not a mistake, it is not where I want to—or feel I should—spend the next two years. The time I’ve been here has been useful; it has allowed me to accomplish many of the goals I set for joining the Peace Corps and served its purpose. Now it’s time to go home. I refuse to spend any more time waking up and wanting to be somewhere else.

In the morning I am off to Nairobi to do all of the closing stuff PC requires. That should take a few days and then I'll be on a plane back to the US. I will fly back to NY and spend some time there with the fam, then head out to HI. Beyond that, I have no clue what I will do, well besides eat everything in sight. I need a job...

Miss you, love you, see you soon!

What a Month

2009-05-07T08:30:00.001+03:00

I am back at site after about a month of being away and finally have a minute and a computer to write this. I and the rest of my training group spent ten days in Nairobi for our last phase of training. We stayed at a conference center in dorm-like rooms and ate in a dining hall and had sessions all day, so it was kind of a flashback to college. It was a little strange to be back around so many Americans after living at site, but we all managed it pretty well! Our second night together some of us gave a cooking demonstration in the conference center’s kitchen and managed to start a grease fire that required a fire extinguisher to stop. The food we made was great though! Most of us took every opportunity we could get to eat as much non-Kenyan food —pizza, ice cream, burgers, and sushi—as possible. On Sunday, our one day off, we went to an elephant orphanage nearby to watch the staff feed the elephants. It was super cute and we saw a baby rhino as well. By the last day we were all ready to be done sitting through sessions and sharing rooms.

Another volunteer (Krystle) and I had planned a trip to Uganda following the training, so at 5am we were up and checking out so we could get downtown to our bus. We spent the entire day—7am to 8pm—traveling to the capital of Uganda, Kampala. The roads were much better than I expected and I was exhausted from the busy past weeks, so I slept most of the way. We stayed overnight at a great hostel and then were up bright and early to go rafting on the Nile. Rafting was absolutely amazing and much more terrifying than I expected. We went through eight rapids from class 3 to class 5. Our boat flipped in two of them and I managed to wind up in the water in two more. Krystle was less thrilled than I was about rafting, but she hung in there. The other two guys in our boat were students from Union College who had just completed fellowships in Uganda and Malawi and were a lot of fun. The rafting company owns a campsite overlooking the rapids and we went back there for the night to eat a BBQ and relax. The next day we went back to the hostel in Kampala to meet up with some other PC Kenya volunteers who were also on vacation. We compared notes on our trips so far and traded rafting stories and spent the next day hanging out with them. Then the other group headed back to Nairobi and Krystle and I went to Mbale to visit a family I know there. The next day we went to Sipi Falls, which is a gorgeous set of three waterfalls near Mbale. We had to hike down into a valley and then back up out of it to see the falls. We were pretty unprepared for the hiking, but the views were totally worth it! Between the falls and the awesome hospitality of the family we visited, we had a great time. The next day we returned to Nairobi.

The thing about traveling in East Africa is that the travel itself is half the adventure. It doesn’t sound like we did much in the six days we were in Uganda, but all that time riding in buses and matatus was part of the experience. Especially getting back to Kenya. We made arrangements with a bus company in Kampala to meet our bus at the border rather than do the extra trip back to Kampala. We paid full fare for our tickets and got to the border, only to find out that our bus had taken a different route. After I threw a small temper tantrum in the bus office, we decided to get on a matatu to the next major town in Kenya and go from there. After a ton of hassle and stress, we eventually made it back to Nairobi. I didn’t think I’d ever be so happy to see that crazy city as I was then. Next I got a message from PC asking me to stay in Nairobi for a few more days, so Krystle went back to the coast and I checked into a hotel. There were several other volunteers also around, so we got a little extended vacation hanging out with them and eating more American food. As an extra bonus, I was there on my birthday and even go t to see a movie! I got back to my site last night (after paying 150 extra shillings because it’s back to school week and all the fares are hiked) and am back at work today.

It looks like it rained a lot while I was gone, because everything is green and lush. It’s also gotten a lot cooler here. I may have to buy warmer clothes if it stays like this. Other than that, everything looks pretty much the same. One of the cool things about being in Uganda was comparing it to here. Even though the countries are neighbors, there are a lot of differences. I think overall Uganda feels a lot more laid-back than Kenya. It has plenty of food and water, unlike Kenya, so I guess that makes sense. Between being there and in Nairobi, which is definitely like a different country than the rest of Kenya, it’s going to take some time to readjust to being back at site. Stay tuned…

Update

2009-04-09T10:29:00.000+03:00

I think this is going to be a very mundane post, since I don’t have much to report or any pictures to show, but I wanted to check in at least once this week since I’m not sure I’ll be able to in the next few weeks. Our last phase of training begins on Monday, so we’re all required to be in Nairobi by Sunday evening. I am going to stay with another volunteer Friday and Saturday, and then head down on Sunday. I’ve been looking forward to a break from my routine and seeing everyone for a while. I feel like it’s Christmas Eve and I am about 10 years old I’m so excited.

Last weekend I went to another town to visit a volunteer. The town is right on the equator and at the head of two of the trails to climb Mt Kenya, so it’s much more of a tourist stop than my town. It hustles and bustles while my town shuffles. And the people hustle too, in the rip-off-the-white-tourist kind of way. The other volunteer and I went to the sign that says “You’re on the equator” so I could get a picture. Just as we saw the sign, a man came up to us and told us he wanted to escort us to it. He offered to take our picture for us and show us how water swirls (something about it goes one way on the north side and the other way on the south…google it). The “payment” for all his helpfulness was to go check out his hut of tourist souvenirs. His was number 8 of about 20 huts lined up with the same stuff and the same persistent sellers urging us to come see what they had to offer. He promised us “no hassle” while we looked, which he seemed to define as only harassing us a little as he followed us around and picked up every item he thought I looked at to show us what a good item it was. Most of the stuff was either beaded jewelry or items carved out of wood and stone. Wooden safari animals and bowls were common, and then random animals, chess sets, globes, and even a Scrabble board made out of soapstone or sandstone. I bought a few things to send home, but not much. And of course I had to bargain for them. The man at the first hut I bought from was easy to negotiate with, but the woman at the second hut asked 2500 shillings for something I was going to offer 150 for. We settled on 300, which in my opinion was still too much, but if you convert to US dollars, that’s about $4 and I guess it was ok. I was most excited to buy a woven basket for myself. All of the mamas make them and use them mostly when they go to the market. I’ve been wanting one since training and almost bought one in my town, but I’m glad I held out for this one because I like it better than any other I’ve seen.

After we had seen enough of the same bowls and animals and things, we headed back toward town. And then the sky opened up and poured on us and my new basket. We tried to share an umbrella for a minute, and then gave up and ducked under shelter to wait out the rain. We stayed under cover for about 15 minutes until it was only sprinkling, and then made our way back to the center of town and had chai. It was great to see the other volunteer and even better to do some shopping (I do so little of it here)! I’ve decided not to lug my laptop to Nairobi, so I will be computer free for the 10 days of training and the week following while I’m in Uganda. However, I will get up a full report, hopefully with pictures, when I get back from those adventures, so stay tuned…

Miss you all! Love me.

Give Me a Biscuit

2009-04-01T11:04:00.002+03:00

The rainy season is here. This means I wake up every morning to gray skies and soggy ground. But by afternoon the sky looks bigger than I’ve ever seen it, a brilliant rain-washed blue with huge puffy clouds crowding each other all around.

This also means that the kids are home on a month-long break. Yesterday town was full of them, and when I went for a walk after work, it was clear that they were in a holiday mood. Let me explain: Children will ask any mzungu for anything that they think they can get: money, candy, pencils, biscuits, your watch, your phone, a bicycle, etc. The common belief is that all white people are rich and can afford to give them something. A lot of times with tourists this is true, but I am a volunteer, and it is very hard to make them believe that I am not rich. Therefore I get asked for a lot of stuff. The culturally sensitive answer (which I have given up on because it doesn’t work) is to respond that I don’t have any of what is being asked for, or maybe tomorrow. I usually just say no, which is perfectly acceptable in the US but all but unheard of in this culture. I say that’s what I’m here for: cultural exchange. This is a conversation I had on my walk:

Children: Mzungu! Mzungu!
Me: Sasa (very informal how are you)
Children: Give me a biscuit (cookie)!
Me: No
Old man walking his bicycle laughs
Old man: The children like to joke with you. They are just playing. (Clearly untrue--they really wanted me to give them cookies.)

Now repeat this exchange about 12 times, add some catcalls, about 20 “howareyous” with plenty of giggling whether I answer or not, and blatant staring from every person I pass, and you’ll get a normal day for me. If anything, I can say I’m working on patience. This is where I take a step back, think about this situation from their cultural perspective rather than mine, which puts a different spin on things. And makes me even more thankful to be an American.

Miss you all. Love me

Mail

2009-03-28T07:30:00.002+03:00

If anyone was planning to send mail/packages in the near future, don't send them yet. My address may be changing and I don't want to add to the post office's confusion!

Finally, the Mountain!

2009-03-24T20:08:00.003+03:00

Today there was not a cloud in the sky. I brought my camera on my evening walk and finally got some pictures of Mt. Kenya. The people here say that the mountain is shy because it usually hides behind clouds, and even today, when the sky was clear, the light was all wrong and the mountain just barely shows up in my pictures.

I’ve been scoping scenic overlooks for viewing the mountain, so I knew exactly where to go today to get some pictures. It happened to be directly in front of a house where these kids had just arrived home from school. As soon as they saw my camera, they yelled “piga picha! Piga picha!” (literally: to beat a picture, meaning take pictures). So I took a few pictures of them, including this one with Mt Kenya in the background. The girl on the left really hammed it up for the camera, which was really funny because people here are generally very formal in pictures and rarely even smile for them.

And then as I was walking the final stretch home, I watched the sun set over the Aberdares (a mountain range west of town). Again, the pictures can’t capture the overwhelming beauty of the landscape and the moment, but they give you an idea.

Language Weekend

2009-03-23T19:22:00.004+03:00

During our pre-service training we were told that we’d know we were really getting Kiswahili (the Swahili language—the official language of Kenya) when we started dreaming in it. Well it didn’t happen for me during training, but after three intensive days of studying with three other volunteers and a tutor, I had so much Kiswahili running through my head that I couldn’t sleep. And when I did manage to, I woke up with new sentences running through my head. The good news is that as of now, I am at the required level of language to get the PC off my back about it and will be able to start learning Kikuyu, the language spoken predominantly in my town. I just have to take the test one more time at training in April. Another result is that I’m having a more difficult time communicating in English, as may be evident in this post! Here are Daniel and Gavin studying hard.

And here I am, pretending I know what's going on.

I wasn’t sure what to expect for this language weekend, but I was pleasantly surprised by how well it went. Three other volunteers stayed in my house with me. They helped cook and washed dishes and gave me someone to talk to, so it was a welcome change from my usual solitary routine. I loved having someone else to wash dishes. And someone to make chai (tea) because for some reason I just can’t get the hang of making it; it never tastes as good as when someone else does it, so I gave up making it for myself. We had class as a group each morning with a language tutor (the same one I had for most of training, which was nice because he has a great style of teaching), then went to town for lunch, then we split into two groups (by level of language proficiency) and worked with our tutor separately. We went for walks in the evening which my town loved—instead of a one-mzungu parade they had a whole group! Most importantly, we made some pretty tasty food. Here is Pat cooking up some French toast.

As far as work goes, I’ve got some small projects lined up at the co-op that will help me see how I can be useful to the organization. I also have several books piling up to read and a house to clean (four people in a small space make it dirty a lot faster than one person!), so it looks like my schedule is pretty well filled for the next few weeks. I’m very happy to not be working two jobs and running around all the time, but I get antsy when there’s as little to do as there has been the past few weeks. I think one of the challenges of being a PC volunteer is finding a workable balance of too much and not enough activity. I guess that’s the trick any time, anywhere, and if I can learn it here, I’ll be doing well.

In other news, there’s a new kitten in the compound (well, she’s not exactly new, but she’s new to me). She strolls into the house occasionally looking for food and she’ll let me pet her, so I named her: chui. Ok, technically Jonathan named her, but either way, she has a name. Chui means leopard in Kiswahili.

Miss you all! Love me.

For Always Roaming

2009-03-19T10:05:00.002+03:00

I’m reading a book called The Piano Tuner and it’s captivating. It contains an excerpt from the poem Ulysses:

For always roaming with a hungry heart

Much have I seen and known—cities of men

And manners, climates, councils, governments,

Myself not least, but honor’d of them all,…

I am a part of all that I have met;

Yet all experience is an arch wherethro’

Gleams that untravel’d world whose margin fades

For ever and for ever when I move. Alfred, Lord Tennyson

This quote captures a little aspect of why I love to travel. The more of this place I see, the more other places I want to see as well. One of my few life goals (I’m generally content to just go with what comes up rather than set up expectations for the future by setting goals) is to visit all seven continents. I have three left: South America, Antarctica, and Asia (if you count New Zealand as part of the Australian continent). Of the three, Asia is the one I’ve been least interested in visiting, so have had no idea where specifically to go. Lately, though, I’ve been considering Goa, India or Myanmar. Goa is emerging as a tourist destination and looks beautiful, and I’ve read two books now about Myanmar and am a little intrigued. I would love to see Mt Everest as well, so I guess I have some options. And plenty of time to decide, since funding these trips will take a little planning. Or I could just take Samantha Brown’s job and start a “Passport to Asia” series…

Also, I found a 20 shilling coin on the ground yesterday. A PC friend had just blogged about a time he found $5 on the ground back in the US, so I mentioned it when I talked to him later that day, and he said it was pretty much the same. While it’s not exactly, I started thinking about its purchasing power. Here in my town, 20 shillings will get me any of the following:

A roll of toilet paper

A cup of chai or an order of fries at a local restaurant

A large mango

2 ½ minutes on my cell or 7 text messages

A week’s supply of tomatoes

2 eggs

About 4 cups of fresh milk

A small bottle of nail polish

What’s odd about that is that in the US these things are not the same price. Just another reminder of how different it is here!

Cross That Off the List

2009-03-17T11:06:00.005+03:00

This weekend two PC friends from the coast came to visit and we went on a game drive in Aberdare National Park, which is about a 45 minute trip from me. The animals we saw included a leopard and a black rhino. That plus the drive through Amboseli National Park on our way to Loitokitok—where I saw lions, elephants, and water buffalo—completes the “Big 5” safari animals to see in Africa. If I had a bucket list, seeing the Big 5 would be on it, and now I could cross it off. This weekend we also saw elephants, bushbuck, waterbuck, a monkey, a hyena, and about a million warthogs. The first animal we saw on our drive: a monkey.

Me in the safari car. It was a rough ride, so I spent most of it hanging onto the side rails and bracing myself. We took this picture when we were stopped.
Me, Jonathan, and Krystle on safari.
Me, Jonathan, and Krystle on safari. Me on safari again.
Looking out over the Aberdare Ranges. The whole sky filled up with huge storm clouds about halfway through the drive. I loved the way this sunbeam was still shining through.

We also ate really good food and I had more coffee in the two day weekend than I had in the entire first two months I was in Kenya. Of all the things I miss about the US, food is at the top of the list. I miss specific things like Sorrenti’s pizza and buffalo wings, bagels, and cheese, but I also miss the variety and availability of food. I miss being able to say “I’m in the mood for…” and being able to make it or buy it. Not that I have any right to complain; I have a comparatively good food situation at my site. While much of the country is experiencing famine or at least reduced food supply, my town market is always well stocked. With the same dozen vegetables, handful of fruits, and few starch staples. Even when I can get more exotic ingredients, either from the grocery store in the next town or Nairobi, I’m still pretty limited in how I can prepare them. Not having a real oven hinders the menu, as does only have one burner so that if I make spaghetti, I have to decide if I’d rather have cold pasta and hot sauce or hot pasta and cold sauce to determine which I cook first. This means I’m making a lot of stir fries and one dish creations with chopped up vegetables and a rotation of the herbs and spices I’ve acquired with either rice, pasta, or potatoes. I realize I talk about food kind of a lot in my blog, but it’s a big part of my life. (I even dream about it, but that could be the malaria meds!) It’s both a necessity and a time-consuming activity. I spend a significant amount of time planning what I’ll eat, budgeting for what I’ll eat, prepping and preparing what I’ll eat, and cleaning up after I eat. The eating itself is really a small part of my thinking about food.

Ok, back to the weekend. For my friends to get back to the coast they had to stay over one night in Nairobi, and since I had things to do for work in the city, I went with them. It was my first time being there without someone else who knew how to get around and I’m very proud of how well I managed. Without a map or bus schedule, I managed to get from the matatu stage to the hostel where we stayed, then to Sarit Center (an American-style mall) for pizza, then back to the hostel, then to the bank, PC office, and finally the matatu stage to go back to site without any snafus. You really have to experience Nairobi to understand why this feels like such an accomplishment. I know it doesn’t sound like much, but it’s kind of a big deal!

This coming weekend will be our long-awaited language immersion weekend. I’m hoping that if I study and prepare this week, then by the time Friday rolls around I can take the test and pass it and then spend the rest of the weekend learning without the pressure of having to pass a test. Enough for now.

Miss you all! Love me.

525,600 Minutes

2009-03-13T10:05:00.002+03:00

Exactly one year ago I was passed out in a dentist’s chair having my wisdom teeth removed because PC told me I had to. I had no idea where I would be going, what I would be doing, or if I would even go through with it. And now, one year later, I’m writing this from the middle of Kenya. A lot of times I think about my life as if it’s a movie, and how this would be portrayed as me typing this and then flash back to the dentist’s office in Hawaii a year ago, then flash through scenes throughout the past year…What song would be playing in the background, I wonder?

This is going to be a really lame post, because this was a really lame week. I haven’t been out of my town for two weeks straight. There’s still not much to do at work. Moving’s been put on hold indefinitely until the current tenant can find a new place to live. The language weekend that was cancelled last weekend is rescheduled for next weekend. I’m hoping that the weekend will give me enough practice to pass the LPI early and not have to stress about Kiswahili anymore. It’s not that I don’t know the language, it’s just that I don’t use it very often, which makes a conversation in a testing situation fairly difficult. Then it will be on to learning Kikuyu. Also, it was just announced that one of our PC Kenya staff is leaving to work with PC in another country next month, so we’ll be getting someone new to fill that position.

And March is still March. No matter where I go—despite climate, schedule, or circumstance—March drags on and on. Obviously in the Northeast it’s not exactly a pleasant month weather-wise, alternating between thawing and making mud everywhere and then snowing or wintry mixing all over everything just when we thought spring was coming. When I was in school, it was the thick of the semester when the end still wasn’t in sight and the work started piling up. In college it was midterms and registering for next semester and everyone getting sick. By the time I got to Hawaii, I thought it would be different, but though the weather was better, it was still a blah month. Here is proving to be no exception. After racing through February, I can’t believe we’re only halfway through March. Adding to that, since our seasons are switched on this side of the equator, we’re heading into the rainy season, not out of it. And after that it gets cold.

However, something that keeps amazing me (that I think I’ve mentioned before, so sorry for the repetition) is that time always passes. There’s no stopping it, reversing it, or changing it. No matter how excruciatingly slow or blindingly fast the minutes tick by, they never stop ticking. Despite our perception, they carry on in a steady, constant march forward. Just knowing that makes the tough times bearable and the good times that much more precious.

Miss you all! Love me

Old MacDonald

2009-03-10T10:30:00.001+03:00

As the people on my compound get more used to me, so do the animals. In addition to the turkey I mentioned before and the baby turkey (which now may be turning out to be just a chicken), there are other chickens, other turkeys, two cats, and some cows. And the spider.

I’ve decided to name them:

Percy: The baby turkey/chicken that comes in my house

Rick: The big tom turkey that struts around the yard

Anita(s): The two female turkeys that I can’t tell apart

Mittens: The black cat with white front paws (yes, predictable and unimaginative, I know)

Kiwi: The all black cat (in honor of New Zealand’s rugby team the All Blacks)

Mr Pheeny: The rooster and my nemesis lately

Ollie: The (very large) spider that hangs out on the bathroom door under my towel

Brownie and Blackie: The brown and black milk cows (more descriptions than names, but they fit)

While I used to worry about getting attacked by Rick, now I watch out for Mr Pheeny, who follows me to the garbage pit every time I dump a bag of trash and poops on my steps when he’s not happy with the selection. He also stands outside my bedroom window to crow, not just at sunrise, but for a solid half hour, usually between 6:30 and 7am.

Also, update on Ollie: I have not seen him for a few days, which worries me. At least when I find him under my towel I know where he is. When he’s not there, I don’t put my hand on any part of my wall in the dark. I’ve gotten very accurate at finding light switches in pitch black.

Reminders #1-6

2009-03-06T11:52:00.001+03:00

Well for the past few days I’ve really felt that I’m living in a foreign country. The day to day routine—things like using a choo instead of a toilet, cooking on a kerosene stove, not having a car, and washing clothes by hand—has become just that: routine. I generally don’t think about these differences very much because I’m used to them. But this week, enough out of the ordinary has happened that I can’t ignore the fact that I’m in Africa. Tuesday I went to the Central Coffee Auction in Nairobi to see how our coffee is sold. This meant that I had to be ready to go at 6:30, so we could ride a bus for 2 ½ hours to Nairobi then walk to the auction (reminder #1 I’m in a developing country). The process was interesting for about the first ½ hour, until I figured out how everything worked. And then it was just tedious. We only had a few lots of coffee for sale, and they didn’t come up until about three hours into the auction. Our coffee sold for the highest prices of the day (well over any other coffee that was bought), which was encouraging and livened things up a bit. After four hours of the auction, we called it a day and left to get lunch. Since neither the coworker I was with nor I know the city very well, we just picked a restaurant close to where our matatu stage was. After trying to order three things on the menu that they didn’t actually have (reminder #2), I finally settled for fried chicken and french fries, which was actually really decent. After lunch my coworker had some errands to run and then we were ready to head home. After rejecting several other options, my coworker picked the most cramped, hottest, smelliest, and overall most unpleasant matatu I’ve been on yet to get home. Though it was unpleasant, I still don’t feel like I can complain because we didn’t break down or get robbed, no one threw up on me, and I didn’t sit on gum or pee (all things that have happened to other volunteers) (reminder #3).

Wednesday we had some visitors to the co-op. Three buyers—from the US, Denmark, and Norway—came to tour the co-op. I like when people visit because I usually get information I need through listening to their conversations. It was a little strange, though, because it made the mzungu-to-Kenyan ratio equal instead of me being the only one (reminder #4).

As part of my ongoing Kiswahili learning, I had scheduled a “Language Immersion” workshop for the weekend. Three other volunteers and a language trainer had agreed to come stay at my site for the weekend so we could speak Kiswahili together. PC is really pushing for us to learn as much Kiswahili as possible, and they pay all the trainer’s costs so we can do this. They were supposed to arrive Thursday afternoon, so I had been spending the week making sure things were set for that. Thursday morning, after I had cleaned the kitchen and bathroom and scrubbed the floors I got a text message from our Safety and Security Officer about a scheduled demonstration by a Kenyan group called Mungiki that may interfere with public transportation. I live in a small town and the other volunteers that were coming live fairly close to me, so I didn’t expect this to be a problem. Wrong. Turns out this group shut down matatus and/or roads in every town the others needed to pass through to get to me, including my town. According to Wikipedia, Mungiki is sort of the Kenyan equivalent of the mob, and there’s a lot of tension between it and the police right now. They spent yesterday barricading roads with semi-trucks and flaming tires, as well as threatening matatu drivers to keep them from operating. This happened in and around Nairobi and throughout my area of Central Province, although I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary in my town except the lack of matatus running. This is apparently ongoing today and may last throughout the weekend. I wasn’t planning to go anywhere this weekend anyway, but just knowing that I can’t if I needed to makes me really antsy (BIG reminder #5). Also, we didn’t have power all day yesterday, so I couldn’t “monitor the news for developments” like we were advised (reminder #6).

Today, like yesterday, my boss is unable to get here, so we’ll have to delay our meeting about what I should be doing until next week. I came across one of my grad school papers from a strategic management class and decided I can at least do my own strategic audit of the co-op and maybe that will give me some avenues to pursue. While the visitors were here, they were accompanied by a representative from the coffee mill that we use who offered training in “cupping” coffee to anyone from our co-op that was willing to learn. Cupping is basically tasting coffee to determine its quality, and I said sign me up, so soon I will start learning!

And so I finish my eighth week at site. I have good days and bad days. I am motivated and I lack motivation. I’m content with my day to day and I look for new things to occupy me. Most of the time I feel like I’m on a roller coaster. Nothing is static and everything—especially my emotional state—is constantly different than it was just a minute ago. Welcome to the life of a PC volunteer!

Kenya Speak

2009-02-27T08:53:00.002+03:00

Though I’m still far from fluent, I’m starting to internalize some Kiswahili, and am developing preferences for some of the common phrases.

Phrases I Dislike

“Tuko pamoja?”: “Are we together?” This is like in a college lecture when the professor wants to make sure the class is paying attention, but slightly more condescending, in my opinion. Many of our technical instructors and guest speakers used it abundantly, so it brings back memories of training whenever I hear it.

“Isn’t it?” Always said in English, the speaker is looking for you to agree with whatever he has just said leading up to the “isn’t it.” I find it extremely irritating because either I’ve been nodding and showing my agreement clearly anyway or I don’t want to commit to agreeing and am now forced to. Or it’s used at the end of a rhetorical question, in which case there is no good way to respond.

“tsssst” (hissing sound) Used to call waiters in a restaurant or mzungus. I’ve worked as a server long enough to cringe every time this happens and not be able to bring myself to do it. Also, I’m not a dog or a cat, don’t hiss at me.

Phrases I Like

“Wewe”: “You” (pronounced “wayway” or sometimes just “way”) Like saying “hey, you” to get someone’s attention. Also a reprimand when used by a mama with a certain tone. I like its versatility.

“Hakuna shida”: “There is no problem” Either really means it’s ok, no problem, or there is a problem, but we’ll work it out. I get this from my boss a lot, and generally his body language clues me in as to which one he means. But things always work out, so it’s good to hear. (By the way, “Hakuna matata” from the Lion King really does mean “there are no worries.”)

“Labda kesho”: “Maybe tomorrow” Actually this could go on either list. Kenyans use it when they really mean no, but since no one just directly says no (it’s culture), they say this instead. So it’s not good to hear, but great to say, when you are trying to politely say no. Also good for refusing marriage proposals.

“Sema”: “Say/speak” Means “what’s the word?” or “talk to me.” My homestay baba (dad) always answered his phone “sema” instead of “hello.” I think it’s funny.

Reading List

2009-02-26T11:49:00.003+03:00

Another volunteer gave me this link: www.gutenberg.org. It is a site where you can download thousands of books that are no longer under copyright. Since I have time on my hands and love reading anyway, I am thrilled. However, I'm sort of at a loss for what to read. I'm about halfway through Sense and Sensibility and would love ideas for what to read next. I'd like something different, and am open to just about anything...

Suggestions? Remember, these are all out of copyright, so nothing current or new. Thanks so much! miss you and love you.

My Walk Home

2009-02-24T18:05:00.000+03:00

I noticed I’ve been getting awfully reflective in my recent posts and not described a whole lot of my day to day, so this post is about my walk home from work. I’ll describe today’s walk specifically, but there’s not a lot of variation, so it applies to most days.

I pack up my laptop and Kiswahili text (in case I get inspired to study tonight) in the office around 4:45. I say goodbye to two coworkers on my way out and leave the compound. As I exit the gate, I turn left and take a shortcut across a small hill behind some of the market stalls that line the road. There’s just been a new delivery of second-hand clothes, so there are several mamas sorting through the selection of t-shirts in some of the stalls. I cross the road and enter the back of the market square. I need to pick up some produce for the next couple days because I’ve been away all weekend and my kitchen is empty. I’m planning to stir fry some veggies with some rice tonight. I just discovered one mama sells cilantro, which I love and will add to anything, so I stop there first. I greet her, ask for the cilantro, and tell her I want 10 shillings worth all in Kiswahili and give myself a mental high five for doing so. Last time I also bought zucchini from her, but today it looks pretty shabby, so I decide not to. I walk toward the front of the market as many of the sellers call for me to buy from them in both English and Kiswahili. I pass a stand selling tomatoes, onions, kale, and bananas. And then I pass another stand selling tomatoes, onions, kale, bananas, and pineapples. Then another, and another. Occasionally there are green peppers, potatoes, and I did see some pumpkins, but just about every stand has the same staples of varying quality and quantity. I cross over to another section where all of the stalls sell beans, lentils, and ingredients to make uji (porridge). These sellers must have finally figured out that I don’t actually eat any of those things, so didn’t bother to harass me. I got to the front section with more of the same produce as in the back. I have two sellers in that section that I generally buy from , one because he has garlic and the other because the mama was nice to me. With so little distinction in price and quality, those are the kinds of things a buyer goes on to decide which stalls to frequent. I bought six roma tomatoes, a bunch of garlic, three green peppers, and six onions for 65 shillings—slightly less than $1. (All the produce is smaller here, which works well when you’re only cooking for one.) I spotted another stall with zucchini, so I went over to get some. I started to ask for it in Kiswahili, but have no idea what the word for zucchini is, so I just trailed off and pointed. The seller said, “oh, zucchini?” and I said “yes.” (When we were learning food in language class, our teacher told us that even though words exist for all the produce, a lot of it is called by its English name regardless. Works out for me.) I asked for 10 shillings worth and he gave me three. I walk past the eight cabbage sellers spread out by the gate (they also know I never buy cabbage so didn’t ask) and turn left onto the road.

I walk past the post office and into the closest thing to a grocery store my town has. I greet the mama who is always at the “register” (cash box), who is the same mama who told me I should marry her son if I was going to be here for two years. I try to go to this store because my boss recommended it and they’ve always been very nice to me. However, I’m realizing they’re pretty expensive. I want to make a cake this weekend and need eggs, sugar, and cocoa. I already knew they don’t sell eggs, so I was planning to get the sugar and cocoa and pick up the eggs another place tomorrow. Most of the shops sell sugar they’ve bought in bulk and bagged by weight, which is cheaper than branded sugar, but this shop only had the expensive kind, so I’ll skipp that too and just buy the cocoa. 100 shillings for a small container. That’s actually kind of a lot, but like I said, I’m trying to support the shop. Tomorrow I’ll go to the shop across from the office and get the eggs and sugar (6 eggs and ½ kilo sugar: around 80 shillings/slightly more than $1).

I digress for a minute, but humor me: I’m conditioned from the other traveling I’ve done to convert prices here into US$ to know how much things cost. However, in doing that I’ve always had a US$ budget to spend. Now that my salary is in shillings, it’s kind of pointless to do the conversion. Instead I’ve figured out what I earn per day, and it gives a much better sense of what I’m spending to compare the prices to that.

Ok, back to my walk. I pay for the cocoa and say goodbye in Kiswahili. I turn right and keep walking. I pass the bank and some mechanics and the shop where I sometimes buy fresh milk. Several full matatus whiz past on the road headed toward Karatina. I start down the hill and hear some hissing. Across the road is a stream of primary schoolchildren just leaving school in their navy blue shorts, plaid blue shirts, and navy blue sweaters (that they’ve worn all day even though it’s at least 80 degrees still at 5pm). The hissing is coming from them. Here in Kenya, hissing is an acceptable way of getting the attention of a waiter, or apparently a mzungu like me. I actually prefer the hissing to the “howareyou” chant we got in Loitokitok because it’s much easier to ignore. I stop at the lone produce stall just above my house to get some mangoes. I feel like I should buy from her whenever possible because she’s my neighbor, so I bought three huge mangoes for 60 shillings. I say goodbye and walk toward my gate. There are a sheep and a goat tied up along the road to graze. Still not sure who they belong to, but they’re there often. A new addition, though is a tiny kid. As I walk past, it jumps, skips, and hops over to its mother for protection. I open my gate and come around the side of the building. I scan the yard to locate the turkeys and chickens (to make sure I’m not going to get attacked), then check to make sure they haven’t left any presents on my steps. I unlock the door and step inside. I’m home.

On Being a Good Volunteer

2009-02-24T13:06:00.001+03:00

Do what you love. This has always seemed to me to be the best advice given on the subject of what to be when I grow up. My biggest challenge in following this advice is figuring out what I love. I’m pretty specific on the things I dislike, but I like a lot of things. Generally liking something provides the motivation to pursue it until you’re really good at it, and this combination usually produces something to love. However, I have been blessed to be good at almost everything I am interested in. I don’t say this to be cocky, but to point out its downside. It gives me too many options while preventing a particular focus, or anything that stands out as something I should pursue.

When I got my assignment to Kenya, I was asked to fill out a resume to be shown to my host organization. On that resume I needed to list my hobbies and interests. I had a really difficult time doing that. While I could have listed twenty or thirty interests, my hobbies have been pretty limited. I am happy to do almost anything, but have trouble choosing what to focus on, so usually just go with whatever the people around me are doing. Since the people around me are frequently changing, so the hobbies are changing too. I don’t stick with many things long enough to consider them a personal hobby, just something I did for a while.

So why am I bringing this up today? I’ve been reading a lot of the other volunteers’ blogs and seeing the kinds of projects they’re already becoming involved in or making plans to initiate at their sites. And then I look at my site, and my lack of inspiration for these things, which the PC calls “secondary projects.” I am really glad that I have a main project that is so interesting to me (coffee), but am at a complete loss to figure out what I should be doing for that, let alone figuring out anything else. Others have started dance classes, libraries, special interest clubs, business classes, and environmental projects, according to their interests. I walk around my town and look at things.

I knew coming to site that I will not be one of those volunteers that immediately jumps into the community and finds ways to be involved. That has never been my style, and even coming halfway around the world is not going to change that. But now that I’ve been here for some time and am starting to feel comfortable in my surroundings, I’m starting to feel like I should have at least some idea of what else to do here. And…I have no clue! We have six more weeks until we get together for the last phase of PC training, so I think it’s acceptable to still be figuring it out until then, but even thinking that I’m starting to put pressure on myself to be a good volunteer. One of the cool things about PC, though, is that there are so many definitions of a “good volunteer.” What one person does at one site to be successful is not what everyone else has to do. It’s like a choose-your-own-adventure book come to life. And while things probably won’t wrap up as easily as they do in a story, the twists and turns are just as exciting.

As I think about what it will mean for me to be a successful volunteer, I have thought a lot about the reasons I joined PC in the first place. It’s fun to be able to see some of those reasons already validated, even in this short time. Yes, they may be the more self-serving reasons because the altruistic ones will take more time to achieve, but it’s still comforting to see they’re being realized. I’m living in another part of the world, I’m being challenged to learn new things, I’m reinforcing life skills that I will need no matter where life takes me, I’m gaining a more balanced perspective, I’m meeting some really great people, I’m traveling, and while I may not know what kinds of projects I want to do here, I think I’m figuring out some things for when I return to the US. The things that will take more time are exchanging my culture with people in my community and figuring out sustainable ways to help my community and my host organization. These are not exactly easy tasks, so I hope that I can figure out ways to complete them and thus earn the title of a “good” volunteer.

Green Hills of Africa

2009-02-16T19:02:00.002+03:00

Ernest Hemingway spent a lot of time in Kenya and wrote about his experiences in a couple books. I found one in the PC library and read it during training. Not that Hemingway is someone whose character I admire, but I do like the way he writes. This is where I came across the well-known—well, it was familiar to me, so I assume it’s not unheard of—quote: “So if you have loved some woman and some country you are very fortunate and, if you die afterwards it makes no difference.” As I am experiencing life in Kenya, it was fun to read his observations and compare them with mine. He goes on to say:

“Now, being in Africa, I was hungry for more of it, the changes of the season, the rains with no need to travel, the discomforts that you paid to make it real, the names of the trees, of the small animals, and all the birds, to know the language and have time to be in it and to move slowly. I had loved country all my life; the country was always better than the people. I could only care about people a very few at a time” (The Green Hills of Africa).

The longer I’m here the more beautiful the country seems. I am growing very fond of the hills and plants and birds and sky. It’s true that at this point I probably love the country “better than the people.” It’s not always easy to love people who shout “mzungu!” as I approach and then blatantly talk about me in their language as I walk past, or those who ask me for money or preach incorrect doctrine at me as I’m walking. But the people are part of the country, and as I get more attached to it, as I do every day, I become more attached to them.

Another Use for a Leso

2009-02-13T18:46:00.003+03:00

I think I've mentioned lesos before. It's basically just a rectangle of patterned fabric. I think they're usually hemmed, but mine are not. yet. I may get ambitious, but probably not. These have about a million and one uses. The most common are as a wrap skirt for the mamas here. I have also seen them commonly used as head wraps, shawls, baby carriers (they just sling the baby on their back and tie the leso around their shoulders, then usually add another one loosely over the baby for warmth because it's only about 85 most of the time...). I have four, three of which were gifts. One is a tablecloth and the other I wrap around my laptop when I carry it in my backpack and sometimes use as a lap blanket at the office when I want to sit in ways not appropriate for someone wearing a skirt (indian style at my desk, usually). It's also been great napkin, towel, and yoga mat. Today, I discovered yet another use for it:

This is a leso tied acrosee my front door to make a barrier. The reason I needed it is below:

This little guy (I think it's a baby turkey, but it's hard to know for sure because we have chickens and turkeys running around) came in for a visit this afternoon. He checked out the entire living room, then my spare room and the bathroom before I kicked him out. I have the door open for air and light, so I didn't want to shut it, but I'm not fond of messy visitors, so I improvised.

Also, just to let you know, I adjusted the comments so that you can now leave one as "anonymous" without having a blogger account. I didn't realize it was restricted, so if you tried to comment and couldn't, sorry, and here's your chance!

love me

Learning How to Sit

2009-02-12T11:35:00.003+03:00

A big part of Kenyan culture is just sitting. I say “just” from a Western perspective, when really it is so much more than that. In such a communal culture, people value spending time together. For the mamas and their girls, the days are filled with such strenuous labor and never-ending demands, that a few minutes spent sitting and talking has been well-earned. For the men, many of whom spend the bulk of their day watching the town and discussing the comings and goings (especially now that they have a mzungu—me—to talk about!), this is their primary occupation. Decisions are made, consensus is formed, ideas are exchanged, and progress is achieved all through this seeming inactivity. The foundation of any town here is its inhabitants’ art of sitting.

This is something our cross-culture trainers tried to get across to us throughout training. For most of us volunteers, however, it’s not something that sinks in right away. To understand and see the value of sitting, having grown up and been employed in the US, takes some time and practical experience. Even after having it drilled into our heads for two months, and then reminding myself every day for another month, I still find myself frustrated at coming in to the office every day to…just sit. I bring my computer and do my own stuff, but by lunchtime I have this creeping sense of guilt for not doing anything “productive” for the co-op. This is compounded this week by my supervisor and the rest of the staff running around to prepare for a huge audit next week by our Fair Trade certifier. In the midst of that hustle and bustle, it takes everything in me to keep still and believe that there is value in learning the art of sitting. Pole pole (slowly slowly) is how things work in Kenya, and pole pole is how I will learn to adjust to them; for now I will rein in my guilt and pretend to be content while I sit.

One Month Anniversary

2009-02-11T09:49:00.001+03:00

Well I have been at site now for four full weeks. The people in town seem to finally be understanding I may be sticking around for a while, not just passing through. This I can tell because they stare less overtly (though it's still pretty obvious) and the shopkeepers of the shops I like are starting to remember my purchases. Actually, yesterday one shopkeeper told me if I was staying for two years I should marry her son. That's completely logical: I chose to live in Kenya for two years to find a husband because there weren't enough choices in the US... I just laughed and told her I didn't want to get married yet, which is a completely foreign concept to people here.

Now that I've been doing this for a few weeks, I have fallen into a pretty set routine. Having a routine helps me to remember to do things like take my vitamin and it's comforting. Here's a typical weekday: I wake up between 5:30 and 6:30 to use the toilet. I am super spoiled to have an indoor toilet, so I don't have to put on extra clothes to be decent like I would if I had to use an outdoor one. It's usually still dark at this point, so I go back to bed for a little bit. I don't usually sleep, just lay under my mosquito net and think about things. Since the malaria medicine I'm on induces such weird dreams, a lot of mornings I try to piece the ones from the night together and laugh at how strange they are. I get up sometime between 7 and 8, make my bed, and turn my computer on. I light my stove to heat water for coffee (yes, I got my hands on some fresh roasted and ground pure Kenyan coffee and it's delicious!) or hot chocolate and decide what I want for breakfast. This morning I made toast for the first time by buttering some bread and frying it in my sufaria (cooking pot), then scrambled some eggs. Other mornings I have Wheatabix, which starts out looking like mini-wheats and then I add warm milk and Rulison honey and it becomes similar to oatmeal. If I thought ahead to buy fruit the night before, I'll have pineapple or mango also. I check my email and write in my journal while I eat breakfast, then get dressed and pack the laptop to bring to work.

I leave my house around 9 and walk the 10 minutes through town to the office. Here is a picture of the front:

I say hello to Mary in the office next to mine as I unlock my door and unpack my things. This is my office:
I open the window to get some air, which means whatever music I listen to on my laptop competes with the blaring radio at the market stall outside. It reminds me, if I ever start to forget, that I'm in the middle of Kenya, but most of the time it's fine. It does serve a useful purpose: when the power goes out in town, the radio goes off, so I know to turn off my laptop, and when the power comes back on, so does the radio, so I know I can use my laptop again. Throughout the morning I do a mix of research for the co-op and personal stuff like writing and reading and memorizing. Most days there's not much work-related to do, so I'm trying to learn as much as I can and waiting for my boss to have time to give me things to do. I've visited several of our factories and the mill where our coffee is processed, sat through a couple meetings, read all of the reports and strategic plans, and brainstormed a lot, and still I'm not sure where to go from here. By 1:30 I'm starving, despite having chai and a snack mid-morning, and go to lunch, always to the same place, since restaurants in town are kind of limited. When I get back from lunch I study Kiswahili or read the news until 4:30. Then I pack up and go home.

I've started cooking dinner pretty regularly, but just about everything I make is two portions, so I am only cooking about every other night and having leftovers in between. If it's a night that I'm cooking, I usually stop at the market or a duka to pick up some produce for the meal. I was buying fresh milk (12 shillings/15 cents) for 1/2 kilo (about 2 cups), but I was saving the second cup til morning for breakfast and it kept going bad, so I finally gave up and just bought powdered milk. When I get home I put things away, change, and go for a walk. There is one road into town that splits on the other side, so that makes three choices for my walk. However, there is a dirt road across the street from me that I found about two weeks ago, and I love it. There are fewer people on it and it's beautiful because it winds through the countryside and past all these cool houses. It also gives a breathtaking view of Mt Kenya when it's clear. I don't usually bring my camera with me, so of course on the days I do the mountain is covered in clouds. The whole rest of the sky will be clear and bright blue, and the mountain will have a clump of clouds hiding it. So this is the mountain hiding:

Before I leave I will have a clear picture of it, I promise! At least I will try. I get home around 6 and cook and relax, so that I'm generally finished with dinner by a little after 7. I heat my water and take a bucket bath, then do a crossword puzzle and read and wind down until bed between 9 and 10. I just started reading Sense and Sensibility, so I read that until I can't keep my eyes open and then call it a night. It seems like I'm sleeping for a really long time, but I don't sleep here like I did at home, so there may be a lot of quantity, but it's not good quality. Then I wake up the next morning and do it all over again.

The weekends are my escape from routine. I usually go visiting other volunteers, which entails a lot of riding in matatus and eating and exploring new places, so I'm worn out by Sunday night. I spent this past weekend in Nairobi, which was an adventure.

I wish I had more entertaining things to tell you, but my mind is blank at the moment. Time is still passing in its funny longest-days-of-my-life-but-where-did-the-past-three-months-go? way. I still have way too much time to just think, which is leaving me emotionally exhausted. I'm used to being busy and physically and mentally exhausted, but this emotional stuff is new to me and something to get used to. I still think the other volunteers are probably the coolest people I've ever met and they help enormously to get through each week. I'm sorry that I don't get to spend more time with them, especially the ones out on the coast. My cell phone rate is 3 shillings per minute or 2 shillings per text message (outgoing only; incoming is free), and I went through 1,000 shillings in two weeks trying to keep in touch!

As I sit here wracking my brain trying to think what else to tell you, I see what time it is and think I should probably wrap this up. Miss you all!

love me

Things That Made Me Happy Today

2009-02-04T17:10:00.001+03:00

(1) Weekend plans: I'm going to the big N (Nairobi) to eat sushi and cheeseburgers. After dreaming about chocolate cake and mom's homemade pizza last night, I'm ready for some American food.

(2) Furniture! I have a couch. It was delivered with two matching chairs, a tv stand/cabinet, and a vanity for my bedroom.

(3) The couch and chairs are zebra print. Not my usual style. Actually none of my furniture is my usual taste at all because I had nothing to do with its creation. Let me explain: all of my furniture is being made by a member of the co-op I work for who is also a (very expensive) carpenter. I paid for my bed and coffee table, but when he gave me a quote for the rest of the furniture I wanted (a couch, a dresser, and a work table for the kitchen) it was about twice what I had been given for my total settling in allowance. The manager of the co-op said he'd talk to the board, and they are buying the remained of my furniture. They also think that I need a desk and chair, the vanity, cabinet, and chairs I got today, a gas cooker, and a tv.

(4) Rearranging the furniture after it was delivered. It was an exercise in Kenyan culture when the men brought in the furniture and then proceeded to discuss amongst themselves how to arrange it. I'm sort of particular about how my furniture is arranged, but I could tell that my opinion wasn't a factor in this decision; there is a very particular way in which Kenyan sitting rooms are set up, and the only debate was how to make sure the tv could reach the plug. Happily, the furniture isn't super heavy so once they left, I shuffled everything around until I was as satisfied as I could be, given the size of the room compared to the size of the furniture. It's starting to look like a real house!

(5) This Land Is My Land playing on the radio of a duka (shop) on my way home. (I also teared up a little at this one. I'm a little patriotic; it's the marching band history.)

(6) An afternoon thunderstorm, happiness amplified by getting home just before the skies opened up and poured the rains down in Africa... (that's for you, Krystle)

(7) Hot chocolate (with milk straight out of the cow) in my new mug. It's the simple things in life!

(8) The You Know You're From Fonda-Fultonville When... list on Facebook.

That's a lot of happiness in one day. I'd have been content with just one or two of those things, but like a lot of things with Peace Corps, it seems to be all or nothing. Miss you all!

love me

Another Week Down

2009-02-01T14:49:00.000+03:00

I managed to get a few more pictures this week. This is the view from my front door. There is a cow in there; look for the black in between the brown fence and you've found her!

Here's the view of my front door. I was not thrilled to see this neighbor as I've heard they're pretty ornery, but this one is laid-back and keeps pretty much to himself.

And this road begins across the street from my house and just meanders for a while. It was so peaceful the day I decided to explore it.

Time is finally starting to move a little faster than the sluggish pace it’s been going, and I’m very relieved. Having spent an entire day at the annual meeting (see previous post), the other four days in the office were pretty easy to fill. I have been using some office time to go over the Kiswahili texts PC gave us to try to improve my vocab and understanding of the mechanics. What I really need is practice with people in the community, but even when I make the effort to initiate in Kiswahili, I still get English back. I could probably make more of an effort, though.

I’m still trying to research all of this coffee stuff to get it straight in my own head. I’ve been to three of the eight factories and seen all the equipment, but we’ve just finished the processing season so the most act

ual coffee I’ve seen is the bags of it waiting to go to the millers. The next steps for me are to go to the miller to see that process, to go see the auction in Nairobi in action, and to talk to a few contacts I’ve made about buyers and shipping. I enjoy being able to do things at my own pace and discretion, but it would be nice if I was receiving a little more direction from the management. I’m also working on some spreadsheets that I want to train the office staff to use. The management committee—all men around my dad’s age—are interested in learning basic computer skills as well, since they don’t even know how to turn one on. I guess I’ll be doing some teaching!

I’m grateful every day that I decided to bring my laptop, as my supervisor told me someone was “looking into getting one in Nairobi for me to use.” He told me this at the end of my first week, which I spend reading the newspaper and watching people work because I didn’t have anything else to do. Knowing the pace of progress here, I offered to just start bringing my laptop while we were waiting for that one. I bought a modem in Nairobi that just plugs into the laptop and dials up and uses pre-purchased credit. My supervisor offered to pay for the credit so I could use it for work, which is awesome. I’m happy to have my iTunes while I work, so it’s been good so far!

I spend a lot of time thinking about myself here. That may seem odd, given my job is to find ways to help my community and my business partner and generally be of service. But it’s sort of necessary to integrate into the culture here. It takes a lot of thinking about my own culture, and culture vs. personality, and interpersonal relationships to get settled here. PC did its best, for eight weeks of training, to start us thinking about these things, and now that I’m on my own, the thoughts never seem to stop.

For example, I am a pretty independent person. I am happy

to do things by myself. When I worked for Oakwood, I spend about 75% of my day alone and that was one of the things I enjoyed about the job. While I’m not antisocial, I’m content whether there are other people around or not. And occasionally, I need to be by myself. Here, I have plenty of time to be by myself. Any time I’m at my house I’m alone. At the co-op, I have my own office at the end of the row, so although I leave my door open and people pop in to say hello, I am usually by myself there as well. Walking through town is a solitary venture because I am usually coming from or going to my house. My supervisor at the co-op is a man with similar preferences for solitude, so if we

happen to be together, it’s very much like being alone. Some days I eat lunch with a co-worker. We always go to the same café to eat, so even in this short time it’s become routine, but we don’t have a lot to say to each other, so it’s generally pretty silent at our table. This is all very atypical for Kenya. This culture is extremely social and communal. While I’m not unhappy doing things by myself, I think that the people in town pity me when they see me by myself. And although they’ll call “Howareyou!?” across the street at me, none are daring enough to approach me to do anything about it.

In addition to the co-worker I eat lunch with, there are three other women at my co-op. The first weekend I was in town the one I eat with and another each invited me over for lunch, so I went with the first on Sat

urday and the other on Sunday. The one I visited on Sunday is close to my age and also lives alone. She moved to town when she took this job, so the rest of her family is not around. I was excited to have such an accessible potential friend, and excited that she introduced me to some of her friends as well. However, that was it on the friend front. On that Monday when I got to work it was as if we were just meeting for the first time, and has been every since. I’m not sure if I unknowingly did something to offend her, or if she just invited me over because she felt obligated, or what. I just know that I don’t have the energy, between all the other things I’m trying to handle, to work that out right now. The other women at the co-op have children and husbands and households to take care of in addition to their working a full-time job (incl

uding Saturday hours at the office), so they’re not readily available for friend-creating activities. As far as other mzungus, PC warned us that it’s much more fulfilling to find friends in the community than to rely on other PC Volunteers for socializing; I couldn’t even do that if I wanted to as the closest volunteer is over an hour matatu ride away. So it is up to me to take the initiative and strike out on my own to recruit friends.

Which I will do, but not yet. Having moved to new places enough times in the past to start to see trends, I know that I have to feel comfortable in my environment before I can be bold enough to socialize. I need to create a comfort zone before I can push myself to break out of it. And I can feel the progress; I’m getting there. One activity I enjoy doing by myself is sh

opping, but here shopping is very different and I have a limited disposable income. One of the things I have loved since I got to Kenya, though, is all of the second-hand t-shirts from America that are sold in the markets. Kenyans buy and wear these shirts, and I can only assume they have no clue what the shirts are advertising or commemorating or the places they have come from. I’ve seen everything from high school senior shirts (Class of ’05) to Hooters, to CATS London, to family reunions, to community sports teams to Race for the Cure Iowa shirts. My goal has been to find some really random ones to buy for myself when the ones I brought wear out. Today, for the first time, I stopped at a market stall to look through the selection. See, progress!

Even though this is turning into a very long post, I will mention my weekend, because it was good. On Saturday, three other volunteers and I met up at a current volunteer’s site. This volunteer has a full gas stove/oven combo, so the plan was to hang out and bake cookies. We got there mid-afternoon and spent a while catching up and discussing our sites. Everyone except the volunteer whose house we were at was in my training group, so we’re still feeling new to everything. We broke out the trusty PC Kenya cookbook and found a chocolate chip cookie recipe. Since there were five of us craving this comfort food, we doubled the recipe and did a little ingredient alteration to match what we had on hand, then got the first batch into the oven. About six dozen later we (and by we I mean I, as the others were lounging outside by the time the first batch finished baking) had plates heaping with good old homemade cookies. They were

phenomenal! Here is one of the volunteers with the finished product:

After we gorged ourselves on about half of them, our host got dinner going. He made bowtie pasta with red sauce. In the red sauce, he put tomato paste, tomatoes, onions, garlic, a chili pepper, green peppers, zucchini, some spices, and red wine. I am definitely inspired to start putting a little effort into my cooking. Even with all this fresh produce available (and cheap!), I’ve been sticking to the basics. This week I’m motivated to spend a little more time in the kitchen. I may even get the rest of my furniture this week, which will make it easier to use the kitchen because I’ll have a place to store things and a work surface, both of which I lack at the moment. But back to Saturday: I haven’t eaten so much in one day in a while, but between the cookies and the pasta, we had a feast and it was awesome. I also got to see the stars (only the second time to see a full night sky since I got to Kenya) and they blew me away.

By the time I make it to Friday, I will have been at site for an entire month. Definitely not one I’d want to have to repeat, but completely worth the experience. Miss you all!

Love me

Annual General Meeting

2009-01-30T10:30:00.000+03:00

Yesterday I attended my co-op’s Annual General Meeting. It was great timing that I could sit in on the meeting, as it presented some useful in formation and helped me to understand more about the structure of the co-op. It was also a great way to learn some more about Kenyan culture, as it was so very typical of the culture. Let me give you a rundown on meetings in Kenya:

They are always scheduled to start at 10am. Any earlier is unreasonable as people have farms to tend, animals to care for, and children to get off to school first and then need time for transport. If they’re not walking the several kilometers, they’re taking matatus (see previous entry).

They generally start around noon. Since people usually take chai around 10 and lunch between 1 and 2, this cuts directly through lunch hour. Translation: be prepared to be hungry. It is no problem for the Kenyans, however, because they assure me they’re used to it.

They are always opened and closed with prayer.

They usually begin with just about everyone present making an “introduction.” Greetings are very important in this culture, so these are not brief and there are usually a good number of people present.

This is generally followed by reading the minutes of the previous meeting. All of them. Word for word, though they’re printed in English and read in whatever language the group is most familiar with.

Representatives from various government ministries, NGOs, and financial institutions come—with presentations—to any meeting with which they may be remotely connected. Once the meeting’s business is done, each of these people get the floor.

The mzungu (translation: me) always sits up front, at the head table, so that my boredom is in full view of all present. Also, if the need arises to use the facilities, all present can watch me excuse myself and speculate as to where I’m going, so I generally don’t.

They take place in a mixture of predominantly Kikuyu (or whatever the local tribal language happens to be), with some Kiswahili and random English words sprinkled in. This ensures that I have no chance of following what is being said.

The attendees are generally patient and good-natured. They listen to an entire presentation before asking questions or making comments. Things can start to get out of hand, as evidenced by an old man shouting, waving his cane around, and advancing to the head table to make his point, but they are fairly easily called back to order with no hard feelings.

By 5 pm people have things to do (basically everything they did in the morning, in reverse), so the meeting is usually wrapped up by then, out of necessity only because people start leaving whether you’re still speaking or not.

After this particular meeting, I practically ran to the choo (“toilet”). Six hours of holding it can’t be good for me, but sometimes it can’t be helped. After getting back to the office, I decided I was too hungry to go through the process of preparing my own dinner, so I went to a café in town. I asked for stew and chips (translation: chunks of beef in broth and a side of fries) and decided to splurge and have a Fanta (a cold one, which is really a splurge). They were out of stew, so I just had the fries with the gelatinous tomato-based substance that passes for ketchup and chili sauce. That was dinner; lunch had been a protein bar (they have been my lifesavers—thanks so much for sending them!), and breakfast was Wheatabix (like a wheat-based oatmeal) mixed with milk and some bananas. I had chai (tea made with half milk and half water) when I got home and another protein bar before bed. I’ve been making more of an effort at eating a balanced diet, and breakfast was a good start, but the meeting threw a kink into the rest of the day, so I’ll try harder next time.

To sum up: I’m glad to have gone to the meeting, but I’m also glad it’s done and doesn’t occur regularly. I have lost enough weight from my less than ideal diet that a skirt that used to fit on my waist now sits on my hips. I am glad to have experienced this bit of culture, if for nothing more than to entertain you with it. I’ll try to get a better recap of the week along with some pictures up by Sunday night. Miss you all.

Love me

Three Hour Tour

2009-01-26T09:48:00.000+03:00

Despite my mom's best efforts, her love of photography did not seem to make it into my genetics. However, sometimes when I'm looking at things I do think about how to capture the image in a photo in a creative way. Here, I think about it a lot, both because I have a lot of free time on my hands and because I want to show you all what it looks like here. So Sunday afternoon I decided to walk down to the bridge that is the boundary between my town and the next town over with my camera. Some tips for taking good pictures have managed to penetrate, so I knew that it was probably too bright, but I couldn't wait for better light because I needed enough time to get home by dark; it was about an hour and a half to the bridge and another hour and a half back. So I set out (in capri pants, which are not the most appropriate for a woman here, but it's a lot of effort to be appropriate all the time and I get stared at no matter what I wear, so I decided to be comfortable for once). The pictures aren't great, and the majesty of the landscape doesn't translate very well, but they will give you an idea. I live in a valley nestled between Mt. Kenya to my east and the Aberdare Ranges to my west. Since all of the mountains are volcanos, the soil is bright red (and gets into everything). That's mostly what makes the coffee here so good, if I can put a plug in for my business partner! Ok, the pictures are just scenics as I walked along the road, so here's what I see every day...

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Today I Took a Trip

2009-01-25T08:30:00.000+03:00

Today I took a trip to a town called Embu. It’s about 50 km (30ish miles) from my town. Another volunteer, Daniel, lives on the way, so we made plans that I would come to his town and then we’d go the rest of the way together. The primary method of public transportation here (and in a lot of East Africa) is called a matatu. The Rough Guide to Kenya describes them as “death traps on wheels” or you can Google them to get an idea. It is a 15-passenger van/minibus that is kind of like a bus and a taxi and a plane in one. It’s like a bus in that you go to the matatu stage (like a bus depot) and find one that’s going either to the town you want or in the general direction you want to go. In Nairobi they are numbered and drive set routes just like a bus, but the more rural you go, the more flexible they are. It’s like a taxi in that you have a little leeway with where you want to get off, and in that the fare depends on where you’re going, though it’s set ahead of time and not metered. It’s like a plane in the seating arrangements, as you have seats with a set amount of space and leg room and passengers with varying amounts of bulk and baggage, so it’s not exactly comfortable most of the time. And then the comparison to familiar modes of transport ends and the rest is purely African. Mainly this applies to space and timing issues. Our language/culture manual makes the statement that “a matatu is never full.” Until there is absolutely no way to squeeze one more child onto someone’s lap, the matatu will accept more passengers. Also, a matatu has no set schedule. There is a driver and there is a person called a tout who manages the customers and takes the money. You tell the tout where you’re going, he tells you the fare and collects it (sometimes ahead of time and sometimes after you’re on your way). Once the driver starts going, the tout lets him know when to stop to let people off by rapping on the ceiling. Once people start getting off, the tout will also start picking up people that are waiting on the side of the road to fill the empty space. But initially, an empty matatu will be at a stage. It will have a sign saying where it is going. You show up, talk with the tout, and then get in. And then you wait until enough other people are going with you that the tout decides it’s filled enough (never full, remember) to go. Some matatus are fitted with a tv screen from which blare either reggae or Christian music videos to keep the passengers entertained. I go back and forth between thinking matatus are an innovative solution to moving people in this society or the hugest mismanagement of time and resources I could imagine.

Let me describe my trip to Embu to give you a better idea. Around 9 am I walked to my office (because everyone works a half day on Saturdays) to get one of my coworkers to help me on my way. Since I needed to go to meet Daniel in his town, I knew I would need make a couple transfers: Mukurweini (my town) to Karatina, Karatina to Kutus, and Kutus to Kugio (Daniel’s town). We walked to the matatu stage in my town and found a car going to Karatina. I got in the backseat to wait for the car to fill up. It only took about 20 minutes to find five other adults and two children also going to Karatina, so the eight of us plus the driver squeezed in and were off. About 25 minutes later we were in Karatina and one of the women passengers of my car walked me to the matatu stage for Kutus. I got in to wait again. This time I only waited about 15 minutes. We set off and drove for about an hour. In Kutus I got out and was directed to the other end of the stage to go to Kugio. I managed to jump in a matatu that was just leaving, so I didn’t have to wait at all in this transfer. Another 20 minutes and I was in Kugio and saying hello to Daniel, the first white person I’ve seen in two weeks. We found a matatu heading for Embu and got in. We left after about 20 minutes and drove for about 40 minutes. At that point, our matatu pulled over on the side of the road where another matatu was idling and they had me and Daniel switch into that one. I think that the matatu we were in didn’t want to stop in Embu just for us because everyone else was going elsewhere, so they transferred us to the other matatu. Strange, but I’m over asking questions most of the time. So then about another 30 minutes of driving got us to Embu.

Travel time: 3 hours 50 minutes

Total matatus: 5

Total cost: 280 Kenya shillings (about $3.60)

Once we got to Embu, we walked around town for a little bit to see what was there, then had a moderately overpriced lunch (beef stew and fries). We explored the two department stores in town and then wandered around a little more. It was hot and crowded and almost four o’clock, so I was ready to head home. We’re supposed to avoid traveling after dark as much as possible, and since dark falls around seven, I wanted to make sure I had time to get home by then.

Since there appeared to be a more direct route home than how I had come, Daniel and I split up. I needed to go from Embu to Karatina and Karatina to Mukurweini. I found a matatu for Karatina and got in to wait. Twenty minutes later we left. We drove for about 50 minutes back to the Kutus stage and dropped some people off, then kept going for about another 20 minutes. We got to a town called Kerugoya and everyone got out. I asked the tout what was going on and he said they weren’t going to Karatina after all, but then brought me to another matatu that was. I got in and waited. And waited. And waited. An hour later, we finally took off with 22 people loaded into this 15-passenger vehicle. In 30 minutes we were in Karatina where I was directed to a matatu to Mukurweini. I waited in that matatu for about 15 minutes. We got on the road and drove for 25 minutes. My house is directly on the main road about a mile before the matatu stage, so I happened to be sitting next to the driver and asked that they drop me off there so I didn’t have to walk in the dark (because by then it was after 7). So after the driver invited me home for dinner (which I declined as I knew a marriage proposal wasn’t far behind) he let me out a few hundred yards from my gate.

Travel time: 3 hours 40 minutes

Total matatus: 3

Total cost: 180 shillings (about $2.30)

So, to sum up, I spent seven and a half hours traveling, rode in eight different vehicles, spent about a day's pay in travel costs (my PC salary averages out to about 500 shillings per day), all to travel the equivalent of a trip to Target (before the one in Amsterdam opened). Karibu Kenya!

Things That Make You Miss a Swiffer

2009-01-21T20:00:00.001+03:00

I was reading another volunteer's blog yesterday and laughed when she described mopping her house. Her bedroom flooded, so she used your every-day basic American mop she had bought to clean up the water. Her Kenyan mama neighbors couldn't figure out what she was doing with that funny thing and why she wasn't just using an old towel. See, the Kenyan way to mop a floor is to put some soapy (cold) water in a basin, grab an old t-shirt or clothing item, and proceed to bend at the waist and hand-wash the floor. It's one advantage to having such small houses, I guess, that it doesn't take as long to mop, but it's still a super labor-intensive activity. Just like 99% of the other things Kenyan women do every day. So today I was mopping my floor Kenyan style (because there's no way I would find a real mop in my town) and I flashed back to cleaning apartments in Hawaii. There I used a Swiffer I carried around in my bag. Some of the apartments had such small areas of floor to mop that I used to just do it by hand with a Swiffer cloth rather than use the whole mop thing. Here, I would appreciate the whole thing, but I do feel like I'm assimilating as I drag a rag across my floors in full view of my neighbors.

While at homestay during training I witnessed someone in my family (either mama or one of the boys) wash our floors every day. Here since I live alone and don't make a lot of mess (and it's not the muddy, rainy season) I think that would be overkill. It seems that once a week will suffice (I can do it on Saturdays and use the rinse water from my laundry). However, yesterday some men delivered a few pieces of furniture and tracked up my floor, so I thought it wouldn't hurt to wash it today. Yes, I have a little bit more furniture. I'm including some pictures to show it off. The first picture is my bedroom. Other than the bed I have no place to put things, so stuff is stacked in piles or still in my suitcases for now. I sleep with my mosquito net down every night like the dutiful volunteer that I am (the net plus malaria meds is a requirement for all PC volunteers). My area has very few mosquitos and is not a malaria-prone area, but the net has other benefits. Just about the only kind of bug I do have in my house is spiders and lots of them, of all sizes and shapes. I sleep a lot more peacefully with the net down knowing that none of them will be crawling on me in my sleep!
Next is the bathroom. You can kind of get an idea of the "toilet." It does flush, quite violently, so I generally only flush when I really need to. I keep a bucket next to it and the rest of the time I just dump some water from the bucket in and that flushes it adequately enough. The room also serves as my bathing area. There is a shower (that pipe on the right goes up to the shower head) but it's only cold water. I prefer bucket bathing with warm. I can splash around all I want while I bathe and when I'm finished the water goes down the toilet. It's a pretty decent system.
The kitchen is small but functions. I was thrilled when I saw the sink. Running water anywhere near the house is a luxury, so to have a tap and a sink is extravagance! I'm keeping everything on the shelves until a cabinet/counter is made, so for now things are kind of just piled. I can't reach the top shelf, however, so I'm trying to only put things up there I think I won't need.Last is my mostly empty living room. The table is new and a luxury so I don't have to sit on the floor anymore. We've commissioned a couch and I have a coffee table, but it's in the kitchen being used as a makeshift counter for now. As you can see, the floor is bright red, the walls blue, and the doors and trim aqua. It's a very lively house. I didn't take a picture of the empty second bedroom and it's too dark to get a shot of the outside. It's funny that these are the first photos I've managed to get up, especially considering I'm probably moving next month and this won't be my house for long. But I like to see other people's environments so I have a mental image, so here's your glimpse into mine. The power just went out, so I'm going to cut this short before the laptop dies. Miss you!

love me

Raining on Sunday

2009-01-18T10:36:00.001+03:00

Just checking in as I begin week #2 at site. It's been sort of a rough couple of days as I continue to try to settle in here. Just like starting any job, this transition has been a little awkward as I try to understand how things work and find a place for myself in the co-op. I priced some basic furniture for the house with my boss and found that I probably can't afford a whole lot. My boss offered to meet with the board to see if the co-op could provide me furniture, which would be awesome. It also means I have to do without a little longer while they work it out. So I'm still sitting on the floor! Not a big deal, but the sooner this house feels like home, the better I will feel about being here.

I went shopping in the open market yesterday. It's less chaotic than the market in the town where we trained, but still quite a bit different than just going to the grocery store to pick up a few things. Most of the people in town assume I'm just visiting or passing through, so it's been tricky to make them understand I'll be around for a while. Yesterday was a housework day. I did laundry, washed my floors, and made an inventory of all my possessions here in Kenya (fits on one spreadsheet!). It's been cool (60s) and rainy for the past few days, which was a nice break from the intense sunshine, but now is starting to be a little gloomy. I know, I know, you people in New York are rolling your eyes about cold and gloomy, so I won't say any more.

I've been doing a lot of thinking and contemplating and analyzing in this past week. I think that I've made peace with my choices and my work for the next few months and I've made a plan for how I'm going to get through this challenging time. I would appreciate your continued prayers and encouragement because this is definitely the hardest thing I've ever done. I knew coming into it that it would be, but knowing it will be hard and living through it are two completely different things! Miss you all.

love me

More Day in the Life of...

2009-01-16T07:39:00.000+03:00

Here is what I did at work today: reviewed the PC emergency action plan, read the job descriptions of the five employees at our headquarters, went to lunch with a coworker, read the newspaper, and failed miserably at a soduku puzzle. It is only the first week, however, and thinking back on it, that’s pretty much how I started at Oakwood too. An office that was being used for storage got cleaned out this afternoon (while I read the paper) so I’m hoping that soon I’ll be in there and that will make things feel a little more official.

After work I went for a short walk down my road away from town, just to see what I could see. Well, actually we’re supposed to draw a map of our house for PC to keep on file in case they need to find us, so I was also looking for landmarks for that. It is absolutely beautiful here. I think I said that the town where we trained reminded me in some ways of home because there were rolling green hills and cornfields everywhere. This town is more of the green fields, though the hills are a lot more volcanic looking since I’m at the base of Mt Kenya. I can see the mountain if I look behind me on the walk to work and it’s great. Not quite as majestic looking as Kilimanjaro, but still pretty incredible. Like Kilimanjaro it is usually only visible in the early morning (6-7:30ish) and in the evening (5:30-7ish). The rest of the day it’s blocked by clouds. The rest of the landscape is just sharp hills and valleys and everything is green despite the lack of rain this year. It’s sort of bizarre because I look one way and I see a clump of banana trees and I flash back to Hawaii and then I look the other way and see rows of corn and flash back to New York. The climate is absolutely ideal as well, at least for now. It’s pretty hot at midday; the sun is strong because we’re on the equator and it feels like the sun in Hawaii with none of the humidity. The mornings are pleasantly cool and the evenings keep the warmth of the day so I’ve been sleeping just with a sheet. January and February are the hot months, and then I don’t know about March but April and May are the rainy season, then June and July are the cold months, not sure about August, then another rainy season in November and December.

According to the paper, last year and this year have had much less rain than normal and it is being attributed to La Nina. I know where we trained the farmers were very concerned about the lack of rain and much fewer crops they were able to produce. Two dry seasons in a row plus the election violence last year (tons of maize in storage was burned and farmers’ planting schedules were disrupted) plus high costs for things like fertilizer has really hurt the food supply here and the government is expected to declare a national emergency due to the food shortage. That plus corruption in the government are two huge issues at the moment and all over the newspapers that I’ve been reading this week and since I got here in November. I have the security of knowing that the PC will give me what I need to survive or send me home if it feels it can’t, so the issues aren’t anything I need to worry about, but it’s heartbreaking for the people who live here and have no other options. It’s even tougher because there don’t seem to be any immediate viable solutions.

Oh, back to my walk, I desperately want to take pictures of everything, but flashing my camera around is not something I want to do this early on. In such a communal culture, everything that I have I am expected to share with anyone who asks, so a camera is fair game for anyone going to a wedding or event or who just wants “snaps” of their family. I am going to try to sneak out at first light on Sunday morning when I think most people will be still in the house to try to get the mountain and some of the immediate scenery. Where we were training I had a much more isolated walk to town and I managed to get a few pictures, intending to get more just before we finished training. However, my camera batteries picked the day before we left to die and the rechargeable ones I had ready to replace them had lost their charge as well, so no batteries and no pictures. A lot of the other trainees took pictures, so I will try to canvass their collections for some to grab. I can take a couple pics of the inside of my house, but (1) I still have no furniture other than my bed and (2) my supervisor told me I’ll probably be moving at the end of February. So we’ll see.

I cooked a real dinner for the first time since I’ve been here. I enjoy cooking and the added challenge of a kitchen with no workspace, no stovetop, and such different staple foods makes it even more fun. I bought a gas burner to cook on (and heat water for baths and dishes and things) and a charcoal stove specifically to use as a makeshift oven so I can bake. The banana bread I made the other day was delicious, as was the chocolate cake we made during training. I’m even going to try making my own bread when I can figure out where to buy yeast.

I’ve been meaning to cook for a few days, but then I got sick and I haven’t actually had much of an appetite since I got here. It’s one of the really cool ways my body responds to stress, which I guess is better than overeating, but no fun. Those protein bars that I received have been a lifesaver because I can manage to get one down and know I’m getting some sort of nutrition. For the past three days I’ve lived on banana bread, protein bars, and fries (at lunch…the smallest thing on the menu). Even tonight I wasn’t actually hungry, but I didn’t want the produce I bought at the beginning of the week to go bad, so I lit my gas burner and made spaghetti. Since there is no tomato sauce in town, I improvised by sautéing garlic, onions, and fresh tomatoes with a little Blue Band (margarine, but the major brand, like how we call tissues Kleenex). There’s a supermarket in the next town that sells both Prego tomato sauce ($$) and tomato paste, so I will stock up when I can get there. Once that was done, I realized that I don’t actually have any forks yet. The only utensils I have are two spoons my homestay mama gave me as a going-away present (along with two bowls and two cups, which was super sweet). So I cut everything up into tiny pieces and ate it with a spoon. Which is, oddly enough, exactly how Kenyans eat spaghetti. They serve the pasta plain as a side dish and they cut it up into pieces because they’re not very adept at twirling it around their forks. Actually, Kenyans rarely use forks. Anything eaten with ugali is eaten with your hands because the ugali makes an excellent scoop. For stews and things they use spoons. I’m pretty sure the restaurants in town only keep forks around for the occasional wazungus (white people) passing through. So I ate my spaghetti with a spoon on the floor of my living room (see above about still no furniture) wearing a skirt/wrap called a leso (lay-so) that all the Kenyan mamas wear and felt that I was really adapting. Lesos are amazing. I can wear shorts underneath and then wrap this piece of fabric around me and be decent to go outside. They’re probably even greater at the coast where it’s so hot and humid, but even here they’re like the Kenyan equivalent of sweatpants. You don’t really wear them out and about, but you can definitely get away with a quick trip to the market in one. However, once it gets cold, I think I will probably trade it for a real pair of sweatpants, which I also love.

Well, this was going to be a short, just-checking-in post, but it has turned out to be pretty extensive. More to follow, but not sure when. Miss you all!

love me

Sick Day

2009-01-13T18:36:00.000+03:00

It will appear that I am posting twice on the same day, which technically I am but the next post is one I wrote about five days ago and couldn't post until today. Today I am home sick. I have fluish symptoms and a slight fever, so I told my boss I wasn't coming in today. I have called in sick, including today, exactly twice in my entire working life. I hate doing it and I rarely get sick. However, here in Kenya it could be the flu or something that I ate, but it could also be malaria or typhoid, so I didn't want to risk making it worse or infecting anyone else in my first week here. So I stayed in bed all day and read a book and slept and checked my email, which after our super busy training schedule and hectic traveling, was a good change.

I'll back up a little and fill in the days from my last post. Saturday I slept in a little and then started to sort through everything I brought to Kenya. Midmorning I got a call from a woman I work with named Mary inviting me to lunch. I went to town to meet her and we went to her mom's house for a few hours. Well actually from 11:30 til about 6, which is how Kenyans tend to do things. She has a 6 or 7 year old daughter named Mercy who is adorable. Mercy speaks Kikuyu primarily, but has been learning Kiswahili in school and has also just started learning English, so we could communicate fairly well between the last two languages. I got back home in time to pick up a few things from town and have dinner (hard boiled eggs and bread).

Another girl from work, Ann, had come with us for lunch and invited me to church with her in the morning. We went to the English service of a Presbyterian Church of East Africa, scheduled to start at 8:30. When we showed up a few minutes before 9, they were just sort of getting started. After only about an hour (about 1/3 of a usual Kenyan service) they announced the English service was ending and the second Kikuyu service would be starting soon. I left to come home because I had a pile of clothes to wash. I had meant to wash them on Saturday, but went to "lunch" instead. Now most of the other volunteers loathe doing laundry here. It's a very tedious process. You start with three basins of water. Dump laundry detergent (Toss, Omo, or Sunlight) into the first one and then put clothes in to soak. Take each item and rub with bar soap, then using a technique I think I've just about gotten the hang of, rub the item back onto itself over your hand/wrist vigorously until clean. The first time I did laundry I wound up with four bloody knuckles, but they have since healed as I have improved. Then the item goes into the first rinse bucket, then the second, then wring out and hang (inside out to prevent getting it dirty again) until dry. Like I said, the other volunteers hate it but I find it kind of soothing. It makes my back hurt because there's no good way to bend over the basins and it usually takes a minimum of an hour and a half, but I feel a great sense of accomplishment when I'm done.

Aftear laundry I read for a while (the Peace Corps has given us all kinds of manuals and handbooks to read) and had more eggs and bread. Then Ann invited me over to her house for lunch (ugali and sukumawiki. google them, they're definitely not my favorite). She had invited some of her friends from church and was insistent that they become my friends too. That's good, but I don't make friends instantly and couldn't quite explain that to her. Then we went back to church for a youth group meeting and then home to bed.

Monday morning was my first day at the co-op. My boss asked me to come in at 9 and attend a board meeting at 10 (I think I said it's a pretty Western company). In training it was explained to us that generally meetings scheduled for 10 will start anywhere between 11 and noon, so I expcected to wait. However, at 2 when I was starving for lunch and still waiting for the meeting to start, I wasn't waiting so patiently. Mary fed me chai (tea) and chapati and a mango, for which I was very greatful, and then finally around 3 I went into the meeting to meet the board members and introduce myself. Ten minutes later we were done. Then Mary took me around town and helped me buy some more things for the house. I'm pretty well set up now except for furniture. We were going to discuss that today, but when I got home last night I started feeling not so hot. I bought groceries to make banana bread and spaghetti, so I got the banana bread going and by then I was feeling really not good. Since I was cooking the bread on a charcoal jiko (stove) I checked it after an hour, saw it needed more time and that the coals were dying, and just left it and went to bed. It turned out really well, despite everything. Baking here is interesting. I'm happy to experiment with it for something to do, but I wouldn't want to have to do it this way forever.

That brings us back to today, which is ending peacefully. I want to spend the rest of the week finishing settling in and starting to get to know the co-op. Feel free to email or call anytime...I'd love to hear from you. Miss you all.

love me

About Time for an Update

2009-01-13T18:33:00.000+03:00

Well after not writing for quite a while, there’s a lot to say. Here’s the beginning of an older blog entry I never finished or posted: This is the first time I’ve ever rung in the new year in a foreign country, so I didn’t have very high hopes for the holidays, but they turned out well. We were in the middle of our sixth week of training when we broke for Christmas and Boxing Day. Having spend two Christmases in Hawaii, it wasn’t completely strange to have warm weather and no snow, but the complete lack of any holiday hype leading up to Christmas was a little odd. There were no carols playing on the radio or festive decorations anywhere. There were a few commercials about holiday sales at the one big chain store in Kenya, but that was about it. My host family treated it like pretty much any other day as well. Well, actually, the tradition is to have a church service on Christmas Eve leading up to midnight and then another one Christmas morning. Since my host dad is a pastor I was prepared witness Christmas Kenyan style; however, all the power in the town went out Christmas Eve afternoon and didn’t come back on all night. So we didn’t go to church for the big midnight service. Then Christmas morning was like any other day on the farm and we didn’t go to church then either. I probably could have just asked why we didn’t go, but they didn’t bring it up, so I just let it go. I learned how to make chapati for most of the morning. Chapati is pretty similar to tortillas but a little thicker and much greasier and all together delicious. It is one of my favorite foods her and will probably be a staple at my house, although it’s pretty tedious because after making a very simple dough, you break off small pieces, spread oil on them, roll them up, let them sit, roll them flat, and then fry them one at a time on a hot cast iron chapati pan.

Now for the big news. I am an official volunteer! We had our swearing in ceremony on January 8, one day after receiving our site assignments and meeting our new supervisors. I am in a town in Central Province called Mukurwe-ini. It is near Mt. Kenya and the city of Nyeri, which I hear is a pretty big place. I got two different population estimates for the town, so it’s somewhere between 6,000 and 10,000 people. I live on my own for the first time ever in a two-bedroom apartment. By Kenyan standards it’s a palace: One large living room, a tiny front bedroom, a decent-sized back bedroom, an inside “toilet”/shower room, and a tiny kitchen area with a sink with running (cold) water! I also have electricity, although I’m paying for it so I’ll probably try to use it as little as possible (as I sit here on my laptop in the dark!). I am only about 3 hours driving distance from Nairobi, which is a big relief. Most of the other volunteers I’m close with got placed on the coast, which is great when I want to visit, but a really long trip (about 8 hours from Nairobi to Mombasa, then one or more hours to their various sites). I’m very glad to be in this province with a dry, cool night/warm day climate rather than at the hot, humid, very Muslim-influenced coast. From what I hear, I’m actually going to have to pick up some more warm clothes because when it’s cold, it’s pretty cold (even down to the 30s).
We volunteers spent the past few days in Nairobi to finish training, get our site assignments, meet our business partners, and swear in. Then this morning we all traveled with our partners to our sites. My method of transportation was a minivan type public vehicle called a matatu. My partner and I crammed into the seats with my bags and were on our way by 10am. We arrived at my apartment (after changing matatus in a town called Karatina) around 12:30. We dropped off my bags then went to the office to meet some people. I am working for a company called Rumukia Farmer’s Co-op Society. It is the second largest coffee co-op in the country. From what I saw at the office today, it runs more like an American company than anything I’ve seen in Kenya. My Peace Corps supervisor told me that they reviewed everyone’s resumes and picked mine, which is both flattering and daunting. It sounds like they have a lot for me to do, which is good because I like to stay busy, but then again “a lot” by Kenyan standards is probably slightly different.

We certainly stayed busy today. After stopping at the office, we got lunch at a hotel in town (a dish called githeri which is just beans and corn together and chapati, of course). Then we picked up the bed my partner had very thoughtfully commissioned for me from a carpenter friend. My apartment is completely unfurnished, so having him help me with the bed was a huge relief because that, to me, is the most essential piece of furniture and also the most difficult to deal with acquiring. Then we bought a mattress and most of the things I need for the kitchen. Although I have electricity, I’ll be doing most of my cooking on a Coleman type single burner and a charcoal burner (called a jiko). We picked up plenty of paraffin and charcoal, so I should be set with those for a while. I am trying to figure out how much I will actually cook, but until I know my work schedule, it’s hard to determine. Breakfast will probably not require heat except if I make tea. I am only a 15 minute walk from the office, so I may come home and make lunch, although the place we had lunch today was super cheap, so it may be cheaper to just buy it. I’m a little concerned with money right now because I really have no idea how much things will cost. Plus I’m paying my water and electric which many others don’t have to do, plus Peace Corps has cut our living allowances due to budget stuff. I’m sure I’ll figure it out; we spent some time with a few current volunteers that have been here for a while and they seemed fine with money, so we’ll see. I still need to furnish the rest of the house, which I think will just entail a couch and maybe a chair or two, a coffee table for the living room, a work table for the kitchen, a dresser, and maybe eventually a bed for the second bedroom for visitors (hint, hint).

After buying all of these items we brought them home in a taxi and I’ve spent the rest of the evening sort of unpacking and settling in. After making sure I didn’t need anything else tonight, my partner said “see you Monday” and left. I have a fairly busy weekend ahead of me just doing the settling in things, but at the same time I’m wondering how I’m going to get through two entire days on my own in a brand new town. I’m confident that I can, but I have a feeling it’s going to be a long weekend. I’m going to break now and go to sleep (it’s 7:30 but I’m exhausted and drained). Let me know if you want any specific information and I’ll try to blog it or email you. Otherwise it will be more of my rambling thoughts as they spill out! Miss you and love you.

Love me

A Day in the Life...

2008-12-15T15:32:00.000+03:00

Well I'm in Kenya. Have been for about five weeks. I'm not sure exactly what to tell you, so maybe I'll run through a (sort of) typical day here in training.

The sun rises at 6 am year round since we're right on the equator. I get up soon after. I'm staying with a family of a mom, dad, and four boys ages 6, 13, 15, and 16. They're on break from school this month, so they're usually around outside somewhere. I spend some time writing in my journal or getting my language notes together while my bathwater heats on our kitchen fire (outside across from the house). I visit the pit latrine (translation: outhouse with a hole in the floor to serve as my "toilet") as our farmhand milks our three cows. When the water is hot, I take a bucket bath. Think camping without a shower house. My "mama" usually has breakfast waiting by the time I'm dressed, so I sit with my "dad" and eat bread with margerine and a banana and drink tea and fresh boiled milk. We usually have the tv on (yes, we have electricity, so we have lights, a tv, and an outlet to charge our cell phones, but we cook all our meals over a wood fire. Welcome to Kenya!) and I listen to the news in Kiswahili. I am starting to be able to pick out random words and phrases, but by no means can I follow what they're talking about.

By 8 I leave for language class. There are 40 volunteers in this training session, and we are broken up into four or five person groups for language classes. Our primary method of transportation is by foot, so I walk down our path and along the road to another volunteer's "house" for class. I used to feel like I'd accomplished something when I walked the two miles to and from my gym in Hawaii. Here, two miles is my short walk to class. Funny how your perspective changes! We study language for the rest of the morning, then head into town for lunch. We eat at one of the restaurants, usually beans and rice or an omelette with veggies mixed in. The food is not bad (except for the meat, which is tough and or fatty or full of cartilage and gristle), but it's pretty bland. There are a few places that serve fries, and that's a luxury to have once in a while.

After lunch we meet again at 2 for technical training. The 20 of us business volunteers meet with our trainer and talk about the projects we've been assigned. We each got partenered with a local business, so we have to meet with them to get a feel for what we may be doing at site. My group is an HIV/AIDS support group that sells beadwork for extra money (like about 20 other groups in town). I'm finding the work a little frustrating, but I think it's a good preview of what I may experience at site. When we're done meeting, we usually go back to a restaurant for more chai and to relax or to someone's house to play cards. We all need to be home by dark, which here means 6:45, so we have a limit to how much hanging out we get to do. When I get home I spend some time reading or studying until dinner, which here is served anywhere between 8 and 9:30 and then straight to bed.

This has become routine for training, but things will be turned upside down when we get sent out to our real assignments. I'm looking forward to settin up on my own and managing to take care of myself. I'm also looking forward to finding out what my assignment will be, but that won't happen until the first week of January. I miss the U.S. and everyone all the time, and am sad to be missing the holidays at home. Mom has my address if you want to send cards, letters, or surprises! I probably won't try to blog again until I'm at site (so after Jan 9), so don't expect to hear from me before then. I do check my email about once a week, so feel free to write!

love me.

And We're Off

2008-11-12T16:45:00.000+03:00

Just a quick note as I leave Philly...we're on our way (by bus) to JFK to get on a plane to go (by way of Amsterdam, Holland) to Kenya. We're scheduled to arrive Thursday night and then who knows when I'll be back online. Thanks to everyone for calls and notes!

love me.

2 Weeks and Counting

2008-10-29T01:06:00.000+03:00

Welcome to my new blog!

There are exactly 2 weeks until I leave for staging with the Peace Corps and get started on my move to Kenya. As I write this I can look out the kitchen window and watch the snow piling up on the deck. In about 15 days I'll be on the other side of the globe in the bright summer sunshine of Embu, Kenya, watching anything but snow.

I am a Small Enterprise Development volunteer, which means my purpose is to "enable rural Kenyan communities to increase their capacity to purchase goods and services they require for their livelihood by deriving better returns from their income generation activities." Some of the things required of me will be to analyze the local business environment, train entrepreneurs in a range of business skills, provide guidance and support to entrepreneurs, and teach computer literacy.

I will be meeting a group of fellow volunteers in Philadelphia where we will get some training information and then fly as a group to Embu, Kenya. Once there, we'll spend 8 weeks living with local families and training in language (Kiswahili), culture, and our jobs. Sometime during that training I'll be assigned a specific project in a specific place, but until then I have no idea where in the country I'll wind up.

For the next two weeks I'll be busy taking care of my bills and legal stuff, buying what I think I'll need with me in Kenya, and attempting to pack those things into two suitcases weighing less than 80 pounds total. I figure if I can do that and wind up with a halfway adequate household in Kenya I've already accomplished a lot!

It's been super surprising how many people I've run into in the past few months that either has been to/lived in Kenya or knows someone who has. It's a small world and appears that Kenya is a pretty friendly country. I have not heard a single negative thing from anyone and have heard more good things about Kenya than I could list, so I think this is going to be an even better experience than I imagined so far. I will try my hardest to keep this blog updated more frequently than the last one. I have a feeling I'll have a lot more to report, so it won't be difficult to come up with things to say...

love leah