Reflections

I have sat down to write this blog on about 10 different occasions now, and for whatever reason, I cannot find the right words to say. I’d like to claim that I simply don’t have the energy to be profound after 12 weeks spent in Africa, but in reality I think I just feel too many different things to put them down on paper in any truly meaningful way and I don’t want to belittle any of the things I have seen or experienced this summer. That said, I will put this simply and keep this blog short: I have had an incredible time in Kenya, despite being convinced at the onset that this would not be an enjoyable summer (I’m sure my mother remembers those early conversations).

I have had the extreme pleasure of meeting some amazing people here in Kenya… people who have shown me the utmost generosity and who have kept me laughing day and night. Eric, Lillian, Lydia, Salesious, Mary, Peter, Grace, and all of the other Mutiso family and friends: thank you for being my family this summer; I could not have been in better hands. I have never known such dedicated people in my life -- the children of Lisha Mtoto, the Cerebral Palsy Society, and each of your own families are some of the luckiest kids in the world to have you all on their side.  I wish for you all more love, happiness, and laughter than you could ever need.

I have also had the pleasure of getting to know some very tiny, very special people this summer. The kids at Lisha Mtoto own my heart. They are the epitome of perfect, innocent beings, and I worry for all of them because of it. I’m not naïve enough to think that our program is going to get every single one of these kids out of the slums… we can do everything we can to provide them with the best opportunities, but the fact of the matter is that it’s very hard to change a lifestyle. We are not the first organization to try to help the people of Kibera, and we certainly won’t be the last -- yet the slum and its vices persist. All I can say is that each and every one of our kids deserves to the chance to be sponsored and helped in everyway possible and it is for them (and Eric) that I will continue to believe in and support Lisha Mtoto.  

I have to say that aside from the remarkable people I’ve met, I have sort of a love/hate relationship with Kenya. This country is the definition of sensory overload. Everything about Kenya is intense… the sites, the smells, the noise, the foods, the crowds, everything. We have taken the same road to get into town for the last three months and I still find myself spending the entire trip gazing out the window, always seeing new things. I am grateful for having been able to see different parts of Kenya… my trips to Maasai Mara and the Coast are adventures that I will never forget and ones which definitely rank at the top of my life experiences thus far. These parts of Kenya are some of the most naturally beautiful places I have ever been too. Nairobi, on the other hand, is not beautiful the way the Rift Valley and Maasai Mara are, but it still has its allure. It is interesting for its sheer chaos, but there are a lot of things I will not miss about this city – namely the constant noise and dirt, the insanity of the driving/traffic situation, and the smells (we have nicknamed one particular road the “sour fruit market” because it CONSTANTLY smells like rot – I will not miss the sour fruit market). Nairobi has challenged me in a lot of ways and I am definitely leaving here a much more patient person than I was before.

I do worry for Kenya. I am unnerved by the corruption that I have seen here… it is obvious, pervasive, and unapologetic. It is bound to be a huge barrier for Kenya in terms of making any real development gains. I am also weary of the passivity of most Kenyan people – I’m not sure whether this is the result of being a <somewhat> new country or what, but it’s been my experience that a lot of Kenyan’s tend to follow rather than lead. I will say, however, that the people I spoke of above are exceptions to this and that does give me hope.

Anyway, as this incredible adventure comes to an end I can surely say that the good has outweighed the bad in my book. I am leaving here with no money to my name, but assuredly much richer spiritually and mentally, and with a new family to boot. I hope to return to Africa someday… this place has really captivated me in ways that I can’t quite express yet, and I feel far more connected to it than I have to any of the other places I have traveled. This trip has reassured me that I am following the right career path, and I hope that someday that path leads me back here.

Before I end this, I just want to say thank you again to everyone who read this blog and followed my travels this summer. And to Frank, my parents, and my other family and friends who took the time to email me or who answered my calls when I was in the throw of one of my minor breakdowns: thank you a thousand times over. I would not have survived this summer without your support and love, and I am really looking forward to getting home to see all of you!

Kwaheri Kenya – naku penda!

Ali

hiccups

It's been a long summer in the making and I am proud to announce that the Lisha Mtoto Initiative website should be up SHORTLY. We have been working nonstop this past week to get content finalized and to make sure all of the formatting looks professional. This really has been a much harder undertaking than any of us ever expected. We have run into a slight hiccup this week... apparently, Kenya is not one of Paypal's approved countries, and therefore we are currently looking into alternative payment methods so that our sponsors/donors can easily and safely send money via credit/debit card online. I am crossing my fingers that we will have the site up by the middle of this week!

I'm planning to write a lengthy blog at some point on my reflections from this summer... it feels weird that we only have a week left in Kenya, and I need to find the time to sit down and gather all of my thoughts and feelings about this adventure. I think that the goodbyes are going to be incredibly bittersweet, though I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't extremely excited to come home. I need to sort some of these emotions out, so keep an eye out for a new blog soon.

cockroaches & kibera

We are currently experiencing a cockroach infestation in our tiny apartment. Let me say this: I do not like cockroaches, but I’m okay with the occasional little bugger crawling in the bathroom at night (oh, how Africa has changed me). I am NOT, on the other hand, ok with cockroaches raining down from the ceiling, as they did last night when we gassed our tiny kitchen with bug spray! In an attempt to escape the poison we sprayed in the woodwork, the cockroaches came spewing into our kitchen… all in various stages of death, but still, it was disgusting. Elliot and Max have since purchased more bug spray and are waiting for Eric to get home so they can commence “Operation Death.”

On a much better note, we just got home from an awesome day spent hanging out with the Lisha Mtoto kids in Kibera. While its hard to put awesome and Kibera in the same sentence, I continue to be amazed at how uplifting our visits to the school are despite the surroundings. It’s been over 9 weeks since my first visit to Kibera, and I still find myself in shock every time I walk in. I realize now that I haven’t really written a whole lot about Kibera in this blog, so I’d like to paint a quick picture. The first thing that hits you upon entering Kibera is the smell -- a nausea-inducing combination of spoiled food, piles of trash, stagnant and filthy water, animal and human feces. The Nairobi heat does nothing to help the odor either, and I find myself spending most of our time in Kibera breathing through my mouth in order to avoid feeling sick to my stomach. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the smell is emanating from nearly every corner of the slum… with no sewer system and very few proper sanitation systems, the “streets” (essentially mud paths) are covered in garbage, filth, and contaminated water. It’s impossible to find a clean space to step. Add to this mix some several hundred thousand people, goats, stray dogs, and even pigs and you have one giant cesspool. I’m truly surprised that diseases like cholera aren’t more rampant given the living situation. While there are a few main streets that are paved, most people live in tin shacks in tiny little mud allies which require some serious negotiating to get to without killing yourself. Perhaps the weirdest part of Kibera however is its general location – its set incredibly close to downtown Nairobi, and even closer to several upper class communities. In fact, there are gated housing complexes that border the slum itself… can’t help but think that a view of Kibera might decrease the property values there slightly. I suppose this is just one of many odd Kenyan dichotomies.

Anyway, despite having to face the starkness of Kibera, we had a really lovely day with the kids. For the first time ever we had no criers! All of the kids seemed to be in really good spirits, and we were welcomed with a song and a wave of giggles. They really love having their picture taken and I still can’t get over hearing the little shouts and laughter following each flash – it’s heartwarming. The funniest part was when we each got down to take pictures with the whole group and they all started petting us. “Pet the mzungu” is obviously a fun game in Kibera, as we often have little kids and even adults approach us simply to touch our skin! I think they think that white skin feels different or something. We brought them the glow in the dark bracelets that Max and Elliot had brought from home – the kind you have to snap to make glow. I think Elliot assumed they would be completely bowled over by these “magic” bracelets but when he demonstrated how they glowed in the dark he was met with total silence, which the rest of us found to be hilarious. Eventually the kids got excited about their gifts, though some of the smaller ones did try to eat them. We had to explain to a VERY pregnant Grace (seriously, she is about to burst) that the kids were not to munch on their presents. Afterwards, we helped Grace serve lunch (rice and beans, mmm) – unfortunately she doesn’t have enough bowls or spoons for all of the kids to eat at once, so about 6 of them had to wait. I couldn’t believe how polite and gracious these little ones were as they watched their classmates scarf their food down. I think some of them ate quickly just so they could give their bowls/spoons to someone else to use – it was all very sweet J As school let out we got to take some more pictures with the kids in the alley before we headed out. I will take credit for teaching them the thumbs up sign, which is currently the new big thing at Salama (as you can see in the Facebook pictures). All in all, it was a really nice day and I can’t wait for everyone to read all these kids bios! They are all so worthy of being sponsored.

While I’m blogging, I guess I should update you on our Carnivore dining experience last weekend. We took Lillian and Eric to the infamous African restaurant on Saturday night, and I’d say the evening was a success. We ate EVERYTHING… it was an insane amount of food. I tried ox balls and ox heart… both disgusting. The texture of the ox heart almost made me throw up, though my brother claims it “tasted like roast beef.” We also tried ostrich, camel, and crocodile… the ostrich was actually delicious. It was a very soft meat that tasted a lot like pork. The camel and the crocodile were okay but I don’t think I need to eat them ever again! We had a lot of other meat as well – beef, lamb, chicken, pork – all of which was deliciously prepared.  

In more non-work related news, we went to Lydia’s yesterday and got to meet the newest additions to her family… 4 little puppies! Lydia’s female dog had puppies on Sunday night, so they are very tiny still and haven’t even opened their eyes yet, but man are they cute! I can’t wait to go back next week and see if they have gotten any bigger!

Ok, well in honor of Jamee’s last night we are going to spend the evening watching trashy soap operas (Lillian’s favorite… and for some reason she is convinced that we all love them as well, so this is as much to please her as anything else). I can’t believe it’s my last night with my summer partner in crime – it’s going to be weird the next few weeks without her. Jamee, if you read this, we’ll miss you!!!!!

The boys and I will be spending the next few days adding content to the website so that Matt can make the last minor adjustments when he gets home this weekend. Hopefully it will be up sometime next week, so check back soon!

It's Organic!

Well, our vacation has come and gone, and was absolutely unforgettable. I’ll start from the beginning…

We left for Tanzania early last Saturday morning. Per usual, the bus was an hour late pulling out of Nairobi, but all things considered the traveling was fine. The most notable part of the bus ride was crossing the Kenyan/Tanzanian border, where we had to physically get off the bus and walk into Tanzania. I’m not really sure why the 100 meter walk was necessary, but it was amusing. Other than the little jaunt between the countries, the transition was seamless and neither Kenya nor Tanzania seemed overly concerned by what we might or might not have been carrying into/out of each country. Customs and immigration are apparently considered overrated here. Anyway, we arrived in Moshi around 2 in the afternoon, and realized we had neglected to take into consideration the fact that the currency would be different. In Kenya, the exchange rate is currently around 88 Kenyan Shillings to the dollar, but in Tanzania it was like 1500 Shillings to the dollar, so figuring out how much money we needed to take out proved slightly difficult. We ended up going to the ATM about 4 times throughout our 2 day stay… c’est la vie. After getting money and finding a cab, we arrived at our hostel, Twiga Home, which was just about a 5 minute drive from the main street in town. The hostel was awesome! It was completely isolated and quiet and the rooms were extremely clean and comfortable. We did have a few lizard visitors throughout our stay, but they were completely harmless. Perhaps the best part of the hostel was the hot water shower! It’s been 2 months since I’ve taken a hot shower, and let me tell you, it was LOVELY.

We spent the rest of our first day/night wandering around Moshi town – basically 2 main streets that are filled with textile shops, curios, restaurants, etc. There were actually a lot of other muzungu’s and foreigners in town, as the town is the most commonly used base to climb Kilimanjaro. In addition to the mountain, Moshi is also known for its coffee! It is one of the bigger coffee hubs in Tanzania, and we were able to sample some at a local coffee ship. It had been a while since I had coffee, and it was surprisingly delicious and refreshing. Overall, I really enjoyed just wandering around Moshi… it was so much easier to navigate than Nairobi, and for the most part we were left alone to look and wander as we pleased. In Nairobi, if you’re white, you’re pretty much a constant target on the streets -- hawkers and children will follow you for blocks trying to get you to buy things. Moshi was thus a really nice change of pace. The town was just incredibly cute and friendly, and Tanzania in general seemed cleaner and greener than Kenya. Once we got back to the hostel that evening we sat down with Steven, our hostel’s shuttle driver, who suggested that he could arrange a trip to see some cool waterfalls and an organic coffee farm for us the next day if we were interested. We had no legitimate plans in Moshi other than to see Kilimanjaro (about this… we never actually saw Kilimanjaro, ha. It was in the clouds the entire time we were there – couldn’t see the peak even remotely. At first this was a huge disappointment but as you’ll see shortly, we made up for it) so we decided that a day trip to see some falls would be awesome. Stupidly, I assumed we would just be shuttled to these sights, take some pictures, and call it a day, but that is not at all how it actually went down.

So Sunday morning we woke up, got dressed, and were ready for our adventure. I knew we were in trouble as soon as we got in the car and Steven looked at mine and Jamee’s flip flops and shook his head. He told us we needed to put closed toed shoes on, preferably boots…it was at this point that I realized there might be some serious walking involved. As it turned out, we had a 9 mile hike UPHILL ahead of us! Steven drove us as far as he could up a mountain in the foothills of Kilimanjaro, but the thick mud made it impossible for the car to go very far. At that point, we were told to hop out and get to walkin! We were met by Steven’s friend Oscar, who runs an organic coffee farm, and who was to be our guide for the afternoon. When I asked Oscar how far it was to the falls, he said “oh we’re close,” which was a complete and utter lie. Now I’m sure this sounds very whiney and typical of me, but let me tell you – this walk was NO JOKE. We were walking completely uphill in the densest, slimiest mud I have ever seen. This mud was slippery to the point where it was hard to stay on your feet. Oscar likened it to walking on ice, if that makes the visual any better. Basically, it was HARD. After about 2.5 hours of walking/sliding/falling we finally arrived at Oscar’s house, where we had a brief reprieve as we learned how to make coffee! The whole coffee process involves a lot more work than I ever considered, but Oscar walked us through each step – from picking the coffee pods (they look like berries), to separating the outer husks from the actual bean by a process of laborious pounding, to roasting, to grinding by hand, to making an actual pot! Perhaps the most entertaining part of the entire coffee show was watching Oscar’s 1- year old nephew, Ichi, pound his own coffee beans as we all chanted and sang for him. I am still not entirely convinced that Ichi was an actual relative – I think they might have hired him to make us all laugh and oooh/awww and then convince us to buy coffee in bulk. Either way, the whole process was awesome to see and the coffee was delicious! It was slightly misty and chilly on the mountain, so a hot cup of coffee was the perfect fix. We were also able to see Oscar’s mother’s banana trees – also apparently a big staple in Moshi. Oscar and his family sell both bananas and coffee throughout all of East Africa. In the end, we ended up buying a couple bags of Oscar’s Hillborn Organic Coffee, and its aroma has since permeated everything I own.

After the tour of the coffee farm, we took to the road again to find the falls, which again, Oscar insisted were very close. Oscar’s house had been set on a tiny hill which had involved some precarious maneuvering to get to in the mud – on the way down however, precarious maneuvering wasn’t even an option. The hill was so steep and slippery that one step into it Max fell on his ass and basically slid the entire way down. From there, the rest of us (laughing hysterically of course) sadly half crawled/half slid down on our hands and knees, groping for any plant we could find to help stabilize ourselves. When we finally got down we were all covered in mud (as if it hadn’t been bad enough during the first half of the hike). Max’s bathing suit had a huge muddy ass imprint on it, and the locals kept laughing and saying that he “bought land,” a joke they make when dumb tourists fall down in the mud. The hiking from Oscar’s house got even harder, as we all the sudden found ourselves on trails that were no more than a foot wide, and which required us to walk in a single file line. The scenery around us was amazing however – everything was so green, it felt like we were in the jungle! Oscar kept pointing out all of the “organic” things in the jungle – rubber plants, plants that make rope, huge slugs, chameleons, safari ants, etc. I think organic is just a catch all term they use because they are hippie mountain people – it was basically just used to mean nature. Oscar would just randomly shout organic at the top of his lungs and then we would all scream too. I will be honest, I’m surprised no one broke an ankle during this hike – it probably wasn’t the smartest thing to have four muzungu’s wandering in the jungle wearing crocs and tennis shoes, but oh well. Anyway, on this portion of the hike we did stop off for another mountain favorite, locally brewed banana beer. Apparently on Sundays, all of the village elders go to church and then go directly to the pubs to get drunk off banana beer. This is exactly how we found them when we wandered into the pub, all laughing and slurring and passing around huge plastic containers of their local brew. We were given the distinct pleasure of trying this stuff ourselves and let me tell you it tasted a little bit like bananas and a whole lot like garbage. There happened to be an ant floating on top when I went to take a sip, so I kept it short and sweet and smiled politely. Oscar, however, drank about ¾ of the container and then proceeded to run through the trails barefoot and scream “MOTO” really loud every 30 seconds. This was how we spent the last two hours of our hike – being led through the jungle by a drunken African coffee maker. All in all, a good time. Finally, after about 3 more hours of hiking, we arrived at the beautiful Mnambe Falls, which Oscar’s tribe used to use for human sacrifices way back in the day (a story he explained to us in depth as he smoked ganja at the base of the falls). The falls themselves were amazing – 300+ feet and just surrounded by amazing green jungle. There was absolutely no one around, we had the place entirely to ourselves… it felt like such a rush to have made it there and to be in the presence of something so extreme. Truthfully, it made me want to climb Kilimanjaro – I imagine the rush of making it to the summit is even greater than the excitement we felt when we finally found our destination that day. I put pictures of the falls on facebook, but they don’t really do it justice. It was just a happy moment to have made it there all together.

The entire day trip ended up being close to 10 hours all said and done… we were exhausted and filthy when we returned to Twiga Home. The hot showers were pretty amazing at that point. I ended up having to throw my shirt and tennis shoes because they were so muddy. Overall though, the day had been unbelievable and it really made up for the fact that we hadn’t actually got to see the peak of Kilimanjaro. Hiking in the foothills of Kilimanjaro was definitely an experience I’ll never forget and I would honestly go back to Moshi in a second. We were all bummed when Monday morning rolled around and we had to leave, but luckily we had the beach to look forward to!

Diani Beach… ahh, where to even begin? It’s like heaven on earth. We arrived there on Monday afternoon after an 8 hour bus ride (very sketchy – we stopped about a dozen times to let random people on the bus; people who were then forced to sit on crates in the aisle) and an hour cab ride. When we first pulled into our “hotel” (called Diani Beachalets – it was basically several cottages) I was a little concerned as I couldn’t see the beach anywhere despite having paid for a sea-facing cottage. The outside of the cottages could definitely have used some work and I was horrified that this place I had found in my guide book was about to be a total bust. Luckily for us, the outside of the cottage was not a reflection of the inside at all. In fact, we were shocked when we went inside – the place was  HUGE (remember we have been living in an apartment the size of a fishbowl for the past 2 months), clean, fully stocked with every kitchen utensil and amenity we could ever need. The best part however, was that out our back door we had an amazing patio that overlooked the white sand beaches of Diani. We basically had the beach and the Indian Ocean at our back door – and what a sight they were! The beaches and water were unlike anything I’ve ever seen before – pure, soft white sand and so many blue hues in the water it looked fake. I could not have been happier with our cottage or the beach.

Our 6 days in Diani went way too quickly and involved a ton of relaxing and reading on the beach. We were there during what was still considered the low season, so aside for a lovely Slovenian family staying next to us, the place was almost totally empty. We had the beach to ourselves almost everyday. Actually that isn’t exactly true – we were the only tourists on the beach, but not the only people. Enter the lovely “beach boys,” or as I like to call them beach bums. The beach bums are a group of African guys whose profession is basically to annoy you into buying something from them or taking a camel ride on one of their dozen camels. Some of the beach bums were much easier to get rid of than others (a simple “I’m trying to read, go away” worked with a few of them) – others decided they wanted to tell us their entire <made up> life stories, which got a little old after a while. We did have one particular beach bum who we couldn’t shed and therefore sort of befriended. His name was Bob or Mohammad, depending on the day, and I got the impression he was fond of the ganja. Either way, he was harmless and in the end he ended up giving us a bunch of free jewelry and organizing a snorkeling trip for us for the equivalent of $4 USD. The snorkeling trip was pretty amazing despite the rustic boat and gear. I’m pretty sure the boat we rode out to the reef in was just a hollowed out tree (there was water filling the boat as we were sailing – I’m not a sailor, but even I know that’s not a good sign). The reef was only about 100 yards out, and the water was so shallow and clear that we got to see all sorts of amazing fish/coral. My favorites were the starfish, which were HUGE and so exotically colored.  

Aside from snorkeling, laying on the beach, and getting sunburned, we didn’t do a whole lot in Diani other than eat and drink. It was AMAZING to have a full kitchen for the week. We don’t have a fridge/oven/any real cooking utensils here in Nairobi, so our diet is very limited. We don’t eat anything that has to be kept in a fridge or anything that can’t be cooked in a pot over our tiny gas “stove.” That said, having a full kitchen meant that we could have whatever we wanted (or whatever we could find in the local grocery store). We had eggs and toast every morning, turkey sandwiches for lunch, and a variety of big meals for dinner! It was so nice to eat like a normal person again for the week, and to subsist on food other than carbs. We did venture out for dinner one night. We went to an infamous Diani restaurant called Ali Barbour’s Cave… it is literally in a cave, and it was absolutely beautiful. The menu was mostly seafood, and everyone really enjoyed their dishes. It was an expensive night out (by African standards), but well worth it.

We spent our last night in Diani getting stupidly drunk and hanging out at a local beach bar for far too long. I’m not sure why we picked the last night of our trip – and the night before we had a 7 hour bus ride back to Nairobi – to get so drunk, but you only live once, right? It was kind of the perfect end to the week – all of us together, laughing, drinking, and feeling perfectly blessed to be in that spot at exactly that moment. I think all of us realized what a journey we have been on this summer and were just feeling incredibly lucky for what we have had the opportunity to do and see. Of course, we all felt like crap the next day and in true Mombasa style it was about 95 degrees outside by 10 am, which only added to the pain. We struggled that morning, to say the least. Luckily, the bus we booked for the trip back was the most legitimate bus we took the entire vacation and we were all able to get some sleep on the ride home without being interrupted by constant stops.

We’ve been back in Nairobi for a few days now and although I’m sad vacation is over, I’m glad to be back here. The four of us went out for an awesome dinner on the 4^th of July – burgers and beer! It was a perfectly American evening. Last night we spent the evening at Peter and Mary’s house, where we got to meet their oldest son (we hadn’t met him before) and spend time with their grandson, Sam. Sam, who is 3, was such a ham – totally reminded me of Bennett when he was little. He found me to be particularly funny and by the end of the night I couldn’t even look at him without him screaming and laughing hysterically. It was a really enjoyable evening, and I can’t say enough how generous and lovely Mary and Peter are. The conversation with them just flows so easily and they are both great and inspiring company. I am hoping we will be able to get together with them again before we leave. On our agenda for this weekend we are taking Eric and Lillian out for a thank-you dinner before Jamee leaves. We are going to this restaurant called Carnivore – supposedly one of the 50 best restaurants in the world! It’s basically a big meat fest and we are all excited to try crocodile, ostrich, and ox! It’s silly to think one dinner can thank them for all they have done for us this summer, but I hope that it will be an enjoyable evening for them nonetheless.

On the work front, we are moving full steam ahead. We finally got our logo (thanks to Elliot’s friend Bryan Patton who generously and patiently worked with us despite having his own full time job) and we all LOVE it! I’m seriously so happy with the way it turned out. It’s simple and sleek, and I think it represents our organization well. We have already used the logo to print business cards for Eric and the other board members. Check the logo out on Lisha Mtoto’s facebook page: www.http://facebook.com/Lisha.Mtoto.Initiative! I am also happy to announce that the website should be completed by mid-month. We are almost to the point of putting content on it, and it really looks amazing. Despite my personal gripes with Matt, he has done a really good job at building the site and it looks incredibly professional. He and Erin will be going on vacation for the next week, so it will be up to the rest of us to get all of the content up and hopefully we will have it launched shortly after they return from their trip. All in all, everything we’ve worked so hard to do this summer is finally coming together and it’s a great feeling. I can’t believe that I have less than a month left here… time has flown by, and I’ve gotten so used to everything in Nairobi that I think I’ll actually be sad to leave. Jamee leaves next Wednesday and I know things will be really quiet and different without her here! I feel so lucky to have had her on this journey with me this summer. There were moments when I think I would have pulled my hair out had it not been for her. She has definitely become a life long friend.

Ok, this blog got really sappy, really fast, so I’ll end it here. I will promise to blog more diligently in my few weeks left here! Hope that everyone at home enjoyed their 4^th of July! Miss and love you all.

OH, also. Just wanted to say thank you again to my wonderful parents for funding some of our trip to Tanzania. You are the best.

The Circle of Life

Well, I’m officially in a depression coma now that our safari adventure is over. To say that the trip was awesome would be the understatement of the century – it was truly a once in a lifetime experience that I will remember forever. I posted some pictures on facebook, so I urge you all to check them out! The pictures tell most of the story, but I suppose I’ll recap some of the highs and lows for all my faithful readers (basically, my mom).

Highs:

1. Our driver – Our amazing driver and guide, Elijad, deserves a million thanks for dealing with us for three days. I think he is officially the wisest Kenyan man I’ve met thus far. Not only did he know everything there was to know about the animals we saw, but he was also a skilled driver (I’m still shocked that they exist in Kenya) and a good conversationalist. The road from Narok (a small town in the Rift Valley where we stopped for a picnic lunch on our way to Maasai Mara – about the half way point) to Masaai Mara might be the worst stretch of road I have ever driven on. In fact, calling it a road is an overstatement. It looks like someone plowed through a field and dropped some rocks in their wake. It should probably only be about a 1.5 hour drive from Narok to Maasai, but it takes closer to 3 or 4 hours. We must have passed 4 cars with flat tires/broken axels on the way (Elijad stopped to help everyone we saw – another reason he’s an angel) – all of this due to the fact that the road is just full of holes and rocks and most drivers tend to drive with two tires off the road completely so as to minimize the shock to the vehicle. While it took us a while to get to Maasai Mara, Elijad’s slow and steady method definitely won the race; we didn’t have one tire or car incident the entire three days. In addition to his awesome driving skills, Elijad knew the park like the back of his hand. He often took us off the main trails to areas he where he knew we would find some cools animals or sights.

2. Our campsite (and our personal Maasai guard) – I’ll be the first to admit that we were not exacting “roughing it” on this trip. I had assumed (thanks to my one previous camping experience) that we were going to be doing some hard core camping– I was convinced (and managed to convince the others) that we weren’t going to be able to shower for three days and that we would definitely be going to the bathroom in the woods. I think I scared the crap out of Jamee when I told her that she would probably have to take her midnight pee breaks in a dark forest filled with lions. For whatever reason, it never occurred to me that most of the people who go on these safaris are incredibly rich Westerner’s and that they probably required more refined settings. As it turned out, our campsite was lovely! I mean we were sleeping in tents, but we each had our own mattress and blankets, and the tens themselves were like industrial strength. I searched my entire tent the first night and found that there was not a speck of dirt or a bug in site. Moreover, our campsite had a hot shower and a flush toilet that worked better than the one in our apartment. Thanks to me, none of us had even considered bringing towels or shower stuff so we weren’t able to take advantage of the hot shower, but it was just nice to know that it was there. The campsite also had a large building where our meals were prepared and where we could sit inside to eat/play cards. There was no electricity but plenty of lanterns. The best part of our campsite though was our guard, a Maasai man named Armala… aka John. John reminded me a lot of Eric in that I think he made up 95% of the stories he told us, but nonetheless we enjoyed his company every night when we were sitting around the campfire. John job’s was to stay awake all night and make sure no animals came into the camp. Apparently lions are “afraid” of the Maasai, so that’s why most safari companies employ Maasai men to be guards. It was really cool getting to talk to John and learn more about the Maasai tribe and their traditions. One of the cooler (or grosser?) ones is that the Maasai often drink a mixture of milk & cows blood. Apparently they shoot the cow in the jugular with an arrow, take blood, and then somehow the cow lives. By the end of the trip, we had been invited to John’s future wedding, where he told us that he would slaughter a cow in our honor and that we would drink lots of Tusker together. One more word about the campsite – we were staying directly outside of the gates to the park and therefore the prospect that animals would show up in our camp was actually a legitimate concern. While we never had any lion visits, we did have a family of baboons that hung out around our bathroom in the morning.

3. The food – Just a quick word on this, but the food we had on our safari was AMAZING! I cannot even begin to explain to you how tired I am of eating RICE. We currently have it at least once a day and it makes me sad every time I see it. On our safari, however, we had amazing new foods, including a buffalo bolognese and a guinea fowl stew (tasted like chicken). Perhaps the high point on the food front was breakfast, where we were spoiled with actual toast, sausage, and omelets! This may not seem like a big deal but when you eat “butter bread” (aka shitty cold white bread with shitty butter) every morning it’s a REALLY nice change of pace.

4. The park and animals – By far the best part of the trip was getting to see all of the animals at the Maasai Mara National Reserve. Over the course of the weekend we did 5 “game drives” – basically 2-3 hour drives through the park. Our first day there we arrived in time to do a game drive around 4 pm, which ended with a beautiful sunset. As soon as we got into the park, we popped the top on our matatu and got to stand up for the rest of the ride. Within the first five minutes of our first game drive we basically drove right into a huge herd of elephants. They were on both sides of the dirt road we were driving on and were at most 15 feet away. We got amazing pictures of the elephants, including some of the adorable (and numerous) babies! At one point most of the elephants crossed the road right in front of our car. It was unbelievable to see them in person. During that first game drive we also got to see zebras (which are EVERYWHERE – there are a billion of them), impalas, buffalo, wildebeest, topi, gazelles, warthogs, lions, giraffes, and a rhino! It was an amazing first drive – got to see four out of five of the “big five” (elephants, lions, rhino, leopards, buffalo). The three game drives on Sunday were also amazing – I especially loved the one at 6:30 am. There was something so incredibly peaceful about being out for a drive as the sun was coming up, surrounded by animals and beautiful scenery. The park was so green and vibrant and the air was so clean - I seriously could have stayed there forever. Some of the highlights from our game drives on Sunday included getting to see two lions mating (this was hilarious actually as the female lion was TOTALLY asking for it), and also finding the mama cheetah and her babies that everyone had been searching for all day. Max was actually the one to spot the cheetahs taking a nap in a bush! We also got to see lion cubs on Sunday… it’s really amazing how playful they look, despite the fact that they could eat your face in about 2 seconds. The lions were by far the most beautiful and impressive animals we saw the whole time. We stumbled upon groups of them probably 4 or 5 different times and I never got sick of seeing them. In the end, the only animal we didn’t see was a leopard, but I can’t even be disappointed because we saw so many other animals. I’m really glad I bought a new camera before I left, as I was able to get some incredible pictures. I actually found myself feeling sad during our last game drive on Monday morning – I didn’t want the safari to end. It was such a surreal experience, and I know that if I ever have the resources to come back to Africa I would do it again in a heartbeat. It was an experience I would recommend to anyone who has the opportunity to do it! Forget Mexico or Europe – go on safari in Africa!

5. The Maasai village – We had the awesome opportunity to visit a Maasai village on Sunday afternoon. While I can’t say that it was a genuine cultural experience, I will say that it was fun. It seems to me that the Maasai make a lot of money off of tourists coming to the park (and why shouldn’t they?) and that much of the visit was well rehearsed. Nonetheless, the experience was still really cool. After paying the village chief $20 each we were welcomed with a traditional Maasai ceremony. For the boys, this meant jumping and singing with some of the young Maasai men, who were all dressed in red and decorated with the traditional beaded Maasai jewelry (which is stunning). The jumping ceremony was amazing – I do not understand how these tall, skinny Africans can jump SO high. It looked like they were jumping on some sort of spring board, when in reality they were just hitting the hard ground each time. Max and Elliot were a sight to see alongside those guys! Next came the women’s ceremony, which involved a lot of chanting/singing and weird neck movements. At one point Jamee and the head Maasai lady had some sort of strange dance off, while Emily and I laughed hysterically. After the ceremonies, we got to see the inside of a Maasai house. One note on this topic – the Maasai women are actually responsible for building the houses in Maasai villages. They build them using cow poop and wood, and each house has a similar structure. Also, the Maasai practice polygamy, so most of the village men have several wives, all of whom have to build their own house. After the visit, we were ushered into a field where all the ladies had set up shop with their traditional jewelry and carvings. It was a total tourist trap but to be honest, I was glad to pay. The Maasai jewelry is incredibly beautiful, and the village uses the proceeds to pay for their local school, which we were able to see.

Lows:

1. BUGS – It’s almost hard to even consider this a low but I definitely did not enjoy the creepy crawlers that were all over our campsite. I got my first wasp bite/sting ever on Sunday and I still have a weird red mark on my leg. I wasn’t even provoking the wasp! The worst bugs by far though were the dung beetles. I have NEVER in my life seen beetles as big as these things – they looked like birds. To make matters worse, they hissed! What kind of beetle hisses?!

Whew, so that’s a brief recap of our amazing trip. We got back to Nairobi Monday evening and have spent the last few days diving back into work. We are officially done with all of our home visits and have written all of the kid’s bios. Most of the website content is written, and now we are just waiting for Matt to finish building the website’s foundation so that we can start adding content. We are also waiting for our logo to be finalized so we can start working on branding. Overall, we’ve made incredible progress and I feel good about where we are!

Given that we’ve gotten so much done in the last 6 weeks, it seems a perfect time for vacation. We are headed to Tanzania on Saturday (after a minor setback, thank you mom for coming to the rescue!) and will move on to Mombasa and the beach from there! I am really looking forward to some down time. I’m not sure I’ll have a chance to write while I’m gone, but I promise to update everyone on our vacation and adventures as soon as we return.

In case we forgot that we were living in Africa...

I started this blog at the end of last week but forgot to post it once I was done:

I think God has decided that we’re getting a little too comfortable living in Africa. In order to remind us of what it is like to suffer a bit and to live uncomfortably, he decided to shut our water off.

We came home today to find that the water to our apartment has been completely disconnected. Honestly, my first assumption was that Eric forgot to pay our water bill, and I was slightly (ok, really) annoyed. All of us were sweaty and dirty and looking forward to cold showers, so coming home to ZERO water was really irritating. Not only could we not shower, but we also couldn’t flush the toilet. To not be able to flush a toilet that is used around the clock by 7+ people is a really horrifying proposition – let me just say that there are a lot of beans and strange things in our diet, if that helps with the mental picture at all. Anyway, as annoyed as I was, I figured the problem would be solved quickly as this has happened with the electricity before and because Kenyan’s generally pay their bills through a phone application called MPESA which delivers quick results.

Unfortunately, at soon as we got a hold of Eric we realized that the problem was not that he hadn’t paid the bill but that ILLEGAL shit had gone down. Apparently, Eric pays our water bill to the landlord, who then pays the water company, etc. Well our landlord is what I like to call undependable, which is a nice way of saying that he is a thief/cheater. Apparently this landlord has not given the water company our payment. This, however, is not the only illegal stuff that has gone down in this whole water debacle. The water company who came to disconnect our pipe is essentially required by law to give us a formal warning ahead of time if they have not received payment, but no such warning occurred. Instead they just came into the building and disconnected our particular pipe from the water tank, rendering us absolutely waterless.

So how did we deal with this maddening situation? Well, we broke the law right back. Eric and the boys have now rigged our water pipe (using some sort of tubing and extremely strong tape) so that we can pump water to our apartment. When I asked Eric if we could go to jail for this he said “yes definitely, but they started it.” Nice.

As of now, almost a week later, we are still illegally pumping our water, despite the fact that the water company has been paid. Eric said that it could take months for them to come reattach the pipe (they’re pretty much waiting for us to get desperate enough to pay them MORE – talk about corruption) and we obviously can’t wait around for that to happen, so I’m totally at peace with our decision to break the law. Take that Africa! 

Home Visits & Nairobi Nights

So to pick up where I left off with my last blog – we started our home visits late last week. Max and Elliot accompanied Eric to Kibera on Thursday and were able to see the school and meet all the kids. Once school let out, Grace took them to 12 of the kids’ homes to meet and interview the parents. Both boys seemed to have been pretty overwhelmed by the entire experience… I’m sure visiting Kibera for the first time and then hearing some of those family stories was a lot to digest, though they said the kids and parents were incredibly welcoming and in generally good spirits, which has been my experience in Kibera thus far as well. Reading over their interview questions and answers, I was really shocked to see just how bad some of these families have it. The poverty in Kibera is evident, but just seeing it alone does not do justice to the types of challenges people are actually facing there. Like Ken said last week, life in the slums of Kibera is absolutely hellish for these kids. The majority of them come from families where neither parent is employed (that is if there even are two parents) or where families of 6 are sleeping in one bed in a one room shack. Most of the homes don’t have electricity, and none of them have private bathrooms. Some of the parents told us during the home visits that they can’t afford to feed their kids more than once or twice a day. If you consider that most of these kids are around ages 2 to 4, that kind of malnutrition is bound to be detrimental to their physical and mental development. Makes me realize that the feeding program Lisha Mtoto is running is equally as critical as the education we’re providing.

I want to avoid sharing all the kids’ stories on here, as we are in the process of writing up bios that will be available on our website for all potential sponsors, hopefully within the next month. I will say that you learn a lot from just observing in Kibera. For instance, two of our students are twins named Stanley and Stellamaris. During their home visit we learned that their mother has 7 children in total, and had previously lost 8 other children. She is unemployed and has no husband, yet she still manages to pay rent on her shack and provide her kids with meals once or twice a day. Without sounding horribly pessimistic, we can probably assume that she is a prostitute, as that is how most obviously unemployed and single women manage to stay afloat in Kibera. I say that without an ounce of judgement because I really can only imagine how hard her life is. Prostitution and drugs are an easy thing to fall into in Kibera, and HIV/AIDS is subsequently a huge problem as well. On a less depressing note, I’m glad to see that this mother has gotten Stanley and Stellamaris to our school and that we have the chance to potentially help the entire family. The twins are adorable and seemingly happy despite everything… they even insist on dressing alike everyday – I can’t wait to be able to share pictures with all of you!

We have about 12-15 more families to visit this week and then we’ll be done with the home visits, which is a big step! Now we just need to get this website up and running and hopefully we’ll see some interest in the child sponsorship program. I can tell you that with every passing day, we all become more attached to this cause. I want more than ever to see this organization succeed and these children get sponsored. There is still a lot to be done but we’re making progress and we all feel pretty good about where we are at. So good in fact, that we allowed ourselves to have a little fun Friday night… fun that involved a lot of Tusker’s (Kenyan beer)!

We haven’t really gone out or gotten too wild here at the apartment since we arrived, so I think Friday was a much needed night of fun and group bonding. Unfortunately in Kenya, buying beer is more difficult than it is in the U.S. – go figure. While a few grocery stores sell beer and liquor, it’s easiest to just go to a pub and buy bottles. What sucks however, is that you have to bring the bottles back when they’re empty or else you cannot purchase anything else. The result of this dumb system is that we had to go back to the pub down the road about 4 times on Friday night and exchange our empty bottles for full ones. I think the bartender was somewhat horrified that we kept returning hourly to restock. Might have something to do with the fact that we don’t have a refrigerator or anyway to keep beers cold, so the name of the game was simply drink fast. During all of this drinking we managed to organize some household drinking games and had a grand old time trying to teach Eric how to play. My personal favorite was watching Eric try to play “Never have I ever…” during a game of Kings. For whatever reason, his first two rounds consisted of “never have I ever bought my uncle a beer” and “never have I ever killed someone” – incredibly random answers if you’ve ever played the game before and hilarious even if you haven’t – he basically had us all in tears. He was also very eager to teach us his favorite drinking game, called Mafia, which required some elaborate storytelling – right up Eric’s alley. One story involved bad guys killing two boys and then everyone in the story simply going to sleep. The night ended with Eric asking the boys for advice on how to “cancel his girlfriend.” All in all, Friday was a hilarious and enjoyable night in Nairobi. One more word on alcohol in Kenya – apparently some people here make homemade liquor known as chang’aa. If you think moonshine is bad, the ingredients in chang’aa include marijuana twigs, battery alkaline, formalin, and dirt. Sounds delicious, right? We were all joking around about this stuff on Friday and then actually saw on the news yesterday that 10 people in rural Kenya had died from drinking the stuff recently. I think I’ll stick to Tusker for the time being…

Tomorrow will mark my 5^th week here! I can’t believe how fast time has going, and the next few weeks will probably go even faster as we have so much planned! Next weekend is our safari to Masai Mara, which I am extremely excited for. We met with the safari company on Saturday and got to see pictures of where we will be staying. The camping scares me a little bit (I have unpleasant memories of Outward Bound) but I think I’ll survive. We will have Masai warriors standing guard around our camp at night so hopefully we don’t get eaten by lions. I promise to take tons of pictures and blog about our adventure when we get back next Monday! In the meantime, I hope everyone at home has a good work week! Miss and love you all.