Most of my pictures all look the same, but to me that doesn't make them any less beautiful

Shitoho, one of the four ACCES Community Learning Centers.

                         

The jigger man making his feet beautiful.

A goat pregnant with three babies. THREE!

Just a quick note: I feel like most of these pictures do not need captions. Enjoy them, add your own commentary, see what I saw. Because, really, I wish I could have shared this day with everyone.

One lone tree in the grasslands. You don't go there, Simba.

 

     

I will forever be covered in dust

My friends,

   I apologize for my lacking communication skills! It has been far too long since my last blog post. So let me tell you about my last two weeks of practicing patience and flexibility in sections.

Part One: The Time I Flew All The Way To Kenya And Ended Up Doing Something Completely Different Than I Had Planned

   So the title of this section basically explains everything. I was supposed to work with an organization that focused on empowering people living with disabilities. Although it is an incredible organization full of passion and commitment, I found the organization without funding and leadership. On Tuesday I recognized that the organization would not work and I was out by Wednesday afternoon. For the time being, I was in No Man's Land. I spent a lot of time at the FSD office hanging out with the fantastic site team. They even included me on a field visit to a fellow-intern's organization to observe a community assembly addressing corruption issues.

   The whole coming-and-realizing-it-absolutely-wouldn't-work thing was a bit difficult for me to swallow at first; but then, after Peter's wise words of “Relax!” and “Welcome to Africa!” I relaxed and embraced the African practice of flexibility. So that Friday I began at my new organization: Africa Canada Continuing Education Society. Here, their mission is to foster social and economic development through education. Some of the projects they embark on are building primary schools for orphans and children of very limited means, providing health and gender services to these children and the community, providing scholarships for certain students from these schools that will enable them to continue on to secondary school, providing scholarships for college and university students with very limited means, agrobusiness income-generating activities that are focused in the communities surrounding the ACCES schools, and vocational training. So basically, it's the breeding ground of truly amazing and inspiring work.

   The only issue is that there has been a nation-wide teachers strike. Public school teachers—and now some national school teachers—have taken a stance against government, arguing that they need to be paid more. Which, by the way, I totally agree with. Because of taxes and such, teachers only actually bring home a small portion of their paychecks to support themselves and their families. However, for a week now thousands of schools have been at a standstill while millions of students are forced to stay home. Even some boarding schools have sent their students home. This has even spread to the ACCES schools, which has inhibited certain work from being done. It does not seem like there is an end in sight, but I am hoping with all my might that the government and the teachers will come to some sort of agreement soon so students can return to their educations.

   Nonetheless, so far I have sat in on a meeting about the basic terms of quality needed for orphans and vulnerable children to be successful, I have assisted the Community Health Nurse de-jigger a man (a jigger is a nasty parasite that lives in the soil and makes its way into a person's feet and then multiplies and can even get in the way of a person's ability to walk), and visited the one ACCES school that remains in session called Shavagala. I have really been enjoying the people who I am working with. They all have such high spirits and love to laugh and joke and learn. It's great!

   So despite the slow-downs, it's been a great experience so far.

Part Two: The Time A Puppy Was Brought To The Office

   One of my coworkers (we'll call him Joe) bought a puppy from another coworker's sons. This puppy was delivered to the office today by the son and holy moley it's the cutest puppy! Everybody was surprised at me when I held the puppy and it started falling asleep in my arms. They were even more surprised when I took it outside to relieve itself when it wouldn't stop barking. I love the puppy. Joe left with the puppy. But now I just want it back. **It is also important to note that this co worker Joe has three main goal professions: to be a businessman, a professor, and a politician. Already, he's basically all three of those, but he wants them on a more grand scale. Today he told me that I he has observed that I have certain qualities of a good politician (I have no clue where he got that one, but I'll take it) and said that he wishes that I'd stay so that we can make a political partnership and change the lives of Kenyans. NOTE: These are his words, not mine. When he was saying this, a picture of Obama dancing into his arrival in Tanzania was sitting between the two of us. Joe said “Like Obama!” We then decided that we would cut Obama in half: Joe would be the right side, I'd be the left. Does it make sense? No, not really. But don't be surprised if I end up staying in Kenya in order to be Obama's left side.

Part Three: How I Came To Be Very Close With My Host Sisters

   I am not quite sure how it happened and I am not sure how to explain it. But for no good reason, I could not sleep last Tuesday night. For the weekend before, I was feeling very homesick and a bit out of it...just not myself. Then Tuesday night came. The second I laid down to sleep, I was wide awake. I kept feeling more and more energized and could not figure out why. I tried watching a movie, I tried planning next summer's internship, and I tried reading (by the way, if you're reading this Christian, I'm sorry but your copy of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Next has gone through a lot of wear and tear). But no matter what I did, I could not lull myself to sleep. Then I realized that something about that night had snapped me back into being my normal self. I was feeling more social, more excited about the smallest of things, more me. Ever since that fateful night, things have gone incredibly smoothly. Everything has been so easy with my host family and coworkers. There was one night last week where the three of us (my two host sisters and I) were all just sitting on the extra bed in my room, hanging out and talking. Just like three sisters normally do (or what I'd expect them too...it's been far too long since I've been with just my two sisters COUGHsadCOUGH).

Part Four: The Most Slippery Walk In The Dark

   This past weekend I made my way to Kakamega Rainforest with the 12 other interns. The rainforest is situated about 20 kilometers from Kakamega town, but because of the bumpy dusty roads, it took us about forty minutes to an hour to get to our guest house. We stayed in two different types of buildings: one was outfitted with a large eating/sitting area, a kitchen, and three bedrooms while the other one was a large round boma filled with enough bunk beds to house about fourteen people. So the thirteen of us ate our yogurt, our avocados, our incredibly surgary peanut butter sandwiches, and our pre-packaged tea muffins without the tea and sat around, talking, and laughing and learning about one another.

   The next morning we rose at 4:30 AM in order to meet our rambunctious guide Abraham for a nice stroll in the forest. I was so smart when I was packing for the weekend: Oh, we're going to be hiking in the dark? Of COURSE I don't need my flashlight! Umm what? I was able to mooch off of other people's lights a little bit, but for a lot of it I was just convincing my body I knew where I was going by trudging through the forest with confident steps.

   We made it to the top of the tallest hill in the forest just about fifteen minutes before the sun rose over the surrounding hills. It was hands down the most beautiful sunrise I have ever seen. The fog that licked the tops of trees, the orange-red tips of the tall grasses, the sounds of the forest animals waking up...it was wonderful and a little bit surreal how perfect everything was while I was just munching on my bag of breakfast peanuts.

   We remained on the hilltop for a while before we hiked back down the very treacherous hill—by the way, how did we not realize how steep it was on the way up? We made a pit-stop in a cave to get attacked by bats for a hot second and then continued on our way back through the forest. The entire hike ended up being about 15 kilometers. Yep, 15 kilometers of beauty in nature. I was a pretty happy girl. Also, somehow I made it through without falling down! I slipped probably five times in two minutes at one point, yet I never fell. (Which is a good thing because I took a tumble down some stairs the day before and let's just say I have the worst bruise I've ever had. Baby's a little tender.)

   So fifteen kilometers, too many slips, and a handful of baboons later we were back at the lodging area, exhausted and ready for our welcoming beds at our home-stays.

Part Five: Now I'm Not So Sure How To End This Post

   So there you have it. That's a slight overview of what my life has been lately. I know it was a lot, but that was just the surface, trust me. Every day something a little odd happens—for example, I was on the bus back from visiting Shavagala and a man decided to stand up in the front of the bus and preach the word of the Lord. In Portland, most people would have gotten annoyed or impatient. But on that bus ride, people either politely ignored him, bowed their heads in thought, or even raised their hands and joined him in prayer.       Huh.

   There's that little snippet for ya.

   I can't quite think of anything else to put on here without reporting every detail of every day. Just know that I am doing well. This trip has been quite the roller coaster so far. The dips are tough, but the high parts are what make this experience fantastic. I know that I don't realize it as much as I will in the future, but this is an experience that will prove to be invaluable. I know it. It may not feel like it right now, but it will. And I'm grateful to be here and to share this opportunity with some truly great people, whether they are here in Kakamega town or back home in little sunny Auburn or wherever you may be.

A little diddy about last Friday because I told Joeva I would

There is a place called Kakamega Golf Hotel. Yes, it is ritzy and no, it is absolutely not real Kenya. However, it is a place to decompress after a tough week while sipping on some drinks by the pool while you utilize their free wifi. So to destress a bit from the first week of internshiphood, I met up with a couple friends from FSD at Golf for just a bit. The rain started, but we decided to wait it out. It finally started to let up--or so we thought--so we decided to make our respective ways home. Only two minutes had passed and it had already started to downpour again. 

NOTE: Two out of the three of us had thirty-minute walks home ahead of us. Whoops. I was soaked within minutes but was having fun with it. Unlike in Portland, I didn't even have to convince myself that I love the rain. This rain was actually really enjoyable! So I trudged past the people crowding under awnings and made my way through the sidewalk-turned-muddy-river lined with produce stands. Sidewalk River was so high that it reached my mid-calf. 

Oy.

All of a sudden, I heard a voice from a produce stand calling "Come over here! Come wait here!" So I joined Victor the friendly fruit vendor in the safety of his stand. We made idle chit chat about where he buys his fruit and how I'm very hesitant to take a piki piki* until the the rain finally subsided. 

I made it home just in time to make a delicious batch of chapati and ndengu** with my host sister Grace.

*Lots of men drive around motorbikes and give people rides for money. So it's like a two-wheeled taxi with a motor.

**The most tasty way you could ever eat lentils. 

Siwezi kuongea Swahili

My first ever impala! So tame. 

                                 

 

Observe the wild house cat.

The view from the back of Sheywe Guest House. Too beautiful.

Because Kenya's countryside is gorgeous part 1.

 Because Kenya's countryside is gorgeous part 2.

 Just a cool cautious tree chillin at the resort.

 Only 6% of Lake Victoria is in Kenya.

 Mother Hippo! Thank you for treating us so kindly.

 A weaver bird with its woven nests.

 And then an oasis of woven nests.

 Our hippo-impersonating leader. Notice he's on the phone in the middle of Lake Victoria (and by middle, I don't actually mean middle).

The last of the sixteen people exiting our fantastic boat.

Oh! I forgot to mention that on the way back from the lake to Kisumu, we had only two tuk tuks. Each tuk tuk is supposed to fit four to five passengers including the driver. We successfully had 16 between the two of us, fitting 8 into each. One intern sat with up front with the driver, four were in the middle, and two sat in the back facing the road behind them. I was in the back and have four things to say about it: first, it was beautiful. Second, it was so not Kenyan, so we got some weird looks. Third, I'm pretty sure it wasn't the safest way of transportation. Fourth, Pollyne (the Local Program Coordinator for FSD Kakamega) kept laughing at the two of us in the back. Regardless, I loved it.

Bug bites on my ankles, ain't no thang.

 As it is now the eve of my first day of work, I figured I should share about all the great people I've met and great things I've seen. For the first four days or so, Alice (the other UP intern) and I stayed at the Holy Cross Seminary where we met some of the most jovial (!!), most amazing men. Each night at dinner, these four men supplied us with enough laughter to suffice for a year. Brother John is the wise voice of reason—I just realized that his name is Brother John...which I think is a character in Robin Hood? Maybe? Anyway, then there's Patrick, who's more laid back, but will bring up points to settle a dispute. Cyprian is the hilarious judge, and Aga is the jokester. And I love them. I'd say that one of the highlights about being in Nairobi was going to the Animal Orphanage right next to the Nairobi National Park. There I saw cheetahs, lions, monkeys in cages, monkeys gone rogue, fed a giraffe, hyenas, house cats, and an impala. Alice and I were also part of the show...school children gawked at us and followed us while a family with a 2-year-old girl insisted on her taking a picture with us. Soon, the entire family was in the picture, too. I guess we're some funny-looking people.

We convened with Peter (the site coordinator) and ten Duke interns to fly from Nairobi to Kisumu AKA the shortest flight ever. It felt like we took off, had a sip of plane-coffee, and landed. Then, a van overcrowded with college kids and literally overflowing with luggage made its way up the gorgeous A1 highway to the small city of Kakamega. The drive with uncomfortable, but it was possibly one of the most beautiful drives I've taken. The countryside is incredibly green with rolling hills filled with maize and tea plants. Oh! One of the coolest details of this drive: we passed over the equator into the northern hemisphere. Turns out Kakamega is 30 kilometers above the equator...so I'm basically living on that imaginary line. We safely made it to Sheywe Guest House in Kakamega where we would spend the next week in orientation, Kiswahili lessons, and learning about Kenyan culture and tradition.

The city of Kakamega is unlike any city I've been in, but that's probably because I've never truly been in a typical Kenyan city. Everywhere, people sell second-hand clothes, shoes, locally-grown produce, fresh meats, and stores carry everything from WiFi modems to freshly baked goods, to I don't even know. You can get anything you'd ever need. It's more of a city than I expected, but it's nice. It is a bit crowded, but it is not the bad kind of crowded. People are friendly and the traffic is aggressive. Speaking of traffic, there are three main modes of public transportation. First,there are mutatus, which are basically big vans that carry people anywhere in the country. It's essentially a bus system, but instead of only carrying fourteen people like they should be, mutatus normally carry twenty to twenty-five. They also tend to have some pretty wacky names. So far, I've seen a countless number of religious names, a few called “Hearse” that we parked across the street from a coffin vendor, and “Swagger Life.” But my personal favorite is “Mimi ni T-Pain” (I am T-Pain). Next, there are pikipikis or motorbikes. I'm a little too wary to try those out right now. But I did try the third type of transportation called boda bodas. Men ride their bikes and you sit on a seat behind them above the back wheel while you hold on and try not to think of all the things that could go wrong. It was actually pretty fun!

Thursday was the last day of orientation, so we split up the group and took two mutatus to Kisumu for the day. There, we walked around, ate lunch, and went to a resort to take a boat trip on Lake Victoria. There were sixteen of us on a long, bright blue boat (twelve interns, two program coordinators, one man to run the boat, and one to tell us what we were seeing) so we were sitting at water-level. We saw countless cool birds fishing and making woven nests. But the coolest thing we saw was a mother hippo with her two baby hippos. We sat and watched them from about thirty or so feet away for probably twenty minutes of pure bliss. Hippos are the coolest! Sure, they kill more people in a year than alligators do, but they're just the oddest animals! I was thinking of the dancing hippos from Fantasia the entire time. So...Fantasia—real life—same thing.

The group split up yesterday morning as we all made our own ways to our host families. I have spent the past two days adjusting to their way of living and trying to become a member of the family as much as possible. From here on out, it is all about adjustments, assimilating, and learning.

Tomorrow will be my first day of observation and learning sign language...I am a bit nervous, but am mostly excited for this fantastic opportunity. I am so glad to have such a great support system here in Kakamega in addition to all the support back at home...wherever home may be, whether it's PNW or California or Spain or Costa Rica. So wish me luck! I'm about to truly start what may be the most difficult, yet most beneficial experience I've had yet.

P.S. Pictures are to come tomorrow. Baby's gonna get some z's. 

How I Saw Zurich

I tried out my German while ordering this cappuccino...needless to say, it turned from German to Spanish to Gibberish.

One of many cool bridges connecting the new and old sides of the city.

Because sometimes Switzerland is perfect.

LOLZ. I thought of all the Rock girls when I saw this.

Ok. So I don't think I mentioned it, but Zurich is just like Portland, but more posh. Bikes everywhere, similar public transportation, the hippest of all people, etc. etc. etc. etc. I could go on forever about why Zurich is Portland...or the other way around.

One nice ferry.

The first swans spotted. Luckily for us, they were definitely not the last.

Pretty nice fountain. I wanted to sit on her lap, but then I thought twice about it.

There is a lot of graffiti in the city, but none like this. So cool, so alluring.

Chillin on the wall of a church circa 1490.

The swankiest restaurant with the swankiest courtyard seating with the cutest menus. Say what you want, I think that she looks like a young Meryl Streep.

Just one example of the immaculate architecture.

We found this McDonald's cup hanging out outside of one of the most beautiful churches I've ever seen.

And here's the beautiful church with a beautiful mother-son duo.

Alice and I camped out with the swans for a couple hours.

Many people were hanging out at the waterfront all day (just another reason why Zurich and Portland are the same).

What's up, Yoga Duck!

A beautiful ending to a beautiful day...

But not before the coolest jigsaw bark in the world.

And then there was an avocado the size of my head...

Hello, friends and family!

I have finally arrived in Nairobi! The past three days (two days? I'm honestly not quite sure how much time has gone by) have been crazy. Let me fill you in.

Flying itself has been a trip. I began emotionally in San Francisco. I was so afraid that I wouldn't succeed at my work and travel and being open to new experiences. Part of it is because I still feel young and naiive...to inexperienced, maybe. The other part is a lack of self confidence. I've never done anything like this. However, I have started thinking that it's because this is so new, I'll embrace it, learn, and grow through the unknown. In San Francisco—at the depths of my uncertainty—everyone was incredibly nice. The woman at security asked me what I was flying for and when I told her, she couldn't have been more excited for me. On top of that, everyone just wanted to help and there was one open seat in my row. Overall, it was a successful flight. Also, there were two women with funky straw caps and dressed in quirky tropical colors. They looked like little happy cherries and pears. It was adorable!

The gate for my next flight (Denver to Minneapolis) was right across the way, so I ended up speaking with Joeva until I had to get on the plane. Sleep and Jo definitely helped my nerves. It took us a little while to take off and the flight ended up being so smooth that when I woke up from a nap, I had forgotten that we were even flying. By the time I got to Minneapolis and bought a new camera battery charger, I was feeling much more confident; soon enough, excitement replaced nervousness.

Funny enough, I almost left my batter charging in the wall of the Minneapolis airport. Whoops! Anyway, I slept and made friends with the flight attendants who also offered words of encouragement. So I sat back, took a break from reading a Jomo Kenyatta book, and listened to Alt-J's “An Awesome Wave” all the way through while sipping on tea and looking out the window.

I got to Newark early so I decided to call Jackie and allowed more time than I probably should have because by the time we hung up and found Alice (another intern from UP); Alice and I then shared our uncertainty of the gate number not being listed for our next flight that was supposed to leave in half an hour. Finally, with twenty minutes till take-off, we learned from some United Airlines workers that we had to exit Terminal C, check with Swiss Airlines to get our gate number (they switched airlines on us), and go through security in order to get to Terminal B. I'm not sure what we were thinking, but we stopped at a small store to pick up an adapter and some chocolates for Alice's host family. We then took off and sprinted through the Newark airport. We persuaded our way to the front of the security check and dashed to gate B67 with our laptops and sandals in hand to find that we had seven minutes to get new boarding passes and attempt to freshen up before getting on the plane.

Despite the craziness, the flight went incredibly well. Swiss Air is quite swanky with its personal entertainment systems, comfortable seats, and delicious food. I was seated next to a man who spoke only either Greek or Polish or Russian...I'm not sure which. Either way, I read, ate, watched part of Pulp Fiction, slept, ate, watched more of Pulp Fiction, and landed in Zurich.

Alice and I walked around Zurich all day. It's a very beautiful and very small city. In just three or five hours we had been to five of the seven things on the list of “Seven Free and Amazing Things to do in Zurich” that we googled when we mooched some free wifi from Starbucks (yes, I am ashamed). The two remaining items were ice skating and visiting a toy museum. It's summer, so the former was unattainable; also, toy museum. We opted to sit on benches lining a lake that housed many swans and ducks. Zurich is beautiful and everything is beautiful and I have many pictures that I will hopefully be posting soon.

We ended up sleeping in the airport that night...I woke up every hour on the hour, but sleep is sleep and I appreciated every minute of it. Being in the airport at night is very interesting...I kept waking up to people cleaning the floors, random people sitting a few rows away, and other sorts of maintenance workers. I wonder what they all were thinking when they saw two young and rugged women sleeping on those chairs.

Anyway, the last flight when well. It was seven hours long and I sat next to a girl named Elaine. She is with five other students from Brown who will be interning at a non-profit in Nairobi for seven weeks. There were actually a LOT of people my age on that flight! I started talking with a few of them while waiting to get our visas, but they were called up to the front of a new line, so I didn't get to find out what they were doing. Everything went way too smoothly in the airport. I had always heard how crazy it was, but I had no problem at all.

A man named Agape picked us up. He lives at the seminary and attends school for theology and will be graduating next year. Agape—otherwise known as “Aga” so that life is easier—is the great driver, greatest laugher, and greatest joker. He is so welcoming and nice. We had supper with him, Brother John from New York, Patrick from Uganda, and another man whose name I forgot from Nairobi. We had a delicious meal of rice, ugali, fish, and kales. Kales! Ugali! Kales and ugali! The two notorious foods. Towards what I thought was the end of supper, Brother John pulled out a large thing that I thought was going to be a mango because of its size—nope! It was the biggest avocado I have seen in my entire life. Huge. Half of one is more than a normal one you'd find in Raleys or Safeway. I can tell I'm going to like it here.

The six of us sat and joked and talked about home and the latest soccer match. According to Aga, Kenya graciously let the other team win for the sake of good hospitality. Ok, Aga. I'm not sure what the next few days holds for us, but I'm not too concerned. Until next time!