Kenya

I am in Kenya now. Hopefully tomorrow I will be going on a safari, then off to Monkey Chasing, so I’m not sure when I’ll be able to get another post up. But this one is certainly long enough to keep you busy for a while!

On Tuesday I flew into Nairobi (via Doha!) and a cousin of a cousin (translation: complete stranger who very graciously said he would host me) collected me from the airport. Two things surprised me as we left the airport. First, it was cold and rainy. This shouldn’t have been a surprise, I suppose, as it is the rainy season. Second, there was a herd of giraffe off in the distance. I guess I really am in Africa! The roads in Kenya, even in the capital of Nairobi, are what could only be described as deplorable. (Infrastructure appears not to be the forte here) so we wove and joggled along through the traffic to their suburb of Langata. They live an ex-pat existence, with a large gate that is always locked (and a gatekeeper and gatekeeper’s cottage) and two ‘domestics’. I’m not sure that is how I would choose to live, but it is kind of them to have me.

On Wednesday, my host had a driver from work take me to the matatu (van shuttle things) stand, so I could go up north to visit the girls’ school that a family friend had some connections to. (I hadn’t realized until I saw said friend in Paris, that not only had he never met Brother John, the man who runs the school, to whom I sent a letter asking if I could visit, but he had never even SPOKEN to him!) My directions from Brother John were to take the bus to 14 km short of its destination, get dropped at the Nkubu Mission Hospital, and ask anyone where he lives. This seemed slightly dubious, but earlier in the day I had met someone from that area, and she knew exactly who Brother John was, so I had faith that I would find him. Alas, the bus driver didn’t know where the hospital was, and Nkubu was slightly bigger than three huts on the side of the road (which many of the other towns along the way seem to have been). So he pulled over, asked some guy where the hospital was, told me that this man would take me there, and drove off.

So there I was, standing with a big pack on my back and little one on my front, in the hands of a stranger. But I know there is some saying about depending upon the kindness of strangers, and that is what this year is all about. The man pointed to a dirt road and said, Down there. So down I went. The thing about Kenya is that on any road of any size at any time of day there are people (many people) walking (most of them carrying machetes). So I had plenty of people to ask if that was the way to the hospital. It was. Once I saw a woman in a habit I decided I was near and started asking about Brother John. A few handlers later, I was delivered to Brother John, who was sitting in his beat up Land Rover at the front gate, awaiting my arrival. I apparently came in the back.

We drove 30 km down a dirt road (and it had rained a lot the day before, so it was a bit muddy in parts, and insanely bumpy the whole way) to the Materi Girls’ Center, which he started 35 years ago. He has 700 girls, boarders from grade 5-12, a vocational school, a nursery school, and a clinic for pregnant mothers and small kids. The cost per student per year at the boarding school is about $800, but he only asks for $400, and the rest he (hopefully) makes up with sponsors. (He showed me how much the girls all still owe… about $30,000, but he’s not going to kick them out.)

I walked around a bit the first day, being stared at by every girl. They were busy washing their clothes (by hand, with water from the pump), getting ready to go home, as school was ending for the year. The 8th and 12th graders were in the process of taking the big national exam, and there were ARMED guards standing at the doorways of the testing rooms so that no one would cheat. (Yes, with live ammunition.) Can you imagine that at the SATs??? And we make sure that the lawnmowers don’t come when we do standardized tests so that the kids don’t lose their concentration!

I visited the nursery school on Thursday and Friday. The four teachers were lovely, friendly women, who were happy to talk to me, and answer all of my questions. (And yes, I had many conversations about Obama.) Those kids were not boarders, and came for only half a day, having lunch (possibly their only meal of the day) before walking home (some as far as 7 km) by themselves. The children were children, and the classrooms were actually vaguely reminiscent of the preschool classes at home with the various centers. They just didn’t have electricity, or pencil sharpeners, or shoes, and had 30 kids in the room…

The second day I asked how much it cost for the kids to attend the school, and I was told 300 shillings and some can’t even afford that. For their 300 shillings they get school, free lunch, free uniform, and free medical. By the way, 300 shillings is the amount that I had paid the previous day to post three letters back to the US. It is about $5. And the absolute most that a teacher will be paid in that area is $50 a month. None of us could even begin to understand what life was like for the other. (When I told them how much I take home a month, after taxes, insurance, retirement, they said that no one in the whole country would make that much… and I’m a teacher with a teacher’s salary!)

To try to give me some context, that afternoon, once the sun had cooled down a bit (we were not far from the equator), the teachers took me to see the homes of some of the students. They were squatters in stick and mud huts. It was amazing, although I felt odd as I took a few pictures of them. The last family was incredibly gracious, getting chairs for all of us so we could sit in the shade of the mango tree. One of the teachers was showing me all of the fruit trees around, and the uncle brought down a few seed pod things that had some fruity substance inside. It was the color and consistency of a fig. I had been warned that it was a good source of vitamin C, but quite sour. I tried it, and everyone, including myself, got a good laugh at the expression that must have been on my face. I puckered right up, and my eyes were watering. It wasn’t too bad, though. They also picked a couple of mangoes for me, which I ate right there, with no obscene mango fork or knife to peel it, just my teeth. (Luckily, I have lots of dental floss with me.)

Yesterday, I piled into a truck with about 12 other people to head up to Nkubu (people were either going home for the weekend or going shopping in town… an hour away), and then Brother took me up to Meru (stopping at the equator for a quick picture… that is a genuine smile of “Oh my god, I am at the equator!” on my lips), to catch a matatu back to the madness of Nairobi. (Not my favorite place, thus far.) The trip was uneventful, except for the chuckle I got when twice I saw passing matatus with fish hanging below the front windshield. Real (dead) fish. Guess they would be a little stinky in what was already a pretty stinky van…