MAJOR! Adjustment – September 25, 2011

More than one time this past week I kicked myself for spending all this money to be uncomfortable and cooped up. My western softness butted up against real life in Kakamega.

I am sharing an apartment provided by ACCES with an old Kenyan hand who’s witnessed my uphill battle. I’m figuring out how to cook on a propane stovetop; Saturday night I concocted an amazing pork stew with gorgeous fresh local organic carrots, shallots, garlic and potatoes. My appetizer was a salad of local avocado, tomatoes and cucumber all perfectly ripe. Dessert was fresh pineapple from Uganda; the local crop is still in the fields. I’ve discovered that a 500 ml. Tusker beer at 100 KES ($1.04CAD) is sublime after the intense heat of the day.

I’ve also figured out how to bathe: turn on the hot water switch, line up my various soap and shampoo containers at arm’s length ,turn on the overhead sprinkler, stoop down to rinse my hair under the cold water tap and voila – showered. My quads are getting a great workout from sitting on my haunches to handwash laundry in the dedicated laundry area. Maybe next week the carpenter will come, install the rod I bought, and I can hang my clothes on it instead of from the light fixtures.

The cooped up part. We live off an unpaved side with no street lights; there is no going out after darkness falls which is 6:45 pm these days. I am used to a lot of freedom of mobility and it has been HARD to be confined every evening. I am learning to make a night of journalling, contacting my husband via Skype, working on my photos and reading. Even when Michael arrives in 10 days, we must use a taxi to return from any place after dark. Apparently, most of the locals rise very early and go to bed early, thereby sidestepping any mobility issues. The students at the new university in town will undoubtedly change this scenario in a few years.

I have not had internet access 4 days in one week. The power has failed three times but mercifully not when it’s dark outside.  It’s all part of the 2011 Kakamega infrastructure. Everyone has a cell phone.

Why prevail? Because of the warmth, geniality and kindness of the Kenyan people; a verdant landscape dotted with banana trees and sugar cane;




and amazing experiences. Such as:

• Travelling by piki piki (motorbike), boda boda (back of a bicycle) and matatu.  Well, maybe never again the exact same matatu from Friday that had  no shocks and entirely dilapidated seats.  A matatu  is local  mass transport,  a minvan fitted out with as many seats as possible that leaves when it’s full, dropping off and picking up as many passengers as possible along its route.

• Being caught in a tropical rainstorm. Lightning, thunder, intense pelting sheets of warm rain. Over in an hour.

• Making a home visit in one of the villages where our schools are located. A mud house with two adults, 6 children (5 in the photo), no furniture or bedding, and a small plot of land. Father is a casual farm labourer. I was utterly moved by mom who shone with love for her kids and her dream to see them educated. 
• Witnessing two children at another of our schools being “de-jiggered” – having small white blood-sucking parasites removed from their toes and fingers with a disinfected safety pin and razor blade. It’s truly one small step at a time to lift these kids out of a cycle of poor hygiene. They were stoical; I am told Kenyans master their emotions at an early age.

• Eating my first 100% Kenyan meal of githeri – boiled maize kernals and beans – with sukama wiki (chopped kale) and ugali (thick porridge) which proper etiquette requires (they didn’t tell me till after I asked for a spoon) be eaten by hand. It was good!

• Attending the Sunday service at a nearby church, admittedly to hear the music. I wasn’t disappointed. The congregation (me, too) sang, clapped and swayed to the marimba- like beat from a congo drum and drum set, and the music from a synthesizer. The song leaders sang like Aretha Franklin. Stirring music from the soul of Africa.

• Knowing that I was really and truly in Africa when the boys started to drum on plastic containers and the girls gathered to sing and dance a welcome song for me on a Friday afternoon in their school yard under the hot Kenyan sun. I can still hear and feel it. It will be one of my “unforgettables.”