jenly in kenya

That I couldn't leave... means something

2007-03-31T03:30:00.000+03:00

I said I was ending this blog. I was wrong. I haven't had this hard of a time sleeping in like... 3 weeks. That's probably the longest stretch of good sleep I've had since I decided to quit taking my malaria prophylaxis a couple months before I got kicked out of Kenya.

I thought it might help to listen to Teach Yourself Swahili clips on my iPod. For a few chapters I listened carefully, saying the answers before the recording could, impatient with the pace of the introductory lesson. Then something caught me off guard and scared me. I couldn't say 'sijambo,' a basic greeting, before the man in my ears did.

In my head I was guided through first-meetings, buying fruit in the market, and ordering at hotelis. I listened and my interest waned. As the lessons faded away, Kenyans started conversing around me. I lay in bed, warm and surrendered, when the first swell of homesickness came, bringing the lobby of the Malindi guest house where Susan and I stayed for two lazy days. The feeling of December-summer-sea-air glazing my skin pushed against me leisurely, teasing time with expanding glimpses of lightweight clothes and plastic tablecloths. It crested with the sound of flip flops shuffling over cement floor, a television set buzzing in the corner, my chuckle, her smile. Lastly it broke in a foam of broken still-frames: her hair in the breeze, a gloomy sky, dark tan sand on a season-muddied beach, the streets of Mombasa, the pillars in the lobby, the bar where we met the other volunteers and waited for the fireworks to start. That New Year, when I couldn't believe where I was.

Again and again came these waves carrying pieces of what I left behind.

The courtyard of my house: Betty laughing, Chepkoech hula-hooping with an old bicycle tire, the girls singing and dancing, Kiptoo's glaring white smile.
Cozy dim-lit hotelis: the satisfaction of 5-carb meals, the smell of frying dough and potatoes, the give of plastic chairs.
Walks that took me: squinting away a cool white-lit sun, rolling mountains gridded in shades of green, dust clouds hung desperately and faithfully around my feet.
And then: warm rhythmic water, warm sand against my back, warm air against my face. My eyes are closed and I am being toasted in an envelope of Earth's smiling yawn.

For a long time after I came back, I didn't really believe my butterflies would come back. Know what I'm talking about? The ones that live in your stomach? Those ones.

Yes?

Mine have been coming back slowly. I'm reluctant to give them too much flying room. On their wings are memories that stop my throat and sting my eyes. But they are trying to tell me -- begging to show me -- a bit about the things I've already forgotten.

Transition

2006-11-27T03:28:00.000+03:00

For anyone who reads this blog and not my mass emails, I suppose you should know I got back to the States for good last month.

I was thinking about entitling this, "The End" or, "Closure," but the end of my Peace Corps experience is neither. I haven't said goodbye to Kenya and I wouldn't be happy doing so. I am now linked to it and will forever be split between America and Kenya. When I'm in one, I'll feel homesick for the other, missing my friends and yearning for their company. And there is no reason to believe I won't have many opportunities to visit again, or even live there again someday.

As I adjust to life in America, seeing old faces and doing old things, I wonder how this was ever my life, and I have to reacquaint myself with the wisp of a notion that this could in any way be 'normal.' It was normal to wash my clothes in a basin, to use three gallons in one bath. It was normal to go for long walks through my neighborhood and be surrounded by beautiful nature every minute of it. 'Normal' was taking time to chat with friends about our country and its problems and feel like development could be real. American cynicism is slapping me in the face, and I don't know how I let myself get so soft and optimistic while I lived overseas. But I'm keeping it with me - I'm so afraid to lose that idealism and feeling of empowerment.

My life isn't over, my life with Kenya isn't over, and my life back in the States is just beginning. This is not the end of anything, really, except this blog. Thanks for reading.

A Proliferation of Nast

2006-07-26T19:45:00.000+03:00

With rainy season just behind us, freshly washed clothing actually dries before it can mold. Produce is abundant and cheap. Rare treats like eggplants and bell peppers make guest appearances in the marketplace. Jen Lees laugh uproariously as they chase children with chameleons (for some strange reason Kenyans find them mortifying). It’s a great time when the roads aren’t yet piles of dust and the verdant hillsides sing with life.

My friend M stayed with me one weekend to discuss some Peace Corps business and hang out. Taking in the landscape by day and the stars by night, she was smitten. She went so far as to suggest I remove the door of my latrine so I could always enjoy the view while… y’know.

One night, M and I got into bed and immediately she spotted a fuzzy black caterpillar on my blanket. She picked him up with some toilet paper (their hairs cause fiery pain in the skin), put him outside, and came back to bed. All the while I’d sat as still as a rock holding its breath. Little did I know it was only the tip of the iceberg.

A couple days later, as I got into bed, my mosquito net thudded onto my foot with uncharacteristic weight. I turned back to see a glistening brownish-green mass the size of a Costco banana. With a yelp I shrank into fetal position and watched as the slug twisted himself upright. Then I used my socks to push him onto the ground. The sound when he landed was enough to haunt me the rest of the night, and the gluey residue he left on my sheet, net, and floor was enough to scare me into staying in bed ‘til morning.

The slug-in-the-bed is either really funny or just so nasty I can’t stop laughing every time I think about it. Well now that I am thinking about it, it’s not quite with mirth that I emit these sounds akin to retching.

Anyway, I knew this day would come, but I hoped it wouldn’t. The termites from last year are back. They’re a little different. Half of their bodies are red, and they’ve been building mounds on the baseboards around my house. I thought that they might be less frightful the second time around, but they’re not, maybe because they’ve started earlier, maybe because they’re a different species, and maybe because I’m a coward. Maybe it’s like that time I got my wisdom teeth pulled in two separate sessions. I was obliviously welcoming of the procedure the first time ‘round and then crying before the needle hit my gums the second.

I’d rather have another slug in my bed the size of my thigh than live through the apocalyptic invasion of last year again. Better yet, I’m gonna spring for the whopping ten-dollar pesticide and get my house sprayed while I’m in Nairobi fundraising for Camp GLOW.

I wish I’d had the sense to take a picture with that slug. It was a snot the size of twenty chameleons! Man! Maybe next time.

2006-06-12T12:58:00.000+03:00

A hundred white butterflies flutter all around me as I walk toward the cars going to Bomet. My brain knows this is a glimpse of God through nature, a piece of the preciousness that life and sight afford me. But my heart doesn't care, my eyes itch from weeks of exposure to dry-season dust, my chest siezes up as I gag on the brown cloud newly thrown up into my face. There's no power at my office again, the only place I can charge my electronics, and as always, everything goes on as usual, belying the frustration and impatience turning my stomach.

On the car ride to the post office, I have two repeating thoughts: "I want to go home," and, "I'm gonna get there and there won't be power." The fact that these two thoughts play on an endless loop inside my head shows that I spend too much time alone, talking only to myself, my furniture, and my insects. "I want to go home. I'm gonna get there and there won't be any power. I want to email my friends. If I just quit I could talk to them all the time. Oh my God, I'm gonna get there, and there won't even be any power. The whole trip will be wasted. Maybe I'll just sit there til it comes back."

"Maybe I should just go home."

I walk toward the post office as my head starts to ache from the bright sun. Some full-grown man-idiot yells "Chinese," I focus on my own shadow before me, and I try to reassure myself that if the posho mill is running, there has to be power. As I get closer, I hear music, and as I reach the entrance, I see the ceiling lights.

I'm here now, the power's on, the internet's working, and the desire to drop everything and quit has lessened. I've sent my emails and I feel so much better. It's not the act of waiting for replies that kills me, it's keeping all these things I want to say inside and repeating them over and over to myself.

Selected Scenes

2006-05-23T10:57:00.001+03:00

I’m packed into the backseat of a car like this: old mama, woman, me, man. The old mama is holding onto the front passenger seat, and I can’t stop staring at her hand. It’s extraordinary: gigantic, wise, and strong. I reach for her hand to compare its size with mine, and upon seeing my hand approach hers, she takes it and shakes it in greeting.
---
On my way to the post office, I inadvertently catch up to a little boy about as tall as my knee. I bend just enough to tap my groceries on his little behind and say, "Wey," an approximation of "Hey you!" He continues marching forward as he turns his head up and back to look at me. When he registers my face, he cries and starts to run, but falls over. Then he gets up again and tries to run, only to launch himself forward for a spectacular crash. By now he’s screaming and kicking, flat on his tummy. Some adult spectators and I exchange giggles - mine guilty, theirs consoling.
---
We were sitting in the covered outdoor eating area of a lakeside dive that serves tilapia caught fresh from the lake. K and I sat on the side of the table facing the lake. C ordered a 200-shilling fish for all of us to share, then sat down with her back facing the lake. A man she’d once hired to ferry her to Hippo Point recognized her. They chatted a while. We were tired and warm and generally able to ignore the glue-sniffing street kids buzzing around us. Hawkers made their rounds among the diners (all Kenyan except for us), and we just answered them with tired shakes of our heads.
We were soon brought our fish along with a giant chunk of ugali, and within minutes we were sucking the last bits of flesh off the bones, ugali coating all the fingers of our right hands, marveling at what a long way we’d come since the days of table etiquette. With our appetites renewed, we agreed to order another one.
When that was done, a street kid reached over the thigh-high wall and took our entire platter of bones. The whole gang converged on the first kid and within seconds the empty platter was back on our table, the waitress telling them off, then giving them our leftover ugali.
---
Suddenly the rain started pouring. It came down so loudly I could hear nothing else. The courtyard emptied of people, leaving the compound seemingly deserted. The water gushed down the gutter so forcefully that it actually drained out backwards at a joint right above my door. I couldn’t let all that water go to waste, so I put a basin under it. In the rainy season, all my water collects from the rain in a tank by my house, but it’s out of my sight. Here it was happening right before my eyes, my muscles were straining to pull the full basin in, my hands and feet were wet and cold from the splashing, and I was putting another basin under there, then another. For a moment, I "got" it, that Earth and only Earth sustains life. My life. For the next two days I washed and cooked with this water that had been delivered straight from Heaven.
---
I’m squished up against the car window, watching the serenely lush mountainsides that are now a daily luxury in my life. A small boy stands erect by the side of the road, dressed in his school uniform, hands at his sides. He is a miniature pillar of seriousness, brows furrowed, mouth tight. We lock gazes as my car passes by, and his head turns slowly to follow. I put my palm up to the window. As he passes out of sight I see his face break slowly into a grin.
---
By this time the sky was darkening, and we were starting to crack from the dozens of grotesquely nasal "ching chongs" we’d received over the past few hours, the taunts and snickers still coming at us. C cracked first. She yelled at someone, then another. I’d long ago stopped wondering why it was always men and adolescent boys who did it, but as I stared at the vegetable salesman’s wide grin as he received C’s scolding, my last straw combusted. On the way to the matatu, I got another ching chong. Without slowing my pace or turning my head, I gave him my middle finger.
On the matatu, after several minutes of glue boys pounding on our windows, sliding them open, grabbing at us, yelling at us, us shutting the windows, sighing, hawkers (again, always men) enjoying the show, K holding her latch-less window shut, C seated between us, ready to throw down, me futilely trying to talk about this great book I’d just read, me finding out my window was also missing a latch when a beaming hawker opens it and says, "Talk to me sista," me and K both holding our latch-less windows shut, Kenyans in the bus glancing back at us over and over…
"WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON!?!"
"Shhhh."
"It’s okay."
"IT IS NOT OKAY! WHY ISN’T ANYONE DOING ANYTHING?"
"No one’s going to do anything," I said, "You have to let it go."
… me starting but then giving up on the idea of talking about the great book I’d just read...
"TUENDE!"
…and the matatu! finally! moving!
"Maybe it’s because it’s Friday," I said.
"Maybe it’s because they’re retards," said C.
---
It had been raining all day. I found myself trudging up the muddy slope towards my house. With each squishy step forward I slid back halfway and gained another pound on my shoes and another inch to my height. I was wet and cold and just grateful not to fall flat on my face. At this realization of my powerlessness against the mud, I laughed out loud. A laugh echoed back. I looked to my left, where an old mama stood. I laughed in response to her laughing at me, and she laughed again. We both guffawed, and then I was alone again, but five feet closer to the top of the hill, with a smile on my face.
---
Emily and I sit together in her dimly lit mud house. The Kipsigis lesson for today is about fruits and vegetables. "Isagek," she says, giving me the name of one of the local leafy greens. I incorrectly identify it as the one I once ate at her house. "Eh eh," she says, "That one is another one."
"Oh!" I realize, "You mean the one with five leaves?"
At the health lesson at Kiplokyi Secondary School, another teacher is giving a lesson on drug abuse. I turn to the teacher next to me to ask what "bhang" is, since it is supposedly the main drug abused in rural Kenya, and I’ve never heard of it. The teacher explains that it’s grown locally and smoked.
"Oooh," I say, holding my hand spread in front of me, "Is it the one with five leaves?"
---
Lunch in The Oven is always thirty shillings or less. Lunch in The Oven is always delicious. Lunch in The Oven usually includes listening to some combination of static and high-pitched whistling coming out of a radio in the corner. That day, though, we were listening to an actual station. First they went over some exchange rates. Then they played a song by that band that sounds like that other band ________ who sounds like ______. Then Evanescence came on, and it was just too overwhelming for the moment I was sharing with my rice. I briefly pondered the influence of American culture on this other side of the planet, then paid, then made my way to the vegetable stands to pick out some tomatoes and isagek. Ace of Base started blasting out of a kiosk somewhere behind the mama. This was too much. I had to run away.
---
After swinging the kids around in circles ("ndege! ndege!") until I’m sweating in the cool evening air and almost falling down in dizzies, my neighbor Janet suggests we visit her shamba. We take the short walk over, I take in the gorgeous view of a neighboring farming hillside, and then we make our way back. The four kids go ahead of us, running-jumping-falling into hilarious somersaults over the lush grassy field.
________________________________
* Isagek and marijuana are not the same.

[No News is] Good News

2006-04-02T19:43:00.000+03:00

I’ve been horrible about updating. On two separate occasions when I had no reception, J left me messages expressing her suspicion that I might be dead. I was sad that her calls and my travels-out-of-site coincided, but I was more moved by how sincerely worried she was. That’s love! The kind of love that parents show when they ground you for staying out too late. Deep-seated panicking love. Rest assured, dear readers! When I don’t update, it’s because I’m busy working or traveling or hosting incredible intestinal invaders.

Note that my new, simpler mailing address is:
Box 287
Bomet
Kenya

Please don’t forget! The old one won’t be valid much longer!

So, since my last post I’ve kept myself busy teaching English descriptive writing and HIV/AIDS at a nearby secondary school. At first I felt like a freak show, standing in front of two hundred kids, facing silence when I made a joke or asked for feedback. After a month they got used to me and I got better at teaching, and on my last day the class was a lot more involved in my lesson. I was even cornered by two girls after class and bombarded with questions. I left campus that day feeling high as a kite.

While they take exams and go on break, I’m working on an Earth Day celebration that we’re planning for Silibwet town. At first I merely suggested it to my supervisor Davila in light of the approaching American holiday, but because of his support and brilliant managerial skills, it has grown into a spectacular project with long-term education and changes in mind.

We’re working on eliminating the use of cheap plastic as schoolbags in two elementary schools. Business owners, churches, and schools are figuring out ways to plant and maintain trees on their property. The municipal council is planning to enforce a regularly scheduled trash pickup from Silibwet town. People are enthusiastic about my idea of using bottle caps on signs, and they’ve just tried using torn plastic bags to braid ropes that are usually made from sisal. Almost everyone uses those ropes at home to tie up large livestock, and plastic ones should theoretically work better than sisal ones, though we’ve yet to test them out. Ultimately, we want to establish a permanent environment committee to continually address the town’s environmental needs.

All this is in addition to the one-day event we’re planning for the end of the month (which we want to make annual) to pick up trash and plant trees. In addition to the orgs I already mentioned, Tenwek Mission Hospital, the National Environmental Management Authority, and several government ministries are involved. Potentially, KASS FM (Kalenjin radio station), a singer, and other PCVs in Kenya will also participate. Last week, the Divisional Officer joined us in a “rehearsal” trash-collecting around town. The fact that she was out there picking up trash with the rest of us was great publicity and an awesome show of government support.

When that’s over, I’ll go back to teaching about health. I’m setting myself up to teach at three schools this time and not just one. I’ll also be busy with a lot of out-of-site activities going on up through July. In order: DPS training in peer support, cross-sector regional training, and Camp GLOW for the empowerment of young women. Camp GLOW is sponsored by the Gender and Development (GAD) committee, which I’ve joined in addition to DPS. In June I hope to attend the training of the new group of public health volunteers. Then there’s a GAD meeting, a July Fourth celebration thrown by the embassy, and maybe a vacation out of Kenya.

I’ve had a lot of doubts about being a PCV. “One outsider can’t change anything. I’m wasting everyone’s time.”

Now that I’ve been here a while I can say pretty confidently that my town does not need me. A Kenyan can do what I do, and a Kenyan can usually do it better. In fact, lots of Kenyans living in and around Silibwet are making bigger and better change than me all the time.

At the end of the day, however, I’m standing in front of the class teaching those kids that they have options when it comes to sex, drugs, STDs, and HIV. I’m preaching against stigma and I’m free (and supported by you US taxpayers, thanks) to do it without worrying about sounding crazy or feeding a family. I’ve celebrated Earth Day since I was a kid and I suggested that we try it here. I’m collecting bottle caps and decorating with them. People in this town were doing great things before I got here and they’d keep doing great things without me, but I happen to be here anyway, and I know I make a difference.

There is one thing I can do that a Kenyan can’t do. A Kenyan can’t be the American living next door. By chatting and being myself and blogging and baking a wide assortment of cakes, I’m living-giving-getting cultural exchanges that could’ve as easily never happened. That doesn’t raise anyone’s standard of living, but it makes a difference to a few hundred people (especially me) here and abroad. Multiply that by thousands of PCVs in almost seventy countries.

As Davila likes to say when we have particularly grand mutual brainstorms, “Are you seeing it now!”

Dang this job is cool.

A Dry Spell

2006-02-07T22:56:00.000+03:00

*Surgeon General’s Warning* Extreme anger, especially in the form of long blogger rants, might be bad for your health, whether or not you’re pregnant.

---------------------

I was feeling really optimistic and motivated for about a month. Now I'm having a relapse of sorts. It's like this...

When I look around at the piles of fly carcasses that my arachnid housemates leave for me, I don't at all appreciate their help against our common enemy. Nor do I have the strength to do more than wish they'd all die, because even if I’m successful in knocking the offenders to the floor and smashing them under my dirty flip-flops, their nasty little pus-sack bodies glue their nasty twitchy hair-like legs to the floor, followed by several large drops of my sweat splashing down, and it's all just mess upon mess. Better to sweep the gray pellets out the door and let them gather again.

When I’m forced out of my hard-won slumber by the gut-wrenching wails and glass-shattering screams of my toddler neighbor for a three-hour duration every morning, every side of bed is the wrong side. They should throw him in the river. It's dry season, though, and throwing little Kiptoo "into the river" would just mean throwing him on the dirt. He would just wail some more, but at least he’d be out of hearing range.

When one community/church group after another approaches me for help in obtaining livestock, clean water, or money, then feigns enthusiasm when I clarify that I’m an HIV/AIDS teacher, then never wants to see me again, I wonder why I even pretend that knowledge is worth a shilling.

When the corrupt, jobless man I've dubbed "The Orphan Profiteer" complains about working "so hard, so so hard" and not being able to obtain food for the 20 kids at his home, but I know through my own sources that it’s because he's already spent almost a million shillings (approx. $14,000) of unmonitored aid money and lost the support of the community because he wrested control completely out of their hands and they know it's not safe to give him their money anymore... When this man repeatedly seeks me out to ask my friends in the US to donate money or buy him a 3 million shilling tractor, then smiles condescendingly as I explain why those are unviable ideas... When he denies the validity of every kind of advice that I try to give him and then I find out he’s also ignored the advice of wise and experienced community leaders that are surely more convincing than I... When I read about corruption in the government leading to the loss of tens of billions of shillings and the big circus show that the government puts on as if all the "investigators" themselves (just some hand-picked Members of Parliament) aren't corrupt, and meanwhile 10% of the country's population is currently dependent on aid food... When you hear villagers that you know and trust say that they would do it too if they had the chance... When I'm given the argument over and over from Kenyans that this dog-eat-dog culture is a justifiable result of poverty, something that I couldn't possibly understand, I allow myself to believe a lot of very awful things that I'm too ashamed to say to anyone but other Peace Corps Volunteers. Even then I say it with a heavy regret, that I could let anyone see my so ugly.

When I make a mandatory vehicle transfer in Kericho on my way to the "Ching Chong Ching Chong!" gauntlet of a city called Kisumu, and the perfectly sober man, two feet from my face, who has just bellowed his fifteenth “CHIIIIIIIINAAAAAAAA” at me with as much gusto as his first one a minute ago, doesn’t seem to be ready to quit, and my fellow waiting passengers giggle, [take a deep breath,] my thoughts of this country fly to hatred and react with my shame to create a pressure buildup behind my tongue that threatens to erupt in a grand display of Mother Nature’s Most Destructive Glory*, swallowing everything in its path. It took me seven months to be strong enough not to explode at the plethora of men like him, or the plethora of passengers like those passengers, but somehow when I’ve been able to contain my inner volcano and not let it ruin the rest of my day, I still feel like I've failed. Maybe it’s because I couldn’t bear to make eye contact with any of them. Maybe it’s because I know I’m doing nothing to narrow the racial and cultural chasm between us.

I’ve gotten over crying and yelling and pounding my fist on my coffee table. But I feel like I’m regressing as a human being, because I've lost a lot of compassion.

The droplets of comfort I eek out for my mental health are only bitter lozenges that leave me thirsty. “It’s okay,” I think, “I guess it makes sense that a slow-killing disease isn’t on the top of their priorities list when they need to worry about how they’re going to get water for the next three months.” “It’s okay,” I say, as I head out for the first time each day, “maybe I’ll get lucky, and never have kids.” It’s ok. NYC is inhospitable to spiders. It’s ok. I’ll find a local donor to provide food and blankets for those kids, because at the end of the day, at least they have a home. It’s ok, because even though I’ve gotten a fair share of ching-chongs and go-back-to-chinas and you-damned-chinks living in Phoenix most of my life, and I sincerely fear that if it ever happens again I won’t do my usual hanging-my-head-in-silent-shame-and-continuing-on-my-way but will instead black out and wake up in prison and have this conversation with my state-appointed lawyer:

“I’m afraid that you don’t have much of a case. It doesn’t look good.”
“But I don’t understand what happened. I remember a car full of teenagers chanting, ‘Ching chong chang chong cho,' and then... nothing!”
“Well, there were twenty witnesses in that parking lot. By the time they pulled you off the young man, it was too late.”
“I... I killed him?”
“You pulled him out of the window...”
“How..."
“You knocked him to the ground...”
“No...”
“And with your bare hands... you pulled his esophagus clear out of his throat.”
“No! No no no, it can’t be true!”
“It took six people to hold you down until you stopped thrashing and screaming.”
“I was screaming?”
“You kept screaming, 'You of all people should know better!'”

...even though racial hatred is still very real in the US and I'm afraid that I've become capable of breaking out a lecture of rage at anyone I think should know better, it won't ever happen, because I hope never to live anywhere but New York City ever again, and there I can trust that only the clinically insane will harass me for being Chinese. Surely they deserve my pity and not my anger.

Oh, my beloved New York! I am on my knees, washing your feet with my tears. My heart will always swell with the languages and cultures that beat in your veins!!

In those moments when I’m about to dive headlong into The Land of Giving Up, I turn around and see the cast of people (Kenyan and American) working so hard to lift up this community, and I am ashamed of myself. Was I really about to give up that easily? They inspire me to believe that people are good, that there’s hope for the sensitive human race, for our abused planet. I ponder my feeling of impotence, the way it comes from my inexperience, my impatience, my fears, my selfishness, and also from understanding that I'll forever be an outsider in this place. But I can’t yet indulge the thought of quitting, because that tired little grain of hope is still there, digging into my side, sharp and desperate, urging me to get back up and try harder.

I'm tired, though. Can't I stay in bed just a little bit longer...

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* I was thinking for a minute that they should rename HIV to MNMDG, and that it would help people take it more seriously, but then I remembered that I’m the biggest and stupidest jerk that ever lived, and that more negative press would be only work against us. So instead, I propose we pass a law in the US that “Mother Nature’s Most Destructive Glory!” be plastered on all ads for tobacco products, with the provision that this slogan must fill at least 60% of billboards and magazine ads, 40% of packaging space, and be yelled emphatically at 110% of the volume of the loudest other part of any TV commercial. Aw heck, just rename all the brands to “Mother Nature’s Most Destructive Glory!” It might not be all that truthful, but who could resist something so catchy?

a miss-list for kenya

2006-01-23T13:39:00.000+03:00

(Again, I can't change the time/date on blogger right now. Actual time/date of authoring was
22 January 2006 11:01pm)

I'm writing this from bed. I had a lovely day. I'm having some technical difficulties involving the non-existent backing up of my photos. And my heart aches for New York City. I wish I could have Gray's Papaya for breakfast. Did they raise the price of a hot dog, by the way? What about the Recession Special? Mmm…sauerkraut.

Here's my List of Things I'll Miss When I Leave Kenya. I started it a while ago, when I decided I'd had enough of my whiny bitterness. It's helped a lot to be able to keep referring back to it and adding to it. I know I’ll think of more, but I’m just gonna post what I have for now.

(In no particular order...)
1) Uninhibited kids
2) Fresh whole milk
3) $0.14 papayas, $0.07 avocadoes, $0.03 yellow passion fruits, $0.01 pink guavas
4) Ugali, especially the kind with some sorghum in it. I would propose that someone open a Kenyan restaurant in NYC, but I think it would fail. Cornmeal paste is just too weird of a concept for Americans. Oh but I do love it.
5) Stewed chapati
6) Ruth & Mama Kamene, my homestay family
7) Widely varying landscape, sparsely populated
8) The lack of light pollution that allows the stars to jump out at you on a clear night
9) The leisurely pace of life
10) The kiosk in town labelled "No. 49" where Wendy & I go to get a big bowl of rice mixed with beans, potatoes, kale, and meat for just 30sh. We've dubbed it "The Oven," because it traps heat like a greenhouse.
11) The way Kenyan women dress.
12) The way Kenyan women laugh.
13) Clean pit latrines (because in many ways they are better than porcelain flush-toilets.)
14) The way that 5-passenger sedans fit a minimum of 8 and 15 passenger vans can fit 23
15) Seeing bikes go by with loads strapped to the back the size of a baby elephant
16) Long walks
17) The sight of all my laundry hanging on the line
18) Knowing my local postal staff and shopkeepers
19) The fact that I've probably used my alarm clock 3 times at site
20) The generosity of my neighbors
21) Kids' frequent spontaneous outbreaks of singing and dancing
22) Adults who, being more subdued, still hum and whistle all the time
23) Little girls who do so many chores and never complain
24) Chasing chickens, shooing sheep
25) The importance of rain
26) Not owning a mirror & rarely wearing matching clothes & knowing that no one cares! (Hey, at least I stay clean.)
27) Sleeping in a mosquito net
28) Totally confusing people when I tell them that my home is drier than Kitui
29) Donkey-watching
30) Meeting and talking with travelers from around the world
31) Roadside mahindi choma (roasted maize - my favorite snack! Only 5 or 10 shillings, depending on the size.)
32) Riding in cars with livestock
33) Forehead-slapping reminders of how stupid and self-centered I am that come from unexpected places – one of life’s best teaching methods
34) Kenyan sense of humor – warm, open, leaves no survivors
35) So much time for reading
36) Seas of skinny little kids in school uniform, smiling
37) The surprising competence of even the tiniest kids - tending cattle, watching their siblings, finding their ways to and from school all alone, lighting fires…

As much as I am and will always be an outsider in this country, I’ve been privileged to taste what it’s like to live here. When I miss home I often wish I could take some of my neighbors home with me, if only for 8 months, so they could learn about my home the way I’ve learned about theirs. Only after I’ve long abandoned my infatuation with Kenya and hated it for a while have I been able to start loving it. I know now that Kenya won't ever belong to me the way America does, and understand that my patriotism is about where I’ve lived and breathed my life, not whether I approve of my government. I don’t think I could’ve gained that without the experience I’ve had so far as an expatriate. And I wish I could turn the tables on my community, so that they could love their country more, specifically because they've learned to love (not just be infatauted with) another.

happy thoughts

2006-01-23T13:24:00.000+03:00

(There's something wrong with my browser so I can't change the time and date displayed. I wrote this post January 18, 2006 around 11:31am.)

As my sister Susan packed up to go home, I downloaded vacation pictures from her camera. I also eagerly saved the few she had of Columbia.

There are only ten, but I look at them often and keep noticing new things, like the small crowd waiting by the falafel stand outside of Law and the unlit thousands of Christmas lights silhouetted off the tree trunks of College Walk. A minute ago I noticed a little gray spot in front of Kent. It looked like a sphere with a bump on top and two red sticks poking out the bottom. “God Bless America,” I realized, “It’s a pigeon.” A very fat pigeon.

I love having a laptop. I can now type up forms and lesson plans. I’ve started brainstorming a newsletter geared toward empowering the youth in my community. I can write blog entries without being online. I can watch a movie, program, or write before bed.

Best of all, I can look at the same ten pictures of one square block of NYC over and over and over.

The first time I watched a movie in bed and then let myself out of my mosquito net to pee in my pee-bucket, I almost had a mental breakdown. The contradiction seemed great enough to crash the whole system. But I mean, come on, I have a laptop now. It’s a lot easier to adjust to something you’ve always known and had a break from than to adjust to something you’ve never known. (From what I hear, the reintroduction of my laptop into my life is a preview of what it feels like to go home for good.)

Regardless of my personal technical advances, village life is fast a-changin’. Livingstone now sells brown sugar and wheat bread. The Bomet Supermarket just got their first shipment of ice cream that comes in a cone.

One night I made ten slices of well-buttered wheat toast and went to bed. It was 6:23. I dreamt I was having a buffet dinner with Susan and my friend Joanna. I joined them at the table after they’d already gotten their food. Between the two of them sat one and three-quarters mixed-berry pies. I just sat down and started eating pie. As Susan reassured me with a, “Yknow, whatever,” when I worried about hoarding pie, I ate another bite and declared, "I just can't believe how FRUITY it tastes!" Then I woke up at 9 with heartburn, but I was so, so happy.

on in-service-training and other things

2005-12-14T13:27:00.000+03:00

I just now saw all the new comments that people left, and I just want to say thank you thank you thank you to all y'all for your support and kindness. I don't know if you can know how much it means to me. If I have time after posting this I'll go back and reply. This is the entry I just typed up before signing on:

So it's like this.
Instead of feeling hurt or sad,
I've become practiced at scowling when faced with harassment. Or ignorance. Or corruption and complacency.
(Not that I haven't had a lot of good times and decent progress, but I'm talking about an increasing overall negativiity.)

Last week we had training in Kitui.

I got to explore my bitterness aloud to a roomful of other PCVs. In the beginning I felt ashamed of the hatred I was harboring, and that made me hate myself more. Which made me defensive, and even angrier about the things that angered me.

Most people could relate. Some were angrier. Several offered great advice for processing and understanding my negative reactions.

I am taking this back to site with me.

We also got more information about where to get funding for various projects, and were able to learn a little from each other about needs assessments in our communities. There are a lot of resources available to us, but it's largely up to us to afford and retrieve them.

Training confirmed my belief that Peace Corps, as an organization, needs an extreme makeover. I think PCVs can do great work, and that we gain the experience of a lifetime through service. Peace Corps is stellar when it comes to manpower, time commitment, and community integratedness. But we waste a lot of that by being disorganized and throwing PCVs out there to figure it out for themselves. I mean, for selfish reasons, I'm glad I've had to figure a lot out for myself, because it's challenged me in ways I've never been challenged, and it's shown me that I'm a lot more competent than I ever thought. It's cool cuz I've gained a lot of confidence. But for the communities we live in and want to help, I believe we could do more, and make greater, faster, longer-lasting change.

I could talk for hours about that though, so I'll stop for now.

At the end of training we had an afternoon to visit our homestay families. My homestay niece Ruth, who I was so excited to see, wasn't there. But my friends Justina and Amber and I talked at length with my homestay mama, who is sharp and energetic and talkative and has a dark sarcastic humor that floors me. We also visited Amber and Justina's families, who I loved visiting during our homestay months. At the end we visited Meg's family, where Meg had stayed all afternoon, and by evening, as the four of us made our way home in the dusk, I felt humbled by the kindness and brilliance of these people we called our families for only two and a half months that could make us feel so at home after all this time. I know that that evening we were all turning inward, cleaning out our dusty emotional cupboards. On the bumpy matatu ride back into town, we held up our arms like we were on a rollercoaster, whooping and giggling as we hit the best of potholes, because we were just loving it all, eating it up.

Anyway, I'm only gonna be at site about a week before I leave again for Christmas vacation, so not a lot's getting done this month. I'm going to get to see Kenya from a tourist's point of view for a couple of weeks, and I think it'll be really healthy for me. Plus I'll get to do it all with my sister Susan by my side, and the world will feel smaller and more connected.

As much as things have been getting harder personally and emotionally, I've reached a point where I know I'll miss Kenya when I leave. And that's a good place to be, regardless of the baggage I've brought with me.

Til next time,
jenly

Nothing in particular.

2005-10-08T10:25:00.000+03:00

"4:53am Sleep is the last and final sanctuary for the troubled soul. For the same reason that I am never having babies, I bet Hitler was an insomniac."
That was the start of an entry I've decided not to post. This morning, after listening to the dogs in my yard bark for an hour, I wrote it on the back of a stationery pad that I've started taking to bed with me. I write letters until I get sleepy or until I give up fighting the cold and tuck myself in.
I finally went back to sleep around 7, but because I wanted to get a lot done today, I was really nervous about sleeping too late. I woke up every three minutes to check the time. When I finally got out of bed at 9, I felt a lot worse. The screaming toddler next door did not help.
As I left my house I saw a little chameleon on our front gate. He was so cute I considered taking him home. "After all," I thought, "he won't bark or cry, and he has prehensile hands and feet!" I had to undo the latch he was standing on, but he held on as it swung him around. I closed the gate again and turned to him. He watched me suspiciously as I pondered how, evolutionarily, he could be so much like a primate. He reached around for a swaying branch like a human baby reaches for invisible things in the air, then caught it and got a bit greener. I wondered what defense mechanisms he could use against me. He inched forward, his eye swiveling keenly, and browned. I wondered how long he could survive in a cardboard box with only a branch to keep him company. He inched forward again, hiding in a dense bunch of leaves. I decided to leave him alone.
I'm going to a nearby school today to do a story-sharing activity with the students who board there. It's a simple activity, a binary tree optimization, where each person shares a story with another, and the partners pick the one they like better. Then the pairs pair up and repeat. This goes on until you only have a few groups left, and each group tells their story. You can do it with whatever theme you want, and our theme today is going to be how AIDS has impacted us personally. I think I'm going to have them present their stories in skit form, because Kenyans love skits. At the end I'll give some stats about how AIDS has impacted the world and various parts of it, and then we'll call it a day. The beauty of this activity is that they do all the work, so I don't know what can go wrong, but this is my first class ever, and I'm nervous.*
As far as teaching in schools is concerned, I think I'm going to hold off on formal sessions. I'll do some games here and there but I'm trying to find a couple of Kenyans who can teach with me as a team so that we can reach more schools and provide feedback for each other. After a year or so of us doing all the teaching, I want to train teachers to teach it in their own schools, though I feel hesitant about it because schoolteachers already work from dawn to dusk. The officer at my local Ministry of Education department said he didn't have a problem with it, but only after he essentially washed his hands of doing anything to help me organize. In the meantime I'm going to continue developing lesson plans and meet the local chiefs, because even though I was reluctant to meet any of them at first, I've decided that I really want people to get to know and trust me before I start vocalizing issues that the community is relatively hush about.
Other than that I don't have any news. I look forward to every chance I get to see my Peace Corps friends as The Homesickness Ache evolves into something permanent, a little chameleon clinging to my heart, silent and resolute, changing from fond reminiscence to unbearable longing and back again. I wonder what would happen if I tried to flick it off. I don't think it would budge.

*The activity went really well, entirely because the kids were amazing.

An update long overdue.

2005-09-23T15:28:00.000+03:00

Until September 6: Met various community people that are doing really great work in this community, met some community groups I may or may not be working with, familiarized with Tenwek, Silibwet, and Bomet, learned about some charitable organizations that I’ll probably be working with, studied my various HIV/AIDS resources, started forming ideas for lesson plans, learned a lot about BioSand filters, beekeeping, tea-growing. Caught up on emails. Settled into my house more.

September 6: Bye bye, Christine (the PCV I’ve replaced)!

September 8: Flying termites with a body length of about ½ inch and a wingspan of about 2 inches took off into the dusk sky as I sat outside cooking on my jiko. I thought they looked kind of pretty silhouetted in twos, fives, tens, until I realized how many there were, swarming around me, on me, frying themselves on the jiko coals. Robert, my homeowner, noted that they were coming from my wall, and as he and his wife helped me kill them by pouring hot water on the hole they were pooled around, the nasty things started pouring out the walls all along the perimeter of the inside of my house. We went around pouring hot water and Doom powder (Doom, while a fantastic name for an insecticide, has long struck me as the perfect name for a perfect mattress) on one pile of juicily fat yet scratchy-winged insects at a time. The worst of the nightmare was over about an hour and a half later. My dinner was ruined but I’d pretty much lost my appetite anyway. I texted some of my friends as the post-battle horror started sinking in. Luckily my dad called, and he thought it was funny, which made me feel a little better. I slept pretty well that night, no small thanks to my mosquito net.

September 9: In the morning I swept up a plump powdery pile of crunch and all was quiet, so I burned my trash with the bugs inside. Burning is how we dispose of burnable non-organic trash here. Other things go down the choo or in a pit. Then I went to Nairobi (yes I was running away but it was just good timing - the trip had been planned weeks before) to meet up with my friend Tessa. In the late afternoon I arrived at Upper Hill Campgrounds, a tidy compound in the middle of a bustling city where all manner of travelers pass through. I had lasagna for dinner and it was spectacular. As I ate, the flying termites redoubled their efforts, getting poisoned to death at twice the quantity and latching their dead bodies to my stuff with twice the passion. I was blissfully ignorant of this, however, sipping tea and chit-chatting with Tessa and a programmer from Seattle who insisted that 15000sh on a cow would be a great investment. How I feel about his argument:

    Strongly Disagree                Meh                    Strongly Agree
                | - - - - - - - | - - - - - - - | - - - - - - - | - - - - - - - |
                                    ^

September 10-12: My brief hiatus at Upper Hill was refreshing. I chatted with tourists, volunteers, and development workers from Britain, South Africa, Brazil, Canada, and the US. I took hot showers. I walked around Nairobi several hours a day and really learned a lot about the city, including the fact that I kind of like it after all.
I have a new understanding (however young and evolving) of development work and the implications and impact of what I’m doing, as well as those of other approaches to development. It was so enriching to be able to exchange ideas about development with two Upper Hill regulars who are doing development work in Kenya and come from backgrounds so different from mine. One thing in particular has weighed on my mind since our conversation: A person’s sense of self-worth is something I took for granted in my American “every child is special” education, yet in Kenya, there’s little if any such teaching in school, and so many donor organizations come in and pour money on people, leaving behind a belief that only outside money can help and not the competence of the citizens or the resources that are so plentiful in the communities. I found myself doubtful after talking to a tourist who was enthusiastic about things like giving chickens and cows to host families, and couldn’t understand why until I was able to bat around ideas with Tessa and those development workers. After all, who can argue that those chickens and cows don’t help? It’s hard to know what the right thing to do is, and I don’t think I’d be able to tell someone not to buy a Kenyan family a cow when the benefit to the family is so immediate, but I have a new understanding of why education is so important in the frontlines of development, and I’m especially in awe of local Kenyans that work in development and education, who empower their peers by example.

September 13/14: I got mosquito-bit on my right eyelid. My right eye was swollen shut. I suddenly cared more deeply than I have since I got to Kenya that I was Ugly. Swept up the bugs when I got back home. They’re mostly gone for now, though they’re still living under and in my house. I know this because I hear the telltale scratching, and every so often, I catch one squirming on my floor as the poison kills him. Wings and the occasional whole bug still turn up every day. My supervisor is helping me figure out how to solve my termite problem.

September 15: Had three short vomiting spells even though I’d eaten very little the day before, so everything that came up was liquid. Later I had a fever. Then it all went away. At night I made some soup and steamed my fingers.

September 16: Blister on my middle finger developed as I did some laundry. Then it grew into its own entity. Tried to chat with me. Naturally, I stabbed it in the side with a needle and let it cry itself out, one sticky tear at a time.

September 17: Blister grew back even bigger and brought a friend with him on the ring finger. Popped painfully as I did some more laundry.

September 18: Couldn’t believe how weirdly calamitous yet happy my week had been. I was in a really good mood because my break in Nairobi where I could be myself for a few days really made me remember how grateful I am to be here. I had a dream that night that Peace Corps sent me home and woke up really glad that I was still in Kenya. This was a breakthrough dream because dreaming that I’m at home has become routine, but usually the tables are turned; I dream about the comforts of home and wake up sad that I’m in Kenya.

September 19: Visited Silibwet Primary School, right in my town, where I talked with some teachers and the head teacher about HIV/AIDS issues that concern their student body. Learned a lot more than I could’ve imagined about the impact of AIDS on my community. Usually people are so quiet about it that hearing about the deaths of parents and even students was new to me. By being so serious about the problem and being honest with me, even acknowledging the stigma, they were very encouraging.

September 20: I woke up from a brilliant dream. I was back at Columbia, in John Jay Dining Hall (though it looked nothing like John Jay), getting some food, when the background music broke out into a two bar Disco-Funk rift, and as can only happen in dreams, I broke out into a two bar dance at the same time. When I woke up I could still hear the music, so I did a little dance in my bed. Then I plugged myself into my ipod and danced myself out of bed and into my clothes. I was still plugged into my ipod and grooving as I ate MILK ON GRANOLA (baked the granola myself just last night) and as I washed my millions of post-baking dishes. Just as I finished my dishes, completely without warning, I broke down and sobbed with homesickness. Bipolar? Karibu Kenya. Karibu Peace Corps. My breakdown was triggered by a memory of how the head teacher at SPS reacted when he found out I was an American with a Chinese background. Even after I told him and we talked a while, he asked where I was born. I said I was born in the US. Unsatisfied, he asked where my parents were born, and upon finding out that they immigrated, he was happy. I get this a lot. It’s nothing new. I used to get angry about it but now I feel pretty positive about it as an opportunity for cultural exchange. Tuesday morning, however, that memory overflowed my internal pitcher of homesickness. Sometimes I feel like I'm lying when I talk about diversity in America, because I face a glazed-over smile that seems to say to me, non-white Americans made it there at most a generation ago and aren’t really Americans, just people who lead a nice cushy life in the States and masquerade as Americans. It hurts me because I’ve left behind the majority of what makes me ME, almost every material evidence of all the memories from my life. I try to meditate on home every day, try to imagine mundane things, like driving on a paved road, anything to keep me from forgetting who I am. Even when I’m not actively imagining myself doing something that used to be routine, like pushing a shopping cart down an aisle with 40 different choices for ready-to-eat cake frosting, my thoughts are of home and family and friends. (Oh goodness, the feeling of carpet under my bare feet!) To be this far away, not just physically but communicatively, to be this far away and to be denied my own origin, the root of everything I am and love and have experienced, threatens to crush my thinly held composure altogether. Well, a good cry should never be underestimated. And neither should blogging. It looks like I’m having a regular month in Peace Corps Kenya, where swimming through termites, Quasimodo-eye, dancing with joy, and sobbing with homesickness all go hand in hand.

September 21-23: Visited schools and attended a “Book Week” celebration at my local library. The library is probably the finest institution mankind ever dreamed up. At the celebration, children from several primary and nursery schools performed skits, sang traditional songs, and recited poems. I also attended a crisp-making (they call chips crisps because they call french fries chips. Blame the British!) demonstration for local potato farmers that was largely a quality-control seminar. I met some really cool people and ate lots of crisps and got a big bag of potatoes for free.

- - -

I’m learning to love this country more and more. I’m starting to belong to my community. In Silibwet I have my main groceries guy at "Home Boyz General Store." In Bomet I have my ice cream guys and my yarn lady. And I have three business owners in three different towns collecting bottle caps for me. I love it.

My newest struggle, being accepted as an American, isn’t really a tough one. Most people, once they get to know me, don’t question it. Some people never imply that I’m not American, even when they ask why I look Chinese if I’m American. There are the rare few that never need to ask and never need to be told, the rare few who already know that it’s possible for me to be both, and they’re the best, because I never have to deny either part. And ultimately even though I do get sad, I have faith that things will change, slowly, polepole, even if I’m home by the time people in a developing country across the world can appreciate the gorgeous diversity I’ve always taken for granted.

Well, until next time, I hope everyone is well and that this post has been a good read. Any manner of stories from home are welcome, including what your most recent order at Coldstone was. Yep, I had a dream about that, too, a nice vivid one complete with smells and patting my belly. I woke up ready to place the order that I wouldn’t get to enjoy, in dream or reality:

cheesecake ice cream
black cherries
graham cracker crust
chocolate flakes

I've just met a town called Silibwet

2005-07-20T15:35:00.000+03:00

First, A Few Bullet Points
- I really am trying to post pictures but haven't had the facilities to do so yet.
- I can carry on a very introductory conversation in Kiswahili.
- I FINALLY saw some African wildlife (as in, not cows, goats, or chickens)! Zebras and baboons on the side of the road.
- This past week we all split up and went to our future sites (where we'll be working for the next two years, starting August 6th!) and I just got back from that on Sunday, so it's the hugest development in my life right now.
- I have a new mailing address for both packages and letters, as well as new tips for how to "decorate" your letters.
- Decided a couple of days ago that this entire Peace Corps experience is the product of the highest amount of bravery I have ever exhibited in my life... it's been rough.

Mail Things
I no longer feel modest about asking for packages. I LIVE IN RURAL KENYA. Feel free to spare a little expense on me. All care sent my way is much appreciated (and HUGE THANKS to people who have sent me letters. They get me through the week, no joke.)
You no longer need to use the other mailing addresses I've posted because I have one for the community I'll be working in for the next two years. Before I start, let me explain that there are a couple of tricks that you are supposed to employ when sending me packages so that people don't try to cheat me with obscene and unreasonable customs charges. Even a padded envelope with, say, a fun size bag of peanut m&ms (hint hint) is still a valuable package.

1) Mark it with Christian phrases, maybe even some bible verses. Maybe, as our training director (a Kenyan) suggested, "Jesus is watching you."

2)Write the address as follows:
Sister Jennifer Lee, PCV
P.O. Box 82
Silibwet, Bomet
KENYA

3) Declare everything as educational materials and don't put a high value on it. Heck, write EDUCATIONAL MATERIALS all over it. This is especially true of food items. I don't know why. Some PCVs have paid $40 in customs for $20 items.

I think letters and postcards are making it here just fine, in just 1-2 weeks, so all the previous warnings were a little exaggerated, but that was before I knew what life would be like here.

OMG BTW (oh my god, by the way)
DID YOU GUYS READ HALF BLOOD PRINCE YET I FINISHED IT ON SUNDAY AND IT WAS SO GREAT. Some of my friends here are in line to read it but after they're done I'm gonna re-read it. AGAIN AND AGAIN. And YES I DID PLAN MY SITE VISIT AROUND BEING IN NAIROBI TO BUY IT ON THE DAY IT CAME OUT AND THAT'S WHY I WAS ALMOST BROKE ON MY MODEST PCV EARNINGS.

My Site
My site is a small town called Silibwet, in the district of Bomet. The people who live in the area are called the Kipsigis, a subtribe of the Kalenjin. I'm starting Kipsigis lessons tomorrow morning. It's hilly, wet, and very green, covered in tea plantations that make the view from certain places just breathtaking. I saw a firefly for the first time while coming out of a pit latrine and look forward to that happening many more times. The stars are brilliant at night and in general I'm really looking forward to living there.

The people there are very friendly and have a positive attitude towards volunteerism. We've been trained to be on our guard for people who just want us to give them things because outside aid usually functions that way (we don't and that's one of many reasons why Peace Corps is so awesome), but in my town people actually volunteer their own time and have successfully set up and are running their own library. The organization I'm working with is a community bank that lends out micro-loans for farming, bee-keeping, & bio-filter endeavors, among other things. It's run by members of the community who have a stake in the wellbeing of the community, and some had been volunteers for many years before working with the financial association.

What I do when I'm at site is going to be somewhat open-ended, but there's tons of work available. Promoting safe water practices is just one of the many jobs available for me in Silibwet. There are many schools and community groups that are interested in HIV/AIDS education and training. The stigma there is very high and the Voluntary Counseling and Testing Center (free and confidential HIV testing facilities that require every testee to be counseled about the implications and how to live with HIV - very cool) doesn't get many visitors, so I hope very much to be able to help promote all the benefits of getting tested and knowing your status. I plan to go on some surveying trips with some of the officers at my district Ministry of Agriculture as well to get a sense of what people need and how various MoA programs are working or need my input. Same with the district MoH (Ministry of Health).

Anyway, that's what I've been up to. I've been really happy and my group is awesome. They make me laugh a lot, and even though my homesickness is pretty high and I've had a rough week, I'm so grateful to be here, and am really excited about finally moving to Silibwet.

As usual I hope everyone's having a spectacular time. Please take care of yourselves and keep me updated on what's happening in your lives. Even hearing about mundane everyday things like traffic and office gossip really cheer me up and remind me of home. And I miss you all like CRAZY, more than I can express.

Sitaki chapati ambayo imekatwa ndogo ndogo

2005-06-25T09:30:00.000+03:00

That means, "I don't want chapati that's been cut into little pieces," in Kiswahili. Chapati...mmm...I'm at the posta on a Saturday for the first time ever! This is also my first blog post from Kenya ever! Whee. It closes in 2.5 hours and I have 4 surf cards (internet usage cards) in my possession (2 100 min cards and 2 partially used cards), so I'm mzuri kabisa (totally good) for the rest of the asubuhi (morning).

My computer is bad though and gives up frequently so let's hope I get this all typed and published. I have received a couple of letters and one package, and I MUST spread the word that everything gets here in 1-2 weeks. It's shockingly fast! The part of Kitui that we're in is pretty nice. I mean, 5 weeks ago I might've considered it poverty but now that I'm living it I realize how comfortable a living it is. People live off their own land and hard work. The main food products they buy are cooking fat, tea/coffee, and sugar. In general, they raise or grow everything else.

If you're ever curious and I haven't already told you, I will give you a rundown of why I think the improved pit latrines are better than flushing toilets. Bucket baths are pretty nice even though I prefer a shower, though it teaches me that I could use about a hundredth of the water than I usually use.

One of the biggest achievements on my part is re-learning how to ride a bike and riding it on the death-trap roads of Kitui, where size-of-vehicle is directly proportional to right-of-way. I white-knuckle my way to and back from town almost every day and have fallen twice. It's awesome.

In Kitui, avocadoes and papayas rain from the sky, unlike in the US where they cost $800.

I have requests for things to send from home that can be contained in an 80 cent envelope:
- pictures of yourselves
- color clippings or printouts of crowds of Americans, because most people here DO NOT understand how diverse americans are. (Don't they all have white skin and brown hair?) You can't possibly send me too many of them because my fellow PCVs could use them too.

Other requests:
- Bittersweet chocolate. My favorite is Ghirardhelli's baking chocolate which is like 71% cocoa or something like that. There is tons of Cadbury MILK chocolate here but no dark.
- CDs of your favorite music. They can be mp3 CDs because I have Gary's mp3 CD player!

Anyway it's pretty expensive to send things so no one is obligated. I am writing a little bit almost every day but there isn't much time when nighttime = lights out. I <3 the letters and am super duper grateful to any and all that you've sent me so far.

Sorry I didn't talk much about what I've been doing in terms of training and learning. I will say that I've done a lot of digging and playing in manure in agriculture-related trainings and that it's been awesome. I also haven't posted any pictures because you can't load anything onto these terminals at the posta. They're so slow that I probably wouldn't try anyway. All my pics have mostly been of fellow PCTs, too, because I've kept my camera stored at the PC training office most of the time.

Awesome! Nimeshiba sana (I am very full, but literally "I am very satisfied") that I finally got a post written. Hope everyone is well. I know I'm having an amazing time!

All my Love,
jenly

I leave in 2 days.

2005-05-18T06:18:00.000+03:00

I have watched too many sunrises of late.

I might buy a sleeping bag and some books, but other than that I think I'm just about done. Right now my stuff comes in just under 70 pounds.

This photo is dedicated to Esther.

The backpack alone is about 47 pounds. At first I thought that I was over the weight limit for 1 piece of checked luggage (50 lbs), but then I took the backpack off, weighed myself again, and discovered that all my frantic feasting of mexican food and ice cream has plumped me up quite successfully. Bring me some more horchata, fools!

I can't stand up straight in that backpack, and I don't think I'm meant to. It feels fine, like I could wear it for a few hours without any real pain other than my exhaustion, but getting it on and taking it off without a chair is impossible.

Misty, a woman leaving in the same group as I, found my blog and invited me to join in a yahoogroup containing a few other members of our group. It's been ridiculously helpful in preparing me mentally and materially for leaving.

I think they need to put me on a plane already, in my pajamas and everything, just so I'll stop packing and repacking. My hands have been numb for hours now. It may be because I've slept 6 hours in the past 61.

Pre-departure FAQs

2005-05-14T15:43:00.000+03:00

There are a lot of questions that I've been asked repeatedly over the course of the past year and with increasing frequency over the past two months. I don't think I've answered everything below, but hopefully it will be helpful to people who I haven't been able to talk with extensively.
The information I have provided is true to the best of my knowledge, but I have to emphasize that I'm not a PC Volunteer just yet, and some of my info may change in a few weeks or months. ;)
Many thanks to Jeansun and Gary who helped me think of questions!

1. What is the Peace Corps?
"The Peace Corps was established in 1961 to promote world peace and friendship through the service of American Volunteers abroad. In adapting to changing needs around the world, the Peace Corps remains guided by three goals from the Peace Corps Act:

to help people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women;
to help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served; and
to help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans

More than 170,000 Americans have furthered these goals through service in the Peace Corps for more than 42 years and in 137 countries."

"A cornerstone of Peace Corps' approach to development is the belief that success is achieved by helping people develop the capacity to use their own skills and resources to improve their lives. Identifying assets and resources to improve their community and building on these assets to increase self-reliance and sustainable development are critical elements of the Peace Corps' philosophy."

- Peace Corps Volunteer Handbook

It's a government agency. Your tax dollars at work!

2. What will you be doing, exactly?
I'm going with the public health program, which means I will be educating people about HIV/AIDS and other diseases.

Yeah, but what does that mean?
It will vary based on my final site, but some examples of what Public Health volunteers do in Kenya are (I have directly quoted some of these from PC materials):

working with a Kenyan counterpart in designing and facilitating community ed workshops to increase HIV/AIDS awareness, prevention, counseling, and testing
participating in HIV/AIDS and communicable disease education through school-based programs.
teaching personal and community hygiene practices that decrease vulnerability to water-borne illnesses.
helping establish resource facilities that provide information
teaching the scientific and medical facts about condoms and demonstrating their correct use
supporting and assisting self-help seropositive groups and linking people with HIV/AIDS and their families to non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that provide support services.

3. Where will you be living?
For the first three months, I'll be training in Naivasha, which is a moderately sized town about 100 km northwest of Nairobi (world66). Its greatest tourist attraction, Lake Naivasha, is famous for its hippo population, and there are more than 400 there (magicalkenya). in Kutui. For the subsequent two years I will be assigned to another site.

4. What language(s) will you have to learn?
Kenya's official languages are English and Kiswahili. I will have to learn Kiswahili and I might have to learn a dialect too. (cia world factbook)

5. Will you be by yourself or with a group of people?
During training, I will live with a host family and see my fellow Peace Corps Trainees frequently. I'm not sure if I will be hosted by the same family as any other volunteers. After training, PCVs are assigned to separate locations.

6. What will you do about housing?
Housing will be provided. I have actually heard a couple horror stories of people having to build their own huts, but those were second- and third-hand accounts, and I'm not even sure where those volunteers were serving.

Some excerpts from the PC/Kenya Welcome Book:
"The standard and condition of Volunteer housing vary widely, from mud houses with thatched roofs to very modern cement houses with running water and electricity."
"...you can expect to have, at the very least, a room to call your own."

Some things that the PC states are "minimum housing standards":

a private, lockable room if housing is shared with other people.
a place to take a bucket bath or shower
a latrine that is private or semiprivate (such as shared with staff of the school but not the students)

7. Will you have electricity?
PC: "you will live in a rural community and will most likely not have access to indoor plumbing or electricity."

8. What about your laptop?
I'm not going to bring a laptop, but I will have some other small electronic devices (camera, mp3 cd player(thanks, gary!!), shortwave radio), and I don't really care if they're uncharged most of the time(I'll recharge when I can). They'll kind of be luxury items anyway.

9. Are baobabs real or were they made up by Antoine de Saint Exupéry?
They are real, they are fat, and they are juicy.

10. Are you really going to live in a baobab tree?
No, but I wish I were a monkey, how fun would that be... (don't eat me!)

11. Will you have phone/internet/mail access?
Internet cafes are supposedly not that hard to find. If I live somewhere super-rural, I vow to sniff one out in a nearby town and go at least once a month, unless that proves to be too difficult.

Cell phones can be bought there (there are two cellular service providers) ~~but I dunno if that's a good idea.~~ and word on the street is that all PCVs in Kenya get them. Some large cities have overseas telephone service. Some places are fast and efficient while others may take several hours to get through. Snail mail might turn out to be the best way to reach me (and for me to reach you), which is ironic, because it's nowhere near as reliable as USPS. (see below)

12. How much can you bring with you?
I have an 80 pound limit, but since I will be moving around a lot initially, I'm limiting myself to 1 large hiking backpack (5000 cu. in.), 1 school backpack, and a purse/carrying bag.

13. Are you going to buy/make your own clothing? Sounds like you won't bring much.
Yeah, clothes will be easier to buy there. In rural parts of Kenya, women have to wear long skirts at all times, and I don't really own any, so I'm better off buying most of my clothes there anyway. Apparently, the underwear, bras, and shoes that I can get here will prove to be much better in quality than the ones I can get there, so I've brought more of those kinds of things.

14. Can I send you stuff?
Yes, but things get lost in the mail sometimes. Letters that contain nothing of value or interest are the least likely to get "lost." Letters take about a month and packages take about three months to reach Kenya, but it'll vary greatly depending on my eventual site. Please see below for more info about sending me things.

15. What will your mailing address be?
This address will change, but during training (May-Aug) you can send letters to:
Jennifer Lee, Peace Corps Trainee
P.O. Box 30518
Nairobi, Kenya

It is strongly recommended that you mark letters with "Airmail" and "Par Avion" and number them so that receivers can know if they missed any letters. Basically, keep mail plain-looking, and don't put anything valuable inside. Enclose postcards in envelopes.

To send packages, you can send to:
Jennifer Lee, PCV
U.S. Peace Corps
P.O. Box 30518
Village Market, 00621
Nairobi, Kenya

Quoting the PC/Kenya: "sending packages can be a frustrating experience for all involved due to the possible theft and heavy customs taxes." Things in padded envelopes are less likely to incur heavy customs taxes and/or be stolen.

I will probably get my own P.O. Box after I've moved to my final site. I'll update the address when I know it.

16. OMG I CAN'T BELIEVE IT TAKE LOTS OF PICTURES DUDE!!
I will try to take tons of pictures! Whenever I can, I will upload them to my Flickr for you to see.

17. Did you have to get vaccinations? / Will you be taking malaria pills?
Yes. I'll be given a bunch of shots during orientation (before we leave for Kenya). Then I'll have to follow whichever precautions are appropriate to where I'll be (so malaria pills at least. We'll be educated about it during training, but I don't know the details right now.)

18. Do you have any idea how much you'll be walking over there?!?
No, not really.

19. I don't want you to starve!
Don't worry, I will get fat like a hippo and spend my downtime wading in a lake with my mouth open.

20. Do you get paid?
We get paid a salary that is intended to cover living expenses (and therefore adjusts based on where we live), and we are never meant to have to spend our outside funds. By all accounts, and I mean all, it is plenty. I hear horror stories about the PC, but I've never heard that the pay wasn't plenty to live a modest lifestyle on. We also get a stipend at the end of service.

21. Do you get any vacations? / Can you come home?
Yes, vacation days accumulate during service. I can come home, but coming back to the States costs so much more than chillin' in Europe or something equally exotic to an amateur traveler like me... so I might take advantage of it to explore. If I'm homesick, though, I'll definitely come home.

22. Can I visit you?
Yeah, you actually can. I don't know all the details about getting there, though. You'll have to get a visa and probably some vaccinations/meds, which could turn out to be expensive (not to mention the cost of the ticket), but you and I need to do some research because PC has handled so much of it for me.

23. What will you miss the most?
IIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNTTTEEEEERRRRRRRNNEEEEETT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

24. If you wanted to, could you quit early?
Yeah, but I don't imagine I will.

25. What will you do when you come back?
I want to go back to school...we'll see about that.

testing, testing...

2005-05-11T23:47:00.000+03:00

Welcome to my Peace Corps blog. I don't know how often I will get a chance to update!
9 days til Virginia.
14 days til I leave the States.
1-5 hours til I finally kick myself off the computer to do a practice run for packing... I need to see if I have any extra room for extra sneakers or a solar charger or a solar shower... hehe.
----------------
My practice run took me a few hours but was a success. I still have some room, and might use it for some good shoes or extra clothes...maybe fifty more pairs of underwear...