Awkward and Halting

Just a quick hello... Jennie and I are set to swear-in next week as training comes to an end. It's been a crazy 10 weeks, and as we reflect on what we have done, we just really want to thank all of you for being supportive. In truth coming here has been hard, and frustrating, and at times it has been one of the best experiences of our lives. I think that the next two years will prove to be no less amazing, and we hope that you will continue to follow us through it.

So with that said, some details. Saturday is family appreciation day, which in peace corps roughly translates to a community day full of cooking and awkward, halting conversation in Kiswahili. It will be really ridiculously fun for our language group, and frankly we all love chapati (Kenyan naan basically) and guacamole, a dish we have shamelessly inculcated our host families with. There is an abundance or ridiculously tasty avocados just falling off the trees at present, so it had to be done. We'll also roast a goat. Jen and I are still veggie, but the folks here get positively giddy over some nyama choma so we couldn't disappoint.

After that we have our final language proficiency interviews, which again basically amount to awkward and halting conversation, only this time sans goat. For one half hour we have to discuss food, culture and family in Kiswahili with a trained interviewer, who then rates our level of proficiency. And I must say, for only speaking Kiswahili this last 10 weeks, we have been chattering on pretty well.

Monday we have a party with our whole class, which officially makes it a full weekends worth of awkward and halting conversation, only this time with beer. It's just a time to unwind and appreciate how far we've come. We started as a group of 50, and now we are about 45, but that's still amazing considering how hard uprooting and moving to a developing country is. In the final analysis here, it looks like we are going to do great. Stay tuned for photos later in the week, and for goodness sake, will somebody post and let a kid know whats happening with the Tour De France already!!!!!

So much to say

My apologies for the last entry. The formatting was really strange, and the pictures were a bit random. I think it represents what "can" be done given the worlds slowest Internet connection, one bad photographer, three chimpanzees, and a blog all locked in a room. In the future I will host our photos on a third-part site TBD. In the meantime, enjoy my senseless anecdotes.

So with that said, we've had an amazing few weeks. First, we now know our future site. We will be living in a small Masai village about 30km outside of Kajiado. This puts us only a couple of hours drive from Nairobi, and an hour or so from the Tanzanian border. We have Amboseli National Reserve and Kilimanjaro to the southeast. And we have the Masai Mara to the southwest, and both are in close range for those thinking of visiting.

Our site is amazing! The village mama's greeted us formally and gave jennie some beautiful Masai jewelery as a welcome. And the kids swarmed us as we walked into the village. It was overwhelming, and friendly, and completely what we imagined when we dreamed of Peace Corps in Africa. Kilimanjaro is visible in the distance, and baboons run across the road as we hike the 2 hours into the village from the main road. To say that we are happy with the placement is a gross understatement--it really is postcard Peace Corps.

Second thing; we were on television. And not only were we on t.v., but people have been recognizing us. While in Nairobi having lunch, we had two women randomly ask about Peace Corps, and compliment our Kiswahili on the nightly news. And in Kajiado we had a man cross the street and say "it was you, on the t.v.!" It's been totally surreal, and really funny. In fact, we complained to one of our host country nationals that we looked stupid. He replied that he "had lived here thirty years and never once been on the news dammit!" We are trying to get a tape so that you can all have a good laugh, so stay tuned for that.

Lastly, we learned that when in Kenya, buckle thy seat belt. On our way to site visit we had an incredible time. We saw some amazing scenery, and met our counterparts, who happen to be incredibly progressive and cool, not to mention dedicated. In short, we laughed, we cried, and we almost went to jail... If you want to know more, you will have to send us a care package, or at least a letter with some chocolate. It's shameless extortion, and we aren't going to try and hide it. Until next time, Much love and many thanks for reading/posting, Nick and Jennie.

This is a shot of our language group. Every morning we study at our host home with a Kenyan language tutor for several hours before working on our technical skills. From left to right are: Nate, Jennie, Hannah and Simon, our instructor. I shot this photo on our first week of training, in the front yard of our host families garden.

Our host family brothers took us to a nearby rock, where legend has it, running around seven times actually changes your sex. You can't tell from the photo, but Jennie and I actually switched places. From left to right are: Nick, Jennie, Dixson and Joseph. At some point the town erected a set of metal stairs to climb to the top. They were the most harrowing part of the entire experience, but the view was well worth it!

Besides being really community oriented, and incredibly hard working, the local government have a great sense of humor. We happened upon this chiefs office while meeting with a local youth group and had to get a photo.

Big in Kenya

The past couple of weeks have been ridiculous! Really great, but totally, absurdly, ridiculous... Let me just set the stage for you. We have been going along our way learning Kiswahili and our technical skills. The material is dynamic and applicable to the lives of our future community. Its been really fun. And then, Friday happened.

So we were informed that some media might come and observe our language class. This was mildly unnerving but interesting news. They were to visit for 20 minutes or so and then move on to some other classes to create some sort of news piece. What happened in actuality was quite different.

A cameraman observed the class for at least 20 minutes. And by observed I mean he got right up in our faces while we stumbled through rudimentary Kiswahili; it was pretty tough to keep it together. The crew then proceeded to take Jennie and I through a series of b-roll shots intended to reinforce mazungu gender roles. They had her washing potatoes, and cleaning our clothes, and all the while firing questions at her. She handled it like a champ. I on the other hand was pulled aside separately and interviewed while picking peas in the garden. It wasn't pretty. To make this long story short, they got enough footage of us looking stupid to keep the continent laughing long after we're gone.

In light of this, things are really going well. We are anxious to know where our future site is, and will be finding out within a few days, so keep your eyes peeled for another post. And yes... pictures as promised.