Afriqueness

It’s been about a month since we last wrote an entry, and in that time we have sworn in as volunteers, moved into our new community, and realized that we now live in Africa. And I mean this quite literally, because it is a shocking revelation to sit up in your bed and see Acacia trees and Masai men wandering with their herds—Africa is now truly just outside our window. I can’t say with any certainty why I didn’t know it until now, but such is this crazy experience.


We swore in at the ambassador’s home, which is beautiful. The seating arrangement in his backyard was such that we (the volunteers) sat in several rows under one tent, and the audience, our trainers, and Kenyan dignitaries, sat under a second tent to our right. The ceremony began under seemingly normal circumstances when the Kenyan side sang a song of national pride. Given my limited impression of Kenyan ceremony, this did not seem out of the ordinary. I was totally unprepared however, for our class to comically fumble through a tone deaf version of the star spangled banner, complete with incorrect wording and more than a few bewildered looks askance.


And so with that, plus a few more formalities, we became official PCV’s. We were even graced by the presence of a large baboon, who sauntered in to see what the racket was all about, and what food might be to his liking. According to the ambassador, whom Jennie and I asked later, this same baboon flooded a wing of the house after some rather ill treatment by the previous occupants. Current U.S. policy is to give all manner of food and fair treatment in an attempt to avoid further hostilities.


It was a day which reaffirmed how happy we are to be here volunteering. And we really got the sense that we had achieved something, a feeling which up to this point has been rather hard to come by. We walked up individually and received our Peace Corps diplomas, smiled for the camera while shaking the ambassador’s hand, and listened to a rousing speech from the minister of health. If I had to sum it up, I would say that it’s been almost a year (counting application, staging and training) of uncertainty and exploration, punctuated by a few tear provoking moments of intense pride and excitement. And most of you know that I strictly reserve my tears for weddings and sentimental film.


Then lots of other important stuff happened, we met up with some of our host family, and I ate the hell out of some roasted goat. That’s not a typo, and it’s not even the craziest part of our evening. Our host family’s eldest daughter is married and lives in Nairobi with her husband and two kids, and they were nice enough to take us out to dinner after our ceremony to celebrate. We went to a really bizarre Miami Vice meets Africa club called Club Afrique. The place is decked out with mirrors, a light up dance floor, large shiny chrome railings, white booths with red velvet seating, and an aerial light show that would make the cast of blue man group insane with jealousy. I half expected to see Scarface slouched in one of the corners chewing on a stirring straw. The really crazy part is that half-way through dinner Geoffrey showed us a news blurb on his phone about the arrest of the minister of health. So the very same woman, whom we were received by and spoken to at swear-in, had just been arrested, which totally stole my whole “vegetarian eating the hell out of some roasted goat” thunder! The following day’s newspaper had her with police and in the same outfit she spoke to us in, which might explain her early and rather abrupt departure from our ceremony. It seems that it was a minor affair after all, but it made for a day we won’t soon forget. This is us pre-ceremony. Enjoy the picture, there’s more to come I promise.