The house is starting to come together, albeit slowly given that most things must come in on our backs. The situation is such that we have a 2 hour walk of approximately 13 kilometers from our front door to the main road. From there we catch a passing Nissan bus called a matatu another 35km north to the market village of Kajiado. We can get most of our supplies there, food, furniture, tools and electricity. And I can proudly say that Jennie and I recently hand carried 2 large papaya, 3 pineapples, several large bags of random other fruit and veggies, 5 rolls of TP, a large tin of coffee, a gallon of paint, a shovel, several plastic lawn chairs, a pick axe, and at least three diet cokes. It puts a new spin on how quickly you choose to consume things, and it definitely makes recycling and reusing a huge priority.
The paint, as it turned out, was a putrid shade of mint green that must have come to East Africa by way of every other continents distaste. Our 1st clue should have been the price. So we did what any poor volunteer would do; we painted our toilet and bathing rooms with it figuring that we spend the least of our time there. The fact is, we were invested financially, and we lugged the can for hours, so the damn paint was going on a wall.
I do have to say that our new home is a place of contradictions. For all the toil, lack of water, and lack of electricity, we are treated to some ridiculously beautiful landscape. This last particular walk was saved by our first view of Mt Kilimanjaro. We struggled with our load up the final few kilometers, and just as I was about to crab at Jen about something phenomenally trivial, there it was. The snow capped peak had, until now, been hidden from view by a dense cloud cover. I would take a picture, but there would be no justice in it.
Beautiful as the scenery might be, there are also some really infuriating aspects as well. I already mentioned the charming two hour hike in, which gets old after the fifth time you do it carrying copious groceries and a days worth of dust and grime from the road. There is also the ad hoc nature of everything here which is quite baffling to American sensibilities. In the U.S., stuff just works. I cant explain it any better than that. But here, everything needs a little kick, or ingenious tweak to work somewhat properly. And so in this vein we come to probably the most angering and tear-jerkingly hilarious part of Jennie's journey. It's the type of thing that seems trivial, and yet is so uniquely Jennie in fashion.
Well, we all know that Jen is fond of her clothes. And here it seems that clothes take a particular beating. Add to that the strange and breakable (remember I said ad hoc) nature of the door knobs in our house, and you are headed straight for hilarity. Somehow, Jennie managed to break just about every door knob in the house. And by break I mean snap off such that a jagged edge remains upon a turnable and still sort of functioning stump. So after accomplishing the door knob massacre, Jennie repeatedly walked past the aforementioned knobs, resulting in the partial impalement, and subsequent tearing of, the right shoulder of every shred of clothing she owns in Kenya. From my perspective there would be a shriek, followed by cursing and frantic shirt changing.
Anyhow, we have a good chuckle when people ask about her clothing tears and subsequent tailoring with odd colored thread. Ironically, we are quickly adapting to the ad hoc nature of things by being, well, ad hoc ourselves. Take this blog entry for example. Three days ago I put our dead car battery on a truck and sent it to town for charging. The battery left, and with the truck, was arrested and impounded for a few days. When we had word that the truck, and battery had been released, it was finally taken to town for charging. Day three saw the battery return, and charge our computer for about 40 minutes and then die.. so needless to say, we are out of power until next time, much love from Kenya, Nick and Jennie.
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
Thursday, August 30, 2007
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.
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.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
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 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!!!!!
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
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.
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.
Sunday, July 8, 2007
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.
Monday, July 2, 2007
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.
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.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Blessing blessing fast hyena!
Okay, it's been exceedingly hard to get Internet access. Jennie was successful once when we arrived, but only got off half an email before drawing a crowd of leering school kids that sent her running from the terminal.
We've been training for several weeks now, and though it's only been a short time, for us eons have passed. We are like children again--everything is incredibly, tryingly, interesting. We can't communicate effectively, and days are exhaustingly long. Most days start at 6am with a cold bucket bath and some hot tea. We leave our house just after 7 and walk for an hour to our training site, wherever that happens to be. It truly doesn't matter where it is, it's always an hours walk from where we are. In fact, whoever designed this place put everything seemingly equi-distant from everywhere else. So like I said, it takes an hour. We have a class, we walk an hour for some lunch, we walk some more... you get the picture. And when you have errands to run, you try your damnedest to string them together to save time. Paradoxically, services being as sporadic as they are, you can never set out on said errand with any reasonable expectation of ever completing it.
Apart from daily life, things here are amazing. We eat very well as vegetarians with fresh fruit and veggies every night. The farm we live on always has fresh mangoes, avocados, papaya and bananas. And the main dishes are usually made up of rice or a thick slab of ugali (cornstarch and water) and a cooked pea and bean stew. Mamas here base their self worth on fattening their men, so I'm coming home a good 25 pounds heavier.
Learning Kiswahili has been challenging, but we are starting to turn a corner I think. I spoke in church this weekend (yes, I went to church) and the entire congregation stopped laughing after only about half a minute, so I'm clearly doing something right. Immersion is hard though, and can make for some pretty funny situations. A friend of ours tried to throw a popular Kenyan phrase into conversation about how being in a rush is not a blessing. He ended up blessing a really fast hyena to the hilarity of the people he was addressing... and we're still giving him a hard time as I write this.
Lastly, and it is of note, Jennie's extra sensory perception has led us to find several purveyors of diet coke. Apparently someone tipped off the folks at Coca-Cola that they should send a diet product to the far reaches of Africa where starving Americans will fall all over themselves to buy it. Who knew?
Well time is running short, but please keep commenting, they're great to read. And we will try our best to post with pictures very soon. Much Love - Nick and Jennie
We've been training for several weeks now, and though it's only been a short time, for us eons have passed. We are like children again--everything is incredibly, tryingly, interesting. We can't communicate effectively, and days are exhaustingly long. Most days start at 6am with a cold bucket bath and some hot tea. We leave our house just after 7 and walk for an hour to our training site, wherever that happens to be. It truly doesn't matter where it is, it's always an hours walk from where we are. In fact, whoever designed this place put everything seemingly equi-distant from everywhere else. So like I said, it takes an hour. We have a class, we walk an hour for some lunch, we walk some more... you get the picture. And when you have errands to run, you try your damnedest to string them together to save time. Paradoxically, services being as sporadic as they are, you can never set out on said errand with any reasonable expectation of ever completing it.
Apart from daily life, things here are amazing. We eat very well as vegetarians with fresh fruit and veggies every night. The farm we live on always has fresh mangoes, avocados, papaya and bananas. And the main dishes are usually made up of rice or a thick slab of ugali (cornstarch and water) and a cooked pea and bean stew. Mamas here base their self worth on fattening their men, so I'm coming home a good 25 pounds heavier.
Learning Kiswahili has been challenging, but we are starting to turn a corner I think. I spoke in church this weekend (yes, I went to church) and the entire congregation stopped laughing after only about half a minute, so I'm clearly doing something right. Immersion is hard though, and can make for some pretty funny situations. A friend of ours tried to throw a popular Kenyan phrase into conversation about how being in a rush is not a blessing. He ended up blessing a really fast hyena to the hilarity of the people he was addressing... and we're still giving him a hard time as I write this.
Lastly, and it is of note, Jennie's extra sensory perception has led us to find several purveyors of diet coke. Apparently someone tipped off the folks at Coca-Cola that they should send a diet product to the far reaches of Africa where starving Americans will fall all over themselves to buy it. Who knew?
Well time is running short, but please keep commenting, they're great to read. And we will try our best to post with pictures very soon. Much Love - Nick and Jennie
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