Staff Christmas Party

This year has been filled with many first experiences. First time living in a foreign land, first Christmas away from family. The staff are experiencing a lot of firsts as well. We have exposed our teachers to materials they have never seen before, they have learned how to use computers, and work with crazy Americans. Well, for Orphans Overseas’ Christmas party, we introduced them to another first…bowling.

The May’s and I go to Village Market almost every week for shopping, lunch, movies, bowling, etc. It’s a pretty popular spot among the mzungus. Most of the staff had never been before, so our outing was a big deal. We told them to dress casual because they were going to be playing a game, but of course everyone came dressed in their Sunday best. Everyone was abnormally quiet on the ride into town. I could tell they were nervous. When we unloaded out of the van, we headed to the food court where people were given money to choose from a variety of restaurants serving any type of every ethnic food you could ever want. They froze. They did not know what to do and it took them an incredibly long time to decide what to order and from where. Most people went to the only African cuisine restaurant and got kuku and chips (chicken and fries), a staple in their diet. With my and Ian’s help, a few people branched out and tried new things. Those that didn’t wish they had once they sampled our food.

Naomi dancing

Then…bowling. Getting shoes, picking out a ball, and explaining the game was stressful for them. Once everyone bowled their first frame though, the mood of the entire day changed. People were dancing, laughing, and throwing the balls so hard I thought we were going to break the floor. I have never seen them so happy. Not to mention, some of them had scores that were incredibly high. Tito beat me and Ian by a long shot! I think they would have stayed longer and bowled the rest of the day if Ian would have let them.

It was a great day. I took pictures of everyone bowling throughout the day and then people wanted posed shots with their ball. Ian and Anne printed them for the staff a few days later. Their faces lit up. They thought it was the greatest present.

That’s so Kenya

There is a simplicity and slowness about Kenya that is interesting…and at times frustrating. Kenyans don’t get in a hurry for much that I’ve noticed. Their mentality is it will get done when it gets done. A task that would take an hour to do at home takes several here. You will give yourself high blood pressure if you let it get to you, so I’ve found that you may as well accept it and move along with the snail pace of things. For the most part I think I’m a patient person, but sometimes I catch myself being that typical American…wanting something done NOW.

Take for example, the Posta. Anne and I went to mail three packages for work and Christmas. In the states, there might be a long line, but there are several people working at the counter, and once you reach it, you are done relatively quick. This particular day, there was a long line with one person at the counter. Kenyans haven’t quite grasped the concept of a line or how it works yet either. People cut in line everywhere and I often feel like a five year old taddle telling that someone cutted. So Anne and I waited in line for probably 30 minutes, with people cutting in front of us, trying not to be frustrated. We reach the counter, do the paperwork, and pay. But of course she doesn’t have stamps to actually mail the package or money for our change. Both have to be found, but she’s not sure where. So we wait…wait…wait. Finally we decide to go grocery shopping and then come back. When we returned, she had our change but still no stamps. So we waited…waited…another 15 minutes later she gets stamps. There were probably 20 different sheets of stamps in five or ten shilling increments. As you can imagine, it took a while. An hour and a half later, we FINALLY left the Posta. I was wishing so badly that they had machines that automatically print the postage for them. Just another day in Kenya….on Kenyan time.

Meet Me at the Manger

I had the delight of attending Eli’s school Christmas play this week – Meet Me at the Manger. When I was invited, I had no idea what I was in for. It’s kind of a given that these types of things will be cute, but I should have known it would be even better with Eli there. This kid never ceases to amaze me. There’s never a dull moment.

Eli of course was the star of the show, not because he had speaking lines, but because he was ‘that kid’ in the performance. You know, the kid that can’t sit still and is doing inappropriate things that everyone ends up laughing at. Yeah, that was Eli. For some reason, he felt the need to do this robot move throughout the entire play, especially when there was a song on. He was really excited about it.

Eli's infamous robot move

He also felt the need to hold the boys hand sitting next to him. The kid went along with it at first but then started shaking his arm compulsively trying to loosen Eli’s grip. Eli got bored shortly after and decided, not to do the robot, but instead to play with the beads in the girls hair on the opposite side of him.

Between Eli’s performance and the really cute Christmas play, it was non-stop laughs.

Babies, and MORE babies.

There always seems to be an interesting story with every birth that takes place. If Ian isn’t taking someone to the hospital in the middle of the night, then there’s a gross hospital story, or the doctors are trying to take someone’s baby away….

Baby Ian, named after Ian May, was the second to be born at Karibu Centre from one of our vulnerable mothers who is 11 years old. When this mother finally had the baby, we were told it weighed 6kg (13.2 lbs). She certainly didn’t seem THAT pregnant, so we knew something was fishy. Then, we were told they were isolating the baby because they didn’t want the mother to feed it and gain weight. In what world does that sound even remotely correct?! Come to find out, the doctors were taking the baby from our mother because they thought she was too young to have one. They were going to tell her it had died. After our social worker and resident assistant spoke with the doctors and nurses assuring them that the baby will be well taken care of, baby Ian was returned to the mothers care…and weighing a normal 6 pounds.

Another visit to the hospital resulted in me almost throwing up. Hospitals here aren’t the most sanitary, and I was reminded when I went to pick up Milka and baby Jonas from the hospital. When I walked into the room, I noticed blood all over the floor. As I was trying not to slip and fall in it, I followed the blood trail between two beds and noticed some bodily organs. It took me a minute to realize it was in fact, a placenta. Just lying there..with flies swarming…no one else in the room seemed bothered by it. I was trying to play it cool but I guess my facial expression said all I was thinking because everyone started laughing. That’s when I turned to Milka and asked, “Is that YOUR placenta?”. Grossest thing I’ve seen to date.

So we had four baby boys, all beautiful and healthy, with proud mothers. Every time someone went to the hospital, I was secretly wishing for a girl. Baby number five was finally a girl – Doreen Mega. I laughed so hard when I saw the birth certificate. Megan is a difficult name for people here. When I introduce myself, I usually have to repeat it a few times. So, Mega is close enough to Megan for me!

Baby number six was also a girl, Lillian. We might be on a roll. Wambui went to the hospital in labor this afternoon, so we’ll have to wait and see. Ian, Anne, and I think there’s a good posibility she could have twins…

Pictures of our mothers and their babies can be found on Karibu Centre’s facebook page.

Uganda

I’ve made some life-long friends since moving here. People from all over the world loving life, work, travel, adventure, and the Lord. It’s a great network of people that I am inspired by and truly grateful for. Definitely an answered prayer.

A few months ago, I went to a BBQ (my first social outing in Kenya) and met these crazy guys Adrian and Joe. I immediately felt like I was hanging with friends back home. Really laid back, down to earth, and hilarious people that love living in Kenya. It got me excited about being here. I got even more excited when there was talk of a trip to Uganda to raft the Nile River. Even though we had met hours earlier for the first time, I told them I would most definitely go. How often do you get the opportunity to raft the Nile? Come on.

A couple months later, there is a group of 12 going on this trip. Adrian is somewhat of a travel agent so he had the entire trip planned for us. The plan was to take a bus over night to Uganda and we would arrive there Saturday morning, go rafting and bungie jumping, and be back in Kenya for work Tuesday morning. So there we were at the bus station…waiting…waiting…waiting. It finally shows up about two hours late (that is so Kenya). I sat next to Kimberly who was visiting Adrian from New Zealand. We tried for a long time to figure out a sleeping situation and ended up in a spooning position. Just as I was falling asleep, I was woken up suddenly by something crawling across my face. When I sat up, I noticed roaches on our seat and crawling in Kimberly’s hair. I then freaked out because I realized it was a roach that had crawled across my face! They were EVERYWHERE…the floor, my seat, the window, and the infestation was coming from the panel of the bus. You could practically see them multiplying if you looked down there. Shortly after, we dubbed the bus ‘the Roach Coach’. Adrian had to fly to Uganda, last minute of course, because of something work related. How convenient! We then spent the remaining 10 hours on the bus contemplating what we would do to Adrian while he was sleeping. Just to say thank you.

The Roach Coach

After 14 hours, three flat tires, and many roaches later, we finally arrived in Jinja, Uganda at the Adrift lodge. We all went our separate ways after taking much needed showers to wash all the roach poo off of us. I went with a few girls horseback riding along the river and into the hills. So nice!

The next day was filled with bungie jumping and rafting. I didn’t even have a chance to eat the breakfast I had ordered when we were being called to bungie jump. It was my first time to bungie and I was surprisingly calm. I wasn’t nervous at all. That is, until I stepped up to the ledge, and then my knees started to shake uncontrollably. The man that was helping me noticed and told me I could grab the ledge above my head. Too bad I was too short to reach it. It was at that point I thought for a split second, what am I doing? Why am I doing this? You are so stupid! And then I just decided to jump as far as I could. It was an amazing experience and I am very glad I did it. I WILL do it again!

Then, we went rafting. I’m honestly not even sure what to say about it, other than it was the most fun/crazy thing ever. A full day of class 5 rapids, with a crazy guide that likes to flip you out of the boat on purpose, alligators, Ugandans wondering why in the world a bunch of American’s would pay money to do what we were doing, great food, and big rapids. Did I mention big rapids?! I seriously thought I was going to die on the last one. It was a class 6 rapid and was the biggest white water I’ve ever seen. We had to get out of the boat and carry it to the other side of this hill so we could raft the last part of it (where it turned into a class 5 rapid again). As we were surrounded by the locals, our guide was telling us where we needed to go and where we shouldn’t. He pointed to this spot in the middle straight ahead of us and said, “We call that, The Bad Place. We can’t go to The Bad Place.” Then he said,”If you fall out of the boat swim towards the middle, away from the rocks, so you don’t die.” Nice, right? We all jumped in the boat and started paddling. At the last second, I looked back to see all the locals staring and laughing at us. This was pure entertainment for them. So we’re paddling…paddling…freaking out…paddling and then the next thing I know we’re in the middle of The Bad Place. Then, the boat flips over and I’m under water for what seems like F O R E V E R. I surface, out of breath and then see rocks ahead of me. Crap! I try to swim against the current away from the rocks but at that point, my body was telling me ‘you are too tired to do this, you can’t swim against the current’. Finally a kayaker picked me up and took me where I could meet up with the boat. Later that day we watched video footage of the last rapid. Everyone, including our guide, had been thrown out of the boat when we hit The Bad Place. With three people left in the boat, they turned around and around in this whirlpool motion for probably 30 seconds until the river finally released them. Video footage will be posted on Facebook very soon.

Waiting on our bus to go back to Kenya. Luckily there weren't any roaches on it.

Sunrise from our lodge

It was probably the best trip I’ve ever been on. Truly a memorable experience. It will be hard to beat, but I look forward to our next one.

I’m in love!

When I was home, I heard a rumor that there was a new addition to Karibu Centre….a washing machine. It came to us from an ex pat who moved back to the states. Bless them!

Isn’t it awesome?!! It was love at first sight for me. After spending countless hours washing clothes by hand for the past four months, and never fully getting my clothes clean, I appreciate things like this so much more. I came to the conclusion that I’m just not good at washing clothes. Too much African dirt I guess.

It looks a little different than your typical washing machine back home, but it gets your clothes clean which is all that matters to me. On the left is the washing tub – you manually fill it with water and drain it. After, you put it on the right side which spins it almost dry. What used to take 3 or 4 hours to do, now takes the normal 30 minutes. Wahoo! Maybe now, I will have more free time to do things I really want to….like writing more blogs.

Wedding Vacation

For months I have been looking forward to going home to attend my two very good friends, Luke Kincaid and Jamie Steinfeld’s wedding. Luke was my best friend from college. We spent many many days together studying and somehow managed to not kill eachother in the process. It was an unlikely friendship for both of us and we still joke about it to this day. He’s my partner in crime – always discussing the latest development project, architecture, and design. I met Jamie through Luke (of course) and she has become one of my very great girlfriends. Truly a sweeheart and a joy to be around. They have both become like family to me over the years and I was honored when they asked me to be a part of their bridal party.

So four months after moving to Kenya, I’m off to vacation back home in Oregon. 10 days of fun, filled with catching up with friends and family, hiking, wedding events, shopping, and most importantly…AMERICAN FOOD! Did I tell you I had a dream about Taco Bell one night? It’s true.

There aren’t really seasons in Kenya. Mainly just dry and wet and I LOVE fall! I was excited to dig through my storage unit and rediscover my old clothes that seemed new again – scarves, hats, jackets, boots. I took a hike with my good friend, John, and took some photos of the fall foliage.

 

Since there were several of us in the bridal party that had come from afar, Luke and Jamie had planned several outings the week before the wedding. Line dancing at Dukes (a first for me), a musical – the Company, first Thursday, etc. We will be making jokes about the Company for ages! There are many many stories to tell…

Luke with his sweet dance moves

The wedding was beautiful. Jamie was a beautiful. Luke…uh….yeah.

I ran into some old friends

It was a wonderful vacation but definitely not relaxing. I think I averaged about four hours of sleep each night. I had 22 hours on the airplane back to catch up on sleep, but I mainly found myself reflecting on my trip and life in Kenya. I have felt somewhat torn between two drastically different worlds these past four months. On one hand, I want to save the world. Help people. But at the same time, feel like I am missing so much back home – friends, family, familiarity, comfort, where things are somewhat predictable. Kenya and the work we are doing is anything but predictable.

I was surprised to find myself missing all the chaos of Kenya, the kids, smells, the May’s, the food (I can’t believe I said that!), my running trail. It’s a hard but simple life we live here, and oh so great. It’s good to be back. It took a vacation home to realize it, but Africa has officially gotten under my skin. Who knows what will come of it all…

Trick or Treat

Last week, (can you tell I’m a little behind on posting my blogs? ) Anne received an e-mail from the Embassy about this year’s Halloween Bizarre. For weeks, we had all been looking forward to a fun filled day of treats and Halloween festivities. I really get into dressing up for Halloween but ran out of time to make a costume this year. Ian and I joked that I should be Joseph for Halloween. He’s always really crafty with things he pulls out of our trash. I’m sure he could have thrown something together for me.

Eli was a ladybug and Lucy, a princess. Aren’t they so cute?! Joseph and Bernard joined in on the fun too.

After sitting between the kids in the backseat of the car, with them asking every 5 minutes if they had messed up their face paint, we finally made it to the party. FINALLY!

The ISK (International School of Kenya) campus was gorgeous. Just as nice as any college campus I’ve visited. The party however…wasn’t much of a party at all. Advertising booths were set up, food was cooking, music playing, but the candy (the most important part of Halloween)…MIA. Or at least FREE candy was missing. Someone must have missed the memo. Poor kids. Anne finally went and bought them some at one of the booths.

We had a nice day though. Definitely not your typical Halloween, that’s for sure. But then again…nothing in Kenya is ever typical!

Team Intel

A few weeks ago a team came to us from Intel. Over 200 employees applied and they chose 5. Their mission was to bring computers and train the staff and kids to use them. This is quite a task considering some people here have never even seen a computer, much less use one. I have been working with a couple teachers the past month trying to introduce them to the mouse. It’s been a true test of my patience but has also made me realize how fortunate I’ve been to have access to modern technology. I’ve used a computer since elementary school and owned one the majority of my life. It’s crazy for me to think of my life without one. It’s practically attached to my hip.

So pretty much, the Intel team had their work cut out for them. They arrived on Wednesday and worked vigorously to install software and teach how to use these computers.

I’ve never seen the children more attentive to anything. They were all crowded around our teachers. Learning. Laughing. It was great to see. We invited the parents to join the fun and I think they enjoyed it just as much as the children did. Overall, I would say it was a great success.

Most people work as vendors (sales), house help (cleaning, washing, cooking, etc.), or in the shamba (garden). So for a Kenyan to have any computer skills is rare. A job as a typist is well respected and well paid at 30 shillings ($.40) per page typed. A high wage. Because of Intel’s generosity, these people are gaining exposure to valued skills. Thank you Intel!

Diwali

I was with some friends from church this past Saturday when Diwali was brought up. Diwali? I had no idea what they were talking about. One of the greatest things about living in Kenya is learning about other cultures and religions. Diwali, the festival of lights, is a five day celebration for Hindus. Each day there is a traditional ritual done, whether worshiping different idols (gold or cows), cooking great meals as a family, or shooting off fireworks.

Although we are all Christian, we thought it would be fun to find a party. The only problem…none of us knew where one was. We loaded up in the car and started driving around to the different temples. When we didn’t have luck there, we started following the pops and lights of nearby fireworks. Once we arrived, I soon found out why they call it the festival of lights.

Everyone was shooting off fireworks into a field. Even children had their own, and of course most of them were unsupervised. All you could hear were pops and squeals, smell sulfur, and see bursts of light through all the smoke. We almost got taken out a few times by things flying at our head. It was chaos!

Tents surrounded the field with food and souvineers for sale. Everyone got something different so we could sample it all. The food was wonderful! Pizza, samosas, spring rolls – the best spring rolls of my life! One guy got a traditional Indian dish, although good, we never could figure out what it was. I think I ate enough grease in one night to last me a few months.

I think we all felt like little kids again. Excited for something new and different, for fireworks, for greasy food.

We were the only mazungus/christians there. All night our group was being stared at. People just couldn’t figure out why we were there. We didn’t care…

some of the gang – Amanda, Lindsay, Kim, and Eric