MWISHO

These are my final thoughts on the last few weeks of my program as I’m sitting in the airport in Nairobi waiting to leave. So, since last time I wrote I had a lovely Thanksgiving at my friends’ apartment in Kisumu town. We successfully made mashed potatoes at our house on our hot plate.

Finished my ISP…it took a lot of last-minute writing but it got done. I ended up learning a lot about women fish traders at Lake Victoria’s beaches and the way they trade their bodies for fish. Yeah, towards the end I also went hippo spotting on Lake Victoria. On the last day of ISP, December 1^st, I relayed the World AIDS Day Half Marathon in Kisumu with my friend Ryan. We each ran half of the half, and the best part was the baton. Not sure the baton is family appropriate for this blog but just think about what they could possibly make you use as a baton in recognition of World AIDS Day. Overall it was exhilarating to run with people again…running alone since the beginning of the summer is really starting to take its toll. The Kenyans were, predictably, incredibly fast. Maybe the secret is in their post-race food: when we crossed the finish line we got a bag of chapatti and mandazi. Ryan and I were slightly horrified. They had great tents set up after the race though, with every organization working to combat AIDS in the area doing demonstrations and free giveaways. That was my last morning and I headed back to the house to pack up and have our last meal of chapatti. It was very sad to leave Kisumu and my wonderful hosts, Onek and Isaac, who I already miss dearly.

We returned to Nairobi on the overnight bus and stayed here for a couple of days before bussing it to Mombasa and then Malindi for our reunion and presentation of everyone’s ISP. Nairobi itself was already a bit of culture shock because I forgot how many white people there are in this country. My two roommates were literally the only two white people I saw during the entire month of ISP.

Malindi was incredible. Kind of a shocking transition since we stayed in a beautiful resort thanks to our AD Jamal who has the hookups on the coast. I felt kind of guilty switching gears to resort life in Kenya. But, we had comfortable beds, hot running water, an amazing buffet with dessert at all three meals, and pools and a gorgeous beach. I got to go running on the beach every morning while the heat was still bearable. And we managed to fit 26 half hour presentations into 2 ½ days so that was an impressive accomplishment. Everyone ended up with really interesting ISPs and it was awesome to hear about all of them. Otherwise, basically we lounged all day and enjoyed each others’ company before we had to say goodbye.

We had our last day in Nairobi before almost everyone on the program left for home on the 10^th. It was an awful and tearful goodbye as the reality that the 26 of us won’t be seeing each other again next semester is slowly starting to sink in.

But, in an attempt to keep the adventure going I decided to make the most of my 4 extra days by going white water rafting in Uganda with 3 other girls on my program. This would have been a lot simpler if all the buses to Uganda weren’t sold out from Nairobi. Instead, we ended up on one of the worst matatus of all time to Kisumu. Basically, most things that could go wrong with our transportation on this trip, did. The matatu could not accelerate, and the engine spontaneously shut off twice, the 2^nd time on a hill while we started rolling backwards into oncoming traffic. To get it going again we all had to jump out to lighten the load, and push it uphill until the engine caught. The exhaust pipe also feel off halfway through the ride. And then, 7 ½ hours into what should have been a 5 hour shuttle ride, we popped a tire in the dark and had to chill on the road for an hour while they replaced it. We finally got to Kisumu at 11pm and stayed overnight at a hotel. The only saving grace of this ride was that I met by far the nicest Kenyan to date on the ride, he sat next to me and we talked for almost the entire ride, which helped distract me from being incredibly tired and uncomfortable.

First thing Sunday morning we got on a shuttle bus to Busia (the border town) which was supposed to be safer and more efficient than a matatu. All was going well until something in the bus’ engine broke half an hour from the border. We sat on the bus for 20 minutes having no idea what was going on until we finally went and found the driver, who was enjoying some sugar cane a ways down the road, and forced her to tell us that she had sent a guy for the engine part and it would be about an hour while we waited for him to return and then fix the engine. Having no other option, however, we sat on the side of the road and waited. Thus, a 2 hour bus ride became a 4 hour adventure.

We did make it across the border and had a relatively problem-free matatu from Busia to Jinja and from there took a motorcycle taxi to Nile River Explorers River Camp were we slept in a dorm for two nights. We spent the 12^th, Jamhuri Day in Kenya, rafting on the Nile. Despite being slightly terrifying it was fantastic! Definitely a great adventure to end the trip with, and we met lots of cool people, including other SIT kids from Uganda at the campsite.

We spent the night after rafting at the campsite again and then made it back across the border to take a night bus back to Nairobi last night. Today I visited my Nairobi host family for the last time and finished packing and now here I am at the airport. I have a million mixed emotions about coming home, but I can’t wait to see family and friends.

Bring on the cold weather. Kwa heri Kenya, it’s been real.

ISP Bila Regrets

I keep hearing about people who actually read my blog, so I figured I should try and update it. ISP is rapidly coming to a close here, it’s unbelievable how fast the time is going. This also means that I’m going to write a 30 page paper in the next 8 days…hakuna matata.

So I’ve been in Kisumu for about three weeks now. Can’t say I have anything too shocking to report. I spend a lot of time chilling at my house here in Usoma village…it’s very relaxing and paradise-esque. My favorite spot to do work or just read is at a table through the field in the backyard overlooking the banana trees and the lake. Everyone in the village knows me as the mzungu who does “roadwork” in the morning, aka they recognize me as the crazy white girl who runs every morning.

Some animal friends that we share the house with. Onek raises goats and chickens (pretty standard in this area) so we have plenty of those to go around. In fact, some baby chicks just hatched so now they poke around the yard too. There’s one chicken who has an affinity for laying eggs in our bedroom (specifically under Jess’s bed). Problem being that Jess is afraid of chickens so I spent a whole day chasing the terrified chicken out from under her bed before we gave up and decided to just let it lay its egg and go. We also have quite a few bats that live in the house and probably have faulty sensory systems because they fly super close to our faces and hit the ceiling fairly frequently at night. There are lizards everywhere too and sometimes they lose their grip on the ceiling and fall out of the sky…sometimes on your lap if you’re in the wrong place at the wrong time. We also have a rat that makes the occasional appearance (aka it fell from the bookshelf yesterday and went crawling off under the couch somewhere). Monkeys also hang out in the trees around the house, but they only reveal themselves if you’re lucky. Oh, and I discovered the other day that we also have two owls living in the backyard!

Best animal story so far: One day last week I woke up and ants had invaded the kitchen. There was a line of safari ants marching from outside, across the floor, up the wall, and across our food shelf. I ran outside to grab the broom that was out by the bathroom only to find 5 monkeys on the roof of the bathroom building. They sat there and watched me but I ran over, grabbed the broom, and hightailed it back to the kitchen only to find that I had left the door to the house open and the chickens had gotten in. So now there were chickens all over the kitchen and baby chickens pooping on the floor and ants still climbing all over kingdom come. So I shooed out the chickens and swept out the ants and the chicken poop and all was well again.

Also, we went to the Impala Sanctuary in town one day, which we thought was kind of like a nice park where you walk around and occasionally see animals. It turned out to mostly be a kind of zoo, which was rather depressing. But, we did get to pet a cheetah, so that was cool. Although if I look weird in the picture it’s because I’m terrified since the cheetah had just tried to eat my friend Helen’s hand.

Another day I went with Onek to the market to buy greens for dinner and while we were driving on the bike some guy yelled out, “Hey, give me that girl!” And, without missing a beat, Onek yelled back “Cows first!” (If you don’t get the reference it’s because here a man has to give a woman’s family x number of cows or goats before he can marry her). We got two more marriage proposals shouted at us on the way home so we decided that I’m probably worth about 25 cows, 50 goats, and a million dollars.

This past Satuday I took a matatu to Eldoret with Katie and Jess (my roommates here). It’s about a 3 hour matatu ride northeast of here. We got there Satuday evening and located the hotel of our choosing only to discover that it had no electricity or water. The receptionist lady assured us that the power would come back on at 7pm so we went to dinner and when we came back, obviously, there was still no power and it wasn’t coming back on. Instead, they gave us four candles and we pushed the 2 beds together and had a nice romantic snuggle fest in the dark. You'd be surprised how used to power outages we are...and I never have running water so that didn't even phase us.

You should have seen the bathroom, that was the real gem.

 Sunday we checked out of our top-notch hotel and spent the morning watching the KASS Marathon! There was a surprisingly large crowd out to watch it and a lot of very speedy and very skinny Kenyan runners. You could tell we were in running country just by the footwear of the masses. I saw more nice running shoes in that one morning than I’ve seen in this entire country. I was tempted to ask people where they get them and do some shopping since my running shoes grow a bigger hole every day that I run in them.

Tell me we don't look good.

Huyu ni numba one!

Other than that I spend some days visiting beaches and conducting interviews. I met this nice guy named Ernest at the Kenya Marine Fisheries Research Institute and his assistant John acts as my translator. I’ve visited 4 beaches and am not sure what to conclude at this point other than the fact that women here have pretty limited economic opportunities. The women at Usare Beach that I interviewed today wanted to give me a young man from their beach to marry. What a generous offer.

Big fish fresh off the boat at Usare.

That’s pretty much the extent of my life at the moment. I also watch the sunset over the lake every day and watch the Mexican soap opera Triumph of Love every night. Kenyan’s love their Mexican soaps. Here’s to some more adventures before ISP is up.

Happy Thanksgiving to all…it’s weird to not be celebrating it at home but we’ll do it up Kenya style from here!

Fall Break: Kenya Version

So the last month of the program has officially begun, which is both exciting and kind of sad that we’re so rapidly approaching the end. Right now I’m sitting in Kisumu, in my home for the next month at my academic director’s house. Anyway, before I get into that, here’s my attempt to fill in the gaps of the last two weeks, try to bear with me, or just skip over the boring parts:

So after half a week back at school after the weekend in Kisumu the big wedding finally happened; the one that I’ve now gone to an announcement party and the sex party for. Unfortunately, I got really sick the Thursday afternoon before the Friday ceremony so I missed part of the actually ceremony for a doctor’s visit (not to worry, apparently just a really bad case of food poisoning, and I got better once I finally decided to actually take the medicine the doctor recommended.) So the actual ceremony at the mosque was on Friday, and sadly I missed the part where the family apparently held up a certificate swearing that Fatmah (the bride) was a virgin and the whole family had to see it and vouch for it. Fun times. Also, Fatmah married an mzungu, a French man she met while working for an NGO in Sudan, so everyone at the wedding kept thinking we were the groom’s sisters. This is despite the fact that I was decked out in traditional Nubian garb.

So yes, on Saturday there was basically a reception party for the wedding which felt much more western…Fatmah wore a beautiful white wedding dress and they did the whole cake cutting thing. The only difference is that there was no alcohol at this wedding since Nubian’s are Muslim and don’t drink. But mama went all out and finally got to dress me up in the outfit she has literally had planned for me since I moved in to her house. She also did my makeup. Needless to say I looked great. Overall the wedding was a good time, even when the emcee kept making really awkward references to how he hoped the French family would bring their white women to Africa to get married next.

Uncle Sabiet, Me, My Brother Chuna, and Mama Zahra steppin' out in style.

The Sunday morning following the wedding was the start of our one-week educational tour. The whole group went with one of our academic directors, Jamal, to Tanzania for a week of traveling and exploring different parts of Tanzania. This was probably the most thoroughly planned week we’ve had yet, and it was jam packed with fantastic experiences, so let me try to break it down for you:

Sunday morning we took a bus from Nairobi across the Tanzanian border into Arusha. Only about a 6-hour drive total, which really doesn’t feel that long anymore. We went straight to the place we were staying, in Maji ya Chai, at Pete and Charlotte Oneil’s hostel. Pete and Charlotte are Americans who led the Black Panther movement in Kansas City in the 1960s. Pete got arrested, basically for being a member of the party, and he was told that if he went to jail he would get killed there for being a black panther. So instead, he fled the U.S. and Charlotte (who was only 19 at the time!) went with him. They landed in Africa, and have now lived in Tanzania for about 40 years. In Tanzania they started a non-profit called the United African Alliance Community Center (UAACC) where they teach English classes for free, have computer classes, music lessons and a recording studio, and run a school/orphanage. The two of them are probably two of the most interesting people I’ve ever met…we watched a documentary that was made about their lives while we were there. It’s called “A Panther in Africa: An American in Exile” if anyone wants to look it up, it was a good movie, and gives a lot of insight into Pete and Charlotte’s lives.

So we stayed overnight at their hostel Sunday and Monday morning we traveled out to a Maasai Village, where we stayed until Wednesday. Their village was literally the driest place I have ever been in my life…they basically live on a desert of all volcanic ash, and it gets kicked up and blown around everywhere. I still can’t really wrap my head around the fact that the Maasai people live there all the time. We stayed in tents next to the village cultural center instead of doing homestays since we were there for such a short time. Ngongoi is a junior elder and was our guide to his village while we were there. The first night there we collected firewood and had a bonfire with some of the village elders so we could ask each other questions about our respective lives. We learned a lot of really interesting things about Maasai culture while the elders sat around drinking their traditional brew (it was foul tasting) and mostly asking us questions about marriage practices in the United States.

The poor goat totally knew what was coming to it...

 The second morning we got up and watched the sun rise from behind Mt. Kilimajaro. It was beautiful, and would definitely be my favorite time of day if I lived there all the time because it gets really cold at night so the air is still cool and fresh in the morning. After sunrise we went and helped Ngongoi milk his goats. At least we started off the day being nice to goats, because after breakfast we participated in a traditional goat slaughter. To begin with we had to walk around and help the Maasai gather roots and bark they believe to have medicinal purposes that they put in a stew with lots of the goat’s insides like the heart and lungs. Once we had collected all the necessary items, and made a bed for the goat and started a fire with dried goat dung, the slaughter began. They killed the goat by suffocation, which was an uncomfortably long process, then skinned it and chopped him up and roasted various goat parts and ate them right then and there. I think I ended up trying some of the hoof (not good at all), the ribs (kind of funky), the liver (eh could’ve been worse) and last but not least…drinking the goat’s blood. That’s right, Maasai people survive by getting iron from cow and goat blood so we all tasted some by drinking it right off of the raw rib cage. Mmm mm good.

Don't worry, I managed to avoid getting blood on the one and only Middlebury dad hat.

Right after this we had lunch, because obviously everyone really wanted to eat more after watching a goat get ripped apart. Then we went and beaded with a bunch of the women from the village. This was a much more light-hearted occasion. We learned what the colors of all of their beads mean, and then we made really simple one-strand bracelets and rings. Didn’t quite learn the complex beading styles that they employ…but they really do wear a ton of jewelry all the time. The patterns and styles of their jewelry are beautiful and incredibly unique.

This was our last night staying in their village so we got to go to Ngongoi’s boma and participate in a traditional Maasai dance. We could see only by moonlight and there was occasional heat lightning far off in the distance, and this made their dance that much more haunting and impressive. The women wear these big, white, collar-like necklaces and sing a chorus while they do some sort of dance that bounces the necklaces up and down. Trust me, they did it much more gracefully than we can. The men stood in their own circle and their song consists of an incredible range of high-pitched shrieks and really low guttural chants, which they sing while jumping and running across the circle.

Just an average sized Baobab tree

Wednesday morning we got up in the dark and had breakfast before driving off in the sunrise to visit the Hadzabe tribe, one of the last 2 hunter gatherer tribes left in the world! It was actually really cool from an anthropological perspective to get to see these people, but basically, it seems like they are surviving off of cultural tourism. They invite groups like us in to pay them to show us the kind of things they do in their daily lives. It felt more like a show than an authentic experience, but I guess that just goes to show how hard it is to make it as a hunter-gatherer in today’s world. We did get to see how the women harvest roots that they chew as gum, though, and we got to check out the inside of a Baobab tree. During the rainy season the tribe hollows out and lives inside of old Baobab trees…they literally lived near the biggest trees I’ve ever seen in my life. Living in one would be like living in the coolest tree house of all time. We also got to practice shooting the men’s bow and arrows. Let’s just say that if I was a hunter-gatherer I would definitely fit into my expected gender role, shooting arrows didn’t quite come naturally to me.

This may or may not be attempt number two after I dropped the first arrow.

We had a long drive from this village to a hostel where we spent the night, which, to our surprise, had hot, running-water showers! One of the best showers ever to get to wash off the layer of volcanic ash, sweat, and goats blood (only kidding) we were covered in. Then, Thursday morning we headed out to the Ngorongoro Crater for a safari drive!! This was the second whole day we spent in our safari car with the same six girls and our driver, Hamis. It was a wonderful bonding experience with lots of girl talk that I’m sure Hamis really loved. He did whip out a picture of his five year old son fully dressed in a pimp suit though, best driver ever! The safari day was wonderful, we saw giraffes first, which was really all I needed to start the day off right. We also saw tons of gazelle and zebra, lots of hippos, some really cool birds, hyenas and pumbas, water buffalo, a rhino from afar, and a female lion! All the animals were spectacular but the female lion was beautiful and about 10 feet away from our car! We safarid until mid-afternoon and then made the long drive back to Arusha and home at the UAACC.

More pictures do exist, but my camera was near death so I have to steal them from the other girls in my safari car...

 Friday we visited the International Court Tribunal for Rwanda, which is based in Arusha. The actual court hearings were closed to the public that day but it was still cool to tour the facilities and get a lecture about it from one of the men that runs it. This is the tribunal where they’re deciding all the cases about people accused of committing the Rwandan genocide. After lunch we also visited the Arusha Mental Health Clinic, which was by far one of the most informative visits we’ve done to date. They are basically the only facility working on mental health in all of northern Tanzania and they do amazing work! One of their psychologists was from America and had a lot of really interesting insight to offer.

Friday night we had dinner at the UAACC. Oh my gosh I forgot to mention that they made us tacos for dinner one night, complete with guacamole and cheese and everything! I literally don’t think the 26 of us had ever been so appreciative of a meal before in our lives. Anyway we had another documentary night and then went early to bed so we could rest up before attacking Kili the next morning!

Yeah, I mean, we basically made it all the way to Uhuru Peak

 To conclude the trip we drove to Mt. Kilimanjaro Saturday morning and got to climb part of it! I make this sound more exciting and impressive than it actually was. Pretty sure we literally hiked to base camp, as in, from the point we got to there weren’t even any views off the mountain or of the peak. But, either way, just getting to see it up close was incredible. The mountain is really stunning, and it has a very rainforesty environment on the way up, which was unlike any climate we’ve experienced here yet. Our guide was also impressive on his own. His name was Rogath and he holds the record for the fastest ever climb of Kilimanjaro- he once made it all the way up and back down in 14 hours!! It takes most people about 3+ days just to go up. He’s also 48 years old and looks like he’s maybe 35 tops. He told me I could look like him one day if I started running up mountains and stopped eating any processed foods and stuck to a diet of nuts, grains, and fruits. Unlikely that that’s going to happen anytime soon, bummer.

Post-mountain adventure we had a wine and cheese night at UAACC with one of Pete’s friends, who turned out to be a former SIT student who now lives in Tanzania and is trying to start a winery. His wine was a little funky but the cheese was great (it’s a rare find around here so we were all pretty excited).

We left to head back to Nairobi for our last few days there on Sunday morning. We got back mid-afternoon and it turns out my homestay mom had traveled to Uganda again so I went back to living at my aunt’s house. The grandma was there this time too and I’m pretty sure she thought I was an idiot because she would try to speak to me in really fast Swahili and I would never understand her. Also, one night we literally watched the same 10 minute long sports news reel for an hour and a half because it was on repeat on the sports channel on TV and no one at this house understands enough English to have figured out that it was the same exact thing over and over again.

My mom did finally come back from Uganda on Tuesday, just in time for my last night in Nairobi. Mostly she just complained about being tired from traveling, discussed her finances with me as usual, and then couldn’t understand why I would ever go to Kisumu when I broke that news to her. I thought maybe she would make a special dinner or do something for my last night at her house, but instead she decided she was really tired so she threw on some potatoes and beans and went to bed. Didn’t make me very nostalgic to leave my homestay. It will be weird, though, not to ever do my daily walk to school through Kibera again, I had really gotten used to it.

But, took the bus from Nairobi to Kisumu on Wednesday morning and arrived at my academic director’s house in Usoma Village where I’ll be living for the next month with his two sons and two other girls studying here from my program. I’m excited to finally figure out my project details and get it started…plus it’s always good to be out of Nairobi and further away from Al Shabaab. Praying that all my friends staying in Nairobi stay safe!

My home for the next month (or I guess only 3 weeks by now, crazy!)

 That’s it for now…trying to wean myself off internet use while I’m here so sorry if I don’t respond to emails right away. Oh, also, side note for those of you who stuck it out and read this far down in this blog post. This morning I tried to do a makeshift Nicole track workout on the one and only dirt road outside my house, and, on top of all the weird looks I got from villagers, one little girl made fun of the way my feet kick out when I run. Seriously? I’m all the way in Africa and still can’t escape getting made fun of for that.

My New Favorite Place

Okay, clearly I’m not good at this and it’s been way too long since I last wrote anything. Since Shirazi we spent about five days in Mombasa, came back to Nairobi and had fun adventures for two weeks, then I spent the past four days in Kisumu. It’s been a whirlwind and the program is flying by! I only have about five whole days left in Nairobi total, crazy! Anyways…here’s my attempt to catch you all up on things I’ve done that seem like they happened a long time in the past now.

Post-Shirazi village living we had a great few days in Mombasa. We had health lectures while there and also got to visit a center for children with Cerebral Palsy and a hospital for physically disabled people and treatment center for kids with Spina Bifida. All really interesting programs for populations that are greatly underserved here. While in Mombasa we also got to have dinner at our academic director Jamal’s house one night and his Uncle’s house another night. Literally best two meals I’ve had in Kenya…the food was to die for! Just to give you an idea: chapatti and mandazi and somosas and rice bread and sweet balls. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

I’ve actually been really trying to enjoy my time back in Nairobi as well. The first weekend back a group of us took a matatu out to Nairobi National Park to go to the elephant orphanage! Unfortunately, the matatu dropped us off at the main entrance to the park, and upon asking we found out that the elephant orphanage was about a 20min drive back the other direction. Other problem, the orphanage is only open for 1 hour every day and at this point we were already late. We ended up paying a park taxi driver to let all 9 of us pile into his tiny car to drive us there…and even though we were half an hour late it was absolutely worth it! We got to watch a group of adorable baby elephants bathe in the mud and play with a soccer ball while their keepers told us all of their sob stories about how they were orphaned by poachers.

When we got back from the orphanage we actually went to a “classical-fusion” music concert at an open field pretty close to the Kibera area. A bunch of SIT kids went and we all brought food and had a picnic lunch. The pretty famous South African acapella group Ladysmith Black Mombazo was there for their first time in Kenya and they owned the stage. Also got to watch all the girls in the audience drool over Sauti Sol, a young Kenyan acoustic pop group who are actually pretty talented. They ended up closing out the day with a rendition of Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes and I felt like I was right back at a Middlebury acapella concert!

Other fun things: had development lectures all last week, which were actually really interesting even though I’m not an econ-type person. Watched Friends with Benefits during lunch in the SIT office because someone’s homestay sister bought it at one of the knock-off stands here for 50shillings. Side-note, you can literally get any American movie here in knock-off form for 50cents on the side of the road. Had liver for dinner one night- not my favorite. But mama made up for it by making pilau. Also went out for two friends’ birthdays and got spinach ravioli- delicious!

Then the next Saturday I hiked a volcano!! It was by far my favorite activity I’ve done in Kenya so far. 11 of us went so we rented the Jazz Quartet (best bus ever) for the day and it drove us out to Longonot National Park so we could hike Mt. Longonot. The drive was worth it in and of itself, as we got to drive along a ridge overlooking the beginning of the Great Rift Valley. Geology friends (you know who you are) I spend the whole time thinking about how much you would have loved this adventure. Then at the beginning of the hike we saw a herd of giraffes walking around the bottom of the volcano. After 6 hours of hiking, with a nice long lunch break, and a weird number of Kenyans running the length of the trail up this volcano past us, we piled back into the JQ to go home, covered in dust but incredibly happy.

This picture makes it look pathetic, but it wasn't, I promise.

The next day was Fatuma’s “Kitchen Party” which Susanna and I concluded is kind of like a bridal shower and a bachelorette party all combined into one. This was probably the most interesting Kenyan cultural experience I’ve had so far. It was supposed to start at 2 (which is when we got there because mama had to make her entrance and help with the setup since we’re basically family with the bride) but in typical Kenyan fashion the party started a little after 4. Basically, in short, the purpose of a kitchen party, for Nubian Muslim’s, is to have a sex teacher come and teach the bride-to-be how to properly please her husband in the bedroom. So Fatuma sat at the front of the room facing an audience full of mostly middle-aged women (probably the entire Kibera Nubian population turned out for the event) and watched some woman show her how to properly shake her hips and crawl across the floor seductively like a tiger. Unfortunately it was all in Swahili but there was enough demonstration that Susanna and I got the gist. The teacher also cited the examples of Beyonce and Shakira to explain sexy hip action. Basically the day was a sex-talk free for all, where hundreds of middle-aged Nubian women got to get together for one day and release all of their sexual energy because other than on special days like that, sex is never discussed. The best part of the party may have been when a fairly large older woman got up in front of the room during one of the numerous dance breaks, bent over with her behind facing the crowd, and shook it like her life depended on it. This prompted about five women to jump up and stick money in the dancing woman’s dress—almost like a bachelorette party minus any alcohol because they’re all Muslim. By far the funniest thing I’ve seen in Nairobi and also a fascinating day in a culture where sex is not discussed at all.

Sex teacher in action

Not too exciting after that. I spent all last week living in my aunt’s house in a nearby neighborhood because my mom had to go to Uganda for some family matters. It was a nice change of pace since this house had a lot more activity. I lived with my aunt, two house help girls, and a two year old son of the house help but we also had a lot of visitors coming in and out of the house all the time. The two-year old, Ampakata, cried every time he saw me for the first night I was there but we bonded after I played soccer with him one night. I did eventually figure out, thought, that this family called me “HiHowAreYou” instead of Sarah. They would be talking to the little boy and say, “Ampakata, onyesha HiHowAreYou.” I guess that’s a nice new nickname to add to the list. We also religiously watched the Spanish soap opera (with fabulously well-done English voice-overs) Triumph of Love every night, and I hate to admit I actually got caught up in the plot-line. I’m going to miss watching it now that I’m back to my normal house.

For school we also visited the Gikomba Market, the largest second-hand clothing market in Kenya and I think in Africa (someone fact-check me on that). It was really interesting to learn about the informal sector of the economy here. There’s incredibly high unemployment, and the informal sector, including the massively large industry of selling all the clothes you’ve donated to the Salvation Army and other such charities, ends up providing a lot of jobs to people. You can buy incredibly cheap second hand clothes on the side of the road anywhere here. We also visited the Kenya headquarters of the Peace Corps and met the Kenya country director, Steve, who was incredibly nice and welcoming and answered a lot of our questions. Their office is also in the swanky neighborhood of Nairobi so that was a nice outing for the day.

Last but certainly not least I took a bus this past Saturday to Kisumu, a city in Western Kenya, to try to figure stuff out for my ISP. The bus ride was stellar, we saw zebras on the side of the road on the way there. Drove through the Great Rift Valley and past lots of tea plantations. Gorgeous all around.

In Kisumu ended up spending most of my time out at our academic director’s house there in Usoma Village. It was far and away my favorite place in Kenya so far…like my own little slice of Vermont only way hotter. It’s right on Lake Victoria with mountains surrounding it all in the distance. Our director’s two sons, Onek and Isaac, are living there right now and they cooked for us and showed us around and had movie nights with us while we were there. We had screenings of Jurassic Park and then the much more intense Blood Diamond. Their house was incredibly relaxing and if I could bottle up the whole house, with Onek and Isaac inside, and carry it around with me to break it out when I needed it I would.

The bench swing under this tree might be one of my new favorite places in the world (you can't tell but Lake Victoria is about 100 meters behind it)!

Also started to figure out my life a little bit in terms of ISP. I had a meeting with the Fisheries Ministry office while I was there and got the phone numbers of lots of contacts on various beaches in the area to see if I could study women’s economic opportunities in the beach communities around Kisumu. Still have to figure out exactly what that will be able to entail but I’m excited to be there!

Now we’re back in Nairobi just until Sunday when we leave for Tanzania for 10 days and then come back to Nairobi just to finalize things for our ISP and then I’ll head back to Kisumu for the month of November to do all my research for ISP! Crazy how time flies, the program is going to be over before I know it!

Also, you will never guess what I’m eating while I post this…that’s right fro-yo baby. I have found YogurtLand in Nairobi!!! I am actually not kidding at all…it is the closest replica I’ve found to yogurtland…self-serve with pink and green spoons. Only in Nairobi…who would have thought Nairobi would be the next place to pick up on the fro-yo trend. Most magical place in Nairobi? I think so. Don't worry, I have photographic evidence, I'll put it up soon.

Shirazi: Sugar on Sugar and Ants on Ants

We arrived in Mombasa Saturday morning, went shopping for “culturally appropriate” attire, aka kangas and mumus, had lunch and took our bus to the kijiji of Shirazi, about 2 hours south of Mombasa. 

Katika Shirazi jina langu ilikuwa Samira. We got to Shirazi and moved right in with our homestay families. I lived with my mom, Birode, my 13 year old sister Samira, and a 5 ½ year old brother Omari. I was named Samira after my sister. My family was fantastic and to continue the food log for dinner the first night we had beans with coconut and rice bread. Delicious if unhealthy, as was all the food in the village. Can't be positive but pretty sure I gained 10 pounds in 10 days.

“I hate Nairobi- it makes me feel weird.” Anna’s excellently articulated quote of day 2 as we were lying in the sand on the most beautiful sandbar beach I’ve ever seen in the middle of the Indian Ocean. We boated out on a dhow right from the dock in Shirazi (because yes, it’s a village on the water, surrounded by palm trees and everything) until we parked it at a sandbar that was basically paradise. The sandbar overlooks the island of Funzi, which is home to the most expensive hotel in Kenya. Basically we spent the day swimming and rejoicing in how much more wonderful everything there was compared to Nairobi.

Went to a funeral when we got home. Well, not really, because we were late so we missed the burial but sat with all the women there. A 21 year old fisherman from the village had drowned while fishing. His death led me to the interesting discovery that a lot of people in Shirazi don’t know how to swim even though the ocean is in their backyard. So if anyone has a desire to move to the coast and implement swimming lessons it would definitely be really helpful.

I told my mom that I wanted to run in the morning and she didn’t think I was crazy!! She didn’t even ask questions, instead we went on a search to find my uncle Fundi who likes to run and recruited him to take me running at 5:45 the next morning. I ended up running with Uncle Fundi (almost) every morning I was there and he’s actually a great runner, except on the days he’s hungover or oversleeps and forgets to come pick me up. Regardless, running in Shirazi was surreal. It was still dark out when we started so we could still see all the stars, which were unbelievable themselves, and then while we ran the stars would fade as the sun slowly rose above the palm trees and lit up the mud huts and sandy paths.

While in Shirazi we had Swahili class every morning from 7-11. My classroom was outside under a mango tree, also home to wandering chickens and a multitude of monkeys. A monkey actually peed on the girl sitting next to me in class one day!

Uncle Salim waving at me from 50ft in the air up a coconut tree.

Another uncle named Salim, who is 22, became my extra Swahili and Shirazi life coach for the week. He taught me how to climb a coconut tree to harvest the coconuts. He literally scaled the tree and kept turning around to look down and wave at me which prompted me to freak out and yell at his that he was crazy in Swahili. But he harvested a bunch of coconuts that we broke open and drank right then and there and then we grated the rest of the coconut to use with dinner. Salim ended up coming to dinner every night and he would stay after and help teach me Swahili while I taught him English. 

After Salim showed me how to climb the coconut tree, this is how far up 

the tree I made it...my sister looks unimpressed.

Some guests I had in my room in Shirazi: a spider the size of my fist, bats galore, gigantic millipedes, a bed-full of fire-ants one night, and a few monkeys. Fire-ants also had an anthill on the floor in my choo which made every bathroom trip a lot riskier than it should have been.

We did a couple of education visits too, one to the medical clinic in the neighboring village of Bodo, and one to the island of Funzi where we learned a little bit about traditional practices there and saw the most wazungu we’ve seen in Kenya since the resort is on the island. When we pulled up in our boat we met a Canadian woman who’s first comment to us was, “There’s a nice little market over there. It’s very African.” How thoughtful of her to give us such a helpful hint.

One day my mom introduced me to my “mpenzi” (fiancée) in Shirazi. We were walking to some random relative’s house when she turned around and told me we were going to meet my fiancée. We get there and sitting outside his house is this old guy with his wife and children. Turns out he’s my mom’s father’s brother and somehow this makes him my mpenzi. The women put a stool right in front of his mat and forced me to sit there while they sat around laughing and asking me questions like, “this is the man you’re going to marry, do you like him?” and “Oh he’s old, he has no hair even, do you like that?” Keep in mind that this is all happening in Swahili and I have never been so uncomfortable before and I couldn’t think of any sort of response in Swahili. This led my mpenzi to think I was sort of stupid and bad at Swahili, which is probably fine because he wouldn’t want to marry a dumb girl, but I got defensive and practically yelled at him in Swahili which made me feel much better about the whole situation. That was the end of that though and I managed to avoid him like the plague (or chiggers) the rest of the time in Shirazi.

Did I mention that our families dressed  us up in Shirazi? This was by far my best look...please note the rainbow-fish-like quality of this lovely gown.

Our mom’s gave all the girls henna towards the end of our stay. Salim also helped me learn a lot about traditional medicine in the village which was awesome. He even took me to interview the traditional medicine man. That was fascinating and it was definitely understandable why people believe in him but my willingness to believe in his abilities was dampened a little when he asked me to pay him for the time he spent answering my questions.

I learned how to kill, de-feather, and cut up a chicken. Also learned how to roast fresh cashew nuts, fry mandazi, make chapatti, and cook tambi (aka sugar spaghetti). There are no recipes here but I can't wait to try to replicate all of this food for you when I get home!

On our last day Salim took me to see the Shirazi village soccer team play a local team in a nearby village. We got to ride a piki piki (motorcycle taxi) there which gave us great views of the village on our last afternoon. Plus Shirazi won 3-1 so we couldn’t complain.

I also broke out the bubble gun I brought for my little brother and it was like Christmas come early. Omari has been walking around with the bubble gun holstered in the waist-band of his pants ever since then.

The most liberating part of Shirazi was being able to walk anywhere and greet every person you saw. I never had to walk around with my angry face on like I do in Nairobi. I also had a cold outdoor bucket shower every day, which was best done by lantern under the stars at night or post-run in the morning with monkey’s climbing the palm trees over my head.

I’m sure I’ve left out a million details that I wanted to share but basically our ten days in Shirazi flew by way too fast and I really hope I can take my mom up on her offer to come back and visit Shirazi some time in the future!

My fam right before our tearful goodbye. They were fantastic people and I've already talked to them on the phone a few times since we left the village.

50 Nifty United States (Pre-Mombasa Stories)

There is literally too much to possibly catch you all up on but here begins my best attempt. I’m breaking this up into parts, so feel free to skip to what you actually want to know about!

First to finish off my last Nairobi stories pre-Mombasa. I promise I’m not actually being stalked by a Massai runner. I was running in Nairobi and this guy ran past me, motioned for me to catch up, and when I refused he came back and ended up running with me for 20min. He only really spoke Swahili so I’m not entirely sure what we talked about sometimes but I did find out that he’s a professional runner and he was training for the Nairobi marathon. So the exchange ended with me taking his phone number since all us SITers want to go to a track meet while we’re here and I figured who would know where to find them better than a real-live-Kenyan runner. The other trackie who’s here and I decided to call Jack the Massai runner (did I forget to mention his name is Jack, funny right?) that night and since then he’s called me a million times and texted me. Don’t worry though, no harm no foul. And I’m not a stupid msichana mzungu.

We got to visit Carolina for Kibera! The people there were great and I learned that their office is basically in my backyard so I could easily go visit again. They have a bunch of impressive programs but the one I was most excited about is a “Trash is Cash” program where they pay kids in Kibera to bring trash to their center and then they recycle just about all of their trash. Literally the first thing I’ve heard about recycling since being in Kenya.

This is just an example of why I got so excited to learn about a Trash is Cash program.

Then hung out with my Nairobi family on my last night before heading to Mombasa for two weeks. In the course of this meal I learned two things: that my family has significantly more knowledge than me about American movies and significantly less about American geography. My mom and brother started asking me about Massachusetts again (a word they find incredibly hard to pronounce) and then in an attempt to figure out where it is my mom asked if it is near Boston. Then I had to explain that Boston is the capital city of the state of MA. That really threw them for a loop and my mom, in an attempt to understand how that works, asked how many different parts there are. I explained that there are 50 states to which mom responded, “50? Oh, are you sure?” Yes, momma, last time I checked I’m fairly certain there were 50 states. This turned into a game where my family named all the states they know, which included Miami and Manhattan before it got too hard to explain.

Then that night we left Nairobi on the coast bus overnight to Mombasa. It was like a track bus, with wonderful movie selections alá Nicole. We watched The Reef, a movie about a bunch of friends getting shipwrecked and eaten by sharks. What better way to start a two week stay on the coast?

The Only Time it Helps to Be White is When You're Crossing the Street

So there is an overwhelming amount of information I could share about all the things that have happened in the time since I lasted posted but I'll try to just hit you with the highlights:

It's really hard getting used to everyone here staring at you just because you're white (then imagine the looks/comments you get while running since you're white and no one runs in Nairobi). Literally, people slow down in their cars and roll down their windows just to stare or say, "Hi, how are you?" the token English phrase memorized by Kenyans of all ages.

Pedestrians here do NOT have the right of way. The other day a magical event happened as I was walking home from school with a couple other girls: a man stopped his car to let us cross the street! This is literally unheard of. We were feeling pretty proud of ourselves, especially when two minutes later we managed to dart across the street and avoid getting hit by a matatu. The feeling of pride evaporated 5 seconds later when we were almost hit by the matatu coming from the other direction.

This is what fish looks like when you buy it anywhere in Kenya: watch out for bones!

Some interesting foods that mama has made me: boiled potatoes with peanut butter (interesting combo), tembi (basically noodles with sugar), lentils (hallelujah a vegetable), boiled potatoes with baked beans, lots of other heavily fried foods, and last night we had samaki (fish) with ugali.

I am learning a ton of Swahili but momma speaks to me in English at home. I think she thinks it's a joke that I'm trying to actually learn her language. But my brother Chuna comes over for dinner sometimes and he's awesome because he always tries to help me with Swahili and he's really nice and a welcome break from the constant interaction with my momma.

Ok onto actual activities that we've done recently. Last Friday we visited the Kibera School for Girls, a part of the organization Shining Hope for Communities. It was incredible because the co-founder is an SIT alum so she was able to answer all of our questions in a really meaningful way and she gave great SIT advice. It's definitely an organization worth looking up, they are doing great work and one of our SITers actually worked there over the summer. Basically they provide primary school education to some of the most at-risk girls from Kibera. It was also our first walk through Kibera which was fine but definitely mixed opinions about walking 26 white people through Kibera. I did learn how close it is to my house though, it's basically right in my backyard (figuratively speaking because I don't really have a backyard).

So then on Saturday we visited Mathare. Two slums in two days. Mathare is a much older slum that Kibera and we went to visit the Mathare Youth Sports Association, which seems like a really cool organization although we only got a small glimpse of what they actually do. Mathare, again, intersting slum to see, not a fan of the way they walked us through it. Felt a lot like slum tourism and basically the whole thing was a heavy topic for all of us here so if you want more details I'll tell you about it off the blog. But we did get to see the MYSA library and learned that they're reaching 25,000 kids from the Mathare area which is incredible!

Post MYSA visit we went to watch a soccer game at City Stadium. We had been warned to avoid going to any soccer games at all because of the potential violence, but when our Office Coordinator Miltone wanted to take us we obviously said yes. One of the girls had also been warned about the part of the stands call "Russia" so where did we sit, Russia, obviously. That was an experience in and of itself. Imagin parading 26 white kids into any all-Kenyan setting, and then imagine that the setting is a football stadium full of rowdy and avid Gor Mahia fans. We were greeted with chants of "Wazungu" and directed to a central row in the stands. There we endured a lot of teasing and joking comments from the crowd. We also learned some wonderful chants in Swahili, which I'm sure should never be repeated. We were having a fine time until it got progressively rowdier and the game we were actually there to see didn't start for another 45 minutes so we ended up bailing before the game even started due to the excessive drunkenness, sexism, and marriage proposals coming from the crowd.

All in all that was an exhausting day, after which I got dropped off at Susanna's homestay family's house because our moms are basically sisters and she lives closer to my Grandma's house where I was supposed to have dinner. Unfortunately mamma was either on African time or she forgot about me because I chilled at Susanna's house for almost 2 hours before mamma finally came to collect me and take me to Grandma's for dinner. Slowly making the rounds of my extensive Nubian family. Did I mention that my mamma comes from a polygamist family and has 34 siblings? Yes, we are somehow related to everyone.

I have two more stories to tell: one about my Sunday experience at a Nubian wedding announcement party for Susanna's sister that involves kissing a girl and one about meeting a real-live Kenyan runner who may or may not now be a stalker. There's some ambiguity there because he doesn't speak English.