My Future As a Piki-Piki Driver

Now that I’ve shared one blog focused on the negative side of things here and I feel I can’t be accused of solely glamourizing life in Africa, let me go back to telling you all about how perfect life in Kenya is.  I had two experiences this week that were thrilling for me in very different ways.

Experience 1: The Treacherous Boda Ride:

The view from Bingutwi school.

Thursday the team was teaching at a school called Bingutwi.  It’s way off the beaten path.  Literally.  But the views once you make it there (if you manage to make it there) are breathtaking!  Sweeping landscapes with two large mountains right in the middle that used to be crawling with leopards and baboons.  Tall beautiful trees blowing in the wind and gorgeous scenery for as far as the eye can see.

I called Charles, a dear friend and one of my favorite boda (also known as a piki-piki or a motorcycle taxi) drivers to take me out there.  By the time the morning meeting at the house was over, it was raining quite hard.  Very strange, as it normally rains late every afternoon but very rarely earlier or later. So, the roads were bad.  One thing I secretly love about Charles is his need for speed.  I think he knows I’ve got good balance and a high threshold for fear, so despite the rain, we were making it to Bingutwi at a decent clip.  Anytime half of my brain is saying, ‘Wow. We sure are going fast, we should probably ask Charles to slow down and take his time,’ the other side of my brain promptly punches the cautious side of my brain in the face and takes the reins, allowing me to enjoy in the thrill of the ride. 

Charles the awesome boda driver.

Once we turned off the main road to the very bumpy, boulder filled path, I remembered why it’s so dangerous to take a boda to Bingutwi.  Charles was navigating his piki over huge rocks and muddy sinkholes with a high degree of skill, but it was a very narrow path lined with sharp rocks and thorn-bushes on steroids, and was way too dangerous for both of us to go over the rocks together, so I climbed off and ran ahead of the boda in the rain.  I had forgotten just how long the dangerous stretch of road extended and ended up running through the mud and over large slippery rocks for at least 10-15 minutes.  I kept asking Charles if I shouldn’t just pay him and go on alone, but he wouldn’t hear of it.  We’d run into some strange people already and I don’t think he liked the idea of sending me down a slippery, dangerous and isolated path on my own.

Needless to say, we made it just fine, and though I suggested I traverse the tricky part of the journey back on my own and meet him on the main road he told me he’d be at the front gate of the school to meet me at the end of the day and wouldn’t hear otherwise.  He arrived as promised and this time we had to navigate the slippery boulder going uphill with gravity against us.  There were so many opportunities for us to both end up with our brains bashed against slimy oversized rocks. It was terrifyingly awesome.  And sometimes just terrifying.  And very, very muddy.

But Charles had a plan; he decided if he built up enough speed he could get the momentum to just fly up the boulders.  He hadn’t shared this plan with me, so I just thought he’d lost his mind and decided that it was a good day to die.  I tried to put all my faith in him and his skill as a driver and just pray for the best, which again allowed the thrill-seeking side of my brain to charge my body with adrenaline and dopamine and enjoy the ride.

We tore over boulders at an alarming rate and once we made it (amazingly) to the open road, we picked up the pace even more.  Against reason, I wondered why I have never owned a motorcycle and even, once I reached home in one piece, started looking into how much one would cost.  There are few simple pleasures I have found that compare to the thrill of the piki....the wind in my hair (and this time, the rain beating down on my face), while the world flies past in a glorious blaze of color and movement.  The rush of it all.  If this whole international development thing doesn’t work out, I may have just found my calling among the Kenyan piki drivers of Kuria.

Some students who were very proud of their work.

Experience 2: Spelling Sheep and Kitten: Now for what happened during the day on Thursday after the first crazy boda ride.  I arrived safely, though a bit muddy and rain-soaked, to Bingutwi thanks to Charles.  I went to observe our Field Officers (we have a Program Leader, three Field Managers and six Field Officers and all but the Field Officers were in a meeting).  I had spoken with the team a few times about how they are trying to teach reading and writing of English without any attention paid to the sounds that letters make and how to add those sounds together to create words.  To us, this is a basic and foundational concept; to them it was a highly irregular and novel one. I’d been trying to give feedback to each of them on this one by one, but finally on Wednesday had talked to the team as a whole and given them examples of how to break intimidating words down into sounds with students and walk them through how those sounds can be added together to create a whole word.  I tried to introduce fun teaching techniques and games that use letter-sound recognition and phonetics.

So, on Thursday I was so excited to see some of the Field Officers trying out new ideas.  For example, George (one of the best Field Officers) was teaching with a book about animals to a group of Class 2 students.  There was a group of girls in the back too afraid to attempt writing simple words like dog, cat, or cow at the beginning of class.  George was so patient with the class and did an amazing job.  He used some phonetic teaching techniques but put his own innovative spin on them.  When the children had no idea how to spell ‘sheep’, he asked them to shush each other (as in to tell each other to be quiet).  He asked them to guess how to spell ‘shhh’ and they guessed correctly, then he asked them about the ‘eep’ sound from sheep and the first student guessed ‘ip’ (the letter ‘i’ in Kiswahili is pronounced like the letter ‘e’ in English), and George walked them through what a soft ‘i’ in English sounds like and what a long ‘e’ sounds like.  He drew a ship and a sheep and helped them understand the difference in pronunciation.  When they were too afraid to try ‘kitten’ he asked who knew how to spell the word ‘kit’ and who knew how to spell the word ‘ten’ then showed them how the sounds of the two words together make the word kitten.  They were thrilled to know how to spell a six-letter word.  At the end of the class, the group of girls who wouldn’t even make eye contact with George at the beginning of class were jumping up to volunteer to write the new words they’d learned and wrote them correctly.

To see something that I had shared put into practice and have an impact was elating, but especially so because it was not exactly what I had shared.  Someone listened to me and learned from me, but then took that knowledge and crafted it into what worked for them.  I don’t want to be here handing people instructions on how things should be done. I want us all to share with each other what we know and what we have seen work and then incorporate what works the best in our own ways.

Our Program Leader Vicky in action.

On Friday morning, while I was sitting in the corner as the team was learning Excel in computer lab, I was still riding high on the wave of the impact we’d had at Bingutwi on Thursday.  Beyond teaching the sounds of letters, the other main issue I have noted is the lack of advance planning for lessons.  Often it can seem that the team is just showing up and deciding last minute what grade level to teach and which books or materials to use.  Because there is no plan, it seems easy for them to get off course or to not have a good sense at the end of class whether or not the students learned much or if so, what they learned.  I had about an hour of pondering this while they were on the computers and afterward asked them if they still wanted my feedback on lesson planning.  They did, so I created a full lesson plan on the spot (objectives and all), involving spelling games, walking through developing a lesson plan, learning objectives, and ways to assess whether or not those objectives were met.  Afterwards, I got so much positive feedback and one member of the team even commented, ‘Wow!  Learning can be so fun!’.

My team is incredible.  They have worked so hard, come so far, and they truly have a passion for education and the students they work with.  It is so amazing to support them as they both expand their horizons and refine their methods to ensure they are equipping the students to break the cycle of poverty to which their families and communities have been bound for so long.

Snowballs from the hailstorm.

Dark chocolate chip banana bread!

Other thrilling events: We had our first massive hailstorm, I knew enough Swahili to jump off a boda and help an injured school girl on the side of the road, I did my first baking without an oven (dark chocolate chip banana bread that was amazing, thank you very much!), Mateo made a chocolate cake with coffee icing that was incredible, and we found out that this guy whose house we pass everyday on the way to work killed his wife and dropped her body down the well. 

As I could write for hours about all the crazy, thrilling, or incredible things that happen here every day, I will just leave you with the image that I am sitting here typing with birds chirping, a soft breeze blowing, and the warm glow of sunlight on my face, breathing in the fresh air and thinking of how there is nowhere in the world I would rather be than right here, right now.  It seems that every week here is more fulfilling than the one before, despite any hardships or tribulations.  It took me over thirty years to find this place that fills me with such joy, excitement and peace, and I am drinking in every accomplishment with the education team, every amazing moment and meal with the team at the house, and every thrilling boda ride to the fullest.

To all with love, Jesi

PS For those of you who wrote to me about sending care packages, please be sure to send anything within the next week or hang onto it and post it sometime around Christmas.  If packages arrive while I am out of the country on break, they will charge me a storage fee at the post office for every day they had to hold it.  I will be back in Isibania around Jan 18.

The Other Side of Africa

Today, the U.S. embassy here in Kenya issued a warning based on information that there is to be an imminent terrorist attack slated to target places where foreigners gather, like night clubs or malls.  (http://edition.cnn.com/2011/10/22/world/africa/kenya-us-warning/) The embassy is urging US citizens to defer any travel plans to Kenya until a safer time.  Our housemates and colleagues will travel to Nairobi in the morning and be there for meetings over the next few days.  They now have to re-think their travel plans, down to the places they hoped to get a refreshing milkshake or grab a bite of decent Indian food.  Are these places that would be targeted?  They cater to the Western crowds, so why wouldn’t they be? We also are counting on the hope that these threats don’t extend to the foreigners in our small little border town. As many of you know, one of my closest friends was abducted last year in South Sudan and held for 105 days, which have remained the longest and and most difficult 105 days of my life to date.  To have someone you love, their life hanging in the balance, and have little to do but wait and watch and hope...it is an experience I wouldn't wish on anyone. If I hadn't already known, the experience would've taught me to take impending threats in the region very seriously.

The road home from work.

A good friend who worked for Kiva in Kenya some years ago has reminded me often of how easy it is to glamourize the ex-pat life, to relish in the memories of this lush and exotic continent, and to focus on the good friends made and the grace and hospitality shown, while pushing into dark recesses all the less savory memories and moments.  I am indeed loving it here and it is wonderful in so many ways. However, my posts so far have likely made like sound fairly idyllic and mentioned only a few negative aspects (such as fear and a few of my least favorite things), and I have yet to paint you a more accurate portrayal of the downside of life in Isibania, Kenya. 

For a start, the evening that we arrived off the long bus ride to Isibania, I joined a small group of colleagues and ventured into town for our first Kenyan meal.  The stares are inescapable, as this is a small border town where few foreigners venture.  We walked to a small restaurant and on the way, while chatting with my friend and colleague David (whose wife, Janine, was a few yards ahead), a man of about twenty said ‘I want to fuck you,’ and laughed with his large and slightly menacing-looking group of friends.  We are still unsure if the comment was meant for David or me (or both of us for that matter), and we are still unsure if the man actually understood what the words meant in English, but nonetheless, he was one of the first Kenyans to welcome me to my new home in my first hours here with those words. Since that time, I have had a handful of uncomfortable experiences, mostly with Kenyan men following or harassing me in some fashion, so much so that I am putting my Shaolin training DVDs to good use and carrying pepper spray for the long walks home on my own.

There are also all the children.  You know I love children, so it pains me to say this, but sometimes I want to avoid them or to sit them down and give them a talking-to, if only I had the Swahili skills to do it.  I don’t begrudge them the excitement of seeing a mzungu (white person) or a Chinese (which they seem to call all Asians).  I always try to greet them with a smile and a wave, but  many yell “Howareyou, howareyou, howareyou,” often not knowing what the words mean, not knowing what the response is, and not stopping until we are long out of sight.  And still that I don’t mind that so much, despite the fact that it happens constantly, each and every day.  What I really mind is when they ask for something.  Even the ones I am relatively good friends with, we will be walking along having a nice inter-lingual chat and then all of sudden there it is… ‘give me 5,000 bob.’ That’s equivalent to $50 USD and is worth a heck of a lot in shillings.  They ask for dolls, my watch, my bag, my sunglasses, everything.  I don’t know where they learn it, and maybe a few of them had some degree of success with that approach in the past, but I don’t appreciate being seen as a walking ATM machine. On top of that, some that live very near us have gone so far as to throw stones at us (I've been hit by one myself), smear us with mud, and swing at us with large sticks.

There is certainly corruption, which I have only seen to small degrees here and there.  I have to pay $30 or more to get each package sent to me out of the post office (and that may actually be legit), but so far most have been opened and then resealed with a different tape.  The boxes I sent myself had inventory lists in them, so I am not sure if that is the only reason nothing was taken or not.  Also, when I walked over to Tanzania with my friends last weekend, two of us were taken into the immigration office and we just talked our way out, but when I related the story to Kenyan colleagues they suggested it would have gone faster and smoother with a nice bribe.

The teaching system has terrible aspects too.  As I have mentioned caning is rampant.  Teachers lay dozens of kids down in the grass and just beat them (so violently and viciously) right in front of us, knowing full well it is illegal, but also knowing no one will enforce that and that if we want to keep working in these schools, we won’t rock the boat.  It is unbelievable.  The male teachers like to try to draw me into uncomfortable conversations about why I should marry a Kenyan man, why white women make good wives and bring prosperity, or when they can invite me to their homes over the weekends.  The first time I encountered this, I was lucky to have Lindsey, my US counterpart by my side, who is aware that this is the norm and is a pro at shutting it down. Still, the teachers have shown no shame in asking me to give them money, to pay for them to go to university, etc. 

My friend and colleague Sabora,
who is an example of a good teacher.

People here also believe in all sorts of nonsense.  Just Wednesday I had to try to explain to one of the head teachers at a local school that tall children are in fact not proven to be completely devoid of intelligence and that being tall does not stretch out their brains so that they are thinner and therefore less useful or capable of retaining information. However, despite my protests, I still don’t think the message got through.

And lastly, though I don’t know how much I agree with this idea, life can seem more challenging than in the States.  Having clean running water is a luxury, you have limited food options (but we've done such an amazing job being creative with what we have), the electricity and internet are quite spotty, you constantly don’t know if you’re getting tan or are just covered in layers of dirt until you get in the shower and it all washes off. It can take an hour or two to walk anywhere you need to be in the hot equatorial sun.  You work long hours, when you’re done working, there are meals to cook, dishes to be done, toilets to be cleaned, floors to be swept.  There are frogs in the bathrooms, dive-bombing insects landing in your dinner, and mosquitos everywhere at night. Oh, and the pancake spiders!  I almost forgot to mention them.  Large, flat, dark things that fly at you when you swing a them.  Lizards, bats and other creatures doing battle in the ceiling over your bed at night....This probably sounds awful to some (or most) of you, but to at least this point, I have to say that I’d still take it over the cluttered craziness of life in DC, LA, or even my beloved NYC.

Rosie, Changala, and T. Hong

Ultimate frisbee.

Things may seem more challenging but they also prove to be so very worth the  effort.  Yesterday, for instance, our friend and colleague, Andrew Chacha invited us to his shamba (farm) to spend the day picnicking, playing, resting, and communing with one another.  This meant we needed to buy some chickens for him to slaughter (I've found that it's much easier to meet your dinner before it's killed in Kenya than many places I've been) and food needed to be prepared well in advance.  It was about an hour and a half walk, carrying supplies on a dusty road in the hot sun.  Each car or truck that passed sprayed us with showers of rocks, dirt, and debris.  As we laid the blankets down, strange spiders and insects came from all over to join us and children gathered in the woods to watch what the strange foreigners would do.  In the States, this would have been a much quicker, cooler, and more sterile endeavor.   Yet, it was in fact one of the most beautiful days I have ever experienced.  We could be there without a thousand kids yelling ‘mzungu!’ or ‘howareyou?’, lying in the grass, staring at the sky, listening to the wind graze the trees.  We shared food with our Kenyan friends, played games, and just enjoyed the beauty of the place and the people. People noticed that I was quiet, but I just felt so blissfully zen soaking in the sun, the beauty of the shamba, and the warmth of the people around us, I thought adding noise would only detract from the moment.

So there it is.  I won’t lie to you and I'm not trying to shield you from the truth; there are as many pitfalls and faults here as anywhere if not more, no matter how exquisite I would like to believe it is.  But, if it were perfect, I wouldn’t be here to do the work I am doing.  Still, it remains one of the most immaculate places I have ever had the good fortune to wander, faults and all. And there's nowhere else in the world I'd rather be.

Love to all from among the beautiful banana trees,
Jesi

Nyumbani (Home)

Our compound with three lovely homes.

If you know Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeroes’ song Home, I ask you to imagine the next time you hear it, that there’s a crazy mzungu in Kenya (me) belting it out at full volume at the exact same time.  It’s quite likely true.  I’ve listened to it practically on ‘repeat’ this week.  (I secretly love the idea that if I ever got married I would be able to add it to my nuptial playlist, along with Ben Fold’s The Luckiest, Michael Franti’s Say Hey (I Love You), Mumford & Sons Sigh No More, and some other songs I’m sure I scribbled down on scraps of paper over the years when I’ve allowed myself to imagine that marriage might be in the future.)

Plantain chips, guac, spicy sweet potato
fries, refried beans, and seasoned steak
with pineapple juice.

Home is at the forefront of our thoughts here, as the time of a new era has dawned at Nuru House.  The last of FT6 (our fearless CEO, Jake) left yesterday morning before dawn and we, FT7, (the FT stands for Foundation Team), now left to our own devices 1) scrubbed everything in sight 2) chucked anything unclaimed, 3) fixed anything that was broken (bathroom door locks where we had just been using a rock to hold shut the door, for example), and 4) enjoyed our first amazing meal together in Kenya as FT7 (thanks to Mateo!). 

First FT7 only dinner in Kenya.

Our team is comprised of so many different characters, each possessing some indescribable and often unexpected awesomeness, and it seems the deeper in we go, the more we learn, the more love and mutual respect there is.  Despite how different we are, somehow we all seem to balance and support all the rest perfectly.  There is this underlying sense that we all genuinely like and fully respect one another, and everyone is willing to pitch in to make life easier and more pleasant for all the rest.  I tell you, it’s a rare and beautiful thing, and I don’t know how we got so lucky.

We definitely felt during the past month how an extraordinarily strong, negative personality can impact the whole, and it is not a pretty thing.  It actually pushed me fairly close to my limit (and for those of you who know me well, that's no small feat) on the final night, but I was lucky to have good friends, equally bothered by the same grating traits (some who actually had to deal with it for the better part of the last year) to empathize and talk me down. But I also saw that we actively tried to shield each other from anything negative, that we remained aware and supportive of hardships the others faced, and reached out to help each other through dealing with hostile personalities and external tensions.  We are a family, and for the next six months (wow! It’s already been a month!), this is definitely our home.

Emma trying on my hair.

I also felt graciously welcomed into another home.  A woman on my team, Pamela, is married to a man we call Pastor, and they have six children (though their home is usually filled with about a dozen more).  My program counterpart, Lindsey, was so close to this family and everyone was quite distraught at her departure.  Lindsey allowed me the opportunity to love and be loved by this family too.  She took me over in the hopes that the kids would take to me and that I would take to the kids, so maybe they would have someone coming by to play with them, help them learn, and show them love.  I have gladly and so gratefully taken on that torch.  Yesterday, one of the kids saw me approaching  their house from some distance and ran into their compound yelling ‘Jes-ka! Jes-ka Matinde!’ (this is my name here).  And before I knew it I had 10 or 12 children on top of me, hugging me, trying to carry my bag, braiding my hair, kissing my cheeks, holding my hands…and yes, the little ones might have peed on me just a bit.  It happens.

After some readjusting of the weight of children’s entire bodies, I was welcomed into their home.  I had a video message for them from another Nuru staffer who has been away for some time but who was also very close to them.  They must’ve watched it 20 times and kept asking me is she could see and hear them.

The kids watching a video message
 from Lindsey Cope.

After that, they asked about Lindsey.  I told them she had flown to England and Italy and they wanted to know more about those places.  I had brought my iPad at Pamela’s request, so I got out my photos from last autumn and tried to explain what everything was.  They were fascinated by Venice!  A place with no cars, but the main streets are made of water and trafficked by boats!  You could walk right off the sidewalk and into the sea! Jaws hit the floor.  I showed them the leaning tower of Pisa, the Vatican, the Coliseum, the works of Michelangelo and Bernini.  Then they wanted to see Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, the Tube, the Eye, and the Thames.  Then we went to Peru and they climbed Machu Picchu with me.  Then to Thailand.  Then to Spain.  Then to Canada, France, and Greece.  At one point, I thought their brains were a little overwhelmed, so I suggested we put a hold on learning stuff for a moment.  Pamela had caught a glimpse of a cartoon in the iPad when the Education team had asked to see it, and she wanted to know if the kids could watch Toy Story 3.  Of course!  I got it set up, added a speaker for volume, and they crowded around.  Within about a 30 second window, it appeared as though they completely forgot that I was there, and it seemed in fact, that they had forgotten that there was anything beyond Woody, Buzz, and the slinky dog in the entire world. Sitting there, with Michelle (a sweet little three year old) on my lap and baby Tony (he’s 17 months) eating (and otherwise smothering himself in ) ugali at my side, surrounded by laughter, fascination, appreciation, and love, I also knew I was home.

I greatly dislike the fact that I so often feel restless, that I am meant to be somewhere else, doing something else.  Each place I have lived has had its own beauty and charm, and I wish to be present always and appreciate all about where I am. The creature comforts of the States are lovely and I do appreciate them greatly, but it is exhausting constantly feeling like a fish out of water, wishing for the simple life uncluttered by material things and manmade/manufactured ideas of what success and happiness look like, searching for the place, the work, the people that make up a puzzle of which I am the missing piece. Where my heart is full, and still, and at peace.  Where I am surrounded by good people doing good things. Where I am able to both enjoy and truly, deeply appreciate the place around me.  Success and happiness don’t require a big paycheck (or any paycheck at all in fact) a big car, or a big screen TV; they shy from drama and gravitate toward peace; they fill you with the gentle comfort that your life has meaning and allow you to see the meaning and value in each and every life around you.

The path that leads me home.

I remember the plane ride over here.  I wasn’t filled with all the doubt and second thoughts that plagued me when I moved to Sydney, Paris, etc.  It was scary and new and crazy, but there was no doubt.  Instead, when I pulled my suitcase up to the compound, I had the comfortable sense of knowing I was home.  I know this is only my home until next April, and then I fly to my old home and have to find the next home (it took me so long to find this one, I have to admit that’s a daunting task), but it is the most at home I have ever felt in my life, even knowing the end date is so near.  And it gives me hope that I can find that same sense of home in beautiful little pockets of the world, where the people are incredibly warm, resilient, and welcoming; where I find an amazing group of friends and colleagues to share the experience with; and where I am doing work I believe in wholeheartedly.

Usiogope (Do Not Be Fearing)

This seemingly calm and pleasant week has subtly taught me a lot about fear.

On Thursday night we were asked to participate in a call with the whole staff of Nuru International, fantastic people spread out over numerous continents.  Each of the nine new team members (including me) on the ground in Kenya were asked to share in 2 minutes or less why they are passionate about their particular area of expertise or what led them to it.  Easy enough, right?

Well, ask me to write you a treatise on quantum mechanics or neurophysiology; ask me to speak about famine in the Horn of Africa, advancements in ecologically sustainable architecture, or the failings of Wall Street; ask me to give my thoughts on the work of Caravaggio or Turner…these things I feel I could do with some degree of focus and ease.  But when asked to parse out and briefly summarize the millions of threads of life that were woven together to lead me to this place in my life and this passion in my soul in 120 seconds or less, without confusing or boring people..or sounding trite or cliché, …well, I hit a roadblock. 

I tried to suss it out for a bit, then when it seemed too difficult, avoided thinking about it for as long as possible  (very out of character for me) then as the hour approached dutifully and painstakingly created a draft, timed myself, and tried it out on colleagues.  They assured me sweetly that it was…hmmm…. good…and then after a pause, gave me feedback along the lines of it being more of what you would hear a panelist say at a conference on the importance of international development work and education and that they had expected something a bit more personal.

Personal.  I needed to get personal.  In two minutes or less.  Baring a little corner of my soul. With a room and a Skype conference call full of people I had known for no more than a month or so, but most of whom have known each other for years.

There were technical difficulties at the start of the call and for a few brief fleeting moments, I secretly hoped it might be cancelled and I wouldn’t have to come up with anything at all.  Maybe it would be postponed long enough for me to come up with something.  Maybe everyone would just get too busy and forget about it….that being said, I have to say I really enjoyed listening to the previous team recount amazing events and accomplishments and learning about the passions and paths of my new teammates… So much so that I forgot to think of something to say.  And before I knew it, it was my turn.  There was no backing out.  I walked to the chair squarely positioned in the middle of my colleagues, facing a computer screen and microphone/speaker that connected us to our colleagues abroad.  The coordinator, Doug, asked silly ice breaker questions, which somehow also made me forget to think of something to say.  And then it was go-time. 

All I remember is thinking, ‘dig deeper….what would I tell a good friend if they asked me this question’…. I pushed aside the fear of judgment, the need to impress new colleagues, the hesitation to open up and be vulnerable.  I vaguely remember what it was that I said.  Something about my love of learning and of kids.  Something else about the resonating impact of education and my childhood experiences learning about poverty and other cultures abroad.  I don’t know how long I spoke.  It felt like both a millisecond or a lifetime.   But despite all that, it just felt right.  Not manufactured or practiced.  Just the simple truth.

In the past week I had the opportunity to visit six rural impoverished schools.  Four we have worked with for some time and two that we have never visited with our program before.  It is incredible to see the difference in the children’s attitudes.  In the new schools, they were full of fear and uncertainty when we arrived.  Though it is illegal, children are constantly and often severely caned if they misbehave , cry, or sometimes if they make mistakes.  Teachers here use rote memorization techniques, so the children can memorize and repeat anything (this is both incredible and definitely a survival mechanism for them), but they usually never get the chance to really understand any of the words, ideas, or concepts they are taught.  With our team, there is no corporal punishment.  As soon as the children begin to wrap their heads around this, the transformation is incredible.  At the schools we have worked with for some time, the kids ask more questions, they crowd around the books and instructors, they try without fear of failing or judgment. 

When we forget our fear of judgment, when we allow ourselves the space to fail…and to succeed, when we go forward without fear of the unknown, when we reach out for new experience eagerly and without hesitation (this reminds me of a great Eleanor Roosevelt quote), this is living, this is how we can progress, this is the hope for the future.

What our team brings to these schools is not only the opportunity to read, learn and understand, but also the confidence to try new things, to make mistakes and learn from them, and to recognize that their thoughts and ideas are important too.  The team teaches them, ever so subtly, to love the process of being curious, learning, discovering, and growing.

This week was also my final week with my program counterpart, Lindsey, who will be based in the States throughout my rotation here.  She has been here for two rotations and accomplished so very much in that short time.  The team and especially the children here remain distraught at her departure.  She is as brilliant as she is kind, and I am so honored to have the chance to work with her and learn from her.

I felt fear creep in again as her departure time approached.  I feared being qualified enough to fill her shoes and I felt the fear of the team who have gone through so much difficulty before she arrived, every time a new person was brought in.  She had brought them together, helped them resolve major issues, given them fantastic guidance and a real sense of stability, and helped develop the model as it is now.  Incredible feats. 

But even as the team and Lindsey (and I) shared a very tearful goodbye, they all made a point to ease my worries and chase away any fear.  Incredible things have happened and amazing progress has been made with Lindsey, but 1) we should be comforted by the fact that we will get to continue to work with her as the program continues, and 2) she has set the stage for great work to be done in my time.  She has helped to build the team’s trust in me, as well as the community’s.

So here I am, at the beginning of my first full week as the sole mzungu on the Education team, thinking about fear, but also realizing I possess the confidence, commitment, and patience to accomplish anything.  In my time here, I hope to help the team get to a place where they can endow all the children we work with those same tools, so they can move forward, grow, learn, create, innovate, succeed, fail…all without fear or in spite of it.

Si ogope.

The Uninvited Guest

So as I was sitting here trying to decide what to write about, my housemate, Jennifer, came running into the common room from the kitchen screaming bloody murder.  She and her husband had gone into the kitchen to make some toast as a bedtime snack.  Some people thought it was a bug-scream or rat-scream, but I had a sense that it was a scream that required mobilization. She seemed unnerved and a bit terrified.  I heard her gasp, ‘There’s a person behind the fridge!’ A Kenyan!’. Her husband, Matt, was still in the kitchen and I could hear him saying , ‘Whoa.  What are you doing here?’.  We live in a pretty isolated and secure compound and it’s quite late (most people were already in bed), so having an unknown stranger hiding in the house is not a situation to be taken lightly.

I was torn between running into the kitchen to try to assess the situation and help Matt if needed it, or running to get our CEO, Jake, (for whom the word 'tough' seems an understatement and who I would already trust with my life in a pinch).  Being in a dress that doesn’t give me a lot of movement (meaning if I walked into a bad situation, I would have a hard time trying to run or fight my way out of it) and imagining in the worst case scenario (that it might be a Kenyan man likely armed with a machete), I bolted out the door to Jake’s window.  I have to say it is the first time since I arrived that I have seen Jake go to sleep at a reasonable hour and he had looked completely exhausted.  I felt a minor pang of guilt amidst my concern when I roused him from his room, but the man bolted into action and was up, armed, and in the upper house kitchen (where the person was hiding) in moments. I followed him into the kitchen and saw a foot in the shadows from around the corner of the fridge.  Jake relaxed a bit at what he saw (which in turn made me relax) and reached out his arm, pulling the person up.  

It was a child.  A girl.  Maybe nine or ten years old at most.  I recognized her instantly.  Chelsea, (a colleague/housemate/new friend), and I had walked into town this morning to buy supplies for breakfast burritos and we noticed a girl sitting next to the food-stand staring at us.  We said hello and tried to engage her, but she just smiled and remained silent.  About halfway home, we noticed she was following us, and once she realized we knew she was there, she walked right alongside us all the way home.  This may sound strange, but it is not uncommon at all.  My program manager, Lindsey, constantly has children at her side and they often have nothing to do but to walk you all the way home.  It happens every day.

To add to the strangeness of the night, and as a sign that we should take even slightly odd circumstances more seriously: 1) My friend Rebecca had mentioned that a girl had been at her window early in the morning (inside the compound) yelling ‘Hodi!’ which is ‘Can I come in?’.  She’d mentioned the girl didn’t speak or seem to understand Swahili or English when spoken to.  Rebecca assumed she was an admirer of Lindsey’s come to say goodbye since Lindsey is leaving Kenya this week and the children around here just love her.  Lindsey in turn assumed she was one of the laundry ladies.  2) I had been giving out digital copies of photos on my external hard drive to my friend’s Janine and David in their room when we saw something big run by the window in a flash.  We joked that we hoped it was a person (there are maybe 17 or 18 of us around the compound at the moment) and not some creature because it was really tall for an animal, but it was pitch black outside and all we could see was a flash of white.  When I left their room I saw my friend Matt, who tends to run around a bit, wearing a white shirt and just dismissed it as having been him.

So, back to this girl.  She stated she had been beaten and cast out by her father.  She snuck into our compound walls and hid in an outdoor latrine through hours of heavy rains.  She got scared and snuck into the house and just wanted to stay here, hidden, probably just to have a safe place to stay.  I am certain Jennifer’s scream scared her.  It scared us all.  And I can’t imagine how Jennifer felt.  She’d been in there making toast for some time and when her husband came up behind her, he noticed the foot in the shadows.  To be there, inches away from someone hiding in the dark for so long, not knowing they are there, if they are armed, or what their intent...I am not a screamer and I tend not to panic, but I cannot blame her for her reaction. Jen had just caught a glimpse of the body wedged in the nook between the fridge and the counter.  A soon as she realized someone was there, took off running.  I must say that I wish I had known it was a child, so I could have passed that information to Jake before he came running in, but as it was, the child was probably even more petrified when she saw Jake, a big and armed mzungu (white person).

Jake took her outside and talked with her and Thomas, who is our regular guard but has Sundays off.  Luckily, Thomas and his family live just across the path from our compound and agreed to let the girl stay with them.  Lindsey brought up that we should speak with the chief to help intervene with returning the child to her home in the hopes that she won’t be harmed again.

I feel so terrible for the girl, but I am also relieved that the stranger hiding in the dark was a little girl just trying to find safe haven and not someone with malicious intent.  Even now, as I sit here, the strange sounds I previously accredited to being in Kenya are standing out as warning signs of lurkers in the dark.  I took two sleeping pills, so hopefully that edge will wear off soon and I will be able to sleep.

So in addition to tonight’s excitement, in the past week I walked over to Tanzania and went fabric shopping with friends, the sister of one of my first Kenyan friends passed away (I have been in situations like this before, but I can never acclimate to how many funerals there are),and I made the walk home alone twice with only one or two minorly sketchy incidents.  I will probably carry my pepper spray in future and continue learning martial arts, just to make me feel a little more prepared for any potential incidents.  I really, wholly  love it here and believe that everything will be fine, but being prepared will just help put my mind at ease.

I also got to observe the Education Team at work at two very different schools (one a town school and one rural), which was both enlightening and informative.  I rode around on bodas or walked down the streets and children already knew me by name and called out to me.  I got the tiniest yet most agitating splinter that took two people/two pairs of tweezers/almost two hours/and a safety pin to get out.(It’s crazy how one can remain calm when a two by four rips their calf muscle off the back of their leg or when they get their teeth knocked out, but a miniscule splinter can drive the same person mad. )   I relaxed in the hammock for the first time this week...and I had my first mandazi (or fried bread).  We celebrated our CEO's birthday with peanut butter and sriracha sauce galore. And finally, I got to have a one on one with him, which reaffirmed my excitement and gratitude to be a part of this project.

So, that’s about it for now.  It is almost one in the morning and I am hoping my sleeping pills will kick in soon so that I can sleep through all the strange noises that never bothered me before tonight’s incident.

Much love to all,

Jesi