Home again, Finnegan, riggety jig - and a look back...

I need to catch up.  Because I had no internet for the last week of my trip, spent in Karotina, I will put some of the images to try and fill out the picture.  This is a very lush part of Kenya with red, red soil and thick green flora.  We stayed at the "compound" of one of the sponsored students who traveled with us, and this his her Shosho (grandmother) with whom we had tea when we first arrived on a rainy evening.  Note the picture of Jesus to her right.  Shosho was very instrumental in the independence movement of Kenya and helped the Mau Maus during their rebellions.

 This is the courtyard with the woodstove "kitchen" to the left, plastic basins used for morning baths on the right.

 Outside the courtyard you can see the goat house and a little path that led down to the latrine; in the middle of the night getting down there was a challenge for the weary and the sight-challenged.

This is Jerry who did the cooking, milking and seemingly all other tasks that had to do with our well-being.  On the first morning I walked down the dirt road to a neighbors with Lillian, the girl who is being sponsored and lives with a family in Georgia, and we went to buy milk from the lovely woman who sat in her kitchen; she offered us yummy milky tea, and the view from inside was this delicately shaded image of door, window and little bench.

The neighbor who loved having visitors also had a daughter and her little adorable baby who sat with us and drank tea.

This is one of the houses in Lillian's family compound, and I love the colors of the outside and the green door, all enhanced by the hanging laundry.

Jerri let me help her pick the corn off the cob for the maize and beans for our dinner; they pick each piece off individually instead of cutting off rows with a knife.  The kernels are fat and whole.  When she got a phone call, I was startled to see her chatting on her cell phone as she stirred something bubbling in the pot on the fire.

The balance of the blue doors - all OVER the country - and the brown wood of the buildings made my heart got pit-a-pat.

Church is an endless affair, and we went to a FOUR hour service where the preacher shouted, pranced, danced, wagged his fingers, shook her arms and strutted through the audience.  Again, we were asked to stand and say something to a large crowd of welcoming faces, but I got no sugar cane; I guess I wasn't the only white person in the group!  Most everyone in our group fell asleep at one time or another during the service/parade.

We went to this restaurant after the service for coffee.  I ordered black coffee and got a cup of warm water and one little packet of Nescafe.  The young Kenyan men with us ALL sat fiddling with their cell phones, heads down and utterly absorbed in their pushing of buttons...

This group of children approached the van, and I got out and sang with them; they were SO receptive and funny that I could have stayed all day!

This building was worthy of a photo with the blue doors shouting at the blue sky and two rather high men gyrating outside on the dirt road.

This is Lillian's mother and her brother; we had many religions covered in our group: the founder of Matanya's Hope is Jewish converted to Christian, Lillian's mother's brother seems to be a Shiek of some sort, and several members of the family were Catholic.  EVERYBODY had some belief in a God's presence.

The toothless grandfather brought us fresh macadamia nuts from his tree, and if you have never tasted a fresh macadamia nut, you are in for a surprise!  They were utterly sweet, crisp and delicious without that creamy buttery taste of those roasted macadamias from Hawaii.  Sheer bliss.

I flipped over the texture and the light on this wall; the bucket is placed just right too.

This is Lillian's old primary school from which she was plucked ans sponsored so that she could go to Slopes View, a private boarding school, before she came the to U.S.  The students all had raggedy clothes, and what they were getting for an education was questionable at best.  This was a 4th form boy, thanking us for coming; he stood tentatively in front of the blackboard, which, as you can see, is rather iffy...

We gave out toothbrushes and pencils, but this girl just struck my fancy to such an extent that I wondered if she even needed a toothbrush; the children's teeth were sparklingly white.

In a lower class this was the method for learning counting - chickens laying various numbers of eggs!  

This blackboard description of creation troubled me; creationism is hardly a scientific explanation worth of any academic endeavor, but here it is, "On the first day God created...

Finally, on the next to last day we drove up to Grace's school just to firm up our plans to take her out of school for two days so that we could spend time with her - this was the whole reason for my trip.  Here is the mission statement for South Tetu boarding school where she is learning to become a "dynamic" lady "of integrity."  Sadly, we learned that they were in the middle of exams and could not leave school; needless to say, I was disgruntled about nobody's having checked beforehand.  I got to spend about 15 minutes with Grace.

Grace seems to be in her element at school, and I am very, very pleased.

This is Douglas to the left, a sponsored young man who has just graduated from Nairobi University in Economics; he loves expensive clothes and polishes his shoes every morning.  David, on his right, was Grace's teacher in the Maasai Mara.  He volunteered for years and finally has gotten a paid position at another school.  He is a lovely, gentle soul, and I'm very fond of both of these fellows.  

When we got to Nairobi, we went to the giraffe park where we fed the giraffes, and here is David with Lyn, the giraffe, who is taking a pellet of food out of David's mouth.  I skipped that part and just let her lick with her sandpapery tongue the pellets from the palm of my hands.

Finally, we ate in a mall at this Indian restaurant where I got mango lassis, not the best but a treat any way you look at it.

Having finished what I had come for, I changed my flight and left two days early.  Now settled at home, I have plenty to process and ponder as I take real showers, drink real coffee and use toilets.  Sometimes taking time away from the technologies and the modern conveniences of our lives can help ground us in ways we can never appreciate until we do it.  This is photograph of Brussels from the plane as we took off.

The trip was for me full of rich human interactions, meaningful personal insights and cross cultural connections that I shall cherish even though I am left with questions, quandaries, and contradictions with which I must grapple for a time.  

Meru and Victory Academy

These are in random order, but I will try to keep things logical.  This is just a sign that is typically Kenyan, perhaps African.  God is everywhere, including in "butchery"!  And, I might add, corruption...

We went from Nairobi to a small town outside of Meru, and this is Mama Diane, whose name I learned later is Rosemary.  Here we are taking a LONG walk to a town about 2 or 3 miles away, all on this knotty dirt road.  Rosemary got tired only for about a 15 second break and then just kept on trucking.  The next morning she was up at dawn to walk the 8 and a half liters of milk up to the dairy.

This is the way ALL the women do tasks whether they be chopping, washing, cooking or baking.  Here we are making chapatis, which I will happily make for anyone when I return in one piece, probably fatter from lack of exercise and intake of leaden chapatis!

This is the consummate grandmother, Mama Diane, with her grandson; she has both a grandson and granddaughter who live with her, both of whom seem to scream for her to pick them up perpetually.  Such a bosom makes for comfort!

Because I am no longer teacher and want to grow things, I feel belonging to the Kenya Farmers Association Limited is probably the way to go.

These two are returning from school and are runners.  They train at altitude in bare feet.

After a 4 hour church service during which I was asked to "make an offering," which has nothing to do with money and everything to do with standing in front of a sea of beaming black faces and speaking.  It was at once exhilarating and terrifying, but they were all so delightfully friendly that it was a piece of cake.  Before easily 300 people, I was introduced as the "one white person in our church today..."  So much for political correctness!  This is a photo of Rosemary and her best friend, Jane, with whom we laughed and laughed on the way home from church.  I love the orange girls against the orange wall.

At Victory Academy, 8:00 Assembly involves raising the flag and songs with clapping.  These are some of the dear little children who sang.

For those of you who saw my TWO pea plants and/or witnessed my first "harvest" of exactly THREE peas, you can appreciate my awe at Mama Diane's garden of peas that she sells for export to the U.S. for 75 Kenyan shillings per kilo, a good crop considering cabbages only get 10 shillings when sold. 

During church there was a sort of auction, during which one man bid on this enormous piece of sugar cane that he announced he was giving to me; of course, I had to haul the sucker home.

Later that same afternoon we went to visit a neighbor who also chopped down sugar cane as a present, and this time, I had to trudge home with TWO long stalks of sugar cane.  We gobbled them right up.

Finally, Mama Diane and I walked to Jane's farm where she, too, had cows and loads of vegetables. I feel so inspired, not to buy land or a house in Kenya (my children would be glad!), but to work within the confines of my own space.  Goodby Mama Diane, friend Jane, husband Julius and ALL the children and grands and students of Victory Academy!  Onto Nanyuki.

Coffee, Internet and the West...

Yesterday we took a game drive at Sweetwater, and this is a blow up of a lion who was just hanging around...  Sweet, eh?  I've been UTTERLY out of touch with NO internet, no cell, NADA, and what liberation it is to live solely and completely in the moment.  We have moved from a farm near Meru (check a map) to a farm an hour outside of Nayuki at the edge of Mt. Kenya where ALL sorts of white western hikers congregate for trips, and where the British are buying up local shambas (farms) in the area; I don't really know why because this is arid country while Meru was lush and green, but there are no white people there.  In fact, I went to a public school where students had never SEEN a white person, and each child rushed at me in a mass of little black, smiling faces so that he or she could touch, stroke or hold my hand.   They were positively gleeful, and even though it was a little overwhelming, it was lovely to feel like a rock star for a minute.

This is "Lucy" who is really known as Mama Susan - a woman is named as mother of her first born child, so I would be Mama Oona.  Lucy does ALL the washing from dinner and breakfast, and then she goes and works in the shamba, digging and planting and weeding.  

Today is visiting day at Slopesview Academy, and all have gone up for that while I sit in Nanyuki to write my blog and organize photos and take a breather; it's 24-7 with people, specifically Kenyans (no problem) and teenagers (gigglers).  I AM an introvert.  Here is a photo of one of the Maasai women who came to stay last night as she was given her foot bath which I prepared for everyone.  It is simply what's done in this part of the world.  Below is a photograph of some of the group, Mrs. Mugo sitting to the far right (out of the photo) in front of her hibachi, which comes right into the room where we cook, eat, chat, drink coffee/tea and pray.  I won't go into the endless praying that seems to be a part of this mission, but it certainly has become evident to me that this is more than a Christian driven mission, a little heavy handed if you ask me.

The other day Mrs. Mugo (she and Mr. Mugo own the house and farm and keep several of the sponsored children at their house because they live far from their schools, especially Grace who is from the Mara, easily a 10-12 hour trip) killed a chicken for dinner, which we never seem to eat until 9:30 or 10:00 PM.  For those of you who know me well, supper for me is during the "children's hour," as a friend calls it, 5:00.  This eating during sleep time is unsettling to an early riser!  So, this chicken screamed in fright as she took a very dull knife ( I know as I've been using it for vegetable chopping, peeling, etc...) to his neck.  It was so clear to me that the rooster was frightened that I was horrified but also riveted.  After she cut off the head, the chicken did, indeed, keep moving in her hands, but the really horrid part is that the head itself was pulsing and almost bouncing. I write this for all chicken eaters, well, really for all animal eaters...

 This is Mrs. Mugo who is indomitable!  She is up at 4:30 or 5:00, fetches about 5 gigantic bottles of water before she begins heating pots of it on the wood stove that serves as her oven.  Once some has been heated, a small amount goes in a plastic tub, along with some cold water to make the temperature ambient, and this is how we bathe.  I even washed my hair with this method this morning, but my trousers I have NOT washed, and they are stiff with the dust and dirt.  We have not stayed in a hotel or had a bathroom of our own since leaving Nairobi.

Ah, this is my exquisite Maasai friend who has come for visiting day.  Her daughter is resisting the talk about NOT being circumcised.  It is SO ingrained in the culture that she says if the school does not permit her to do it, she will run away.  Last night the other women were trying to convince this lovely lady to talk her daughter out of what amounts to genital mutilation.   She, too, resists a critique of their cultural methods...

Below is a photo of David Pesi, the teacher who got Grace a sponsor (me) and who taught at her school for years with no pay.  He recently got a real, paying teaching job three hours from the Mara.  I gave him my old computer, and he was so thrilled that he has become a very, very good friend.  We watched the World Cup last night and were THRILLED at Costa Rica's win!

Finally, this fellow we fed sugar cane to yesterday, but he is behind an electric fence; they are smart enough to steer clear of the fence, but WE are not a savvy as these chimps and two of us accidentally bumped against it with our cameras, getting the shock of our lives.  It felt like a heart attack and hindered my breathing for about 15 minutes - very scary.