things are busy with visiting different orphanages and daycare centers everyday. the added difficulty of communication barriers and transportation issues makes the past week and a half frustrating at best. today i visited a law firm to get help with understanding tanzanian law and discovered why i have been having so much difficulty: there are no tanzanian laws specifically regarding children. none. there is a law regarding marriage that says girls can be married at 15 and men at 19, and this has been used to determine at what age people are adults or children. there is apparently a law on education and labor rights which hint at the definition of a child, but only sort of. it's amazing. so, in my report, i will just have to reference the various united nations conventions that tanzania is technically (use your imagination) a signee of and pretend that they actually matter in analyzing how the government has followed its own rules in treating children. there is an act in parliament right now (it might have already been approved and be awaiting the president's signature) regarding the rights of a child, and it's such a big deal because it's the first law regarding children. this is where i am. i'm not sure if i'm doing an adequate job demonstrating my amazement at this government, this government that lets its own people die from starvation so that foreign companies can entertain rich customers and friends; this government that pretends to require primary education, but does not fund it; this government that does not have a single law protecting its children, whose populations far outnumber its adults; the government whose budget is funded largely by developed countries, which absolutely includes the united states. it is hard right now not to revert to my cynical ways and rhetorically ask you, the reader, why governments exist in the first place. because, if i had not for the past 14 years of my life been fed the concept that a government originates from and exists for its people, i would think, based on three months of observation, that it exists as a means of manipulating reality. because there is just no way that what i'm seeing can be real. maybe the people responsible for this sleep easy at night, but i don't understand how this world of thievery and deception can sustain itself in the larger universe of supposed democracy and goodwill. people say that the tanzanian government is poor, but all i see here is dirt roads and 20 year-old failing water infrastructure and hungry children and "public" schools that charge fees for attendance, food, supplies, and uniforms, so i want to know where the hundreds of millions of dollars are going. and then i see the president and his friends and family with their ten cars and personal security and fashion sunglasses and mansions built on people's farmland. and i know that the united states know this, and that the united nations knows, as well. and the local people know, too, but you have to listen for it carefully, because they are too cautious to speak out against their government. because accidents have a funny way of happening.
www.thomsonsafaris.wordpress.com
i'm providing the link above in case you want to see the way that politics are handled around here. when an investigative journalist publishes a story revealing abuse of villagers, the people responsible get away with it by just making up complete lies in rebuttal. they quote a man who supposedly wrote the letter at the top of their webpage claiming to be a maasai man who is offended by the original article. after spending time with maasai people, especially those near loliondo, i can actually tell that this man, based on his photo, is not maasai, and even if he's ethnically maasai, there's no way he is pastoralist or truly cares about his people. the man in the picture is FAT, has a mustache, his ears aren't stretched out, he's holding some weird touristy wood carving, and he's being photographed in someone's modern house. it's the most ridiculous thing. thomson's safari uses this webpage to argue against any journalism pieces against them by completely making up facts. i just about had a heart attack reading through their stuff. if you're willing, take a look yourself by going to the above link and see what you think. i'd like to think that if i hadn't spent time with people affected by this disaster, i still could've sensed BS, but maybe i wouldn't have.
sorry for turning this blogpost into such a negative rant, but the whole thing is almost too much to handle. i hope the rest of you are doing well, and i look forward to coming back home in about two weeks.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[UPDATE] Thomson Safaris stalked this blog for a long time while I was in Tanzania. Based on my blog tracker, I'd say they were able to trace back to my blog when people clicked the above link to their site. They have now taken down the "letter of support" by their fake Maasai man and have replaced it with an entire website devoted to challenging those who speak out against them. I could go on about this forever, but will leave you with three thoughts: 1. Maasai pastoralist elders don't speak English, so how do they make legally binding agreements with Thomsons? 2. When your cattle are dying and your children are starving, it takes a very small bribe to get you to say whatever Thomsons wants. These "testaments" that Thomsons provides are bought, not earned. 3. It's true. Thomson paid for the land in every Western sense of the concept. What Thomsons doesn't mention is that the brewery company they bought the land from had stolen that land from the Maasai a long time ago and had since then allowed Maasai to graze cattle on it. When Thomsons bought that land, they kicked all the Maasai off, because in their mind they had paid for that land. Thomson's website and testimonials reek of the destructive sense of entitlement necessary to take away native people's lands without the blink of an eye.
11/18/09
11/15/09
11.15.09
my blog posts from now on will probably be small or nonexistant, both because i am very busy and because after posting about some of the crazy things i was witnessing and doing for the past month, things just seem so tame here. i am living at a campsite within the village i'm working in. i am working at the various orphanages, child day centers, and schools to collect statistics on children in need and at risk in the village. the village chairman told me this was the most helpful thing he could think of me to do, so i figured i might as well do it. i was a little disappointed, because i wanted my independent study project to relate to government policy and even international politics, but hopefully i will be able to meet with some local groups here and connect the issue of national politics with the statistics i am finding (i.e. what laws exist to facilitate an increase in government assistance to the community level-groups who are struggling with an overwhelming number of children affected by HIV and poverty?)
i am in a very good mood right now, because we had our first real weekend today and yesterday, visiting a local craft fair and playing guitar/cards. i've still been pretty busy, though, working on internship applications (done!) and research.
i hope you're all having a great time and that it at least is acting a little more wintery in the u.s. (it's hot here, still, which made the 'christmas' fair we went to a little disconcerting).
i am in a very good mood right now, because we had our first real weekend today and yesterday, visiting a local craft fair and playing guitar/cards. i've still been pretty busy, though, working on internship applications (done!) and research.
i hope you're all having a great time and that it at least is acting a little more wintery in the u.s. (it's hot here, still, which made the 'christmas' fair we went to a little disconcerting).
11.6.09
look up 'loliondo' on youtube. i interviewed two maasai folk who were evicted from their homes by the tanzanian government so that a royal family from the u.a.e. could have the entire area for private hunting. entire villages were burned down, animals killed, women raped, a child lost in the fires, a man shot, many people arrested just for asking questions or resisting. everyone would have burned in the flames if they hadn't run away. if you know someone who works for a large media group (npr, cnn, large newspaper, etc.), i'm working with one of the other students (she got video footage) in trying to get international pressure on the tanzanian government (media > NGOs > large economic AID groups), since about half of the tanzanian government's budget actually comes from outside aid (it's also a common practice to include conditions attached to econ. aid, so that indigenous land rights could be included). there is also a safari company that essentially did the same thing. the name of the company is THOMSON'S SAFARI, and they managed to buy the land that a few thousand maasai had been living on, and then kicked them all off of the land. the land was fruitful and had the water and grass necessary for raising cattle, but now the inhabitants have been forced to live on much less suitable land. combined with the current drought, the effects are fatal. cattle are dying every day and are practically worthless in the market, they are so skinny. the way of life of one of the most renowned tribes in east africa, perhaps even all of africa, is being threatened by people who feel that their desire for entertainment (be it looking at wild animals or shooting them) is more important than the livelihoods of thousands upon thousands of people. all of this happened this summer, as in only a few months ago, and nobody is talking about it.
i have two transcripted interviews and photographs of people and the drastic conditions if anybody has media/large NGO connections.
i have two transcripted interviews and photographs of people and the drastic conditions if anybody has media/large NGO connections.
maasai homestay blog 11.2.09 - 11.5.09
day 1
-we walked perhaps 2-3 km
-claire, kim, and miles are near me
-right now i'm in the house (one room boma)-- me, mama (maluwa), her sister (nalarami), her sister's 3 children (lomelo, nabirr, damitt (baby))
-home remarkably clean, small, hard dry mud floors, 2 elevated stick beds w/ cow hides, fire in middle, small hole at top and side (fist sized) to let in light and let out smoke. not too smokey. there seems to be another room, but i'm not sure, haven't seen inside.
-mama's husband is pretty old, asked me to take a picture of him and i said i would on the last day i was there.
-helped peel all potatoes w/ blunt knife-- first used a machete, then they gave me a small knife, both blunt. also helped pour corn into sack (not sure if it was for selling or cows)
-i know a few maasai words (from a vocab sheet), but i am lucky and they speak a small amount of swahili
-hopefully i will not need to go to the bathroom tonight, because the gates are closed and there are supposed to be elephants nearby
-translator (linga) visited an hour after i arrived.
-they sing a lot and i almost fully learned one song, and i try to sing with them. it makes them laugh, because i get the words wrong, but it's a joyful laugh, not teasing.
-mama showed me her 3 cows today-- there are only 3, because the others are being grazed far away (connects to land rights issue-- they lose their land to the government, plus the draught means they have to graze far away)
-while looking at cows and visiting claire, i saw a tiny puppy. it was so adorable and i picked it up and am in love with it. they let me take it into the boma and it slept on my lap for a while until they kicked it out. i want to bring it to america. they want me to, as well, but we both know it's impossible.
-there are no bugs in the boma, except a couple flies during the day (note: this changes later..)
-it's hot in the boma from the mud insulation and fire
-i gave my mama beads and she got so happpy and said thank you many times and kissed my arms, which caught me by surprise. maybe she was just happy that i understood how much she and others enjoy beading during their spare time. when we were peeling potatoes today with the blunt knife, i very much wanted to give her the egetable peeler i brought, but i have been instructed to wait until the last day.
-while we were still at camp, all the women came to us and stood in a line, all singing and some dancing or jumping. we were each given a long walking stick and stood in a line facing them. after they had finished singing for us, we sang 'row row row your boat' for them in three rounds, because it was the only song we could think of that we all knew. they they were told to choose a student. my mama pushed two women aside to take my stick, meaning we were together. that was pretty cool.
-when we got to the boma, she served us all very sweet tea and chapati. it was delicious, but i should've remembered to use my hand sanitizer first (after note: two people are ill and one person has intestinal worms, likely from the maasai homestay. it happens.)
-i'm slightly nervous about alarming them by talking in my sleep. hope i won't do it.
day 2
-had difficulty sleeping. every time i moved, mama woke up and spoke to me in Maa, and i didn't know how to respond, so i just pretended to still be asleep.
-woke up shortly after dawn. they asked me immediately if i needed to 'choo,' which is usually a faux pas to discuss in maasai culture, so they must've noticed that it had been a long time since i went (AKA not at all).
-mama led me to shrub fence, apparently a popular place to 'choo'
-went back, drank sweet tea, took vitamins
-collected water with large (her) and small (me) jugs at the primary school. many school children stared at me and yelled greetings.
-brought water back to house, ate 'uji' (porridge), which was very good
-she took me to the shed nearby and showed me all the jewelry she'd made. then she gave me a necklace and two bracelets. i also proposed that i buy one of the larger, thick necklaces for $5 from her later and she seemed to like the idea, but we decided to wait.
-cooked chapati and i helped prepare potatoes and cabbage, which she cooked with 'beef flavor' packets (they used to use cow meat, but their cows are all dying-- cheers to the government taking their land and consequential livelihood)
-before eating we walked out and chopped firewood. it was far away and i have blisters, had to wrap my foot in toilet paper with spit. firewood chopping requires lots of strength. my mama was much better at it than me, probably better than most guys in the u.s. at it, seriously. she still seemed to appreciate the effort, though, when i tried to chop the wood.
-visited claire's house for water
-made anklets. she wanted me to cut off the one i already had from the hadza women, because it didn't match, but i said no, and she didn't seem to mind too much. i think she just wanted my ankles to look cool.
-we had a meeting with the other students which was boring and kind of useless, then left
- beaded a bracelet
day 3
-on the first night, i gave my mama the vegetable peeler, because i wanted her to know what it was for so it didn't just sit around, even though we'd already finished cooking for the day. she used it yesterday. well, technically, i used it, since i peel all the potatoes. she was appreciative.
-last night i discovered that there are about 30 cockroaches living in the wall next to where i sleep. this is because the sticks there are not covered in mud/cow dung. 30! \i looked up the phrase 'i am afraid of cows' (which had been provided to us, just in case) and just used the 'i am afraid of' and then pointed at the wall. they laughed and just replied 'hamna shida' (it's not a problem) so i repeated that and said no more of it. yeah.
-still love the puppy. they still hate it (bugs, dirty, needs too much attention, etc.)
-made large earrings and another bracelet today
-took the cows (3 large, 1 calf) out to the 'forest' (2 km) and cut down branches for them to eat since there's no grass. they gave me a swatting stick and later made me a thick stick with a knob on the end for really hitting stuff. it's similar to what maasai use to kill big/medium cats (i think... i was a little confused about how you kill a leapord with a stick). when we got back, mama made the little boy (lomelo) bow his head to me and i had to place my hand on his head. then i gave him the sticks and he said 'ashe' (thank you in maasai). CUTE.
-while making the earrings, mama cut herself (she was using a razor blade to cut pieces), so i ran out (it was raining) and got my bag and treated the cut with alcohol swab and band aid. i guess it was kind of comical, but she was bleeding quite a bit.
-have had no meat or blood (traditional meal things), only animal product has been milk in the tea. people are really struggling.
-turns out it's not my mama's sister living with her, it's her husband's 3rd wife and he just hasn't been able to build her a home yet. she gave me a bracelet today and we took pictures together.
-we walked perhaps 2-3 km
-claire, kim, and miles are near me
-right now i'm in the house (one room boma)-- me, mama (maluwa), her sister (nalarami), her sister's 3 children (lomelo, nabirr, damitt (baby))
-home remarkably clean, small, hard dry mud floors, 2 elevated stick beds w/ cow hides, fire in middle, small hole at top and side (fist sized) to let in light and let out smoke. not too smokey. there seems to be another room, but i'm not sure, haven't seen inside.
-mama's husband is pretty old, asked me to take a picture of him and i said i would on the last day i was there.
-helped peel all potatoes w/ blunt knife-- first used a machete, then they gave me a small knife, both blunt. also helped pour corn into sack (not sure if it was for selling or cows)
-i know a few maasai words (from a vocab sheet), but i am lucky and they speak a small amount of swahili
-hopefully i will not need to go to the bathroom tonight, because the gates are closed and there are supposed to be elephants nearby
-translator (linga) visited an hour after i arrived.
-they sing a lot and i almost fully learned one song, and i try to sing with them. it makes them laugh, because i get the words wrong, but it's a joyful laugh, not teasing.
-mama showed me her 3 cows today-- there are only 3, because the others are being grazed far away (connects to land rights issue-- they lose their land to the government, plus the draught means they have to graze far away)
-while looking at cows and visiting claire, i saw a tiny puppy. it was so adorable and i picked it up and am in love with it. they let me take it into the boma and it slept on my lap for a while until they kicked it out. i want to bring it to america. they want me to, as well, but we both know it's impossible.
-there are no bugs in the boma, except a couple flies during the day (note: this changes later..)
-it's hot in the boma from the mud insulation and fire
-i gave my mama beads and she got so happpy and said thank you many times and kissed my arms, which caught me by surprise. maybe she was just happy that i understood how much she and others enjoy beading during their spare time. when we were peeling potatoes today with the blunt knife, i very much wanted to give her the egetable peeler i brought, but i have been instructed to wait until the last day.
-while we were still at camp, all the women came to us and stood in a line, all singing and some dancing or jumping. we were each given a long walking stick and stood in a line facing them. after they had finished singing for us, we sang 'row row row your boat' for them in three rounds, because it was the only song we could think of that we all knew. they they were told to choose a student. my mama pushed two women aside to take my stick, meaning we were together. that was pretty cool.
-when we got to the boma, she served us all very sweet tea and chapati. it was delicious, but i should've remembered to use my hand sanitizer first (after note: two people are ill and one person has intestinal worms, likely from the maasai homestay. it happens.)
-i'm slightly nervous about alarming them by talking in my sleep. hope i won't do it.
day 2
-had difficulty sleeping. every time i moved, mama woke up and spoke to me in Maa, and i didn't know how to respond, so i just pretended to still be asleep.
-woke up shortly after dawn. they asked me immediately if i needed to 'choo,' which is usually a faux pas to discuss in maasai culture, so they must've noticed that it had been a long time since i went (AKA not at all).
-mama led me to shrub fence, apparently a popular place to 'choo'
-went back, drank sweet tea, took vitamins
-collected water with large (her) and small (me) jugs at the primary school. many school children stared at me and yelled greetings.
-brought water back to house, ate 'uji' (porridge), which was very good
-she took me to the shed nearby and showed me all the jewelry she'd made. then she gave me a necklace and two bracelets. i also proposed that i buy one of the larger, thick necklaces for $5 from her later and she seemed to like the idea, but we decided to wait.
-cooked chapati and i helped prepare potatoes and cabbage, which she cooked with 'beef flavor' packets (they used to use cow meat, but their cows are all dying-- cheers to the government taking their land and consequential livelihood)
-before eating we walked out and chopped firewood. it was far away and i have blisters, had to wrap my foot in toilet paper with spit. firewood chopping requires lots of strength. my mama was much better at it than me, probably better than most guys in the u.s. at it, seriously. she still seemed to appreciate the effort, though, when i tried to chop the wood.
-visited claire's house for water
-made anklets. she wanted me to cut off the one i already had from the hadza women, because it didn't match, but i said no, and she didn't seem to mind too much. i think she just wanted my ankles to look cool.
-we had a meeting with the other students which was boring and kind of useless, then left
- beaded a bracelet
day 3
-on the first night, i gave my mama the vegetable peeler, because i wanted her to know what it was for so it didn't just sit around, even though we'd already finished cooking for the day. she used it yesterday. well, technically, i used it, since i peel all the potatoes. she was appreciative.
-last night i discovered that there are about 30 cockroaches living in the wall next to where i sleep. this is because the sticks there are not covered in mud/cow dung. 30! \i looked up the phrase 'i am afraid of cows' (which had been provided to us, just in case) and just used the 'i am afraid of' and then pointed at the wall. they laughed and just replied 'hamna shida' (it's not a problem) so i repeated that and said no more of it. yeah.
-still love the puppy. they still hate it (bugs, dirty, needs too much attention, etc.)
-made large earrings and another bracelet today
-took the cows (3 large, 1 calf) out to the 'forest' (2 km) and cut down branches for them to eat since there's no grass. they gave me a swatting stick and later made me a thick stick with a knob on the end for really hitting stuff. it's similar to what maasai use to kill big/medium cats (i think... i was a little confused about how you kill a leapord with a stick). when we got back, mama made the little boy (lomelo) bow his head to me and i had to place my hand on his head. then i gave him the sticks and he said 'ashe' (thank you in maasai). CUTE.
-while making the earrings, mama cut herself (she was using a razor blade to cut pieces), so i ran out (it was raining) and got my bag and treated the cut with alcohol swab and band aid. i guess it was kind of comical, but she was bleeding quite a bit.
-have had no meat or blood (traditional meal things), only animal product has been milk in the tea. people are really struggling.
-turns out it's not my mama's sister living with her, it's her husband's 3rd wife and he just hasn't been able to build her a home yet. she gave me a bracelet today and we took pictures together.
11/9/09
10.26.09
there are so many things i could share with you right now. i could tell of my awe-inspiring farmers tan or the battered condition my legs and ankles have found themselves in. or I could tell you about my five hadza arrows (three that i traded my watch for and two that i gave $8 for) that i have safely strapped to one of the roof supports in our safari truck. but, perhaps best of all, i could tell you the story that connects all of these, and it begins at 5:30 in the morning, because the best hunting is before dawn. today i stalked animals in the desert with a hunter from the hadza tribe, thought to be one of the original people, and the last full time hunter gatherer tribe in africa. i huddled fifty feet away while i watched him shoot a giraffe with his bow and arrow. we had been sitting on a cliff, him smoking tobacco in our notebook paper and the four of us (rachel, jazz, elly, and myself) snacking on peanuts and dried pineapple, when he told us he had spotted giraffe. we had already encountered a small herd of them earlier, though they quickly were alerted by nearby birds and our scent, as we had been upwind. we had also stalked a warthog, a bird of prey, and dik dik (small ungulate). after spotting the second giraffe, we quickly headed down from the rocks, me making sounds of nervousness and galumping awkwardly the whole way. to us, in our untrained minds, we were walking without aim or purpose, and i did not connect his announcement on the cliff with our current wanderings. sure enough, after ten minutes of us tripping through bushes and ripping through thorny (2 inch long thorns) acacia branches, he motioned for us to get low. we complied, and he did the same, taking off his red shirt and sandals silently and then crawling in a way only comparable to a lion for fifty feet or so, finally crouching behind a large bush and waiting. we must have waited for ten minutes, muscles tightening and minds wandering. i didn't even see the giraffe until it started galloping away, at which point he jumped out and shot his arrow into the giraffe's behind. it was a poisonous arrow, and i write this while we rest back at camp before trekking out again to collect it it. it is "kubwa"-- big-- and a mother. we followed the injured beast's trail for twenty minutes or so, by its trail of staggered tracks and occasional small pools of blood.
--later---
in the end, we did not catch the giraffe. we left the camp after lunch, perhaps twenty students, the teachers, and ten or so hadza hunters. we walked quickly and sometimes ran, following what eventually became a fresh trail left by the giraffe. after an hour, they declared that the giraffe was unbelievably still alive and "drunk" off the poison from the arrow, staggering and weaving, even once running into a tree. at one point, two of the hadza spotted the giraffe, which led to a frenzy of running to try and follow it. we ran for a long time through acacia and shrubs. twice i had to quickly stop and pull long thorns from my feet, before running to catch up. the group got separated and we continued trying to follow its trail. after two hours, the sun was getting ready to set and our professor told us we had to go back to camp, lest we get lost in the dark. i was so utterly disappointed. the hadza man i had been with told me he would try to find it tomorrow, but i could see the disappointment in him as well. even for these guys who hunt every day, a giraffe is a big deal. two other groups had caught hyrax, but nothing like this. the walk back was excrutiating, physically and mentally. after hunting all day and then running/jogging/tripping for the past two hours, i was unbelievably sore and had blisters, cuts, bruises, and the like all over. plus, it was a two hour hike back, after having lost a giraffe. when we got back, i skipped dinner and just went to sleep, waking up the next day in a significantly better mood.
--later---
in the end, we did not catch the giraffe. we left the camp after lunch, perhaps twenty students, the teachers, and ten or so hadza hunters. we walked quickly and sometimes ran, following what eventually became a fresh trail left by the giraffe. after an hour, they declared that the giraffe was unbelievably still alive and "drunk" off the poison from the arrow, staggering and weaving, even once running into a tree. at one point, two of the hadza spotted the giraffe, which led to a frenzy of running to try and follow it. we ran for a long time through acacia and shrubs. twice i had to quickly stop and pull long thorns from my feet, before running to catch up. the group got separated and we continued trying to follow its trail. after two hours, the sun was getting ready to set and our professor told us we had to go back to camp, lest we get lost in the dark. i was so utterly disappointed. the hadza man i had been with told me he would try to find it tomorrow, but i could see the disappointment in him as well. even for these guys who hunt every day, a giraffe is a big deal. two other groups had caught hyrax, but nothing like this. the walk back was excrutiating, physically and mentally. after hunting all day and then running/jogging/tripping for the past two hours, i was unbelievably sore and had blisters, cuts, bruises, and the like all over. plus, it was a two hour hike back, after having lost a giraffe. when we got back, i skipped dinner and just went to sleep, waking up the next day in a significantly better mood.
10.17.09
list journal
-last night we played Mafia with twenty people, and i was the narrator.
-i have a tooth ache in the back of my mouth
-we have coldcut sandwiches for lunch every day
-there are songs i forgot to put onto my ipod and now really miss, such as "i'll believe in anything" by wolf parade and "king of carrot flowers" by neutral milk hotel. i'm also missing a lot of sleater-kinney and tegan & sara songs, as well as kimya dawson.
-there are ticks everywhere, but they're tiny
-i miss playing drums and piano in a big way.
-we all take the exact same photographs. once one person takes out their camera or points it at something, everyone follows suit. occasionally annoying
-the first night on safari, i couldn't sleep between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m., because i thought i could hear lions. so last night i took benadryl, drank a beer, and left my ipod in my ears.
-i am absolutely gaining weight.
-i finally started wearing my chacos on the coast (now i don't wear anything else)
-i wanted to go straight from london to portland, but it was going to be expensive and i realized i was going to be fat and still experiencing culture shock, so i'm going to austin instead. this probably means i won't see katie or katherine or heather for a full year.
-i should've brought a mandolin.
-i am currently reading 'middlesex' and have lent out my copy of 'perks of being a wallflower,' which has become a popular (quick) read for a lot of the students.
-i got a B+ for my swahili grade (i am bummed out, but a lot of people got that grade)
-i am growing my hair out. this won't mean much, but at least i'm trying...
- last night after we played Mafia, i sat by the fire with heather, rachel, zach, and elly, and we talked about the morgan shaw-fox thing, and it was so niuce talking about serious stuff
-"loose lips" by kimya dawson is so good and i love listening to it on one of the other girls' ipods, even though it brings back difficult memories
-i have been being tentmates with a girl named devin
-we were given 100,000 tanzanian shillings for two days in arusha. i spent maybe 30,000 of it on hotels and food, and pocketed the rest (later note: it came in handy for buying crafts from the people we stayed with).
-i will be working with nicole at the orphanage in olasiti for our independent study project.
-birds are boring. my bio professor cares about nothing but birds.
-i smell awful.
-rachel rogers' birthday was yesterday. devin gave her a slice of watermelon with a candle in it.
-i am now a complete expert on tse tse flies, since i had to research them and talk to our guides about them. their life cycles and adaptive physiological characteristics are pretty interesting, as are some of the crazy ways some people have tried to cope with them (sterilizing a small group of males with high amounts of gamma rays and then releasing them into the wild, since female tse tse only mate once in their lives, even if its with a sterile male)
-last night we played Mafia with twenty people, and i was the narrator.
-i have a tooth ache in the back of my mouth
-we have coldcut sandwiches for lunch every day
-there are songs i forgot to put onto my ipod and now really miss, such as "i'll believe in anything" by wolf parade and "king of carrot flowers" by neutral milk hotel. i'm also missing a lot of sleater-kinney and tegan & sara songs, as well as kimya dawson.
-there are ticks everywhere, but they're tiny
-i miss playing drums and piano in a big way.
-we all take the exact same photographs. once one person takes out their camera or points it at something, everyone follows suit. occasionally annoying
-the first night on safari, i couldn't sleep between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m., because i thought i could hear lions. so last night i took benadryl, drank a beer, and left my ipod in my ears.
-i am absolutely gaining weight.
-i finally started wearing my chacos on the coast (now i don't wear anything else)
-i wanted to go straight from london to portland, but it was going to be expensive and i realized i was going to be fat and still experiencing culture shock, so i'm going to austin instead. this probably means i won't see katie or katherine or heather for a full year.
-i should've brought a mandolin.
-i am currently reading 'middlesex' and have lent out my copy of 'perks of being a wallflower,' which has become a popular (quick) read for a lot of the students.
-i got a B+ for my swahili grade (i am bummed out, but a lot of people got that grade)
-i am growing my hair out. this won't mean much, but at least i'm trying...
- last night after we played Mafia, i sat by the fire with heather, rachel, zach, and elly, and we talked about the morgan shaw-fox thing, and it was so niuce talking about serious stuff
-"loose lips" by kimya dawson is so good and i love listening to it on one of the other girls' ipods, even though it brings back difficult memories
-i have been being tentmates with a girl named devin
-we were given 100,000 tanzanian shillings for two days in arusha. i spent maybe 30,000 of it on hotels and food, and pocketed the rest (later note: it came in handy for buying crafts from the people we stayed with).
-i will be working with nicole at the orphanage in olasiti for our independent study project.
-birds are boring. my bio professor cares about nothing but birds.
-i smell awful.
-rachel rogers' birthday was yesterday. devin gave her a slice of watermelon with a candle in it.
-i am now a complete expert on tse tse flies, since i had to research them and talk to our guides about them. their life cycles and adaptive physiological characteristics are pretty interesting, as are some of the crazy ways some people have tried to cope with them (sterilizing a small group of males with high amounts of gamma rays and then releasing them into the wild, since female tse tse only mate once in their lives, even if its with a sterile male)
10/11/09
10-11-09
as i write this journal entry at 6:45 a.m. at a campsite in arusha, with fingerless gloves on my hands and ahalf cup of fire-brewed coffee at my side, there are a few things i want to quickly mention before i forget them, such as the fact that after finishing our two and a half hours of presentations on our marine biology data collection two days ago, professor clifton informed us of president obama's nobel peace prize award, and i thought to myself that he better have more up his sleeve (although, gigantic hats off to his speech in cairo-- please read the transcript if you haven't experienced brilliance in linguistic diplomacy for a while (sup, George W.)). Enough politics. Other things on my mind are my nostalgic longing for quiet philosophical bathroom time, an event that i naively took for granted for the past couple years of my life. to me, the "choo", as we call it over here, has always been a sacred place of contemplation. i have never felt so rushed, unclean, exposed, and generally awkward while doing the deed, and consequently find myself lacking in the quiet-time-for-thinking department.
we leave for safari in maasai mara the day after next. i am rooming with 5 other people in a 3 person room, but it only costs us about $3.50 per day. more money to go out for meals and do nice things around town.
i hope you're all doing great. much love from tanzania.
we leave for safari in maasai mara the day after next. i am rooming with 5 other people in a 3 person room, but it only costs us about $3.50 per day. more money to go out for meals and do nice things around town.
i hope you're all doing great. much love from tanzania.
12-8-09
every day i become sunburned in a new and exciting area, and consequently, every additional day, i add a new piece ofclothing to my snorkeling outfit. the first day, i wore shorts and a swimsuit. the second day, i wore shorts, a swimsuit, and at-shirt. the third day, i wore a swimsuit, a t-shirt, and pants. the fourth day, i wore a swimsuit, a t-shirt, pants, and a big winter hat. today i wore all of those, plus socks under my flippers an da bandanna around my neck. i can't wait to share with you the photography one of my tripmates took of me in this ridiculous outfit.
my sunburn on my back has finally gotten better, but now i have burns on my feet, ears, face, legs, and arms. i discovered the reason for this, which is that the sunscreen i brought is not actually waterproof, but 'water resistant' instead. yeah... apparently there's a difference, and you can find that difference on my face. oh, well. it will work fine while on safari, as we won't be in the water.
my sunburn on my back has finally gotten better, but now i have burns on my feet, ears, face, legs, and arms. i discovered the reason for this, which is that the sunscreen i brought is not actually waterproof, but 'water resistant' instead. yeah... apparently there's a difference, and you can find that difference on my face. oh, well. it will work fine while on safari, as we won't be in the water.
10-7-09
today we saw two humback whales while out snorkeling. right when we were getting in the water, some of the divers and boat handlers noticed them far in the distance. i got out of the water and got to take my camera out just in time to photograph the mother whale jumping out of the water partially. eventually we got back into the water and collected data for a n hour. i've been working in the team that counts echinoderms with a quadrat. when we got back in the boat for cookie break, one of our guides asked if we wanted to drive out into the depeer water to find the whales, to which we replied in favor. for the next hour we tracked the mother and calf, until at one point we were about forty feet away from them. you could hear them breathing in and out, like tired elephants. i snapped a huge number of photos and gave my camera to rachel to snap a couple, as well, since she was in the front of the boat. the waves in that part of the water were pretty big, and i was actually rather afraid, seein gas how there were two gigantic whales near me and the boat was being tossed around.
10-7-09
schedule on the coast (7 days)
6:15 am-- wake up
7:00am-- breakfast
8:00am-- meeting
8:30am-- walk out to boats
9:30am-- start snorkeling
10:30am-- break
11:00am-- resume snorkeling
12:30pm-- head back
1:00pm-- arrive back on mainland
1:30pm-- lunch
2-4 pm-- free time (laundry, cards, journal, nap)
4:00 pm-- biology lecture
5:00 pm-- general lecture
6-7 pm-- free time
7 pm--- dinner
8--? free time until we sleep
6:15 am-- wake up
7:00am-- breakfast
8:00am-- meeting
8:30am-- walk out to boats
9:30am-- start snorkeling
10:30am-- break
11:00am-- resume snorkeling
12:30pm-- head back
1:00pm-- arrive back on mainland
1:30pm-- lunch
2-4 pm-- free time (laundry, cards, journal, nap)
4:00 pm-- biology lecture
5:00 pm-- general lecture
6-7 pm-- free time
7 pm--- dinner
8--? free time until we sleep
10-5-09
i am in the echinoderm quadrad research group, meaning that, along with two other people (elly and lisa), i will be randomly tossing a 1 m x 1m pvc pipe square into the water, and then counting how many sea stars, urchins, sea cucumbers, and sand dollars there are in that area. we will repeat this over and over again in an attempt to achieve a random sampling of the average numbers of each of those on the reef. the other groups are\: benthic (sea floor) communities, giant clams, lobsters & octopus, butterfly fish, and grouper & snapper.
i very much enjoy seeing all this sea life (did i mention that i caught a baby puffer fish in a coconut shell a couple days ago?) and reading about it. however, i know myself well enough to realize that this is because this whole field is so new, not because i should have been a biology major.
i very much enjoy seeing all this sea life (did i mention that i caught a baby puffer fish in a coconut shell a couple days ago?) and reading about it. however, i know myself well enough to realize that this is because this whole field is so new, not because i should have been a biology major.
10.4.09
(some of these posts are kind of mixed up, but you get the idea)
today we went snorkeling for our first time. i was already sunburned on my back, so i wore shorts and a t-shirt over my bathing suit. it wasn't until after we got back that i realized i could've skipped the bathing suit all together, seeing as how i was fully covered anyways. we ate an early breakfast and headed out around 8\;30. i was admittedly nervous, to the extent that my professor and his wife assumed i'd never gone snorkeling before, so they were a bit confused when i told them i was a good swimmer and relatively experienced snorkeler. the boat ride out to the reef was at least half an hour, which gave me the perfect amount of time to become even more nervous (about, you know, sea monsters and drowning and the lot). But, as soon as i got in the water and immediately spotted our first stingray, followed by sea stars and pipe fish, i forgot my anxiety and had a great time. evidently, water is vastly less frightening when it contains interesting things to look at. a list of things i saw\; sea cucumbers, two octopi, many types of sea stars, jelly fish, parrot fish, lion fish, pipe fish, snapper, grouper, butterfly fish, sea anemone, trumpet fish, and piles upon piles of interesting types of coral-- some that looked like bright green brains, others that consisted of thousands of smaller anemone-like organisms. my back didn't get any more sunburned,m but the backs of my legs now have a nice pink (or bright red, if you will) tint to them.
today we went snorkeling for our first time. i was already sunburned on my back, so i wore shorts and a t-shirt over my bathing suit. it wasn't until after we got back that i realized i could've skipped the bathing suit all together, seeing as how i was fully covered anyways. we ate an early breakfast and headed out around 8\;30. i was admittedly nervous, to the extent that my professor and his wife assumed i'd never gone snorkeling before, so they were a bit confused when i told them i was a good swimmer and relatively experienced snorkeler. the boat ride out to the reef was at least half an hour, which gave me the perfect amount of time to become even more nervous (about, you know, sea monsters and drowning and the lot). But, as soon as i got in the water and immediately spotted our first stingray, followed by sea stars and pipe fish, i forgot my anxiety and had a great time. evidently, water is vastly less frightening when it contains interesting things to look at. a list of things i saw\; sea cucumbers, two octopi, many types of sea stars, jelly fish, parrot fish, lion fish, pipe fish, snapper, grouper, butterfly fish, sea anemone, trumpet fish, and piles upon piles of interesting types of coral-- some that looked like bright green brains, others that consisted of thousands of smaller anemone-like organisms. my back didn't get any more sunburned,m but the backs of my legs now have a nice pink (or bright red, if you will) tint to them.
10/4 & 10/5
we arrived on pembe abwe yesterday around noon after a four hour boat ride from zanzibar. the boats were small and traditional looking, but with motors attached. i could feel the sun cooking my skin slowly and had to consequently switch seats with somebody who had been sitting under the tarp ceiling. the boat stopped halfway, and four students jumped into the ocean to go to the bathroom. we had to jump from the boats and walk to shore when we arrived, through hot murky sea water filled with seaweed. we then were reconnected with our large luggage (that we had been without for two weeks) and had a quick orientation with mike peterson, who owns the section of the beach we will be living on this week, along with the safari company we will be using for the two weeks after. then we were allowed to divide into groups for our huts. i didn't want to stay in the far-away hut i ended up in, so i'mn staying with four other people in one hut nearby (lisa, heather, kim, jazz), which should be great. the sun here is strong, and i am currently suffering from painful burns on my back and the backs of my legs. tomorrow i will wear my long pants (thank you, aunt julie!) and t-shirt in the water when we go snorkeling. we snorkel every day for two to three hours, depending on the tides.
the housing situation is pretty nice-- running water and everything, right on the beach, etc.-- except for one thing: bugs. there are inch long ants that have huge pincers and make a solid crunch when you step on them. there are also large spiders, small scorpions, lizards, and the occassional millipede or bumblebee. there are also bush babies and monkies outside, which sounds lovely, but theyu're loud as heck at night, and i suspect one of them of pulling some of my clothes from our outside laundry line. we sleep on mats on the floor, except i don't have a mat, so i sleep on my sleeping pad with a mosquito net tucked around me. it always manages to be either too hot or too cold, and right now i can only sleep on my stomach, since everything else is burned. that last paragraph was pretty negative, but it's really not that bad, plus the coast is so beautiful and it's nice being in such a secluded area. i have been reading 'orlando' by virginia woolf at night. my head lamp is my new most treasured possession.
the housing situation is pretty nice-- running water and everything, right on the beach, etc.-- except for one thing: bugs. there are inch long ants that have huge pincers and make a solid crunch when you step on them. there are also large spiders, small scorpions, lizards, and the occassional millipede or bumblebee. there are also bush babies and monkies outside, which sounds lovely, but theyu're loud as heck at night, and i suspect one of them of pulling some of my clothes from our outside laundry line. we sleep on mats on the floor, except i don't have a mat, so i sleep on my sleeping pad with a mosquito net tucked around me. it always manages to be either too hot or too cold, and right now i can only sleep on my stomach, since everything else is burned. that last paragraph was pretty negative, but it's really not that bad, plus the coast is so beautiful and it's nice being in such a secluded area. i have been reading 'orlando' by virginia woolf at night. my head lamp is my new most treasured possession.
in arusha
i'm in arusha for two days, don't have my notebook with me now, but will post journal entries later. the past week, i've been on the tanzanian coast doing marine biology data collection by snorkeling on maziwe (protected reef) and funguzinga (unprotected reef). it was like being in the caribbean. starting to realize that east africa has extremely diverse geographic features. these two days are free days, so the plan is that we go out to a movie tonight, then tomorrow morning some of us are attending the rwandan genocide tribunal. there is also supposed to be a tanzanian circus in town, which is supposed to be really good, so we're aiming to do that, too. currently rooming with five other people in a 3 bed room. it's a bit cramped, but cheap as heck. but, like i said, i will post more later.
9/30/09
wednesday
oh, relief, how you freely flood my brain this hot afternoon.
today has been awesome so far. i have just completed my oral swahili exam and believe i did relatively well. earlier today we walked in our bui buis to one of zanzibar's private schools for a bit of a tour. it was interesting to see how the number of girls gradually decreased with the grade level, so that there were more girls in the first year class than boys, but a ratio of 2:1 men to women in the pre-college class. they say it is related to poverty, which i do not doubt, but i won't accept it as the sole reason. i gave one of the pre-college women my e-mail address, so we can hopefully keep in touch to discuss the academic life of us women-folk in two starkly different worlds. after the school, we were given a new assignment by our professor david-- we were to cross over, while wearing our bui buis, from the tourist-y section of zanzibar to the local section, which is divided by train tracks. we were to stay in small three or four person groups and explore the streets and shops and try to see how we'd be received. the biggest benefit of this trip ended up being how much cheaper everything was in the area, since there were no tourists around. my friend bought a casio watch for two thousand tanzanian shillings ($1.50, about), though it was probably a fake. i bought this beautiful piece of cloth that can be used as decoration or a dress or skirt for two thousand shillings, as well. also bought black, blue, and white glass beads as a gift to give to the maasai when i stay with them. this is because the maasai are renowned for their beaded jewelry, and it's a sure fire way to receive a bracelet or necklace in return. also bought a cheap lunch of chapati and soda for about fifty cents, then had a mango later. people certainly treated us differently on the other side of the tracks, but there was a huge variety of behaviors. some still yelled mzungu at us, others told us we were beautiful, some asked if we were muslim, and most just tried to test us to see if we spoke swahili, either calling out 'saalam a leku' or 'hamjambo' (to which we would reply, respectively 'a leku saalam' and 'hatujambo'). sometimes it went on for a while, since there are so many greetings. example conversation: jambo: jambo / mambo?: poa / hamjambo?: hatujambo / habari za leo?: salaama (or) nzuri sana / unatoka wapi: ninatoka nchi ya amerika, jimbo la oregon / unafanya nini hapa?: mimi ni mwanafunzi na ninajifunza kiswahili na historia ya afrika / karibu: asante, kwaherini
in all of that, i am basically saying that i am doing well, come from america, and am studying swahili and history. now imagine having to have this conversation fifty times daily with all the strangers and shopkeepers curious as to why you are wearing the local garb. also, as it turns out, henna is something done on the arms of women after they have just been wed, so my parting gift from my homestay family in tumbe actually tells all the men on the streets i have a new husband. you'd think this would be useful in warding off unwanted potential suitors, but because i am white, it actually makes them very curious, because they doubt that i know what it means. it is also a very local thing, not something many tourists usually have, so that illicits a lot of questions as well.
anyways, after walking through that market, we eventually came back to the touristy part, where our hotel is. i was with two other students and we started talking about maybe working our collective bargaining powers to get some reduced prices on trinkets and jewelry. it just so happens that i, unexpectedly, am really good at bargaining, and find it rather fun. one of the other people i was with, heather, is the one other person in our travel group who i would say is better than me at bargaining. so we were a pretty intense team. there are these really cool beaded bracelets that the shopkeepers try to sell for five dollars a piece. you can usually get them down to three dollars a piece, but not more unless you are buying multiple things. so what the three of us decided to do was collectively buy 15 bracelets and then split them three ways, five each. so we went into the shop and our first move was for me to tell the shop keeper that i had bought one of the bracelets for only 2000 shillings the other day from a different person, which he believed. so then we told him, if i had bought one bracelet for 2000 shillings, we should be able to get a discount and buy 15 bracelets for only 1500 shillings a piece, which he didn't like the sound of. he asked us to buy the 15 for a total of 30,000 shillings, while we wanted 22,000. so then he said 28,000 and we said 25,000, after which we refused to go any higher. we then pulled the "don't have enough money" move and pulled out exactly 25,000 shillings. when he still asked us for 28,000, we said it was okay, we could just go somewhere else, which is the winning move, because no shopkeeper lets 25,000 shillings walk away, so they gave us the bracelets at 25 and then let us get three of the larger bracelets instead of small like the rest. the whole shabang took about 15 minutes, and as we have learned, no shopkeeper will sell at a loss, so it was a win-win for all. translated into dollars, we paid about $1.25 per bracelet. i am excited to give them away as gifts, they're so beautiful-- an inch thick with colorful beads.
tonight i will work on my last essay, the subject of which is: east africa, change and continuity.
on friday we leave for the coast to start our snorkeling sessions.
hope you're all well.
today has been awesome so far. i have just completed my oral swahili exam and believe i did relatively well. earlier today we walked in our bui buis to one of zanzibar's private schools for a bit of a tour. it was interesting to see how the number of girls gradually decreased with the grade level, so that there were more girls in the first year class than boys, but a ratio of 2:1 men to women in the pre-college class. they say it is related to poverty, which i do not doubt, but i won't accept it as the sole reason. i gave one of the pre-college women my e-mail address, so we can hopefully keep in touch to discuss the academic life of us women-folk in two starkly different worlds. after the school, we were given a new assignment by our professor david-- we were to cross over, while wearing our bui buis, from the tourist-y section of zanzibar to the local section, which is divided by train tracks. we were to stay in small three or four person groups and explore the streets and shops and try to see how we'd be received. the biggest benefit of this trip ended up being how much cheaper everything was in the area, since there were no tourists around. my friend bought a casio watch for two thousand tanzanian shillings ($1.50, about), though it was probably a fake. i bought this beautiful piece of cloth that can be used as decoration or a dress or skirt for two thousand shillings, as well. also bought black, blue, and white glass beads as a gift to give to the maasai when i stay with them. this is because the maasai are renowned for their beaded jewelry, and it's a sure fire way to receive a bracelet or necklace in return. also bought a cheap lunch of chapati and soda for about fifty cents, then had a mango later. people certainly treated us differently on the other side of the tracks, but there was a huge variety of behaviors. some still yelled mzungu at us, others told us we were beautiful, some asked if we were muslim, and most just tried to test us to see if we spoke swahili, either calling out 'saalam a leku' or 'hamjambo' (to which we would reply, respectively 'a leku saalam' and 'hatujambo'). sometimes it went on for a while, since there are so many greetings. example conversation: jambo: jambo / mambo?: poa / hamjambo?: hatujambo / habari za leo?: salaama (or) nzuri sana / unatoka wapi: ninatoka nchi ya amerika, jimbo la oregon / unafanya nini hapa?: mimi ni mwanafunzi na ninajifunza kiswahili na historia ya afrika / karibu: asante, kwaherini
in all of that, i am basically saying that i am doing well, come from america, and am studying swahili and history. now imagine having to have this conversation fifty times daily with all the strangers and shopkeepers curious as to why you are wearing the local garb. also, as it turns out, henna is something done on the arms of women after they have just been wed, so my parting gift from my homestay family in tumbe actually tells all the men on the streets i have a new husband. you'd think this would be useful in warding off unwanted potential suitors, but because i am white, it actually makes them very curious, because they doubt that i know what it means. it is also a very local thing, not something many tourists usually have, so that illicits a lot of questions as well.
anyways, after walking through that market, we eventually came back to the touristy part, where our hotel is. i was with two other students and we started talking about maybe working our collective bargaining powers to get some reduced prices on trinkets and jewelry. it just so happens that i, unexpectedly, am really good at bargaining, and find it rather fun. one of the other people i was with, heather, is the one other person in our travel group who i would say is better than me at bargaining. so we were a pretty intense team. there are these really cool beaded bracelets that the shopkeepers try to sell for five dollars a piece. you can usually get them down to three dollars a piece, but not more unless you are buying multiple things. so what the three of us decided to do was collectively buy 15 bracelets and then split them three ways, five each. so we went into the shop and our first move was for me to tell the shop keeper that i had bought one of the bracelets for only 2000 shillings the other day from a different person, which he believed. so then we told him, if i had bought one bracelet for 2000 shillings, we should be able to get a discount and buy 15 bracelets for only 1500 shillings a piece, which he didn't like the sound of. he asked us to buy the 15 for a total of 30,000 shillings, while we wanted 22,000. so then he said 28,000 and we said 25,000, after which we refused to go any higher. we then pulled the "don't have enough money" move and pulled out exactly 25,000 shillings. when he still asked us for 28,000, we said it was okay, we could just go somewhere else, which is the winning move, because no shopkeeper lets 25,000 shillings walk away, so they gave us the bracelets at 25 and then let us get three of the larger bracelets instead of small like the rest. the whole shabang took about 15 minutes, and as we have learned, no shopkeeper will sell at a loss, so it was a win-win for all. translated into dollars, we paid about $1.25 per bracelet. i am excited to give them away as gifts, they're so beautiful-- an inch thick with colorful beads.
tonight i will work on my last essay, the subject of which is: east africa, change and continuity.
on friday we leave for the coast to start our snorkeling sessions.
hope you're all well.
9/27/09
9/27
there are so many things i need to share and not nearly enough time. we were in mombasa for about four days, then flew in a tiny plane (TINY-- like, duck your head and suck in your stomach to get to your seat) to pemba, where we stayed in a guest house for one night. that night, hundreds of flying foxes flew over us while the sun was setting, with the beach in the background. it was beautiful, absolutely breathtaking, and i look forward to sharing those photos. pemba is very tropical, not what we imagined east africa to be like. it is more like the caribbean, except muslim and without the western influence. the next morning we drove via shaky truck/cab to tumbe, a small isolated village on pemba. this was a two night/three day homestay, and very difficult for us. the program is still in its pilot stage here, so the experiences we had are shaping how the program will be done next year. our two biggest problems were communication (three weeks of swahili lessons dont prepare you fully for living in a remote village with people who don't speak english) and authoritative younger men. 20-year old boys living in tumbe ruined the homestay for many of the women on this trip, because of their rude behavior, to put it bluntly. constant marriage proposals, innapropriate comments and questions, treating us more like a prize to show off to friends, and making fun of us in loud and fast swahili are some of the things we dealt with. the village was a disastrous example of patriarchy combined with misinformation on caucasian women. aside from this, i learned many great things. people on the island are largely self sufficient when it comes to water, food, building homes and structures, etc. i learned to use my swahili better and how to collect the insides of coconuts, prepare roots, pull water from wells, and.. well.... ward off unwanted attention. it was certainly a learning experience.
yesterday afternoon we said goodbye to our homestay families and boarded a ship to zanzibar. i bought sundried something (sea creature resembling mussels) on a stick (like fifty little shriveled things on one stick) for 40 cents and shared it with everyone while we were waiting in the port. i've been having some interesting snack experiences. the sundried shrived sea creatures were one, fake strawberry chocolate that tasted like bubble gum was another, "choco cream toffees" in fancy wrappers that were actually... bizzarre and not chocolate at all... was another. i have learned to share a lot... ha..
anyways, we rode the ship for two hours. our trip leader, david, asked one of us to speak to a man on the ship who did not believe that we knew swahili. so i spent some time conversing with him in swahili. it turned out he was a mathematics and physics professor at the university in dar es salaam, tanzania, so that was cool. we got to the hotel in the late afternoon. the rooms are spacious, so nice. we have running water and toilets and showers, did laundry last night, which was awesome. ate some great dinner and breakfast, and now i am here. today is a free day and i have a lot of journaling and essay-writing to do. i hope you are all having a great time in the states.
much love,
natalie
yesterday afternoon we said goodbye to our homestay families and boarded a ship to zanzibar. i bought sundried something (sea creature resembling mussels) on a stick (like fifty little shriveled things on one stick) for 40 cents and shared it with everyone while we were waiting in the port. i've been having some interesting snack experiences. the sundried shrived sea creatures were one, fake strawberry chocolate that tasted like bubble gum was another, "choco cream toffees" in fancy wrappers that were actually... bizzarre and not chocolate at all... was another. i have learned to share a lot... ha..
anyways, we rode the ship for two hours. our trip leader, david, asked one of us to speak to a man on the ship who did not believe that we knew swahili. so i spent some time conversing with him in swahili. it turned out he was a mathematics and physics professor at the university in dar es salaam, tanzania, so that was cool. we got to the hotel in the late afternoon. the rooms are spacious, so nice. we have running water and toilets and showers, did laundry last night, which was awesome. ate some great dinner and breakfast, and now i am here. today is a free day and i have a lot of journaling and essay-writing to do. i hope you are all having a great time in the states.
much love,
natalie
9/22/09
9/22
i have been a bad journaler this week, so i have no journal entries to transcribe. but a short update is that we are in mombasa, which, despite being in kenya, is very different from nairobi. we have been here for almost two days now. mombasa is mostly muslim, as it is the city of the swahili tribe, which follows islam only. therefore, the interactions we have had have been really interesting. at first, we walked around in conservative western clothing-- long skirts, blouses, sandals-- and were treated as tourists. but yesterday morning, we went out and bought traditional muslim clothin-- most of us women bought bui buis with hijabs, though a few bought kangas. the attitude change-- the way people looked at and spoke to us-- was dramatic. people seemed amazed and very grateful that we were wearing these clothes (the boys dressed in traditional wear, as well-- a long sort of dress with a hat). 'respect' is the best word, i think, for how we were treated after changing our clothes. i wish you could see photos. many people now assume we are muslim, and ask. before, some of the guys on the street looked at us like raw meat, others asked for money. now they just seem really happy, perhaps a little curious, and tell us we are beautiful. it is very hard to be analytical when the relief of not being treated like a mix between tourist and prostitute is so great. i am writing an essay on this whole situation for class, and will probably transcribe it onto here later, so i'll hold off on any attempt at deep analysis right now.
another thing-- it is hot. so hot. it's hot, and we're walking around constantly, draped completely in black, including necks and heads, and wearing shoes, and clothes underneath all of it. wow. it's hot. but we have lots of water, good food, and are staying at a hotel until tomorrow morning (and our rooms are air conditioned!). i wish you could see the bathroom in my hotel room. i've draped clothes lines through the small washroom, so that you can only open the door a quarter way through, and then slink between the door and the toilet to get in, while ducking under the lines of undergarments and damp shirts.
homestays start tomorrow evening. we fly out of mombasa by tiny plane tomorrow morning.
we are being led around mombasa by ahmed sheikh, a renound scholar of islam and poet. i'm in a rush, but experiences have included: mosque, prayer demonstration, fancy dinner with lime juice, lecture at swahili institute, tour of fort jesus (yep), and a bunch of other stuff.
gotta go! hope you're all well.
another thing-- it is hot. so hot. it's hot, and we're walking around constantly, draped completely in black, including necks and heads, and wearing shoes, and clothes underneath all of it. wow. it's hot. but we have lots of water, good food, and are staying at a hotel until tomorrow morning (and our rooms are air conditioned!). i wish you could see the bathroom in my hotel room. i've draped clothes lines through the small washroom, so that you can only open the door a quarter way through, and then slink between the door and the toilet to get in, while ducking under the lines of undergarments and damp shirts.
homestays start tomorrow evening. we fly out of mombasa by tiny plane tomorrow morning.
we are being led around mombasa by ahmed sheikh, a renound scholar of islam and poet. i'm in a rush, but experiences have included: mosque, prayer demonstration, fancy dinner with lime juice, lecture at swahili institute, tour of fort jesus (yep), and a bunch of other stuff.
gotta go! hope you're all well.
9/18/09
friday
did i mention that i open my bedroom door with a knife, since there's no handle? it makes me feel badass, which is why i'm mentioning this.
today was our second swahili exam, and this afternoon lidya is teaching me to make mandazi, which is basically fried sweet dough. i might go into town tonight and go to a club with my host father and some friends, but right now i'd rather just hang out and read one of the books i brought. tomorrow we are having a big group lunch with all our host families, and then we are staying the night in a guest house. sunday morning we leave for the 9 hour bus ride to mombasa. i'm excited. staying in a small village off of nairobi for two weeks has been wearing me down a bit. think suburbs, but... really, really different.
i finally got to take pictures! but i have no idea how to get them onto the computers here, so we'll just wait a month or two until those get shared.
like i said before, i won't have internet for a long time (i think).
i hope you're all having a lovely autumn.
today was our second swahili exam, and this afternoon lidya is teaching me to make mandazi, which is basically fried sweet dough. i might go into town tonight and go to a club with my host father and some friends, but right now i'd rather just hang out and read one of the books i brought. tomorrow we are having a big group lunch with all our host families, and then we are staying the night in a guest house. sunday morning we leave for the 9 hour bus ride to mombasa. i'm excited. staying in a small village off of nairobi for two weeks has been wearing me down a bit. think suburbs, but... really, really different.
i finally got to take pictures! but i have no idea how to get them onto the computers here, so we'll just wait a month or two until those get shared.
like i said before, i won't have internet for a long time (i think).
i hope you're all having a lovely autumn.
9/14/09
my first blog post that isn't directly transcribed from my journal...
i got an A on my first writing assignment for my african history class! maybe that will make up for the B+ i got on my swahili exam... but i will continue to try to improve. ninajaribu sana!
i am getting to know lydia, my family's house help, better and better. she told me about how her mother is from uganda, how she's actually 25 ( i thought she was 16...) and has two children who live with her mother on the border between kenya and uganda. she earns about $1.75 per day, most of which goes to buying her children clothes and food. she works so hard, i've never seen this kind of work ethic. on saturday she taught me how to make chapatis outside on a pan over charcoals. she also showed me how to make ugali. i prefer chapati... ugali is like mashed potatoes, but with the grain being rice-like, not like potatoes. chapatis are delicious fried flat breads, like tortillas but ten times better. on sunday afternoon i cooked macaroni and cheese for my host family. i know lydia really liked it, and my host parents seemed to like it pretty well. it was hard! there is no wondra flour here, so i had to make a roux for the first time, and the cheese is interesting. and i had to make stewed tomatoes from scratch. but it worked alright. and it was definitely a comfort. after that, lydia took me to the market nearby-- there were SO MANY things there-- dried fish, jewelry, beads, clothing, shoes, and so many random things. she helped me bargain. i bought her a shirt as a thank-you. then we visited her brother for a couple hours. she keeps all her clothes there, except for a few, in case my host mother fires her (happened once, so now she's prepared).
tomorrow we visit the university of nairobi and a museum. on sunday we leave for mombasa. it will be a nine hour drive. after this week, i will not have much internet access.
hope you are all well.
i am getting to know lydia, my family's house help, better and better. she told me about how her mother is from uganda, how she's actually 25 ( i thought she was 16...) and has two children who live with her mother on the border between kenya and uganda. she earns about $1.75 per day, most of which goes to buying her children clothes and food. she works so hard, i've never seen this kind of work ethic. on saturday she taught me how to make chapatis outside on a pan over charcoals. she also showed me how to make ugali. i prefer chapati... ugali is like mashed potatoes, but with the grain being rice-like, not like potatoes. chapatis are delicious fried flat breads, like tortillas but ten times better. on sunday afternoon i cooked macaroni and cheese for my host family. i know lydia really liked it, and my host parents seemed to like it pretty well. it was hard! there is no wondra flour here, so i had to make a roux for the first time, and the cheese is interesting. and i had to make stewed tomatoes from scratch. but it worked alright. and it was definitely a comfort. after that, lydia took me to the market nearby-- there were SO MANY things there-- dried fish, jewelry, beads, clothing, shoes, and so many random things. she helped me bargain. i bought her a shirt as a thank-you. then we visited her brother for a couple hours. she keeps all her clothes there, except for a few, in case my host mother fires her (happened once, so now she's prepared).
tomorrow we visit the university of nairobi and a museum. on sunday we leave for mombasa. it will be a nine hour drive. after this week, i will not have much internet access.
hope you are all well.
9/12/09
9.12
things:
little children follow us in the street and yell "mzunguuuu!" and "howayoo?". i think every child in a two mile radius knows how i'm doing now.
this small village is very much like new york city, in that if you look straight ahead like you're kind of pissed and don't want to be bothered, nobody bothers you. if you look around and look friendly or naive or lost, some people will yell at you or make fun of you. most of the people here are wonderful, but there are a few who really ruin it sometimes. drunks (rare) are the worst. they loudly harrass you up and down the street, try to grab you, etc. this has happened to me twice, and the first time someone tried to calm him down to leave me alone, the other time, it was just really quick, and then we lost him.
i broke down and bought a pair of jeans. it's so nice... if i cannot fit them in my bag, i will give them away later. i will be going with lydia, our house help, to the real market later today hopefully. apparently she's an awesome bargainer. also, she taught me how to make ugali and a traditional meat dish today. she thought it was funny how i wanted to help.
went to a restaurant and bar last night with fellow students. we didn't drink very much, or anything, just looking to spend an evening in the city. i had a hamburger with guacamole and real ketchup, which was so exciting. \'ketchup" is usually tomato sauce. the famous beer here, tusker, tastes like water but it's very popular. the taxi ride back was scary, because the taxi driver didn't know where riruta was and it was very hard to give directions in the dark.
i have had common cold-like symptoms for the past few days, despite taking daily vitamins and eating oranges. however, we are all mostly still in much better health than was expected. only three people have had any intestine-related ill feelings.... i'm being vague on purpose... maybe you get my drift, though.
had a swahili exam yesterday. wasn't bad. it is amazing how much swahili i can speak already. i understand a third of what i hear around the house, and am able to barter, purchase, and generally converse with people in swahili, albeit slowly.
i have been hit on by three kenyans so far. two men, one woman. like i said a few posts ago, nothing surprises me anymore...
i miss you all fiercely when i think about it, but am fortunately pretty busy most of the time, so i dont have to linger on it. there are so many interesting things going on. i really want to photograph the cows being herded through the dirt streets by maasai people. it's quite a sight.
i am cooking macaroni and cheese for my family tomorrow night. hopefully. but who knows what will be going on that evening?
little children follow us in the street and yell "mzunguuuu!" and "howayoo?". i think every child in a two mile radius knows how i'm doing now.
this small village is very much like new york city, in that if you look straight ahead like you're kind of pissed and don't want to be bothered, nobody bothers you. if you look around and look friendly or naive or lost, some people will yell at you or make fun of you. most of the people here are wonderful, but there are a few who really ruin it sometimes. drunks (rare) are the worst. they loudly harrass you up and down the street, try to grab you, etc. this has happened to me twice, and the first time someone tried to calm him down to leave me alone, the other time, it was just really quick, and then we lost him.
i broke down and bought a pair of jeans. it's so nice... if i cannot fit them in my bag, i will give them away later. i will be going with lydia, our house help, to the real market later today hopefully. apparently she's an awesome bargainer. also, she taught me how to make ugali and a traditional meat dish today. she thought it was funny how i wanted to help.
went to a restaurant and bar last night with fellow students. we didn't drink very much, or anything, just looking to spend an evening in the city. i had a hamburger with guacamole and real ketchup, which was so exciting. \'ketchup" is usually tomato sauce. the famous beer here, tusker, tastes like water but it's very popular. the taxi ride back was scary, because the taxi driver didn't know where riruta was and it was very hard to give directions in the dark.
i have had common cold-like symptoms for the past few days, despite taking daily vitamins and eating oranges. however, we are all mostly still in much better health than was expected. only three people have had any intestine-related ill feelings.... i'm being vague on purpose... maybe you get my drift, though.
had a swahili exam yesterday. wasn't bad. it is amazing how much swahili i can speak already. i understand a third of what i hear around the house, and am able to barter, purchase, and generally converse with people in swahili, albeit slowly.
i have been hit on by three kenyans so far. two men, one woman. like i said a few posts ago, nothing surprises me anymore...
i miss you all fiercely when i think about it, but am fortunately pretty busy most of the time, so i dont have to linger on it. there are so many interesting things going on. i really want to photograph the cows being herded through the dirt streets by maasai people. it's quite a sight.
i am cooking macaroni and cheese for my family tomorrow night. hopefully. but who knows what will be going on that evening?
9.8.09
i have discovered a way to make my own mosquito net! last night i took my laundry bag made of light mesh material and put it over my head and shoulders, the n puled my bedsheet up to my shoulders to that they overlapped. voila! no mosquito bites this morning.
the only other thing that i can think to write about right now is my frustration with the way my class has been gong recently. african history class. the professor is with out a doubt the most knowledgeable and experienced person i have ever met when it comes to african history and politics. however, i cannot help but feel uneasy in the way we are going about discussing african people and culture. perhaps this is why i am not an anthropology student, but i absolutely cannot stand talking about people int terms of broad generalizations like this. this unease is perhaps strengthened by the faact that my host family does not fit into most of the cultural stereotypes of traditional social structre here. in class today, we took turns sharing our observations and reflections from our homestays so far. all i could think of was how weird it would be if a kid from another country was staying with my family in the u.s. and then sat around in a circle with their efellow students nad tried to talk about my family in a sort of pseudo intellectual anthropological manner.it's just too weird! furthermore, i have trouble believing that observations from one family can be used to generate broader observations on kenyan culture, especially when it seems that our families are all very different. the last and biggest thing i am struggling with is what i believe is a double standard that i and others have been enabling when talkng about american culture and when talking about african or kenyan culture. this was highlighted by what my host mother's cousin said to me, which is that kenyans never want to move on from british colonization because then they woudl have to take responsibility for their own problems, which they don't want to do. given, this guy is incredibly cyclinical, which is why i got along with him so well, no doubt,. but wheni started to automatically defend kenayans, i realized that i was holding them to a double standard. i was intellectually coddling kenyans when i am always otherwise prepared to challenge citizens for the situations they find themselves in, especially in america. the cousin was telling me that while people are starving to death because of the draught right now, there is a river nearby that in a few months will flowod, as it has every hear, and that a few eople will be killed in the floods and many livestock will die, and everybody knows this, but no one dams the river. he cites this as an example of kenyan laziness, which i am still hesitant to agree with. however, i think i am beginning to be persuaded by his ideology, if only partially. i think perhaps a better way to put it is that many people here are used to manipulative government and have not been exposed to the history and culture of grassroots political action, which is nobodys' fault . however, it's my personal ... naive perhaps... belief that there is always some concept within individuals of what should be, even if these ideas conflict with others' beliefs, and because of this, people are laways in my mind to a certain extent responsible for their political situation if they find themselves in the majority of popular opinion and in a relatively democratic society, which i am pretty sure is the situation most kenyans and themselves in, at least when it comes to matters of government corruption, food security , and water scarcity. when i just join people in allowing all blame for kenya/africa's situation to be put on colonizers, i am not giving kenyans or africans the same respect for their own potential. and for the record, this is not me saying that things in kenya should be different using a western perspective, this is coming from hearing constant remarks from kenyans in the media and in person, saying the government is wrong, and water should be available, etc. i just want people here to be more empowered to strive for the things they collectively desire, because they deserve these things.
i have an adventure every night. three nights ago i was attacked by mosquitos and bitten by a spider. two nights ago i discovered my mesh laundry bag as a makeshift mosquito net. and last night i fell asleep with chewing gum in my mouth. i woke up this morning with bright blue bits of gum on my face, neck, shoulder, elbow, pillow, and sheets. hooray!
the only other thing that i can think to write about right now is my frustration with the way my class has been gong recently. african history class. the professor is with out a doubt the most knowledgeable and experienced person i have ever met when it comes to african history and politics. however, i cannot help but feel uneasy in the way we are going about discussing african people and culture. perhaps this is why i am not an anthropology student, but i absolutely cannot stand talking about people int terms of broad generalizations like this. this unease is perhaps strengthened by the faact that my host family does not fit into most of the cultural stereotypes of traditional social structre here. in class today, we took turns sharing our observations and reflections from our homestays so far. all i could think of was how weird it would be if a kid from another country was staying with my family in the u.s. and then sat around in a circle with their efellow students nad tried to talk about my family in a sort of pseudo intellectual anthropological manner.it's just too weird! furthermore, i have trouble believing that observations from one family can be used to generate broader observations on kenyan culture, especially when it seems that our families are all very different. the last and biggest thing i am struggling with is what i believe is a double standard that i and others have been enabling when talkng about american culture and when talking about african or kenyan culture. this was highlighted by what my host mother's cousin said to me, which is that kenyans never want to move on from british colonization because then they woudl have to take responsibility for their own problems, which they don't want to do. given, this guy is incredibly cyclinical, which is why i got along with him so well, no doubt,. but wheni started to automatically defend kenayans, i realized that i was holding them to a double standard. i was intellectually coddling kenyans when i am always otherwise prepared to challenge citizens for the situations they find themselves in, especially in america. the cousin was telling me that while people are starving to death because of the draught right now, there is a river nearby that in a few months will flowod, as it has every hear, and that a few eople will be killed in the floods and many livestock will die, and everybody knows this, but no one dams the river. he cites this as an example of kenyan laziness, which i am still hesitant to agree with. however, i think i am beginning to be persuaded by his ideology, if only partially. i think perhaps a better way to put it is that many people here are used to manipulative government and have not been exposed to the history and culture of grassroots political action, which is nobodys' fault . however, it's my personal ... naive perhaps... belief that there is always some concept within individuals of what should be, even if these ideas conflict with others' beliefs, and because of this, people are laways in my mind to a certain extent responsible for their political situation if they find themselves in the majority of popular opinion and in a relatively democratic society, which i am pretty sure is the situation most kenyans and themselves in, at least when it comes to matters of government corruption, food security , and water scarcity. when i just join people in allowing all blame for kenya/africa's situation to be put on colonizers, i am not giving kenyans or africans the same respect for their own potential. and for the record, this is not me saying that things in kenya should be different using a western perspective, this is coming from hearing constant remarks from kenyans in the media and in person, saying the government is wrong, and water should be available, etc. i just want people here to be more empowered to strive for the things they collectively desire, because they deserve these things.
i have an adventure every night. three nights ago i was attacked by mosquitos and bitten by a spider. two nights ago i discovered my mesh laundry bag as a makeshift mosquito net. and last night i fell asleep with chewing gum in my mouth. i woke up this morning with bright blue bits of gum on my face, neck, shoulder, elbow, pillow, and sheets. hooray!
the past week...
on sunday i woke up at 6:30 am to get ready for church. janet my host mother, wrapped nelson to her back and we headed out into the street. we walked for a while , cut across a field, and waited with a group on the side of a two lan e highway. soon a matatu pulled up, horns blaring. a matatu is a van used in the way busses ar e used. it is usually a 9person van with 15 to 20 people crammed inside *depending on how many children there are(. i was sent to the back of the van with nelson who did not seem phasedd by this transportation means. janet sat in the front because it was too narrow a fit in the back. we rode for about ten minutes, then got out and walked for another while, until we arrived at an anglican church, which janet tells me is the church she grew up in. i recognized some of the songs we sang * everything was in english, save a few verses(. there were hundreds upon hundredds of people in attendance, and at one point all first time visitors to the church were asked to stand. now, that was awkward. i stood up along with two other people and immediately felt hundreds of sets of eyes on me. i gather it is rare for a young mzungu to attend this church service. after the service, i met many of janet's relatives, all women, now that i think about it. i met her sister, mother, aunt, grandmother, cousin, and a few friends. we walked around to the back of the church and got a cup of chai each. after a few minutes, i took a step back and realized how different my surroundings were from what i would have expected in the u.s. for perhaps five minutes, as strange as it may seem, i had been completely unphased by standing in a dusty field, being the sole 'white' person in a group of kenyan africans, sipping chai from a plastic cup, in the middle of an african country on a sunny sunday afternoon. i realized that i have lost all sense of expectation. i walk in whatever direction the person next to me walks, eat what is put in front of me, climb to the back of an overcrowded kenyan van with a three year old child and sit there until i am told to get out. i never know who i am going to meet or what my next meal will be, or what i will be doing two hours from now, and i never know where i am. i do not even know how much anything is supposed to cost, it's always different. six machungwas cost me 199 shillings in the supermarket last week. today i bought four small machunguas on the street for 20 shillings. this is a very significan difference *2.5 dollars vs 25 cents(. everything is unpredictable and i have consequently found that i am completely free of any anxiety i used to experience ni the u.s. it's truly amazing.
anyways, when we were finished with out chai at the church, i walked with janet and nelson along a path by the highway for fifteen or twenty minutes, and finally arrived at a gate, which was unlocked and opened for us from the inside by a young teenage boy, perhaps 13. we were led through a dust path and wen t through another gate.the house was dark and the television was automatically turned on, playing brooklyn rules *an interesting choice, no doubt*. i stayed at the house for about eight hours, doing many things. i browned a bowl of rice, entertained nelson by playing soccer and games with him, explored the small family farm *on cow, chickens, rabbits, vegetables*, drank chai, ate a late lunch at four pm, and got into a three o r four hour political/cultural discussion with my host's cousin. he is very smart and outspoken about his political views, and his english is at the same level as mine. we discussed kenyan politics and corruption, american politics, african culture, black american politics, classism, racism, the concept of beauty , gender politics, soccer, movies, and how i thought he should become the kenyan president and change the way politics are done here. he says the two most beautiful sounds in the world are that of a v10 engine and a lion roaring. by far the most interesting person i have met n a long time. by the time we left the house, it was dark outside and relatively late at night, which is the first time i have done such a thing. being in a group of kenyans, including two males, i was perfectly safe, but was warned never to do such a thing alone. we crowded into another matatu and then took a taxi from there, for at this point it was just me and janet, which was not safe. that night i fell asleep in front of the customary blaring tv. i was also given a cell phone by my host father,, they insisted, to my surprise that i must have a cell phone for keeping in touch even though i go to school within walking distance of the house. last night i was bitten by quite many mosquitoes, and their whines woke me constantly. fortunately i am on malaria meds, but i will nevertheless be on the lookout for a mosquito net.
favorite quote so far, before i forget it:
"Look at what the government has done to us, that we use our bathtubs as feeding troughs" spoken by janet, on tour of her family's small farm, as we indeed watched the cow drink from her now useless bathtub.
as for the water situation, it is undoubtedly dire, due to a number of factors. the cousin i spoke of previously claims that the water issue is due to a combination of political corruption and kenyan civilian laziness. the only thing i can speak on from a first hand basis is that people use water with incredibly caution right now. i bathe with a large bucket of water and piece of soap. the water from bathing drains out into the yard. the water i don't use is poured into a larger bucket next to the toilet. when iwish to flush the toilet , rarely done, i open up the top of the toilet and pour a gallon of water from the bucket into the top, after which i can flush the toilet. we wash our hands n a bowl before eating, and then that water in the bowl is used to water the plants outside. i find these practices, though enacted within the limitation s of necessity, rather admirable, and look forward to practicing much of this when i get back to the u.s. i bath every day here, and have probably used in total a quarter of the amount of water i use in one long shower. there is also house help in the home, which i am totally down with ... her name is lidya and she is very nervous around me *note, this was written about a week ago , and we actually get along very well now*. janet said she had never been around a white person before, let alone sleeping in the same room as one * i bunk above her in a 6 x 10 room(.\
today was my first day of school in riruta, which is the village i stay in right now. since elly's host father and my host father are brothers, we live next to each other, so we walked a short way this morning, also stopping along the way to pick up lidya *student, not house help*. we got very lost, but eventually arrived at the school *which is actually a house* twenty minutes late. i had lessons in the living room, and for lunch i ate what my host mother packed me *rice, peppers, beef, spices, peas, and chapati*. after eating, i went out with two people and we walked around the street markets, which i s where i bought the oranges for 20 shillings.
as you may have noticed, i have not e posted any photos. this is because i've hardly taken any. it is not a good idea to walk around with a camera here, so i am waitng until i'm more familiar with the place and people to take it out. i will take photos in the next week, but do not know if i will get to post them.
if you have any questions, please ask. there are many things i amy be forgetting to mention.
anyways, when we were finished with out chai at the church, i walked with janet and nelson along a path by the highway for fifteen or twenty minutes, and finally arrived at a gate, which was unlocked and opened for us from the inside by a young teenage boy, perhaps 13. we were led through a dust path and wen t through another gate.the house was dark and the television was automatically turned on, playing brooklyn rules *an interesting choice, no doubt*. i stayed at the house for about eight hours, doing many things. i browned a bowl of rice, entertained nelson by playing soccer and games with him, explored the small family farm *on cow, chickens, rabbits, vegetables*, drank chai, ate a late lunch at four pm, and got into a three o r four hour political/cultural discussion with my host's cousin. he is very smart and outspoken about his political views, and his english is at the same level as mine. we discussed kenyan politics and corruption, american politics, african culture, black american politics, classism, racism, the concept of beauty , gender politics, soccer, movies, and how i thought he should become the kenyan president and change the way politics are done here. he says the two most beautiful sounds in the world are that of a v10 engine and a lion roaring. by far the most interesting person i have met n a long time. by the time we left the house, it was dark outside and relatively late at night, which is the first time i have done such a thing. being in a group of kenyans, including two males, i was perfectly safe, but was warned never to do such a thing alone. we crowded into another matatu and then took a taxi from there, for at this point it was just me and janet, which was not safe. that night i fell asleep in front of the customary blaring tv. i was also given a cell phone by my host father,, they insisted, to my surprise that i must have a cell phone for keeping in touch even though i go to school within walking distance of the house. last night i was bitten by quite many mosquitoes, and their whines woke me constantly. fortunately i am on malaria meds, but i will nevertheless be on the lookout for a mosquito net.
favorite quote so far, before i forget it:
"Look at what the government has done to us, that we use our bathtubs as feeding troughs" spoken by janet, on tour of her family's small farm, as we indeed watched the cow drink from her now useless bathtub.
as for the water situation, it is undoubtedly dire, due to a number of factors. the cousin i spoke of previously claims that the water issue is due to a combination of political corruption and kenyan civilian laziness. the only thing i can speak on from a first hand basis is that people use water with incredibly caution right now. i bathe with a large bucket of water and piece of soap. the water from bathing drains out into the yard. the water i don't use is poured into a larger bucket next to the toilet. when iwish to flush the toilet , rarely done, i open up the top of the toilet and pour a gallon of water from the bucket into the top, after which i can flush the toilet. we wash our hands n a bowl before eating, and then that water in the bowl is used to water the plants outside. i find these practices, though enacted within the limitation s of necessity, rather admirable, and look forward to practicing much of this when i get back to the u.s. i bath every day here, and have probably used in total a quarter of the amount of water i use in one long shower. there is also house help in the home, which i am totally down with ... her name is lidya and she is very nervous around me *note, this was written about a week ago , and we actually get along very well now*. janet said she had never been around a white person before, let alone sleeping in the same room as one * i bunk above her in a 6 x 10 room(.\
today was my first day of school in riruta, which is the village i stay in right now. since elly's host father and my host father are brothers, we live next to each other, so we walked a short way this morning, also stopping along the way to pick up lidya *student, not house help*. we got very lost, but eventually arrived at the school *which is actually a house* twenty minutes late. i had lessons in the living room, and for lunch i ate what my host mother packed me *rice, peppers, beef, spices, peas, and chapati*. after eating, i went out with two people and we walked around the street markets, which i s where i bought the oranges for 20 shillings.
as you may have noticed, i have not e posted any photos. this is because i've hardly taken any. it is not a good idea to walk around with a camera here, so i am waitng until i'm more familiar with the place and people to take it out. i will take photos in the next week, but do not know if i will get to post them.
if you have any questions, please ask. there are many things i amy be forgetting to mention.
9/7/09
9/5 -9/6
note; typing on this keyboard is very difficult and i have little time...
today has been a very long day. i woke up at the standard six thirty a.m. for breakfast, then headed back to my room to pack. my roommate devin was very kind and lent me a very small duffel bag for my homestay, as it would be inconvenient for my family if i brought my full size duffel bag. we waited for about an hour after being briefed, and one by one, our families came to pick us up. it was very nerve wracking. eventaully my homestay mother came and brought me a gift- a kanga (beautiful) and we left in a taxi. driving to her house, i realized how upscale of an areai had been living in for the past few days. my family consists of a businessman, secretary, three yer old son, and house help, bt the area we went through and came into was bvery different-- much dust, pot holes in the narrow roads, goats walking the streets, small tin structers with signs for barbers and burchers, some very thin children playing n the sides. eveything was much more compact and tall wlals lined the road. this area was more like what i imagined from the movies .the house i am staying in is not, though. i think it is probably pretty nice, perhaps considered middle class. there is a living room, kitchen, toilet, and two bedrooms. the rooms are small, but the way i se it is taht they have just done away with the unnecessary emty spaces of large rooms. perhaps living in a dorm room taught me this. the television is always on, and is seen as the sole source of entertainment in the household (my homestay father even explained taht during the days when electricity is rationed away everyone leaves the house because there is no entertinment inside since the tv wont work). i watched more tv today than in the past three weeks combvined (not saying much, but still impressvie). when i first got to their house, i chatted with my homestay mother and father wahlie we watched remember the titans (in english! on regular tv! in kenya!) later, my homestay father and i watchd extreme home makeover, ripleys believe it or not, and heroes. this was very weird for me. all the shows were in english and there were almost no commercials. elly, another student on my trip, is styaing in the apartment next to me, as the husbands of our families are brothers. nelson is the three year old son of my homestay family, and he is very cute and very... energetic. perhaps some of you parents can relate to what i am saying. the child does not sit. we bonded over a toy car and mickey mouse doll. i showed him a small trick of twirling a plastic tube between two fingers, and he thought ths was the funniest thing ever. my homestay father (michael) has been very outspoken in his criticism of the kenyan government, which surprised me, because we were warned carefully not to be too inquisitive or opinionated about kenyan politics, especially corruption. we were also not supposed to mention the 2007 post election violence, because most of our homestay families are kikuyu, the tribe that won the election (via tainted means-- not that the other side didnt try this, too... its complicated) and was the consequent target of most of the violence. however, the 2007 election was one of the first things my homestay father brought up with me, and it was mentioned on tv as well.
hope you are all well.
today has been a very long day. i woke up at the standard six thirty a.m. for breakfast, then headed back to my room to pack. my roommate devin was very kind and lent me a very small duffel bag for my homestay, as it would be inconvenient for my family if i brought my full size duffel bag. we waited for about an hour after being briefed, and one by one, our families came to pick us up. it was very nerve wracking. eventaully my homestay mother came and brought me a gift- a kanga (beautiful) and we left in a taxi. driving to her house, i realized how upscale of an areai had been living in for the past few days. my family consists of a businessman, secretary, three yer old son, and house help, bt the area we went through and came into was bvery different-- much dust, pot holes in the narrow roads, goats walking the streets, small tin structers with signs for barbers and burchers, some very thin children playing n the sides. eveything was much more compact and tall wlals lined the road. this area was more like what i imagined from the movies .the house i am staying in is not, though. i think it is probably pretty nice, perhaps considered middle class. there is a living room, kitchen, toilet, and two bedrooms. the rooms are small, but the way i se it is taht they have just done away with the unnecessary emty spaces of large rooms. perhaps living in a dorm room taught me this. the television is always on, and is seen as the sole source of entertainment in the household (my homestay father even explained taht during the days when electricity is rationed away everyone leaves the house because there is no entertinment inside since the tv wont work). i watched more tv today than in the past three weeks combvined (not saying much, but still impressvie). when i first got to their house, i chatted with my homestay mother and father wahlie we watched remember the titans (in english! on regular tv! in kenya!) later, my homestay father and i watchd extreme home makeover, ripleys believe it or not, and heroes. this was very weird for me. all the shows were in english and there were almost no commercials. elly, another student on my trip, is styaing in the apartment next to me, as the husbands of our families are brothers. nelson is the three year old son of my homestay family, and he is very cute and very... energetic. perhaps some of you parents can relate to what i am saying. the child does not sit. we bonded over a toy car and mickey mouse doll. i showed him a small trick of twirling a plastic tube between two fingers, and he thought ths was the funniest thing ever. my homestay father (michael) has been very outspoken in his criticism of the kenyan government, which surprised me, because we were warned carefully not to be too inquisitive or opinionated about kenyan politics, especially corruption. we were also not supposed to mention the 2007 post election violence, because most of our homestay families are kikuyu, the tribe that won the election (via tainted means-- not that the other side didnt try this, too... its complicated) and was the consequent target of most of the violence. however, the 2007 election was one of the first things my homestay father brought up with me, and it was mentioned on tv as well.
hope you are all well.
9/4/09
9/2/09 9:30 am
we are given 500 shillings (about 7 dollars) for each meal that we do not eat at the hotel. this is more than enough. the first day that we were here (tuesday) i bought six oranges, a notebook, and a large stack of notecards for 288 shillings (200 of which was the oranges!). then i spent 40 shillings in the internet cafe for twenty minutes. then we walked down a backstreet, trying to find our student leader's favorite chapati cart, but all of the street vendors' carts had been destroyed by the government (as we were told by one of two groups who were still there) in an effort to "beautify" the city (to which one asks, for whom?). we were offered food by one of the groups (2 women and two teenage girls working over a fire and under no shelter on the side of the dirt road) and accepted. we sat tightly together on their two facing benches and were given steaming hot bowls of potato/beef/carrot/lentils/corn mashed together. it tasted delicious and burned my tongue, which was a pretty good sign, since if you are going to eat street food, it better be piping hot (for sanitation reasons). we were also given large pieces of flat bread (chipati). each bowl fed two people and cost 50 shillings (75 cents)-- meaning i had a meal for THIRTY FIVE CENTS. the flat bread was passed around and cost a total 20 shillings (es than 30 cents). we were offered tea, but delicned. the two women and the other man who was eating there, as well, were incredibly friendly and talked to us about local ongoings and swahili tps. they were absolutely lovely people. i spent another fifty shillings on internet today. so, with one meal's allowance (7 dollars), i have 6 oranges, one notebook, lots of notecards, 2 days of internet, lunch, and about 100 shillings pocketed for later. not bad (si mbaya).
i have been trying to keep in shape by having my own personal dance party (hosted by my ipod) in my room when my roommate goes downstairs for breakfast (i eat before her). today when i was getting jiggy to "tonight" by the black eyed peas, i saw that i had an audience outside, and decided to call it a day...
schedule (ish)
3:30 a.m. wake up involuntarily. fall in and out of sleep for three hours.
6:30 a.m. get dressed. eat breakfast downstairs.
7:30 a.m. journal and review swahili for class (and dance..)
8:30 a.m. swahili class (it just occurred to me how early this is... funny.. it seemed late)
10:30 a.m. chai and cookies
10:45 a.m. swahili class
12:30 a.m. lunch
2:00 p.m. african history class (was swahili first day)
4:30 p.m. free time
6:00 p.m. dinner
7:00 - 9:00 ish work on homework
9:00 - 10:00 pm fall asleep
it is very cold today, and our chai break was quite welcome. i crushed an orange into my tea, which was delicious and much healthier than the usual milk/sugar combo. we had our first history lesson today, adn i must admit that i prefer swahili (note one day later: today's lecture on presidential history and corruption was much more interesting).
there is a seemingly tangible difference between being a tourist or foreigner here and being one of those in any other place i have ever been. i do not know how much of this has to do with the nature of us being an academic group consciously seeking connections with the kenyan people, but i will say that such connections and personal interactions woudl be bizarre in the u.s. for example, i go to the guest house's front desk to pick up my room key, but first am asked by the attendant how my day is going (hujambo?) and my reply is the standard cordial response (sijambo!), as it is important to stay positive in conversation. if anything is not going well, then you are "good, but..". what we are learning right now in swahili classes are all the different parts of small talk that are important when you at first meet with someone. so, i do not yet know how to ask for a glass of water, but i can tell anybody about the members of my family and friends, where we live and were each person comes from originally, whether they are tall/short/beautiful/clean/dirty/young/old/smart, what kind of jobs they have, what they read/speak/do/like, what all of our names are, how we are doing, and then ask the same questions back. i think the most frustrating thing right now is not knowing how to count. not even the number one! but i understand that this is the most important, because when you greet someone, it is usually through quite a bit of conversation, not just "hello" and "goodbye." as they say... haraka haraka haina baraka... but, i digress. the interactions with the staff here are unline those of any place i've ever been. the guards help us with ur swahili homework and explain various things about the language-- for instance, a few minutes ago i was walking through the courtyard and the guard greeted me with 'habari' to which i slowly responded 'nzuri, nawewe?'. he then explained that 'nawewe' (meaning "and you?") is actually not the most common way to reciprocate the greeting, because although it is proper swahili, most people on the streets are speaking a more broken swahili, as it is not their native language (rather they speak origianlly a different tribal dialect, and are now translating their thoughts into swahili).
somewhat paradoxical is the fact taht although the hospitality here is unmatched, i feel very much like an outsider. it is not just the color of my skin that inspires stares from all sides on the street, but also how i dress, speak, move, and what i carry with me. i wish, for example, that i had brought more than one pair of pants, because i feel odd walking the streets in shorts, as non of the civilians do this. wearing a watch or backpack has similar effect. in fact, i generally walk the streets with a few dolars in my pocket, and nothing more on me.
that is it for now. hopefully i will get the chance to write about politics in kenya, as the lecture today was wonderful. i go to my homestay tomorrow (for two weeks) and am very nervous, though i have been told that we will have a constant fresh water supply and are allowed to go out and buy any food we like (such as fruits and vegetables to keep us "regular" (general health reference)). i am trying to memorize "i am very full", because it will be a very important phrase over the next few weeks.
hope you are all safe and healthy.
i have been trying to keep in shape by having my own personal dance party (hosted by my ipod) in my room when my roommate goes downstairs for breakfast (i eat before her). today when i was getting jiggy to "tonight" by the black eyed peas, i saw that i had an audience outside, and decided to call it a day...
schedule (ish)
3:30 a.m. wake up involuntarily. fall in and out of sleep for three hours.
6:30 a.m. get dressed. eat breakfast downstairs.
7:30 a.m. journal and review swahili for class (and dance..)
8:30 a.m. swahili class (it just occurred to me how early this is... funny.. it seemed late)
10:30 a.m. chai and cookies
10:45 a.m. swahili class
12:30 a.m. lunch
2:00 p.m. african history class (was swahili first day)
4:30 p.m. free time
6:00 p.m. dinner
7:00 - 9:00 ish work on homework
9:00 - 10:00 pm fall asleep
it is very cold today, and our chai break was quite welcome. i crushed an orange into my tea, which was delicious and much healthier than the usual milk/sugar combo. we had our first history lesson today, adn i must admit that i prefer swahili (note one day later: today's lecture on presidential history and corruption was much more interesting).
there is a seemingly tangible difference between being a tourist or foreigner here and being one of those in any other place i have ever been. i do not know how much of this has to do with the nature of us being an academic group consciously seeking connections with the kenyan people, but i will say that such connections and personal interactions woudl be bizarre in the u.s. for example, i go to the guest house's front desk to pick up my room key, but first am asked by the attendant how my day is going (hujambo?) and my reply is the standard cordial response (sijambo!), as it is important to stay positive in conversation. if anything is not going well, then you are "good, but..". what we are learning right now in swahili classes are all the different parts of small talk that are important when you at first meet with someone. so, i do not yet know how to ask for a glass of water, but i can tell anybody about the members of my family and friends, where we live and were each person comes from originally, whether they are tall/short/beautiful/clean/dirty/young/old/smart, what kind of jobs they have, what they read/speak/do/like, what all of our names are, how we are doing, and then ask the same questions back. i think the most frustrating thing right now is not knowing how to count. not even the number one! but i understand that this is the most important, because when you greet someone, it is usually through quite a bit of conversation, not just "hello" and "goodbye." as they say... haraka haraka haina baraka... but, i digress. the interactions with the staff here are unline those of any place i've ever been. the guards help us with ur swahili homework and explain various things about the language-- for instance, a few minutes ago i was walking through the courtyard and the guard greeted me with 'habari' to which i slowly responded 'nzuri, nawewe?'. he then explained that 'nawewe' (meaning "and you?") is actually not the most common way to reciprocate the greeting, because although it is proper swahili, most people on the streets are speaking a more broken swahili, as it is not their native language (rather they speak origianlly a different tribal dialect, and are now translating their thoughts into swahili).
somewhat paradoxical is the fact taht although the hospitality here is unmatched, i feel very much like an outsider. it is not just the color of my skin that inspires stares from all sides on the street, but also how i dress, speak, move, and what i carry with me. i wish, for example, that i had brought more than one pair of pants, because i feel odd walking the streets in shorts, as non of the civilians do this. wearing a watch or backpack has similar effect. in fact, i generally walk the streets with a few dolars in my pocket, and nothing more on me.
that is it for now. hopefully i will get the chance to write about politics in kenya, as the lecture today was wonderful. i go to my homestay tomorrow (for two weeks) and am very nervous, though i have been told that we will have a constant fresh water supply and are allowed to go out and buy any food we like (such as fruits and vegetables to keep us "regular" (general health reference)). i am trying to memorize "i am very full", because it will be a very important phrase over the next few weeks.
hope you are all safe and healthy.
9/2/09
9/2/09 1 pm
breakfast today was fried potatoes, sausage, ham, eggs, pineapple, bananas, millet porridge, beans, toast, juice, chai. no, i did not eat all of those, but prett close. i am trying to eat things that will keep my blood pressure up and vitamin levels happy. so, i had a large serving of beans, a banana, some pineapple, and small amounts of sausage, toast, and potato. i understand why we gain weight now. humongous, delicious meals, class all day )= sitting), and tea/cookie breaks in between. of course, this is a very upscale guest house that we are staying at this week, but i think the lots-of-food/little-exercise thing applies everywhere. lunch today was mikala [i think] (potatos corn spinach), mixed vegetables, fried fish, sauteed chicken, bread rolls, fresh fruit, beef stew, and rice. water. apparently americans drink infinitely more water than africans (to which i respond that we probably consume more of everything, save the potato mix i mentioned earlier). but, it is true. i have been drinking water constantly, mostly as an attempt to keep my temperature, heart rate, and blood pressure stable. everything is very new and exciting, and my health is consequently out of whack, to put it scientifically. i fell asleep at eight pm last night and woke up at three thirty a.m., ready for the day. i am also pretty shaky and find that y heart starts to beat very quickly for no apparent reason once in a while. but i figure that being in such a truly foreign land for the first time, with people i do not know very well, can do that to you. lots of sleep, daily multivitamins, lots of fruits and proteins, liters of water, and keeping a positive outlook should be the perfect remedy-- at least, that is my professional opinion.
we are being immersed in swahili very quickly, with six hours of constant lessons daily (plus we practice with each other). it is a simpler language than english, but in no way easy (at first). when i do not focus very hard, everything sounds the same. the teachers are wonderful, incredibly friendly and helpful. i also have better hygiene here than at home.. probably because i have more to worry about, but it is still funny. i will update more when i write more in my journal (was interrupted on the last entry by having to go back to class).
hope you are all well.
we are being immersed in swahili very quickly, with six hours of constant lessons daily (plus we practice with each other). it is a simpler language than english, but in no way easy (at first). when i do not focus very hard, everything sounds the same. the teachers are wonderful, incredibly friendly and helpful. i also have better hygiene here than at home.. probably because i have more to worry about, but it is still funny. i will update more when i write more in my journal (was interrupted on the last entry by having to go back to class).
hope you are all well.
journal entry 9\2/09 7 a.m.
asante = thank you
mimini mwana funzi= i am a student
ninaitwa natalie= my name is natalie
choo kiko wapi= where is the toilet?
habari gani?= how are you?
mimini mwana funzi= i am a student
ninaitwa natalie= my name is natalie
choo kiko wapi= where is the toilet?
habari gani?= how are you?
9/1/09
8/21/09
update: okay now i have sent out the link to people. that took a little longer than it should have.
kenyan visa: check
vaccinations: check
malaria meds: check
antibiotics: check
clothes: check, mostly
incredibly small camping towel that REI sweet-talked me into buying: check
binoculars/multi-tool/headlamp/ORS/medical kit: check
everything you could ever imagine: check
nerves/anxiety/insomnia: double check
gifts for homestay families: oops
family photos to share with homestay families: oops
flight tickets: confused...
almost there. NINE DAYS.
kenyan visa: check
vaccinations: check
malaria meds: check
antibiotics: check
clothes: check, mostly
incredibly small camping towel that REI sweet-talked me into buying: check
binoculars/multi-tool/headlamp/ORS/medical kit: check
everything you could ever imagine: check
nerves/anxiety/insomnia: double check
gifts for homestay families: oops
family photos to share with homestay families: oops
flight tickets: confused...
almost there. NINE DAYS.
7/26/09
moja mwezi
moja mwezi means "one month" in swahili (i think). it is just about one month until i ship off to kenya, and i have decided to start my east africa trip blog now, mostly so that i can send everyone the link now instead of waiting until i get to nairobi. i am currently in the process of requesting my kenya visa (i'm technically late in applying for it... but don't tell my professor) and finding gear. i wish i could pack for this trip like any other trip i go on-- wait until the night before, find an old duffel bag in my closet, stuff a couple days worth of clothes and toiletries in it, maybe buy some sugarfree gum and a book of sudoku for the plane ride, and voila! ready to travel. but, i can't do that this time, and the whole process seems so weird to me. i have to buy all these new things that i'll never need again, which kind of goes against my instincts. for example, i am currently looking at buying a pair of chaco sandals, which, in case you aren't familiar with them, cost about a leg and an arm. they will be really useful and important for three and a half months, and then i don't know what i will do with them. same goes for mosquito spray with a really high DEET concentration, a "crushable hat", water purification supplies, 50 feet of rope, oral rehydration salts, iodine, etc. etc. oh well. maybe being required to buy a bunch of weird stuff is indicative of big adventures and good times ahead. let's hope so.
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