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!