Monday, February 16, 2009
Sunday, February 15, 2009
A little bit, a lot of what's been happening
I was just going to upload pictures because I think they say more than I could ever say, but to appease certain people (Trangle, cough cough) I will try to describe parts of what’s been going on here in Kenya this past month.
Every morning on my way to school I encounter four or five burning piles of trash, men peeing on the protective wall that surrounds the hospital housing that I live in and beautiful women with babies wrapped snuggly around their backs. Little by little I’ve become desensitized by many things and even find certain things enjoyable. For instance, I love matatus. They get me where I want to go faster than any city bus or car ever could. The loud music is fun to dance to and I’m always in for a good adventure when I’m on one.
Just yesterday I was sitting close to the door when a guy jumped in to talk to me about how Obama was his brother and black power was alive and well. Then he yelled, “black power, world domination, we’re taking over!” The whole matatu, about 20 people crammed into one van, looked at me and laughed, but I think I was laughing the hardest of them all.
Things are just different here. It’s hard to describe unless you experience it. But as soon as you say hello or acknowledge another person you’ve formed a connection with them. It doesn’t matter if you start a conversation or just keep walking, you both know that if you see each other you’ll say hello again but care a little more. At the same time, Nairobi defines “dog eat dog” mentality. People push, shove, bite to get on a matatu even though the same route will show up in about 30 seconds blaring insanely good reggae. People love to watch police arrest others and if someone can cheat you out of your money or better yet steal your money they will. Not to worry, I have not been mugged or lost anything (knock on wood).
I feel like I’ve done a lot and yet done nothing at the same time. Last weekend I went to one of my program director’s home, which was about 45 minutes outside Nairobi. He comes from a traditional Maasai family therefore we met his mother and his father’s other two wives. We at lots of goat meat and hung out with cows. We joked about how often one gets to hang out with a polygamist Maasai family watching them make their incredible beaded jewelry, eating their tasty food.
One of my friends here, Jake, lives with a woman who runs her own makeshift orphanage and on Saturdays we go and help out. The children are amazing and all they want is to be held and loved, even the older kids who are about 12-years-old. My arm hair was like the most fascinating, enjoyable thing for them and they would nuzzle into it, often rubbing their cheeks against it. It was cute and we had lots of fun with them.
So classes are both interesting and agonizing. Interesting because the teachers are charismatic and great storytellers. Agonizing because we’re really not learning much and each class lasts two hours. One class is called Development and another class is called Country Analysis and each professor says the exact same thing. But the country analysis professor uses great metaphors that paint pictures rather than provoke though, still they are entertaining and priceless nonetheless. We have Kiswahili for about 4 hours every day and as much as it is, I still find it interesting. I try practicing it at home, but have yet to really use it outside of the house. We have three teachers that rotate every day and one of them, Omanga, is beautiful and a joy to make smile, which means I purposely make mistakes so that he’ll laugh at me. Little does he know I knew the right answer and got the last laugh.
My family is fine, not great, not bad, just fine. I have some problems with how they reprimand their children- corporal punishment- and their lack of involvement in their children’s lives, which leads to them acting up and finding ways to pester me. This morning Adrian thought it would be funny to repeatedly spit his ndizi (banana) at me. Even if I tried punishing him it would not work because he a) doesn’t care and b) doesn’t speak any English. I’m supposed to stay with my family the whole time I’m here because my internship is based in Nairobi, but I wanted to use this weekend to make my decision about switching because lately I’ve just felt very uncomfortable at home. My family doesn’t seem to care about me much, unless we’re out drinking, and this weekend they went out of town without telling me. They left me alone with the kids and house-help, which was fine except it would have been nice to know. Because of that I want to look into switching to this family that lives close to my internship. The girl who lives with them now will be doing her internship somewhere rural, which would free up space for me. Who knows what will happen though. I’m optimistic and happy about everything else.
I’m interning for this organization called Hot Sun Foundation that Jake informed me about. Side note: Jake is one of the coolest, nicest, smartest people I’ve ever met AND he’s gay and goes to Madison, which means we’re instant best friends, duh! Anyway HSF is in Kibera, the large slum anyone who’s ever been to Nairobi should know about, and they’re a non-profit that does a few really cool things. One, they show movies on a huge screen that’s set up in Kibera every two weeks, keeping kids safe and out of trouble, while being entertained and educated. Two, they’re making the first ever feature-length film written by, directed by and starring people living in a slum. I’m involved with the movie by doing casting right now, but my main endeavor is this project called Stories from Kibera. It’s an oral-tradition story-telling competition for residents ages 15-23. The theme is reconciliation based on the election violence last year and professors and students from the University of Nairobi theater department have agreed to come in and train the three finalists that will then perform for all of Kibera. It will sort of be like American Idol where there will be judges, but then residents will also get to vote as well. I’m really excited about it and it’s also sort of fate because a grad student who TAs for J 202 is involved with HSF. Look them up at hotsunfoundation.org and check out the video clips they already have. The organization started when Nathan Collet, the co-founder, shot a 13 minute story about a boy living in Kibera, called Kibera Kid. The short film took off and won all sorts of awards world-wide and then he moved back to Kibera and started HSF.
Ok that’s all I can think to write as of now. I’ll update this from time to time, but internet is hard to come by and very iffy. Hope everyone is doing well and I send my love!
Every morning on my way to school I encounter four or five burning piles of trash, men peeing on the protective wall that surrounds the hospital housing that I live in and beautiful women with babies wrapped snuggly around their backs. Little by little I’ve become desensitized by many things and even find certain things enjoyable. For instance, I love matatus. They get me where I want to go faster than any city bus or car ever could. The loud music is fun to dance to and I’m always in for a good adventure when I’m on one.
Just yesterday I was sitting close to the door when a guy jumped in to talk to me about how Obama was his brother and black power was alive and well. Then he yelled, “black power, world domination, we’re taking over!” The whole matatu, about 20 people crammed into one van, looked at me and laughed, but I think I was laughing the hardest of them all.
Things are just different here. It’s hard to describe unless you experience it. But as soon as you say hello or acknowledge another person you’ve formed a connection with them. It doesn’t matter if you start a conversation or just keep walking, you both know that if you see each other you’ll say hello again but care a little more. At the same time, Nairobi defines “dog eat dog” mentality. People push, shove, bite to get on a matatu even though the same route will show up in about 30 seconds blaring insanely good reggae. People love to watch police arrest others and if someone can cheat you out of your money or better yet steal your money they will. Not to worry, I have not been mugged or lost anything (knock on wood).
I feel like I’ve done a lot and yet done nothing at the same time. Last weekend I went to one of my program director’s home, which was about 45 minutes outside Nairobi. He comes from a traditional Maasai family therefore we met his mother and his father’s other two wives. We at lots of goat meat and hung out with cows. We joked about how often one gets to hang out with a polygamist Maasai family watching them make their incredible beaded jewelry, eating their tasty food.
One of my friends here, Jake, lives with a woman who runs her own makeshift orphanage and on Saturdays we go and help out. The children are amazing and all they want is to be held and loved, even the older kids who are about 12-years-old. My arm hair was like the most fascinating, enjoyable thing for them and they would nuzzle into it, often rubbing their cheeks against it. It was cute and we had lots of fun with them.
So classes are both interesting and agonizing. Interesting because the teachers are charismatic and great storytellers. Agonizing because we’re really not learning much and each class lasts two hours. One class is called Development and another class is called Country Analysis and each professor says the exact same thing. But the country analysis professor uses great metaphors that paint pictures rather than provoke though, still they are entertaining and priceless nonetheless. We have Kiswahili for about 4 hours every day and as much as it is, I still find it interesting. I try practicing it at home, but have yet to really use it outside of the house. We have three teachers that rotate every day and one of them, Omanga, is beautiful and a joy to make smile, which means I purposely make mistakes so that he’ll laugh at me. Little does he know I knew the right answer and got the last laugh.
My family is fine, not great, not bad, just fine. I have some problems with how they reprimand their children- corporal punishment- and their lack of involvement in their children’s lives, which leads to them acting up and finding ways to pester me. This morning Adrian thought it would be funny to repeatedly spit his ndizi (banana) at me. Even if I tried punishing him it would not work because he a) doesn’t care and b) doesn’t speak any English. I’m supposed to stay with my family the whole time I’m here because my internship is based in Nairobi, but I wanted to use this weekend to make my decision about switching because lately I’ve just felt very uncomfortable at home. My family doesn’t seem to care about me much, unless we’re out drinking, and this weekend they went out of town without telling me. They left me alone with the kids and house-help, which was fine except it would have been nice to know. Because of that I want to look into switching to this family that lives close to my internship. The girl who lives with them now will be doing her internship somewhere rural, which would free up space for me. Who knows what will happen though. I’m optimistic and happy about everything else.
I’m interning for this organization called Hot Sun Foundation that Jake informed me about. Side note: Jake is one of the coolest, nicest, smartest people I’ve ever met AND he’s gay and goes to Madison, which means we’re instant best friends, duh! Anyway HSF is in Kibera, the large slum anyone who’s ever been to Nairobi should know about, and they’re a non-profit that does a few really cool things. One, they show movies on a huge screen that’s set up in Kibera every two weeks, keeping kids safe and out of trouble, while being entertained and educated. Two, they’re making the first ever feature-length film written by, directed by and starring people living in a slum. I’m involved with the movie by doing casting right now, but my main endeavor is this project called Stories from Kibera. It’s an oral-tradition story-telling competition for residents ages 15-23. The theme is reconciliation based on the election violence last year and professors and students from the University of Nairobi theater department have agreed to come in and train the three finalists that will then perform for all of Kibera. It will sort of be like American Idol where there will be judges, but then residents will also get to vote as well. I’m really excited about it and it’s also sort of fate because a grad student who TAs for J 202 is involved with HSF. Look them up at hotsunfoundation.org and check out the video clips they already have. The organization started when Nathan Collet, the co-founder, shot a 13 minute story about a boy living in Kibera, called Kibera Kid. The short film took off and won all sorts of awards world-wide and then he moved back to Kibera and started HSF.
Ok that’s all I can think to write as of now. I’ll update this from time to time, but internet is hard to come by and very iffy. Hope everyone is doing well and I send my love!
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Monday, February 2, 2009
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