'fugees

there is nothing like returning to a place that has remained unchanged and seeing the ways in which you yourself have altered [mandela. i may be paraphrasing]

I am back in the Kakuma Refugee Camp in northwestern Kenya. I spent 3 (now knowingly clueless) weeks here in 2005 as part of my study abroad program. We spent days wandering around the camp, using the internet, eating food and feeling lost, just looking for (what i now know are called) informants. Today I got mildly scolded for wandering out into the camp alone. In broad daylight. Now that I am a guest of IOM, I am a security risk. Yet, I enjoyed every second I was out and about. People talk to you, as they are kind of confused to see a white person on foot (due to IOM/UNHCR security precautions). And I purposefully wore my Obama t-shirt, which is always a crowd pleaser. I'd prefer to be called "Obama!" from across the road than "mzungu!" I wandered through the dust and took some Ethiopian dish with brown, liquid, spicy goat fat and njera and watched music videos of a voluptuous woman singing and aggressively shaking her shoulders in about 62 different outfits.

The camp hasn't changed that much. It is still diverse ("oh, you want njera, mzungu? you must walk this way {points} to Ethiopia"--apparently I was in the S. Sudan region) with thousands of refugees and Turkana people milling about. And people are living their lives. For decades. The money is soft and light brown in color, not like newly printed money we get in Nairobi. I gave a man a dime today 'cause he said he will get resettled to America. I figured when his federal assistance runs out after 8 months, maybe a dime will mean something. My room is air conditioned though, lest I melt in the hot, dry climate. But, I love being out of Nairobi and seeing something different and new.

My flight here was harmless, as was the two hour land cruiser ride with 5 kenyan colleagues across the desert. The conversation was priceless. I heard about how Bill Gates made a killing off Y2K by designing "viruses" then selling people programs to get rid of them; if the weather got as cold in Africa as it did in the D.C. people here would have to adapt and would spend more time inside thinking of new ideas and Africa would be more developed; email reached Kenya in 1996 and that made it easier to communicate faster (text messaging made it easier to get the ladies. it was informal and no one cares if you spell incorrectly); the Luos physically fought their future brother-in-laws to show their strength and ability to care for their desired wife ("now, it is still the same, eh? it is just with chocolates and not physical force.")

the guy next to me had just been in D.C. last week and said it was TOO COLD.

this past weekend was low-key. lots of sleeping in. movie watching (true grit and when harry met sally--always a classic). A few of us went out to an Ethiopian dinner and dancing Saturday night (dance jams included billy ocean's top 40) and I was home by 2am. The Valentine's Day was lovely. Ann came over and we indulged in mac 'n cheese and sweet red wine. It had unexpectedly poured in Nairobi and I was glad I brought my rain boots and hat and hiking pants, as I trudged to the grocery store unaffected by the mud, like a warrior.

welp, now i'm alone in my IOM, air conditioned room. What to do now? I think i'll wander out for a soda.

(i'll upload enough photos to wet your whistle when i'm not paying for the internet)

werkin' in reverse

good thing love is an etch-a-sketch

it appears that i only want to write on fridays. and sundays. what that translates to is: i am working for the weekends. just a couple of days where i can remember that i'm in Kenya, which is in this magical continent, Africa. It is fun and safe and i don't think i get out enough to have outlandish, culturally diverse stories to report. Just me and some air conditioning and a little Swahili and hot showers. Oh! I have switched sides of the office as well. Now i sit with the Kenyans and I'm closer to the air conditioner. Ideal, really.

nice photo, left over from last weekend

this week was great. effortless. comfortable. and any other adjective you can think of to describe pleasant boredom. i worked. had a swahili lesson (ninajifunza sana). went to an ethiopian dinner with a wonderful scottish friend. went to a DELICIOUS sushi dinner with colleagues. and went to see "togetherness supreme" last night at the alliance francais and managed to bump into almost every white people i have met since being here. but the movie was wonderful. i also (clearly) learned how to embed videos in the blog! big day.

Togetherness Supreme - HD Teaser from Hot Sun Films / Premier Account on Vimeo.

and this morning, i stalked andrea gibson. she never lets me down.

and then i went to a meeting at the IOM transit center. noted some posts before, but essentially a holding pen for refugees before they get resettled. on our way out of the KEMRI campus a piece of driveway was blocked off for a conference (maybe the MOH was here?) and a Kenyan co-worker said, "Eh! Why we can't go this way? Without us, there is no minister. We voted for him, we should be able to pass." Despite his logic, we weren't allowed to pass. Then the same Kenyan co-workers spent 1.5 hours describing a database we've been working on to the clinic staff. 1.5 hours. He...talks...very?...slowly. Okay...yes. He talks....slowly, that's it.

i read this article about Scientology. listened to a lil nicki minaj (and laughing at drake's face at 4:23). and cursed nytimes.com, 'cause it hasn't been loading.

amerika

omg. the packers won. i am sure my dad and youngest sister are elated. i'd be lying if i told you i was personally invested in the NFL, but on their behalf, it is certainly exciting. now, i'm at the bottom of my (instant) coffee cup and the back of my eye balls hurt. the game was on the AFN (Armed Forces Network), a channel for our service men and women stationed overseas. The channel is operated by the DOD, and doesn't show Budweiser commercials, so we missed the cultural significance of advertisement and watched PSA's on quitting smoking, protecting your social security card and how to safeguard your OPSEC (secrecy when in the field?) and famous athletes read the Declaration of Independence over 15 minutes before the game started. The food was good, people ventured to the Embassy grocery store and we had burrito dip, tortilla chips and brownies! kick off was at 2:30am here. I survived through the first-half.

view of the living room

the rest of the weekend was super! becca and wingo came from kisumu and we hung out at home and got some beers nearby my house and just relaxed on friday night. on saturday morning we drove the hour to Naivasha and picked up Jonathan at a gas station. He rode a night bus from Kampala! Like a true African man! And we found him at a table chugging through some instant coffee and reading and maybe regretting his decision to take the bus. We then drove to Crescent Island--essentially a wildlife sanctuary in the middle of Lake Naivasha (by island they mean peninsula) operated by a British lady where you can walk around with the water bucks, giraffes, zebras and gazelles (of sort). Our guide's name was Momo and was super nice and we just wandered in the sun for awhile searching for a python. naturally.

the wild west

DGH would be proud

our picnic spot

i pretty much blended in with the zebras

giraffes never get old

Then we took some lunch and piled in the car. Took some naps and arrived at our taxi driver and friend, Daniel's mother's house, where she fed us tea and showed off her kitten and cow. It was gorgeous out there. Green and quiet and no cars WHICH would come into play when Daniel's car wouldn't start. He left the headlights on. opps. Oh, but he had cables (essentially black cables with exposed wire. Not what we would think of as jumper cables, more if you pulled the cables out from behind your TV and used them to conduct electricity) but, huzzah! by chance his aunt (or sister or cousin) had a battery in her house, so he hoisted it on a stool and put two 8-year old boys in charge of holding the wires on the battery. As we watched Jonathan said, "Uhh, they can't hold that..." to which Daniel replied, "yes they can! they are strong." In the face of an ethical dilemma and concerned we would see two 8-year old's electrocuted, we turned away when Daniel went to start the car. Thankfully, our moral compass was not scrutinized, because they were fine and the car started! We returned to Nairobi by dark.

taking tea at Daniel's mom's house

That night we went out and danced our rear ends off until 5am. Good conversation. Good music. Great company. Sunday we recovered over brunch at noon and wandered the market downtown. We had about 3 personal shoppers each and spent a majority of our energy trying to explain why we didn't need a t-shirt or a soap stone elephant or a mask or a necklace. Despite how much the Kenyan vendors thought my life was not complete without them. Then I napped in anticipation for the football game.

listen to this and try not to dance. and "nimedata" is a lil slang for 'i'm crazy about you.' that's nice.

i wish i had photos for you

...but i don't. it's miraculously friday again. the fact that i don't have pictures feels kind of nice. one doesn't take pictures of their repetitive daily life, right? and i'm approaching that point. this is what my typical day looks like:

7:00am first alarm goes off (a nice british-sounding lady coming from my cell phone actually says, "it is time to wake up. it is 7 o'clock. it is time to wake up")
7:30am i stop hitting 'snooze' and get out of bed
7:33am twenty minutes of yoga in my living room, listening to 'trapeze swinger' on repeat
7:53am-8:25am get dressed, eat toast, drink some OJ, brush my teeth
8:25am-8:35am stand outside waiting to be picked up, usually denying taxi drivers that pass by and are SO confused why there would be a white person loitering on the side of the road
8:55am-1:00pm sit on the computer in my cubicle. read the news. talk to jonathan on gchat. read some blogs. do a little bit of work. look at photos. think of music to download
1:00pm-2:00pm walk to the dining hall with josh and debbie (two other young white cdc people). talk to the girls in swahili who work at the cantina (they don't make me feel dumb). gossip about anything and everything and everyone we can think of. drink a cold coke and whatever they have on special. maybe "take" a bowl of fruit if i'm feeling crazy.
2:06pm-4:00pm do the same thing i did in the morning.
4:00pm-5:00pm panic that i haven't done any real work all day
5:00pm-5:30pm sit in the backseat of a car in traffic
5:30pm get home. sit on my balcony and read until dark
7:00pm go run on the treadmill for 20 minutes. sit on the stationary bike for 10.
7:30pm put on a pot of water to boil so i can make either a) a bowl of green beans b) an ear of sweet corn c) some pasta
8:30pm-11:00pm talk to friends in the States (who are now at work) on gchat. Look at flights to far off places. download music. search IRC's job database. send emails. start on the yellow-brick road of the internet and click on things and follow it until it takes me to the emerald city (i haven't found the end of the internet yet)
11:00pm-12:00am "watch" an episode of mad men and fall asleep. realize the next day i fell asleep during the episode and have to start halfway through.

so! now you know. i will say, i am enjoying the solitude. this whole 9-5 job thing has made me appreciate the quiet and my balcony sits and having an empty appointment book. this past week a friend came over for dinner, which mixed things up a bit. i also got a drink with some american girls (one of which is moving back to the US to work with the IRC in Baltimore and another one I coincidentally worked with in Ghana in 2006. small world.) So, for two of the 4 nights I had places to go and people to see. (i'm making friends!)

i also finished "the road to hell", and learned loads about the politicalization of food aid by U.S. agriculture businesses. international aid really is one large corporation. the more starving children we see, the more we donate, the more money is put in the pool, the more NGOs sign up to take a stab at it (or UNHCR, UNFDP, NATO, CARE, IRC, yada. yada. yada.) a lot of loopholes. a lot of shortcomings. the author recommended trimming all the excessive NGOs and putting someone in charge (like the UN, but actually effective) of monitoring their money and programs and reporting. kind of like these guys or these guys or them but it needs to be implemented by governments and if they're the ones getting economic benefits and serving their own interests, it is highly unlikely (read: not in a million years) they will implement a watch dog system for their own cronies. {sigh} now what to do with that $24.95 a month I'm donating to PlanUSA to an alleged Bolivian girl who sends me letters?! i feel like a fake. Helping or hurting?

but now it's an hour to lunch. which means i begin doing work. i should also mention if you ever see spelling errors on here, feel free to tell me. some of you are doing so and it's appreciated. i strive to be a person that doesn't need 'spellcheck' to survive and appear educated. i miss you all and i hope you're having a great weekend and staying warm and daydreaming of summer, 'cause i am too.

and i've been listening to robyn (is she an awkward dancer?) and reading about the success of cell phones in kenya. and i just picked up 'Dark Star Safari' and three pages in I'm a bit annoyed but thinking maybe i'll write a book. If you search Amazon for a minute, it seems that any westerner who has done the Peace Corps or traveled in Africa is qualified to also be a novelist. Good to know I could try to publish the blog if the the job hunt doesn't work out.

weekend in nairobi, take 1.

This past weekend was lovely and full of new friends in Nairobi. Friday afternoon, Federico and I went to Nakumatt to get party preparations and it felt good, to be in a friend’s car and buying food and beer for expecting guests. I took advantage of bringing the car and bought a yoga mat (awkward to walk home with one of those here) and it will hopefully bring me endless happiness in the mornings before work. Then the festivities began. My “cooking” skills weren’t impressive enough for my Italian-born roommate, so he swiftly took over the pasta and I just made sure everyone had enough to drink and people to converse with. It was a wild success. I called upon every person in Nairobi I knew, even on the peripheral, and people came! and drank! and ate! and spontaneously danced even. Then we wandered out to the bar/night club that is a stone’s throw away and kept dancing. We got home and decided we would wait until morning to tackle the kitchen clean-up.

federico and i

beautiful ann

new friends

laura and two women from work, guarding the desserts

Saturday, I recovered. Went to breakfast with Ann and napped and read the news in bed. I also paid my rent. It’s really hard to pass the street kids here. Last year, in Eldoret spending time at Tumaini minimized the wealthy, white-person guilt I felt when walking around town. The town was small. I knew (some of) the street kids, and I knew just enough Swahili to joke and I felt okay buying them a loaf of bread, ‘cause I knew on Monday they would put down their glue bottles for a few hours and come do math problems. In Nairobi, it’s completely different. I don’t know anyone I pass on the street. The kids anxiously skip across the street to strategically position themselves in my path and look as helpless as possible and put out their hand. And I greet them and it’s always followed by “sina pesa, pole.” But that is a big ole lie. I turned down two street kids while I walked with my month’s rent IN CASH in my backpack. As if there was any doubt, I pay more in monthly rent than most Kenyans make in a year. It just makes me feel dirty. Lying to an 8 year old. But the alternative is impossible. I can’t give out money, ‘cause then I’ll just perpetuate the problem of white people being banks. And I only have 4 t-shirts here, so I think word would spread and the kids would start to recognize me. “Oh! the mzungu that hands out 20 bob when she walks from the nice mall to her nicer apartment! She’s there!” Wealth disparity is just very in your face in Nairobi. But, I’d prefer the daily reminder over putting poor children on a bus and shipping them out of town. (which I’m sure they do anyway, I’m just naive). I’m comfortable. I made my bed of luxury, I need to lay in it.

Following my inner monologue about my wealth situation, I went to a graduation ceremony from the Kibera Film School (a production company who has made this great film, Togetherness Supreme) with Federico where he was the “Chief Guest”. We, sadly, didn’t know how important he was and were 2 hours late to the event. Africa-time got the best of us. We failed. But he gave a speech and was such a good Chief Guest. That night the internet entertained me and I fell asleep early.

the chief guest!

screening the short films

Sunday I woke up and went on a hike with new-friend-from-DC, Matt, who I met at the film school the day before, his Kenyan roommate and two British girls who are hanging out in Kenya working for various NGOs and backpacking around. It was a good long walk in the sun in the Ngong Hills (about 30 mins outside of Nairobi). We wandered over 1 hill (there are 8, and we arrogantly thought we could conquer them all), came back to my apartment and went for a swim and then had dinner at the place across the street. My apartment could use a little cleaning, I will do that tonight. It was interesting to spend a day with transient people with backpacks. I don’t live here for long, but I do live here right now, and I have to get up early every morning and put on my Gap clothes and go to work. Every day. Monday through Friday. For really the first time in my adult life. Spending the day with them was just like being forced to see how I’m changing a bit.

a view from the base of hill #1

progress in the ngong hills

I think I would love this video. But the internet has taken 2+ days to load it, and I may never get to know, but you can fill me in on how wonderful it is.

and i got justin's birthday present, and it warmed my heart.

tgif

"i don't need friends, i have a usb modem"-anonymous

It is Friday here. It will be Friday where you are in 10 hours or less! (the world is so small) This week passed without much happening, but it flew by. The highlight was finding an old college friend that coincidentally lives down the street from me! So we had dinner and it was nice to catch up on the past 4 years, she writes for the Enough! Project, and you can read her good work here. I also got lights put in above my cubicle. I think the handy man took a light from 4 fixtures around the office and combined them above my cubicle, but whatever gets the job done. There has also been less traffic on the road. It is hypothesized that it's because it's the end of the month and people can't afford gas money until their next paycheck.

Otherwise, I read a lot of blogs. And this article by Kristof about Catholic Hospitals. Learned a bit about Microsoft Access to build databases. G-chatted all day with other fellows at desks around E. Africa. Listened to this song a lot. Read this article about the culture of elitism. Quote: "The main culprits turn out to be people for whom a monied and therefore educated background lies behind the adoption of aesthetic, intellectual, or political values that demur from the money-making mandate that otherwise dominates society." (I keep a blog, about my comfortable (adventurous?), brief life in a foreign place, made possible by my graduate school grant, i think i may fall into this). I bought some books. I ate (early) Valentine's Day candy (thanks, mom!). And I ran on the treadmill for a combined total of 35 minutes (probably over 3 days). I went to the orphanage and held a chubby baby boy until he fell asleep. It was a good week though. Scheduled and robotic. The kind of time that makes me feel as though I am building a resemblance of a life here.

I also discovered this fact sheet on my desk, which shows where most refugees are resettled from in Africa:

there is a mzungu sleeping on the bus

and i know i can leave in the night, just a moment in time, a moment in

time, don't be scared of what you find, in the night. [us royalty]

After finishing my second work week, i left on a night bus to head to jinja, uganda to meet up with the other fellows and indulge myself on rolex's (a chapati with nutella and a banana = kind of awesome), white backpackers and beer. Moral of the story is the bus was completely harmless. I was the only white person on the bus, which essentially meant i did not go unnoticed. there was a rumor going around the CDC about travelers who shook hands with a stranger, then felt woozy and woke up to find their belongings gone. The scientific rationale for said scam seemed debatable as we discussed it, yet when my bus neighbor sat down and offered his hand to introduce himself, I was a little weary (i am a sucker for urban legends, i have only ever flashed someone driving without headlights maybe once). But, I shook his hand. and LIVED! Huzzah! and I took a nap and woke up to my wallet and passport and camera exactly where I had left them! Praise Jesus.

The bus was comfortable. The seats are constantly in a super reclined position, just like a bed in first class. Before we left we said a prayer for a safe journey, and the conductor gave a little speech that ended with, "...i hope you have an enjoyable ride, even if the road is in terrible condition." I fell asleep immediately and slept like a baby the whole way. I was pushed awake at the border (4:20am) and when I stumbled to the border agent at the window, he said "Oh! We heard there was a mzungu asleep on the bus." I can only imagine the gossip train that took place before I got there between the passengers, the driver, the money exchangers and the random people that congregate. I also had a man on my bus wearing a stunning 1984 Nike track jacket that was brightly colored. I just followed him for the border crossing, and never got lost. Even in the dark.

eastern uganda speeding by at sunrise

I made it to Jinja (the main mode of transportation are boda bodas, or motorcycle taxis, so, again I'm sorry for breaking the "no-motorcycle" rule, dad. but they're just SO FUN) I met up with Christina and we had coffee and wandered into town and through the market and had chicken for lunch and the roads were so dusty that every time we got to our destination Christina has a layer of red dust on her face (she sat in the middle of the motorcycle, therefore I got to use her as a shield)

sitting over the nile and waiting for jinja to wake up

just being stereotypical in a coffee shop

christina with new friends in the market

omg. shoes.

That night, Jonathan arrived (for those that are concerned, he survived the rafting and in standard fashion, was underimpressed) as did Wingo, Becca and Purser. We spent that night meeting new people (plenty of Americans, as the Peace Corps Uganda team was also camping out at the hostel), drinking beer, dancing, talking and having an all-around carefree, white-person-in-a-foreign-hostel-experience. The next morning, my headache, rolex, Jonathan and I got in a matatu and rode the hour back to Kampala. We had a lovely burger at a Japanese restaurant (Sushi? in Uganda?) then parted ways.

a view from inside the safari tent

jonathan and wingo outside of the tent, on our lil porch

...it'll make you lazy?

I wandered to the old taxi park when you can get a matatu going more or less anywhere. Organized chaos, definitely. But, I found my bus to head to Entebbe (the airport is an hour or so outside of Kampala) and napped and then got off and wandered to the beach front and sat for 2 hours, napping, reading, and taking a soda (I may turn into a bottle of Coca-Cola before too long). I am half-way through The Road to Hell by Mike Maren and so far the take away messages are: NEVER, EVER work for Save the Children. And that the politics of development work fueled the crisis in the Somalia in the 80s and 90s. And if you're working on your MPH in Global Health and have life-long aspirations of working "in the field" you may want to further develop your justification for said activity or find a career change so you don't look like an idiot. (errr, awkward.)

from the vault: justin in front of the old taxi park in 2005

a view of the lake

where i camped out for the afternoon

Otherwise, I am almost done with Season 1 of Mad Men, and I am hooked! I downloaded a lot of jams from here: www.thisbandissick.com. I learned how much Asian-Pacific geography I don't know: Nauru, Kiribati, Niue and Borneo, to name a few. I read about how if you're not on Facebook in Tunisia, you just may miss out on the revolution. I went out to a delicious dinner with my roommate and his brother and girlfriend who have since left Nairobi to head back to Spain. I looked at these photos from Cote d'Ivoire. I toyed with the idea of getting up at 5am to watch the State of the Union. I had a few meetings and played around in Excel with DHS data re: resettled refugees. I ate a lot of fruit from the canteen on the KEMRI campus and
enjoyed the candy my mom sent in my birthday package.