Mom & Eliot - Part 1

Whew! So Eliot and Mom have come, stayed and left. It was an interesting 14 days full of crazy bus rides, being force fed excessive amounts of food, big animals, absurd gifts, being force fed even more, all while seeing just about every side of Kenya there is to see. I have to say I'm quite impressed with both Mom and Eliot. They were thrown into the fire and rolled with the punches that inevitably come when traveling Peace Corps style. By the end I think they might even have been enjoying the bone chattering bus rides through the country side. Well "enjoy" is probably too strong a word. "Cheerfully tolerate" might be more accurate. Either way I think they're going to share some of their impressions of this fine country once they've had time to digest everything.

However, whatever I say and whatever they say, so much of our experience can't every really be articulated. There were certainly noteworthy events and stories, and those will be recounted. But I don't know if there is enough story telling ingenuity on the face of the earth to truly capture things like a simple exchange with a traditional Masai man who might have never talked to a white person before, or the sensory overload of a bus ride where the aisles are packed with giant bags of noxious onions, dust is blowing mercilessly through the door that can't be closed because the bus is too full, crazy old African men are acting especially crazy, the road is so rough that the windows are shaking to the point that it has to be considered a miracle that they haven't shattered, and despite all that every twenty or so minutes something so outlandish happens that you manage to be shocked. Some of those experiences involve a certain amount of misery as you go through them, but I'm happy Eliot and Mom got their share because I have a feeling that's what they, and I, will remember in ten years.

As the title implies, details will be coming in a few installments. First I'm just going to give a brief outline of where we went and what we saw. Following posts will have pictures, stories and some commentary from my two visitors.

The adventure began almost immediately after they arrived. Their flight landed at 6:30 AM in Nairobi and less than twelve hours later we were waiting for the night train to the coastal city of Mombasa. The night train is a little bit of a blast from the past with its less than shoulder width hallways, cabins only slightly wider and timeless decor. If you've seen The Darjeerling Limited it's like that but with better scenery. After two days and nights of being tourists in Mombasa we got on one of the legendary public buses headed to Loitokitok to see Mama Alice and the rest of my host family. Even though the first leg was on a pretty nice bus and paved road, it did provide one of the most uncomfortable experiences of my time in Kenya, and possibly life, when the unedited version of Akon's I wanna f*ck you was blaring as I sat next to my mom (warning: don't Google those lyrics if you're easily offended).

Mama Alice was her usual overbearingly welcoming self, feeding everyone until they were nauseous and refusing any help whatsoever. She really is a great and kind woman, and I think Eliot and Mom will agree with that. From Loitokitok we traveled half way to Mbumbuni (my site) to a town called Makindu, staying at a cool Sikh temple that has lodging for all types of weary travelers, which we most certainly were at that point. In the morning we visited another Volunteer's place of work, a nursery school and support center for orphans of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. I've been in Kenya almost 9 months now, and I like to think that I'm pretty hardened to the realities of Africa. But going to a place like the Makindu Children's Center requires serious effort on my part to stay composed. I think it was while watching parentless five year olds, most of whom are lucky if they get two meals a day, playing with old broken toys that Mom and Eliot started to grasp the crazy abundance we have back in the US, and how frighteningly little of the essentials Africa has. Here's the website for the center - http://makindu.org/. It's definitely a place that will put donations to good use.

After that excursion it was off to my home in Kenya, the sprawling metropolis (sarcasm) that is Mbumbuni. Almost immediately we went to the Secondary School where I teach, and oh were they ready for us. Exams were stopped so the whole school could assemble to present us with their gifts for Eliot and Mom. Mom got a traditional bag that Kamba (the predominant tribe of the area) women use to lug stuff the many kilometers they walk daily. When it was time for Eliot to get his, there was some big commotion about the gift being misplaced so the principal sent two students out looking for it. A few minutes later they came back sharing the burden of carrying a 6 foot 2 inch, 75 pound carved giraffe. The thing is nothing less than absurdly massive. An incredibly generous and memorable gift, I must say, but they've put us in a little bit of a conundrum in figuring out how to get it back to the US. Whatever the shipping cost ends up being, I'm sure it's worth the conversation starter Eliot has for his future home. Other than school, we went around and saw the projects the community and I have been working on. General Kianga came with his wife for a night and they held a small dinner for us and about a dozen neighbors. The next day there was a bigger community celebration that saw the trip's second slaughtering of a goat. This party also probably made me feel as appreciated as I ever have. The community groups did give a few "real" gifts like carvings (normal sized, for better or worse) and some traditional garb for my mom, but then a bunch of old ladies who own next to nothing and don't speak a word of English came and gave bag after bag of fruit from their farms. This seemed to be far more genuine than a lot of the bigger more formal tokens of appreciation I''ve seen or received in Kenya. The stay in Mbumbuni concluded with the church I go to having a send off service, also borderline over the top, for us.

From Mbumbuni we went on a safari in the Masai Mara. We got there just in time for the beginning of the great wildebeest migration, which is when millions of grazing animals (mostly wildebeests, obviously, but also tons of zebras and gazelles) leave the savannas of Kenya for the Serengeti in Tanzania. Unfortunately we did not get to see the epic climax of thousands of animals surging across a crocodile infested river, but we did see a few lions laying down trying to catch their breath before eating the prey they just caught. On top of that there was a pretty terrifying up close and personal encounter with a family of elephants. This is also where I had my 26th birthday. I can't say that I ever expected to spend a birthday on an African campsite with Czech women from the Humanist Movement and a few men wearing red dresses (more or less) and holes the size of golf balls in both ear lobes. Just so there's no confusion the latter isn't referring to myself and Eliot, the camp is run by a Westernized Masai man who employs traditional Masai warriors for guards (and for the sake of authenticity).

The last day and a half was spent in Nairobi, preparing to get back to our various realities. Again, it was a great trip for me, and from what I saw and heard I think the fam is going to concur when they have a chance to formally respond. That's most of the generalities, more specifics to come!

Before I go, and this will get its due attention soon enough, I need to announce that the books for the Nduluku library are on their way! Mr. Ade Otenaike, the President of Wings of the Dawn, agreed to send the books out before all the money was raised in order to get this thing up and going sooner rather than later. I and the students and staff of Nduluku are GREATLY appreciative of everyone who donated, and to Wings of the Dawn for everything they've provided and done, as well as their shared sense of urgency. But I was hesitant to make any announcement for a reason! My work in sales, and the influence of some good bosses, taught me to have the discipline to not count any chickens before they've hatched. There is still a lot of work that needs to be done before there are real fruits from everyone's labor. I need to do a lot on the ground here and I think there might be a fundraiser or two in the works to get the remaining money and to help ensure the library is furnished properly. Regardless, thanks to everyone for helping get to this point:) Soon updates about the library will be posted on the Wings of the Dawn Facebook page - linked here - which I encourage everyone to join so that you can follow easily.