Updates from Nairobi

I'm really bad at this whole blogging business.

Updates: I've been going to Kibera, I got braids, I gave blood at the hospital yesterday, and I'm going camping tomorrow.

I started going to the Kibera Girls' Soccer Club (which is really a school) with my friend, Jeremy, to help with the girls' play. The play was this Saturday (it was amazing, look at the videos on my Facebook). At first I was incredibly pissed off that people lived like that in the slums, and that no one was doing anything about it. But after being with the girls for a while, I realized that yes, it sucks that they live in a place like that, but they're making the best of it, and they're doing a great job of it. It's incredibly inspiring to see a group of young girls reap the rewards of all their hard work, and raise money for themselves.

That same day, in the morning, I visited the giraffe center and got to kiss some giraffes! We were allowed to put giraffe food in our mouths so the the giraffe could take food from us! I got some lovely pics, particularly of another guy in our class really going for it. He got along splendidly with that giraffe...

After the play, some of the other students and I went to an Egyptian restaurant and enjoyed some Tuskers while watching the Wisconsin football game online...until we lost the feed. Then we relied on updates from Grace's boyfriend, and Roy gave me updates on the OSU game. We stayed out for a while, and Chris and I had an unfortunate almost run-in with some men with AK-47s, but the night ended with all of us happily in our beds (except maybe Steve, he may have hit the floor first).

Also, I managed to find time to get braids last Friday. I tip-toed into the Kenyatta market, trying to avoid attracting too much attention (impossible, I stick out a bit) and after a few minutes found some ladies who were willing to attempt the challenge of braiding a mzungu's hair. At one point there were five ladies working on my head, it was quite the experience!

The final result!

On a darker note, the local hospital put out a request for blood after an explosion in a nearby slum caused by a oil spill. Over 100 people were killed, and many more were injured. A lot of the MSID students went to give blood and food to the hospital, and there were tons of people lined up there when we arrived. The hospital staff said the response had been great, and that they'd reached their goal for blood.

Tomorrow I'll be going camping with Simon's (one of our coordinators) family, in Ngong Hills. It should be a great time! We will be matatu-ing out there (a kind of crazy bus), and then piki-piki-ing (a motorcycle) to the camp site. Apparently we're going on a guided hiking tour, so I'm very excited for that.

The majestic Matatu.

That's all for now, I'm off to write some papers for class.

Mia

First Experiences in Nairobi

Good afternoon! Getting internet took a really long time. I'm actually writing this on my computer (no internet) on the 3rd; I couldn't get to an internet cafe, and the service stores close early on Sat and don't open on Sun. So I'll tell you about my day today!

I met my host mom! She's an adorable Kikuyu woman with a 17 year old son. Her husband died about 16 years ago, and she lives alone with her son, but has a househelp come once a week to clean and do the laundry. We watched soap operas and the news all day, and had lots of rice and masala tea. By the way, the soap operas here are English-dubbed telenovelas (figure that one out), and EVERYONE watches them. It's very odd, but I did enjoy watching them with her. Tomorrow I'm going to meet a group of women that she's part of who loan each other money to start businesses and help each other out.

My mom also does HIV outreach in the Kibera, the largest slum in Africa, and I'm going to try to tag along with her. One of the boys in my class, Jeremy, also works in the slum with the Kibera Girls Soccer Club, which started as a soccer club but involved into a school. It's a great place, and UW Madison has strong ties to it. I'm going to visit them as well. I'm very excited by all of this, and I really like Kenya...it's so beautiful, and the people are so honest with you. I get stares everywhere because people have never seen a whitey ('mzungu') before, but everyone I've met has been friendly.

The city itself isn't that different than the worst parts of Kazan, and the house I'm in is spacious (two bathrooms!). I've got my own room, desk, and queen sized bed. However, there's rarely running water because the government rations it, and the electricity is intermittent. However, it's a good trade-off, and I have a yard to play in! Also, I'm about 20 feet from a golf course...the Air Force has followed me after all.

Sadly, I doubt I'll be drinking here. The streets are very unsafe at night, and being drunk after dark, even in a group, is a bad idea. Some guys on our program got robbed last year, and some guys this year almost got carjacked, so I'm going to be 'keeping it real' with studying and the lovely telenovelas.

Update, 5 Sep 11

So I decided that running by myself during the day wouldn't be too risky, and went for a 3 or so mile run on the streets. It's hard to run here; it's a mile higher than I'm used to, and there's smog everywhere.

I talked to Jeremy, and I'm definitely going to Kibera with him tomorrow to meet the girls. We also have 4 hours of Swahili lecture tomorrow (the director, Jama, swears up and down that it's 2 hours straight, then another 2 hours straight, but my experience with Kenyan time leads me to believe otherwise...). I'm very excited to start learning again :)

I'm thinking about getting braids with Barb next week. I know they usually don't look good on white girls, but I'm hoping to find a style that don't look too ridiculous. I've always wanted to try them, and everyone has them here so it won't look out of place (even on a mzungu). It's also incredibly cheap here, 20USD as opposed to the 100$ it usually is in the USA.

I picked up internet today, and I won't mention names, but it's awful. Splotchy, slow, and agitating in general. But, it works sometimes, which is all I need. The MSID office has wifi, so I'll be skyping there. It's about a 40 minute walk away, so it'll be very rare.

I'm watching a random American movie with my family right now (my brother has lots of them, most of them are recent, and I don't watch movies so I haven't seen any of them). It's great bonding- we watched 'Friends with Benefits' last night. It was interesting to watch it with my brother, he got almost all of the random American pop culture references, which I wasn't expecting. American culture really has permeated Kenya.

Ah, I've figured it out- the movie we're watching is 'No Ordinary Family'. Or maybe it's a TV show. I'm really not sure. But I'm going to take a break and relax on the kiti (chair). Until tomorrow!

Mia