Your Tax Dollars At Work

Hello from Kenya! As most of you know, I've arrived in-country and I'm finally settling in and getting into the swing of pre-service training for the Peace Corps. I finally have an internet connection that's somewhat useable, so here is my first mass email to say I'm alive and well and enjoying kale and maize a lot. Apologies for everyone who received my last email as a forward...you weren't "forgotten"; the computer kept dropping my connection so I only had time to email a few people.

I got a cell phone! Please send me text messages if possible; this is the cheapest for me and probably for you too, though some providers in the U.S. seem not to
accept my text msgs (sorry Joyce, Lynn and Phillippa; I sent you sms and looks like you didn't get them or you're ignoring ;p). You can also call me; I will try to keep my phone on between 7pm-9pm Kenya time.

And since email here is pretty unreliable, please write me (send envelopes, not boxes as large items tend to get opened, raided, and/or taxed heavily), send snacks and other small goodies because getting mail is truly a slice of heaven here, as are Snickers and Twix bars and any type of ethnic food/snacks. Will someone please send me a folding map of the world as well? Keep mail small, though, i.e. send only 1-2
items at a time.

[my name], Peace Corps Trainee
P.O. Box 30518
Village Market, 00621
Nairobi, Kenya

Things are going really well so far, I'm slowly learning Swahili (Eric B, it's "pole pole" not "apoly apoly") and accepting the fact that by Kenyan standards I'm a complete failure as a woman b/c I can't wash clothes, peel sugar cane, pound maize with a mortar and pestle, sift grains in a straw tray, make chapati (a local flatbread like flaky greasy naan), mop the floor, carry 20 Liters of water on my head, wash a baby or light a charcoal stove. All of these moments of self-discovery were accompanied by a chorus of Kenyan laughter since the whole village always
comes out to watch when a rumor circulates that I'm doing any of these things.

This past week we started going into the community and talking to locals about public health and HIV/AIDS. It has been interesting to hear firsthand what community
members know and don't know about the disease, as well as about some of the local customs and values. It's really true that many people, especially in rural areas like the town we are training in, believe that AIDS either doesn't exist or it's God's way of punishing people for something, and the science of transmission and prevention isn't something they are willing to accept. The good news is that there has also been a lot of progress made in educating people, and most people have some notion of how AIDS is spread. There are also lots of campaigns to educate kids in schools, but most of it is abstinence-based. Pole pole (slowly slowly) as they say here.

Anyway, my PC buds are waiting on me for dinner so I'll sign off for now. Hope all is well! Will try to write again soon.

Karibu Kenya!!! Hello Hello Hello Hello Hello!!!

Hey everyone!!! Let me just say I'm happier than every one of you combined to finally be on email!! There is only one connection here in Kitui and it is unreliable
at best. So apologies for a rambling email and for the huge mailing list that's missing people (please forward this to anyone not on the list, i'll try to
bcc next time). I'm alive! I'm alive! And well. Very very well. We're two weeks into pre-service training and I'm settling into my new homestay with a Kenyan host family. I have lots of stories to tell but I only have time to slap out a few bits of info (sorry):

1. I have not been able to read anyone's emails, sorry. I will try when I have a faster connection. Please don't send me any forwarded jokes or large files for awhile as I have tons of mail to sort through.

2. Therefore, please write me!! And you can include a small item (1 or 2 only) in there if you'd like; they won't charge a tax if it's in a small padded envelope.
Appreciated items: chocolate, clif bars, photos, cheese, newspaper clippings, anti-bacterial gel, 1-2 pairs of chopsticks to demo for my host family. The address is the Peace Corps headquarters in Nairobi:

[My Name], Peace Corps Trainee
P.O. Box 30518
Village Market, 00621
Nairobi, Kenya

3. Thanks Mom and Dad for your message and sorry I haven't been able to contact you sooner. I miss you!

4. I am going to try to get a cell phone soon so you'll be able to call or text me. Will keep you posted.

Anyway, I am late for class so I'm signing off. Twenty five words or less, my experience so far: I introduced my host family to peanut butter last night (they loved it) and I found out that the black crunchy things in the honey we've been eating are bees. I have no electricity or running water so I'm getting good at
using kerosene lamps (thanks Zafar for all the LED flashlights!!) and scaring the cucarachas back into the hole in the choo (choo=pit latrine in Swahili). My new name in the local dialect (Kikamba) is Mutanu. It means Happy Girl.

Hope all is well back in the U.S. I miss everyone! Write me write me write me - snail mail.

Malaria is a Very Bad Sick

("Malaria is a Very Bad Sick" is a song kids in Cameroon learn in school)

Today was the first ful day living with a host family, and you'll be happy to know that I've done nothing to diminish the stereotype of the incompetent American. I took my first bucket bath today, to the amusement of my host parents and later, the whole neighborhood. Apparently you are not supposed to dump the bathwater over your head and let it cascade down your body as the grand rinsing finale. Normally one's whole neighborhood wouldn't know all about one's bathing incompetence except that the bathroom is right next to the kitchen which is next to my parents' bedroom, and then my baba hosted a nine-hour meeting in front of the house, during which everyone basically talked about the mzungu and stared at me. At one point there were about eight adults and 15 kids watching the mzungu sit in a chair. Later they watched the mzungu wash the dishes. ("Do you know how to wash dishes?" -"Yes." -"With your hands?") Later they watched the mzungu put on a flip-flop to show that she knew to put the thong part between her first and second toe. Later mzungu Amber and mzungu Shinita came over and everyone watched the wazungu (more than one mzungu=wazungu) talk to each other.

So it is day two and the homestay experience still has the freshness of day two of camping. People and kids walked for miles to come over to our house to meet the mzungu. Nearly everyone can speak to me in English, and the one that don't are mainly limited by their shyness. Well, actually they are limited by my incompetence in Swahili. The first thing they always ask is, "Are there poor people in America?" And when I say yes, they don't believe me. So after the fifth time I say yes, they say, "Oh, I thought everyone in America was a billionaire."

My homestay brother asked if people in rural America farm their land. I said some do, but most farmland now is owned by big corporations that use machines to do the work. He said that since American kids don't have to stay at home to help with the chores like in Kenya, that all American kids must be so smart and well-educated. HA! Laziness is a difficult concept to explain to people in a country where kids say "no" if you ask whether they're happy that today is a school holiday. I said, "Some kids don't want to study, instead they go to parties or get into trouble." My brother just looked confused. Kids here are really obedient and so far I have yet to see one cry.

Under the Mosquito Net

Habari gani from Kitui, Kenya! Tonight is the first night of homestay, which means that for the first time I'm not staying in luxurious Peace Corps subsidized accommodations. I'm staying with a lovely Kenyan family who has graciously offered to let a crazy and stupid American crash in their home for ten weeks. It has been a little under a week and I used my first African squat toilet ten minutes ago. Host families are from the Kenyan middle class, so even my homestay accommodations are quite cushy (although my family only owns one knife). This family's choo (pit latrine) actually has a thin piece of rope hanging from the window (the choo has a window!) so you can hold on while you "help yourself," - Kenyinglish for using the loo. also Kenyan are the terms "short call" - to pee - and "long call" - to poop.

My homestay baba is a mason so his home is particularly nice, a cement structure gleaming among his neighbors' mud huts. So far I'm the local celebrity in my neck of the village, and everywhere I go there are always 20 kids following me and touching my hair. The first Swahili word I learned, of course, was mzungu - white person. They call all foreigners mzungu, including Black Americans. So right now I can't tell if everyone actually thinks I'm white or if they don't have enough Asians in Kenya to come up with a racial slur for us yet. Either way, my Swahili won't be good enough to explain Pacific rim immigration to America for awhile, so they will have to think whatever they think for now.

So far we have had some basic culture, language and health/safety training, but the intensive technical training for our jobs begins on Thursday. My baba and one of my brothers borht speak more English than I speak Swahili, but I think we'll be mostly smiling and nodding at each other for at least another week.

Anyway, the Peace Corps has eased us into Kenyan life so gradually that I've felt very little culture shock so far. The biggest changes I've had to get used to are being around religious people, being around people who are more reserved than me (more reserved than ME!) and having to pretend that underwear doesn't exist. In orther words, you can't hang underwear outside to dry, they must hang in your room...and if you have someone else do your laundry, you never give them your underwear to wash because they'll return them to you hidden - and unwashed - among the rest of your clean clothes. I do have a bit of Peace Corps paranoia after those health and safety sessions though...every itch feels like scabies, every matau (public transport minibuses) is a rusty death trap full of passengers carrying TB, every mostquito is carrying malaria, every kid who shakes my hand just wiped his ass with it, every dog has rabies, and everyone in Nairobi is waiting to rob you.