Mail Day

Today I got the mail. I know you all might be thinking, oh, hey, me too, but getting the mail is a bit different here. It’s an adventure in itself. During the school year the deputy principal checks the mailbox most Mondays and Thursdays. She’ll bring me the mail since she lives in Kinamba and it’s easy for her to check. However, during breaks, it’s up to me to go to Kinamba if I want mail during the month long break.

I woke up, checked my email, drank my 2 cups of hot delcious porridge and decided that I would check my mail today. It had been 15 days so I was hopeful there would be some to collect. At 9:30 in the morning I left my house and went to the matatu stage. Loud Kikuyu music was blasting from the matatu as I climbed in and sat next to an elderly lady on my right. I sat and waited on that matatu for one hour before we started to head out of town. We were already full but as we left town we kept stopping to pack more people in. I ended up with a 4 year little boy on my lap whose mother was 2 women to the left of me with her daughter on her lap. That is one thing I love about matatu rides here. If you have more than one child, you automatically just put them on whatever stranger has an available lap, no questions asked. We ride in bumpy silence for maybe two thirds of the way before the lady directly to my left looks at me and starts laughing. She apparently can’t hold it in any longer. She begins telling the mother that her boy is sitting on a mizungus lap and the mother starts laughing and tells her son. Her son we realized at that point, also hadn’t noticed he was on my lap yet because he had on one of those winter caps that has a pom pom on top, covers your ears and ties under your chin, thereby hindering his peripheral vision. He comically turns around very slowly and his eyes got very wide. He smiled with only his mouth and then slowly turned back around, unsure of what he wanted to do. He kept half turning back for the next 5 minutes to ever so slyly glance at me before he decided he was ok with sitting on my lap and went back to enjoying the ride. We arrive at Kinamba, only 8 kilometers away from Sipili, but 30 minutes later and tumble out like clowns stuffed in a Volkswagen. I walk to the Posta, only a 5-7min walk, and hear at least 15 ‘Hey mizungu!’s along the way. Thankfully when I got there postmaster Ann was able to retrieve my mail for me and hit me up with some stamps. She’s great; we’re on a name-to-name basis and she helps me out since I lost my mail key. So I’m happy with my mail and I head back to wait for another matatu. I am suddenly surrounded my men offering me a ride on their motorcycle (piki piki). I turn them all down, one because Peace Corps doesn’t allow us to ride them and two, because the boy who asked me the most looked to be only about 15 years old. Not someone I was willing to trust my life with just yet. Thankfully, I did’t have to wait too long at the stage. I had just finished telling them all my name and that I was from America as a matatu pulls up. Once again we are shoved in like sardines. It’s odd to think how normal this has become for me to have half my body squashed underneath the person sitting on either side of me like we’re pringles while someone else has their legs pushed in my back because I was stuck in the seat where there is no seat (aka the small open space that is where people walk to get to the back two rows but when the matatu is moving has a small wooden plank to sit on). I think one person got out at the Kinamba stop but 4 of us got in, including a man carrying a live chicken in a biscuit box. Yes, you read that right. Normally when people here carry chickens, they just have their legs tied together and then hold them on their laps or put them under the seat…which can cause much shock in a person when they move their legs and feel a flutter of feathers and a loud squawk in the middle of a journey. Nope, not this guy. He had this box that was a bit thinner and maybe an inch longer than your average shoebox, with twine tied around like a Christmas present and a little hole in the front where the chickens head poked out. Entertaining yet effective. We rode home with at least 5-6 people (1-2 kids were piled on top) in every row (of a normal, supposed to have 3 people in each row) van. We finally make it back to Sipili and after picking up some bananas, I was on my walk back home. I turn the corner where there is maybe 300 meters before I reach my school when this guy catches up with me. I thought he was one of the workers working on building the kitchen/dining hall when he started a conversation with me. He looked to be in high school but maybe he had just entered college and was on break? He asked my name, if I was American and if I worked at the school. Then he was out of questions. We make it to the school when he stops and I find out he isn’t a worker. He wants my contact info. I told him I didn’t have a phone. He says he wants us to be together. I tell him sorry, I’m married. He says he needs me. He wants me. Literally all I know about him is his first name. I tell him sorry. He looks at me and tells me that if I find any other white Americans who are looking for a husband to find him and he’ll be their guy. I nod and say ok. It’s now noon, I left my house 2.5 hours earlier and now one thing can be checked off for my day: get mail. J What a morning.

It’s weird to think about how easy it is to get mail or even stamps in the U.S. If I want my mail here, I either have to travel to Kinamba or wait for my deputy to bring it. If I want to mail something, I have to remember to buy my stamps when I go to Nyahururu. I can give mail to my deputy to send but only if they’re pre-stamped because by the time she makes it back to Kinamba at night, the post is closed. The Kinamba Posta is open only Mondays-Fridays, 9-5 with a lunch break of an hour or hour and a half. So going during the school year is pretty much impossible. Then in Nyahururu I can buy stamps but the Posta is closed on Sundays as usual and on Saturdays they are only open from 9-12.

I’m not writing this for sympathy or to make you feel bad for having your mailbox so close or whatever, I just wanted to tell you about my mail day. I find it interesting how different little things can be sometimes between here and in America. The big things are easy to notice and hear about like the food, or transportation or the weather but it’s the little things and way of living that I find intriguing. If you would’ve told me before I came to Kenya that it would take me a good part of my morning to get the mail, I’d have told you, you’re crazy. And yeah, sometimes the ways things take time can feel bothersome but it’s what needs to happen and it’s the way things go so you just gotta roll with it J I wish you all a happy Tuesday and mail day! I’d also like to wish you a Happy (almost) Easter, a Happy (almost) Earth Day next Tuesday and a Happy (almost) World Malaria Awareness Day on the 25^th of April!

Many Kisses from Kenya,

Elizabeth

A Sheep, a Rat and an Umbrella

Hello Hello Everyone!

    It’s high time I filled you all in on the latest happenings here in Sipili and I hope that you are all doing fabulously this fine April day. Ok, so first off, I wanted to tell you all that the walk has been postponed. There were many things that came into making the decision but it was decided that it would be best to postpone it and now we are hoping to do it in May. And it really has to be done in May if I’m going to have enough time to fill out the grant so fingers crossed it all works out!! It’s good that we have the majority of the leg work done and we mainly just need to work on raising more awareness and fine tuning some details.

   School has officially ended for Term 1 and I am on break! On our last day, Wednesday, our headmaster bought a sheep to celebrate a great term. He brought in a little basket on the back of his motorcycle, how most animals here are carried long distances, and we ate it and it was great! He, along with a few of the students and the cook, did all of the slaughtering while all of the students watched. It was really neat at one point when all of the innards were out and he did a science lesson. I mean it was a bit more ‘practical’ than most anatomy lessons I’ve heard/seen but overall good. At one point he was blowing into the ventricle of the heart so the students could watch it rise and fall and then one of the students got a chance to do it too. It was still bloody, veryyyy fresh and not cleaned at all but they all seemed to be enjoying themselves. They cooked it and we ate it with ugali for lunch. Then later that evening the boys housemother knocked on my door with some more sheep for me to try. I looked under the plate and basically saw the skull and then dropped my jaw. Hahaha nah but it was not what I was expecting when she asked if I wanted some more meat to eat. She then cut me off a piece of the tongue which was a fetching color of recent death but was surprisingly sweet. Then she cut me off a piece of the head which was pretty good considering I was eating it while staring at the head of an animal I’d just heard baa-ing a few hours earlier hahaha oh man. It was an interesting but tasty day.

Here’s a short story for you all: So a few days ago I woke up and went into my kitchen and found things strewn about. My spice bottles were knocked over, a cup was on the ground, the plastic bags I buy my eggs in were everywhere-basically, it was not the way I left it the night before. I didn’t want to admit it but I knew it was one of three things: a lizard/gecko, an unusually giant bug or a mouse/rat. Seeing as I’ve only seen super sized bugs on the coast, I figured it probably wasn’t one of those (thankfully!) and it had been colder that day and I hadn’t seen many lizards so I’m doubting it was one of those. I start questioning where this mouse is…is it in my bed? Is it on my head? Is it on the chair? Did he come in as a dare? Oh man, I didn’t know. I knew how it had gotten in because there is a water pipe leading from the outside to my bathroom to my kitchen and then through my wall to the boys dormitory bathroom and they made the hole for the pipe a bit larger than it needed to be….big enough for a small mouse/rat to easily climb through. I needed a plan. I knew I wasn’t going to get a cat like some volunteers do when they have rat problems, because, well, then I’d have a cat problem seeing as I don’t like cats at all. So I scratched that idea. Then I decided to attempt to nail 3 pieces of cardboard to the wall. Well, my nailing skills are pretty awful and every time I’d think I had a piece up and start on the next one, the first one would fall down. I decided to just cram the cardboard into the hole. I’m pleased with myself at this point with my genius idea. I go sit down at my computer and start watching Friends when after an episode or two, I hear the sound of gnawing and cardboard being eaten. I look up and see the bug spray and start spraying the cardboard like it’s nobodys business. I feel like that’ll do it but I’m not as sure anymore since my first plan was such a bust. That’s when I came up with my last and final plan. I made maybe 8 trips out my door to find rocks and started piling them up in the corner to block the water pipe hole. I felt like a really bad architect because I ended up redoing the pile at least 4 or 5 times cause it kept falling down or it wouldn’t go high enough to actually serve a purpose. But I won in the end because the tower is built, the bug sprayed cardboard is still intact and there are rocks on either side so no little mouse can get into my house…at least through that entrance. Whabam! Peace Corped!

Speaking of buildings and how they’re built, kind of at least, there is a new being built on our school compound. The nice Italian man who sponsors our school in various ways with his church from back in Italy has sponsored our school to have a new kitchen and dining hall built. We don’t have a dining hall now and our kitchen is pretty old so this is fantastic. It’s also pretty cool for me to watch. I’ve seen plenty of buildings being built, but only when passing by. This is the first time I’m seeing a building start from scratch and I get to see the progress every single day. I just find it interesting to watch.

This break I’m very excited for my little vacation I’m taking with 2 friends. In a few weeks I’m heading down to Zanzibar with 2 girls from my group for the week. Well we’ll be on a bus for 16hours on two of those days plus an hour and a half long ferry ride to get there but I’m crossing my fingers for beautiful scenery along the way. I’m not really sure what we’re doing/where we’re going on the island but exploring and beach-going at the two main things. It’s going to be fabulous J While I’m not in traveling, I’ll be hanging around my town just doing whatever. I hope to do some arts and crafts, puzzles, hang out with MC and his family and read a lot. And speaking of arts and crafts, the other day I started and completed my first project. I bought an umbrella in Nyahururu and made a skirt! I cut off all of the fabric from the wiring. Then I spent maybe a half hour attempting to follow the direction I found on wikiHow on how to make an umbrella skirt but I couldn’t figure it out so I just cut up all the pieces and sewed them back together. There is a drawstring and a tiny button at the top and it goes to my knees. I’m excited because I’ve wanted to make one for a while now but never got around to it until now. And the cool part is that it doesn’t look like it used to be an umbrella, you can really only tell when you feel the fabric or hear it swish when I walk. I love it and I would suggest anyone of you trying it if you are looking for a fun pretty easy project or if you just want a new skirt. And the best part is that I only paid 300shillings for the umbrella and 25shillings for the thread, which equals about 4ish dollars for a skirt!! I got an umbrella-ella-ella-ey-ey-ey!

Lastly, I would like to give a HUGE shout out to Angie and the 8^th graders at Swift Middle School!!! In case any of you were unable to make it last Friday evening, there was a big poetry blow-out! I missed it sadly, but I heard there was poetry you could look at and walk by to read as well as a poetry concert where poetry was made into songs and read aloud. They raised money through donations and all of the money is going to help our school raise money for a bus!!!!! Once the grant is on the Peace Corps website then the money will go onto it as the grants money is raised strictly from overseas donations and so now we are a good chunk along the way! Thank you to everyone who was able to attend and donate and give their blessings!!!! Thank you thank you thank you!!!!!!!!!!!

Well that’s about all I can think of right now but I think you should all write me an update with what’s going on in your lives! I’ll even give you my address again in case some of you forgot J

Elizabeth Linde

Sipili School for the Deaf

Box 199

Kinamba-20320

KENYA babyyyyy!

Kisses from Kenya,

Zabet