The Holidays (Part 2: America)

America: So after a good bit of traveling I finally made it the good ol’ US of A! Nate picked me up at the airport with about 5 layers to bundle myself with and a milkshake to go-talk about a good way to be picked up J I got home on Wednesday night, the night before Thanksgiving and was very warmly greeted by my awesome family! It was soooo good to see them! Thanksgiving morning came early and we headed out with the sun to make it to the York Turkey Trot for a Linde tradition of running with all of cousins before we eat. It was a solid-and very cold-race with maybe 20+ runners who were Lindes or came with a Linde! We ate the day away after that and it was D to the E to the LICIOUS! Of course, football was played as well and a game of tug-o-war of Lindes vs non-Lindes. Hahaha I couldn’t tell you who won either one but I watched with about 5 layers on from the sidelines. I came out with one jacket on but within 20 min as relatives kept looking at me shivering, they would bring me another winter jacket to put on, guess I was more acclimated to Kenyan weather than I thought. The rest of the familys Thanksgiving break was filled with family and food-a most excellent combination! I also got to see BekBek hand over her Miss Solanco crown and perform one last time, which was pretty awesome since I missed last year when she was crowned. I spend the next few days seeing a few friends, running and just hanging out with the family. From Thursday to Sunday I went on a college tour with Sarah. We started off seeing BekBekBek at Messiah and went to a cool church singing thing, Power House, after eating at the cafeteria and we ran in the morning when she was at class. It’s a solid college and seems like the perfect fit for little Beks even if it still a bit weird to think that she’s now starting her 2^nd semester already! I was really happy I got to see her there and meet a few of her friends. We left in the morning, the 3 of us, for PSU to see Stephen. He lives in a house with a few other Navigator guys who all see pretty darn cool. We hung out in his house and cooked lunch and dinner together while also playing a few board games. I also got to witness some of their talents as the practiced for the talent show that evening. Beks and Stephen did a ring toss type thing, Sarah played her violin and Stephen along with 2 of his roomies saying a trio mashup including Davey Jones and Amazing Gace. It was hilarious!! Nate came to pick me up that night to travel back to JC so I could be there for Madrigal the next day. I was able to run with 3 JCXC girls in the morning and then go on a date with Nate for the first time in over 14 months! We ate some super delish Standing Stone sandwiches and then headed out in the cold to explore town. We walked to my old church and saw the nativity scene walk around display and then afterwards we found something else awesome in town. We wandered around ready to head back to watch a Christmas movie before getting ready for the evening when we realized that Huntingdon was having a Christmas parade! Say what?! We had no idea that existed but it lasted between 20 and 30 min and we saw 2 HS bands, some police cars, floats with various Christmas themes and someone dressed as a moose with no explanation. It was pretty random and pretty great. Our day ended with Madrigal as we ate with 3 other couples and a JCXC freshman at Mimis, the classiest place in Huntingdon before hanging out at the dance and the off campus where Nate lives with 2 other guys. It was fun night to dress up and be fashionable in a way I hadn’t been in a looong time! I had gotten a dress made in Kenya with a tie made from the bottom of my dress so we matched perfectly-I loved it. The college tour ended with us driving back to PSU with our friend Kate to see Beka and a JCXC guy, Park, run a half marathon. It was a lot of fun because we ended up having 5 people to cheer for (Bek, her 2 friends, Park and Lugg (both JCXC). We drove back to good ol’ Solanco after the race and it was good we left right away because it ended up snowing a good bit-so much that Solanco had a snow day the next day! My last few days in America was great since my family had a snow day and delay so I got more time to spend with them.

Overall, I ate lots of delish food, saw lots of family and friends and although I was in shock at times with parts overwhelming-it was a grrrreat trip! The most shocking part for me was being in Walmart. There is one store here called ‘Nakumatt’ which is bigger and has a fair amount of stuff in it-but it is not really comparable to Walmart. The grocery store was also a bit overwhelming so I only went once with a list in my hand. The differences in food color, freshness, size and price is crazy! The other thing that blew me away was how I’d forgotten how many different varieties of one food type there are. For example, in Walmart I saw 10 different types of Oreos-how and why?! Or how can there be an entire looong aisle of cereal? I cant even buy cereal in Sipili. I have to travel 1.5 hours to my banking town and then I have 3 options-all expensive though so I never buy it. Another thing I noticed was transportation. I was surprised at how many cars travel with one or two people in them and how much I appreciate the public transportation available in Kenya. Some days I don’t but most I do. The matatus (14-16 passenger vans) wait to fill up before they leave so that they are always traveling with the maximum capacity (even if that means when I travel to Sipili-25+ people in the van). It’s also nice that I can get public transportation to anywhere in the country-even small towns like mine have it available. Lastly, it was crazy how many things had changed in the past 14 months. My family redid the floors, added a walk-in freezer and my sisters grew a foot each it seemed. I saw new buildings when we traveled places and there seemed to be new technology everywhere. It made me think about when I come back to America for good and how many things I’ll have to readjust to. I try not to think about all of the things that are going to be on my ‘to-do list’ for moving back but in a few months I suppose I will have to start. Oy. 

The Holidays (Part 3: Kenya with Nate)

I left America on the 11^th and it would’ve been a lot harder but I lucked out because I was traveling back with my wonderful boyfriend and we had lots of exciting plans ahead of us. It was tough leaving my family all over again but I keep thinking about how I will be home by next Christmas to see them all once more! Nate & I left Dullas and had a 12 hour layover in Amsterdam and were able to walk around, ride the train for a few hours (we couldn’t figure the system out), eat lots of sample cheese, see the flower market & a punch bug and check out the public library for a free view of the city. It was the best layover. We arrived early on the 13^th in Nairobi and traveled pretty easily back to Sipili. We hung out and caught up on sleep before we had to leave for Naivasha 2 days later for my Peace Corps training. I had mandatory training with my group for 3 full days. We basically talked about what we learned from our last year, what we wanted to work on and getting excited for the upcoming year. This was the first time PC had this training for volunteers but I think he decided to because after year one is when volunteers are more likely to early terminate (the other times are right when you arrive at site and 6 months into service). It was alright though I wasn’t a fan of being in sessions from 8-5 every day when Nate was so close and I still couldn’t see him. He ran, read, napped and watched a few movies and got to see some cool animals! We were at the Kenya Wildlife Training Service Training Institute so there were animals everywhere. We saw warthogs out the window, zebras, impalas and gazelle and Nate got to see 3 giraffes one morning. It was really good to see the other volunteers in my group too! It had been a long time and hanging out with them afterwards was lots of fun. After Naivasha we went back to Sipili to relax before my school field trip 2 days after training. Nate got to experience a day in the life at my school with the field trip. The morning started off like most during the year where I had no idea what was going on or what to expect and no one I was asking seemed to know either. We were supposed to be ready at 8 to leave at 9…we left at 11:30ish and headed with 30 kids to Land of Hope, a Laikipia Conservancy. We were supposed to arrive early enough to see some animals but we missed that being as we run on Kenyan time and the Dutch don’t hahaha. Our kids were fitted-or rather inventory was taken-for hearing aids that the group from Holland had brought. They handed out balloons and bubbles afterwards, that were a huge hit!! It was hilarious to watch the little ones try and pick up the balloons or throw them in the air-they loved it. That was pretty much the field trip though only lasted about 1.5 hours. We hopped back on the lorry (basically a truck) and headed the 2 hours back to Sipili on a very dusty and bumpy road-sitting on mattresses in the back of this truck. The kids who lived in Nyahururu left right after getting back to Sipili and so it was very long day for them with little food. The day was an adventure for sure! The next day Nate & I left for Fishermans Camp, Naivasha. We arrived and got a little tent set up for us and we waited. Nothing. An hour and a half of waiting later, we decided to eat our picnic dinner and that’s when it happened. We looked across the fence and we saw our first hippopotamus! And it was HUGE!! On Christmas Eve we left Camp and biked to Hells Gate-a beautiful park filled with lots of wildlife. We biked for about 7 hours and saw the obsidian caves as well as giraffes, zebras, gazelles, impalas, warthogs, antelope and African buffalo. The African buffalo were the scariest because they were in a humongous herd with the biggest ones in the front staring at us. There was a car that we’d passed maybe 15 min before and so we decided to wait for them to pass the buffalo and scare them away. The car arrived and they stopped to ask what we were doing and they laughed but told us it was a good idea because they can be really dangerous animals. Oh snap. We were on bikes and after the car scared them a little bit, we rode past as fast as we could and the people in the car were nice enough to wait a little way ahead to see if we made it okay. We got back to the camp and after a warm shower (the only one Nate was lucky enough to have) we decided to splurge and eat at the one restaurant on the grounds. It was sooo good and it ended with the best treat-we saw 6 hippos that night! That was one Christmas Eve experience I’ve never had before. On Christmas Day we left for Nakuru and walked around, ate some Nyama Choma (fried meat) with ugali and then finished off the night skyping Nate’s family in Pittsburgh. The next morning Nate went running and ended up running 25 min with 3 fast Kenyans out on their morning run-he was so happy! The rest of the morning, we hiked up to Menengai Crater. It’s the 2^nd largest caldera in the world I believe. It took us 2.5 hours to hike up and 2 to hike down-we definitely got our workout in for the day. We relaxed and ate lots of good fruit the rest of the day and ended that night by skyping my family! It was soo good to hear their voices and catch up! We left Nakuru for Sipili the next morning to hang out there for a few days before our New Years adventure. We left for Iten on the 30^th and it was a long travel day. It took us 4 matatus and 8 hours to get there but that was faster than we’d anticipated. When we arrived we weren’t sure where the key would be since we were staying at my friends house but she was in America. We got to the school and ended up going to the graduation party that was held at the school that evening (for people not from the deaf school) and getting a free meal and chai while the principal searched for the spare key. It was eventually found and we were able to sleep at Mackenzies house like we’d planned. Her neighbor at the school we found out is an athlete training there and he offered to take Nate with him on the easy run the next morning-jack pot! At 5:30 the next day Nate & Robert left to meet up with maybe 50 other Kenyans. Nate said they started out at a slower (its all relative) pace but by the end of it some of them were going pretty fast. He estimated they ran around 12ish miles that morning. Robert was impressed Nate stayed with them the whole time. He said he checked his watch at 30 min then 40 then 50 min and was happy to see Nate still holding on. Nate was ecstatic when he got back. Robert invited us over for chai and bread and we chatted a little while we watched some New Years celebrations on TV. Robert ran a 64, I wanna say, half marathon but aspires to run a marathon some day. The rest of the day we spent by relaxing, eating mandazi & more chai, walking around in search of the Olympic Stadium (we found out in mid-afternoon that the stadium is actually in Eldoret-45 min away) and then searching for the one track in Iten though we never found that either. It’s a little town filled to the brim with runners and it was really neat to be there again. The following day before we left Nate went running one more time. This time was a workout. They left around 8:30 and ran a one-hour workout of one min fast then one min easy. Nate kept the top group in eyesight for the first 56 min before he said he fell back a little bit and although when he got back he was tired, he still looked on top of the world. All of the Kenyans kept telling him he only needed to be there for 1-3 months and he’d be so much faster. Maybe one day we’ll go back so we can both train J We got home late that night and then had 2 days of relaxing in Sipili before Nate would fly out. He helped paint the map of Africa. I hate the ladder and so he climbed up and did the 2^nd coat on the word ‘Africa’ and repainted the blue around it and now it looks much better up top and is officially done done done!! We also visited MCs house and he gave us the full tour. He was so excited to hear that Nate is an environmental major and told him a lot of cool stuff about his farm and the plants in it. We left for Naivasha on the 5^th so that on the 6^th Nate could leave in a taxi for the airport at 3:30 am. And just like that, 3 weeks were over, time sure flies when you’re having fun!

Overall the time with Nate here was amazing!!! We had so much fun exploring and seeing new things together. I’m so happy he got to see Sipili, meet my kids briefly and just see beautiful Kenya. Sadly he is arriving back in America today-on the coldest day I hear-but school starts soon for both of us and then time will continue to fly.

Speaking of school tomorrow is the official opening day for Sipili School for the Deaf! I can’t believe my second school year is about to begin! I have no idea when we’ll have our staff meeting and we’ll pick classes or when classes will begin but so it goes. I wish all of you the best with work and school and hope you all survive the cold winter! I can’t believe it’s possible to now say that I will see you all this year since I will be home before next Christmas but I wish you all the happiest 2014 and hope it goes well for us all!

Wishing you all the best and lots of kisses from Kenya,

Love Zabet

Favorite Things of 2013

Howdy Ya’ll J

 I have now officially completed my first school year of teaching. Ever. It was challenging, tough, interesting, hilarious and chock full of crazy experiences! In thinking back on this year, it’s crazy how much happened in Kenya! It has been filled with so much action and I’m hoping things calm down in 2014. We started off the school year with the elections and all us PCVs were consolidated for 2ish weeks. In term 2 there was the 3ish weeklong teacher strike across the country and the Nairobi airport had a fire due to electrical issues. Then in Term 3 there was the awful terrorist attack at Westgate Mall. And now as the term ends, there have been a build-up of riots/unrest on the caost and in Maralal and PC is moving all of those volunteers! Whew! Now here we are in November with the holidays quickly approaching! This school year has taught me a lot and although it has had its fill of rough and tough times, it has also been incredible and awesome too. I want to share with you what I loved this past year-in the spirit of the upcoming holidays-I’m going Oprah on all of you minus the absurd gifts but plus bullet points with fun things hahaha J

So with “raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens…wild geese that fly with the moon on their wings, these are a few of my favorite things…”

Zabet’s Favorite Things from 2013

• Running every day with my kiddos and having one or both of my hands held by the little ones
• Kicking around the futbol with the older boys and seeing all their moves
• Occasionally hearing Elizabeth or mwalimu (teacher) called our while walking in town or getting a run in, instead of mizungu (while running 2 Sundays ago I had, for the 1^st time, 2 separate people call out ‘Hello Elizabeth’!! Dude, that rarely even happened to me in the States)
• Being able to go to market and eat fresh fruit and veggies every day
• Receiving snail mail! Thanks everyone, you guys are the best!!!!
• Treating myself to mac and cheese with hot chocolate for dinner
• Hanging out with MC and his family in Sipili on Sunday afternoons
• Chai twice/day and meat most Thursdays at school
• Experimenting with variations to the classic choco-chip recipe since I haven’t seen a choco-chip since leaving the States haha I add different fruits, oatmeal, spices and cocoa powder-yummm!
• Having Magdaline and the girls play with my hair endlessly and come up with new styles and ‘dos for me while constantly telling me how excited they are at how fast it is growing (I’m equally excited!)
• Seeing the kids play in front of the Africa Map and point out things to their friends that they know about the different places, usually it’s the country name &/or futbol team status
• Making fresh banana bread about once/week after the kids help me successfully light the jiko oven
• The awesome view I can get from almost anywhere in Sipili-makes my runs so amazing!
• Watching my kids dance and getting their groove on-I recently taught some of them the moves for the Macarena- so. so. so. great!
• The kindness in Kenyans. One small example, recently I bought potatoes and a lemon from the lady I go to once or twice a week on average and before I left she handed me a bag of 4-5 tomatoes and a large mango, just ‘cause J Made me smile so big!
• Being able to read a lot & successfully complete 2 puzzles on my own for the first time in my life
• Running with the little 4-6 yr old boys and then having them show me their muscles after maybe 3-5 min to show me how tough and strong they are and how impressed with themselves that they’ve already run so far J
• Hearing my fellow teachers stick up for the students when they go on an outing anywhere to make sure they have an interpreter and that they can all see the interpreter fully
• Experiencing Sipili (as well as other parts of Kenya) in all it’s glory with my sister Sarah and cousin Clarissa!
• Having all of the matatu guys in Sipili and most in Nyahururu know me
• My kids signing or spelling Batman and then asking me if I love him which then ends in fits of giggles
• Being asked if I or Americans in general eat snakes
• Hot bucket baths after making banana bread on my jiko ‘oven’- it’s a double win
• Catching up on enough sleep to hold me over til I’m retired and can get the same amount as I’m getting now! …pretty sure I go to bed earlier than my entire family back in the States….including my sisters who are in elementary school and my all of my grandparents! I’m talking between 8 & 9 is totally normal for me now! Hahahahaha yep.
• Drinking 2 mugs of baby porridge every morning with a fresh banana and making lots of homemade French fries for dinner
• Hearing laughter all the time!! My favorite is at night when the kids have finished dinner and are hanging out outside my kitchen window and the boys laughter floats through and fills my house.
• The support I have from all of my family & friends! I was able to rewatch the video some of you made for me right before I left a few days ago and I still love it! All the letters, packages, FB msgs, emails and little notes that I receive make me feel so blessed and thankful to have you all in my life!!!

To say this year was easy and always fun-filled with my favorite things would not be true. It has been tough and at times really hard to be so far away from family & friends and Americans in general. The things on this list helped me to see the sunny side of things when I was having a rough day. If all your days are great, well that’s awesome, but it makes it much harder to appreciate the little things-even things like a hot shower, a cube of cheap cheese or electricity so you don’t have to take a bucket bath with only a few candles-those things feel ahhhh-mazing when you get them! When I go to a big town once a month where I can meet up with some PCVs, eat cheese or bacon and take one hot shower it’s soo good. I am so incredibly thankful to have this opportunity of a lifetime and as hard as it can be, overall so far, it’s been an amazing experience and I’m head over heels for Sipili and all my students!!!!

Kisses Galore from Kenya,

Elizabeth

My Kenya by the Numbers

I’ve been thinking about this past year and I love stats and wanted to share some that I’ve thought of with you all…my Peace Corps Kenya experience thus far in numbers:

Number of…

• Names I’ve accumulated since arriving: 4 (Zabet, Mwende-my Kikamba name that my host family in Machakos gave me, Nwera-my Kikukyu name that my co-teachers game me and ‘color’ is my KSL name)
• Lindes who have visited Sipili: 2
• Different classes/subjects I’ve taught: 5
• Elephants I’ve seen: 1
• Longest time without using a restroom: 18 hours
• Times I’ve mopped: 3
• Longest amount of days I’ve gone without bathing: 8
• Letters I’ve sent: 223
• Average hours of sleep each night: 9
• Milkshakes I’ve tried: probably around 10 ….milkshakes that have tasted like the ones I grew up with: 0
• Times I’ve known what was happening at school before it happened: Very few
• Marriage proposals: Between 5 and 7 I think
• Most crickets caught within my little house: 5 in 90 min…now I don’t even bother, we’re friendly to each other now
• Pineapples carved like pumpkins: 2
• Cups of chai/day: 2-3 on average
• Longest ceremony attended: 4.5 hours
• Consecutive days that potatoes were my main meal: 7
• Days without seeing an American in person (and only skyping once): 45
• Most letters I’ve received on 1 day: 8
• Days I’ve shaved my legs: 0
• ‘Wedding’ rings I’ve bought to show that Nate & I are ‘truly’ married & I’m taken: 3…total cost? $8
• Weeks school was missed: 3.5 (strike) + 2 (elections/consolidation)
• Hot showers: less than I can count on my fingers and toes
• Choco-chip cookie variations I’ve made up: 14
• Terms of teaching I’ve completed: 3
• Kids I’ve had knock on my door between 6 & 6:30am to return a magazine, get triple antibiotic ointment for a cut I can barely see or to just say hi: countless!
• Students who’ve stolen my heart: 78 :)

Governor & Education Tidbits

Hello Friends and Family J

It’s nearing the end of October and I thought I ought to update you all. The biggest news at my school was the governor’s visit 2 weekends ago. It was all the teachers could talk about it seemed-about getting ready, doing the planning and what exactly would happen when he came. The kids had to help in the school beautification. This meant they moved a lot of rocks, and when I say a lot I mean more than a Kenyan elephant load worth of rocks. They outlined every path, and then the teachers thought the rocks weren’t big enough so bigger rocks were found to substitute. Though that wasn’t the end of it. They then had to rearrange the rocks and move them out to dig a narrow ditch so that the rocks were more in place. After this was all done and a few more paths were added, the rocks were good to go. It did look pretty good at the end and we got a nice ramp/stair set built leading to the staff room for visitors so it was good even if it seemed a bit ridiculous to me at the time. 

The First Governor of Laikpia County (Kenya only recently decided to have governors and such since the newest constitution came out in 2010) came on Sunday with an entourage of people and our school was nicely packed. He told us he’d arrive at 2 p.m after church but since this is Kenya and time is much more fluid, he arrived at 4. They got a tour of the school, officially opened the boys dormitory and planted an indigenous tree in front of it to begin the afternoon. After the tree planting, everyone moved to the big tent and our students provided the entertainment. 5 of the lower primary students signed ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes’, our Class 6 & 7 preformed a dance and song and the scouts did a march sort of performance. They did really well and it was fun to watch them in center stage! We received some money from the event and raised awareness of our school so I’d say overall, the event was great.

The event also helped us raise some money to improve the student’s meals and yesterday they saw the beginning of that with a special meal. It was decided we’d give them one special meal and then improve upon their lunches the rest of the term with a change of foods some days. They will now be eating lentils, rice and more cabbage I think to substitute with their beans, rice and ugali. Their special lunch was very exciting for them all. They ate potatoes, rice, goat, chapatti and I think cabbage and loved it! That was all they could focus on in the morning as the smells came into the classrooms and they knew it was coming! It was quite funny and so my KSL and English lessons that morning revolved around spelling food names and telling stories using food vocabulary J

Next, I want to share an article that was in the Daily Nation newspaper last Thursday. It sheds some light on education in Kenya. I think it’s pretty interesting and if you want to know more about the history of education in Kenya, it is a good place to start. You can read the article for the full story but here are just a few points that stood out to me:

• Kenya has the largest education system in East Africa with 28,000 primary schools, 7,000 secondary schools & 60 universities/colleges
• Enrolment in 1963 had 892,000 pupils in primary schools-now there are 9.5 million & in ’63 there were 30,000 pupils in secondary schools but now there are 1.8 million
• Free Primary Education (FPE) came into action in 2003
• There are still almost 2 million school-age students not in school and who can’t access basic education
• The quality of basic and even higher education is very low compared to other countries with the same or lower GDP per capita as Kenya. 
• The teacher-pupil ratio at primary school is about 1:80 instead of the required 1:40 in a developing country like Kenya
• Most teachers are demotivated and remain in the classrooms just because there is no better alternative

http://www.nation.co.ke/kenya50/education/-/2032870/2035180/-/cmnrnp/-/index.html

Speaking of school, I had a crazy realization this week as my kids asked about when they get to go home and realized that we only have a few more weeks of Term 3 left! As of today we have 3 weeks left because we end on 13^th December (Wednesday)! I can’t believe how fast time is flying by!!

And a fun fact to leave you all with…I recently learned that Kenya only had one radio station up until 2002! They could only tune into KBC (Kenya Broadcasting). Now they have stations galore!

I wish you all a very merry Halloween and hope to see some pictures of super awesome costumes! If any of you have punny/clever/outrageous costume ideas, please do tell J Hope you all get some delicious candy and are having a happy autumn!

Lots of kisses,

Lizabeth

Hodgepodge of News from September

Hello Friends J

 I realized it’s been about a month since I last wrote a blog and wanna fill you all in on the happenings of Sipili.

The biggest news in Kenya right now is the terrorist attack at the Westgate Mall. Thankfully no PCVs were there that day and all are safe. It’s a true tragedy what happened and the police are still investigating though some suspects have been caught and some died in the attack. I don’t want to comment on the actual attack because I wasn’t there and don’t want to give false information. However, if you want more details on it there are plenty of articles online. If you want a Kenyan perspective you can check out the Daily Nation Paper website (nation.co.ke) which I prefer. The part I do want to comment on is to say how incredible it is hearing and seeing Kenyans have come together. They’ve been showing pictures on the news of Kenyans lined up in super long lines to donate blood all over in Nairobi particularly but also across Kenya. The Red Cross made a plea for blood with so many people injured and Kenyans reacted right away. More acts of kindness were shown with people who came out to offer free chai, lunch or snacks for the volunteers in the rescue missions. It really brought the people together. You can see ‘#WeAreOne’ just about everywhere and the Kenyan colors on everything. Everyone is and has helped out in whatever way they could. The President announced a 3 day mourning period after the attack stopped and the healing process has begun. We live in a crazy world where horrible things can happen but seeing what people do afterwards and during is the intriguing part. It is so cool to see all the Kenyans coming together, wearing their national colors and helping each other. Kenyans are one!

Speaking of coming together, school is back in session! I finished the Africa painting with a second coat on everything except for the title. I don’t particularly like ladders to begin with but being on the one at my school without the kids was not on my list of things I’d like to do. Thankfully I have a sweet boyfriend who is willing to do the second coat when he comes to visit and than it will officially be complete! Term 3 is maybe 3 weeks in by now and things are rocking and rolling. We lost 5 students to transferring but we gained 5 new students I believe. All of the new students are in the Classes 1 or 2 so I don’t have any of them but they’re all super cute! Only one of the little boys knows a little sign whereas the others mostly just mimic what you sign to them or nod and smile at whatever you say. They’re adorable and most are missing a few teeth which only adds more to their cuteness J

The most exciting thing so far for me this term actually happened with running. There is a boy named Moses but his nickname is Bean and he’s in Class 4. He is hearing but has other mental disabilities. He doesn’t write or sign much though he will respond to Kiswahili. He is always running around and has a fascination with doors and locks and has many a time locked me into my house. Thankfully there is a window by my door that I can stick my hand out of and open the door J He has an immense amount of energy and I wasn’t sure how I could best help him. Every day I run with the kids though now it’s a main group of about 5-8 girls from Class 2,4 & 5. Last Wednesday the girls took off and Bean started running off too. He’s done this before but normally we turn him around and he goes back but not Wednesday. He’d gotten about a minute into the run and we decided what the heck, let him come along and we’ll see how long he lasts. 3 of the girls in Class 5 ran with us and held is hand around turns to make sure he went the right way. It was awesome. The loop usually takes us 15-20 minutes to do and Bean ran the whole time! The girls wanted to do 2 loops so I took Bean back to school and told the other teacher there what he had done and after a high five he told me to take him again if I was going to do two loops anyways and see if he could do it. So we left the school again and went for lap two. Bean blew me away! He walked maybe a minute the whole two laps!! And he kept a pretty even pace, which is more than the girls I run with every day can say. I mean they’re all elementary school age so even pace is rarely found but he just laughed the whole way and kept on truckin’ J It was sooo amazing, made my day!

The big news from today is baptism! I went to church with my students, three of the other teachers as well as the two housemothers around 9:30 this morning. The service itself was long (10-1:30) but I was happy to see my headmaster and the sister interpreting this Sunday. We have a sister who comes every Tuesday to teach a class called PPI, which is basically teaching them about Catholicism since we are a Catholic-sponsored school even though we’re still a public school. Anyways, we had all but 5 students from Classes 5,6 & 7 as well as a vocational student and the our Deaf mother/workers baby get baptized. It was by far the largest group I’d ever seen and my first time seeing a Catholic baptism. It was really neat! 30 of my students got baptized in front of the church they go to every weekend while at school and it was awesome to witness. They had water poured on their heads, a necklace put on; oil anointed on their foreheads and the candle they were holding was lit. A cool experience and I’m so happy for my students!

On a totally different and not happy note, I wanted to share this article from the Daily Nation that I read this week about Uganda. It’s utterly outrageous. The gist of it is comments made while talking to youth from the Ugandan Youth Affairs Minister Ronald Kibule on rape. “Addressing youth in Kajara County, Ntungamo District on Saturday, Mr Kibule said the police should instead charge the victims with inviting the crime. The minister said the police must scrutinize each rape case reported to them to establish the dress code of the victim. He added once it is established that the victim was indecently dressed, the suspect should be set free.” Gah!! Don’t worry; he continues with his thought, it gets better. “When journalists called him Tuesday evening to verify these reports, the minister reiterated his position, noting that indecent dressing was “an open invite to rapists”. Say whatttt?! C’mon now! He stuck by his answer! I mean props I guess for sticking with what you said but of all the things to stick with, jeez louise!  He goes on to say that “Most women currently dress poorly especially the youth. If she is dressed poorly and is raped, no one should be arrested. Asked to define what amounted to indecent dressing, the minister listed mini-skirts, bikinis and tight jeans.” Well there’s the dress code for basically all the youth in America and what I’m imagining is quite a few youth in Uganda. Thankfully a female Prime Minister stepped up and said “I don’t support wearing of miniskirts but on the other hand a man who is normal cannot go and rape a woman because she is putting on a miniskirt. He should have self-control,” said Mbarara Woman MP Emma Boona. And another lady was quoted, Ms Rita Aciro, the executive director at Uganda Women’s Network who said “It is unfortunate that we have such leaders in this country. Does he know that there are laws in this country against rape?” she said. “He is obviously misleading many men by saying that it is okay for them to go ahead and rape women who put on short skirts. 
“Mr Kibule should come out and issue an apology to the people of this country. We live in a civil society that respects people’s rights”. You go girls! It’s hard for me to fathom someone-especially the Youth Minister-telling youth that if they’re raped and wearing clothes that might seem scandalous; the rape is their fault! What kind message is that?! I don’t understand one bit and I hope he makes a statement clearing things up in the very near future. That cannot be what the youth need to hear and I can’t see it helping anyone except the people getting away with rape. And if you want to read the whole article (though I’ll tell you I ended up copying most of it) it’s here: (http://www.nation.co.ke/news/africa/-/1066/2006934/-/90jek4z/-/index.html)

Lastly, to end this blog on a happier note, I wanted to give a shout out to Lindenhof Farm! Dad recently got a call from a chef at LiveNation who said that Jack was doing a ‘greening tour’ and wanted only locally-sourced, sustainably-raised meats for dinner before his show in Philly. They talked and bought 25lbs of our chicken to make dinner for Jack freakin’ Johnson and his entourage! Just wanna throw it out there that you can enjoy the same kind of meat that Jack Johnson ate this Thanksgiving or any day you want, with a delicious turkey from Lindenhof Farm…just sayin’ J I mean I might be a little bias towards it but it’s pretty tasty stuff and after only cooking tofu at my house and occasionally eating meat that’s been hung without refrigeration, it’ll probably taste even better when I get back to the states!

Happy Almost October to everyone! Wanna know something nuts? In 4 days I will have been in Kenya for exactly one year-how crazy is that?!!!! SO COOL AND CRAZY!

Lots and lots of kisses from Kenya,

Zabet

Punch Bug Theory

I’ve figured it out! Took me a while but I finally cracked the code! I figured out whom I feel like a lot of times when I’m wandering around Sipili or other smaller towns in Kenya. Guess who? Punch bugs! Didja get the light bulb action like I did? If not, let me explain a little.

Punch bugs in small towns in America are like mizungus in small towns in Kenya for the following reasons:

• Children get excited to see you and hit whoever is next to them to point you out while simultaneously yelling out ‘mizungu/punch bug’.
• They both get stared at often by whomever they happen to be passing at the time
• There are usually only a few in each town-if they have them at all-so though people know you’re there and have seen you many times- they still stare a little when you pass
• Parents also can get excited and point/yell them out to their children so the children-if they were about to miss the opportunity-can yell at the moving punch bug/mizungu and then follow that up with hitting/punching their friend/sibling yelling out what they saw
• Parents also sometimes get into the game of seeing them first and it can become a competition between parent and child as well. They both come in multiple colors, different shapes and sizes, and may have been around for a while but they’ll always be part of the punch bug/mizungu game to the majority of people living there.
• Some people dream of owning them or marrying them even if they don’t know how to drive stick or if the only conversation they’ve had is ‘Hi, my name is ______. Will you marry me?’ because they look cool/different.
• The name ‘mizungu or punch bug’ is always called out to identify said thing to all surrounding people to let them know there has been a spotting
• If you go on vacation or travel a little bit and people don’t see you for a while-when you do come back-the excitement rises substantially. Same thing when children are on school break and playing outside and they see one-it becomes the most exciting thing in the world for a short while and that much more attention is thrown onto said thing.
• Lastly, and I’m only hypothesizing here since I cant read a VW Bugs mind, but I bet they also kinda play the game when they see foreign punch bugs in town the same way mizungus hit their friend to point out the new mizungu in town if they don’t recognize them and are intrigued J

That’s all I got but I think it’s a pretty substantial list and I’m sticking to my theory J  Hahaha just think about this next time you see a VW Bug driving around your town. Now you know how they might be feeling.