Church, Milkshakes, Life Skills and Exercising :)

Well I don’t know where to start because I feel like I’ve seen and learned so much this week but I’ll try to hit the highlights.

Let’s see, sessions have been really good. This week we had a lot of KSL (Kenyan Sign Language) as well classes about lesson plans and schemes of work. There was also some on coping skills and learning about the Deaf culture. Interesting stuff!

And speaking of interesting, I went to church for the first time here with my Host Mama! It was pretty great-an experience for sure. Parts of it were longer than I was expecting but overall good. It was 2.5 hours but thankfully she took me to the English service. Most churches here have one service in English and then another in Kiswahili and sometimes one in Mother Tongue. It was a protestant church called African Inland Church and there was a full congregation! The singing was uplifting, loud and powerful! The preacher was similar with a real passion for the Lord and just a love of his church and everything around him!

The only weird part came at the end. The preacher kept talking about a visitor that was coming, this professor, who was running late (Kenyan time for sure) and showed up near the end of the service. So after the benediction the preacher introduced him, his wife and the 5-6 other people that came with them. I think his wife had gone to university in Machakos and they loved the place. They talked about how they weren’t asking for money but that they had come because they wanted to greet everyone and see how they worshipped. Well that was fine until he subtly put in there that he was a presidential candidate! Say whattttt?! I’m pretty sure everyone else in church already knew that he was but it took me by surprise. The kicker was when he asked if everyone believed in their prayers being answered by God, naturally everyone raised their hands with a yes. Then he said that they should ask God about whom to vote for and said that if they ask, he is sure that God will say him! Talk about culture shock for me. After church I asked my Mama about him coming and she said that politics aren’t allowed in the church but because that wasn’t his main reason (his main reason being that he loved God and wanted to experience the fellowship of the church) it was all ok! Oy, I have so much to learn.

On another note, I tried a milkshake here for the first time...but it was a bust-sadly but not surprisingly. They didn’t have chocolate and so I opted for the strawberry. I ended up getting cold strawberry milk….though I’m not positive it was all actually milk. No ice cream or even ice was involved in the making of the so-called-shake and it reminded me of those cheap wafer cookies haha oh well. Whoever finds a way to send milkshakes to Africa-hit me up, I’ll be a test rat for your invention ;)

This past weekend I learned & worked on some solid life skills, which I feel, is always a good thing…especially since we are working on being able to live alone in Kenya. So I hand washed my own clothes successfully; purified my own water; learned how to tie a tie and watched how to make: ugali, masala chai, sukuma (kale dish) and a chicken dish. The chicken was from our front yard and I saw everything except for when Kelly (the house help who lets me watch everything she does and then explains it to me) killed it. She called me outside and there is a chicken with no head in a bucket. For the first time, (which was odd since I come from a farm that sells poultry pre-plucked) I saw a chicken be plucked then broken up into pieces and then put in a stew. I don’t know at what point in my service here that I’ll be able to kill-pluck-eat a chicken for dinner but we shall see, maybe by the time I come back I’ll be so pro at it, I can set up a butcher shop at home and help out in a different way with the family business? ;)

Sunday was a great but full day! I was able to RUN for the first time IN KENYA!!! I got a solid 40 minutes in at 6 a.m. J I had been worried about if I’d be allowed/it would be safe and then this weekend I got the a-ok! I’m glad I waited for 2 weeks of being in Machakos, a total of 21 days since I’ve been with the Peace Corps before embarking on a run because I felt safer knowing my way around. My body felt out of shape and I was definitely dehydrated but it was just so good to be running…and doing it in Kenya!!

Lastly, on Sunday I went on a crazy hike to the top of this giant hill/almost mountain with Jocelyn and Carla. It started off with a bang when we saw a shiny green old VW bug (my 2^nd since being here) and only got better! We weren’t really told which path to take but we knew we wanted to go up. So we started and going up we took a shorter path but it was steep. We met this guy who was walking up the path with a little girl on his back…the people who live up the mountain impress me so much with their strength! He told us that if we went over this little mound and took a short detour we could see some tribal dancing. The next part was surreal!!! I felt like I was in the National Geographic for Kenya. We were in this dome hut thing and they were having lessons for either drum or dance and gave us a show! Three elderly women, Joseph, a man in his 40s who was the teacher and a bunch of super cute kids got dressed in some of their garb, got their drums going and danced a traditional dance for us! Then when they were getting in the groove, they pulled me up to dance with them! Carla joined in the fun and Joselyn sadly didn’t get to because she was too busy videoing it all. It was crazy awesome and they got to see how much I can’t dance J We stayed there for maybe 20-30 minutes and then kept going on our way. From there we got a tour guide, a girl in 8^th grade who offered to show us the way to the top! It was quite the hike, especially after my first run in 3 weeks, but so incredible. The view was fantastic and I felt like I could see forever at the top!! I could basically see all of you in the States ;) Incredible!!

Overall, this week has been really good and I’m excited for what’s next! Please keep me updated on what’s happening with you all from back home! I want to be in the know… even if I’m the last to know ;)

Many many kisses from Kenya,

Elizabeth

p.s. Here is some Kiswahili for you!!

Lala poa! [La-la poe-ah]

(sleep well!)