A Whitey Christmas

What do you get when you combine 8 volunteers, 2 single beds, a safari, David Hasselhoff, an assortment of spirited beverages, a tree branch, and several rainy days? A very Peace Corps Kenya Christmas! Or at least a lot of dirty, tired people who have had one of the strangest holidays of their lives. And yet, it was still a good one.
Matt, Jeane and Keith decorated the tree branch for our Christmas tree and made snowflakes out of a cell phone manual. Kyle mailed me the Hasselhoff super fantastic activity fun book which provided much entertainment. Keith was temporarily lured away by a promise of cookies, which then turned out to be intestines, which he ate. Erin was eternally dirty and every time she washed something and put it out on the clothesline it started to rain (I blame her for the rain). I gave Matt a "Kill Whitey" tattoo, Jeane took her bra off & pledged to marry a tout*, Ellen scared away the wildlife, Kristen made sure we all remembered to eat and Caitlin recorded it all for future blackmailing opportunities. I even managed to stay up all night Christmas eve playing poker and finally went to bed at 7:30am Christmas day. Then I got up, ate ramen (twice) and was back in bed before dinner. Merry Christmas to me! The day after Christmas we found someone to drive us around Aberdares National Park...
Unfortunately, it was still raining and most of the animals weren't wiling to get wet for the sake of having their pictures taken. Jerks. However, we did see lots of water buffalo, baboons, a hyena, warthogs, cranes and possibly a magical gazelle. And although we have some good footage of a water buffalo charging our vehicle, the drive around the park was much scarier. Steep hills, an enormous amount of mud and a navigator that had very little sleep made for an exciting day. Now all we have to do is rest up and get ready for the New Year! Happy holidays everyone! [*tout: a pushy man, usually dressed in maroon, that is in charge of stuffing people into a small passenger van and collecting the fare.]

Swearing in Kenya

Well, I've officially sworn in as a volunteer and promised my first born to Peace Corps. Suckers. Swearing-in consisted of two days in Nairobi visiting the American Embassy, going to the Ambassador's house for a bbq and of course, going out to celebrate. (See Beth and Katie!)So, now I am on my own at my permanent site and have a little less than a month until school starts. What does one do while living in a tiny village in Kenya with an entire month of "free" time, you ask? Well, it's about time someone asked. Since I do live in a tiny village, I typically travel about 40 minutes to the nearest town to buy things for my house... you know, furniture and fancy stuff like that. I've also been visiting nearby volunteers here and there and had a few over to my place to make cookies and pizza.

Last week I went to see another deaf ed volunteer who has been here a year and we were invited to an Indian wedding... in Kenya. Well, I should say we were invited to day one of the bride's celebration. Apparently, it's a four day affair and the groom was having a separate party across the country. We arrived at about 9:30pm (which is way past our bedtime now), ate delicious food and watched everyone dance. Unfortunately, there seems to be quite a bit of discrimination against the Indian population here, so they are a very close group of people. You would think that there may be some Kenyans invited to a wedding in Kenya, but no.

Then last weekend I got my first initiation into the deaf community in my area. The deaf VCT (Voluntary Counselling and Testing) mobile unit from Nairobi showed up at my school unexpectedly. One of the counsellors is a former student at my school and since they were planning to do a presentation to a deaf group nearby they stopped in to say hello to some of the teachers. I went with them to visit a deaf man living in my village who has TB and ended up interpreting for the man's family because they don't sign. I sucked, but I tried. The following day I went into town and attended a deaf church service and stuck around for the VCT presentation. Then I got tested and finally went home at about 5:00.

Well, I'm using one of the other volunteer's computers to write this, so I had better go. There are a few types of cell phones here that have internet access and if you hook them up to your laptop you can spend hours and hours pretending you're far away. So, I'm glad I didn't bring a laptop and have no money or else I would get nothing done. Plus it's just strange when you can access the internet in your living room, but have no running water in your bathroom. But, welcome to Kenya.