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.