Moving to Kenya... Jornal Week 2 (Mar 21 to 27, 2009)

Week 2 - Mar 23, 2009 (Day 9)



No no no, it's too hot for sheep to survive in here. This nursery rhyme just came in my head since I am surrounded by black people everyday. No offense, it's just a description of our colors! (I am proud to be a Yellow~ :P ) Sometimes I just feel so tired of being politically correct...

Anyways, back to animals. Yes I do live with animals coz they are everywhere. There's a chicken family at the yard of the house I stay in. Mr. Rooster crows everyday starting from 5:30am... The good thing is I never hear a thing when I am asleep, so it's my fellow who told me about this. Every morning I see the big masculine Mr. Rooster leading his wife and a large group of chicken going round and round the yard... and that's what they do all day long. And since almost every corner of the neighbourhood got their chicken family, I can now differentiate the crow of each rooster, as they are all slightly different. :D

No sheep, but there are goats. They run on the car pavements, rest on the side of the road in the shade of shabby old stalls made of wooden sticks and rusted metal plates, and kids at 3 just chase behind them everyday (seldom the other way round). Since I always see them eating rubbish on the roadside (no garbage bin, half decomposed rubbish are just everywhere), I always save my apple/ pear cores and feed them in the morning. I am going to name my favourite one which is a baby in white and brown...

Also, herds of cattle grazing on some very very very dry (yes, Kenya is having a drought) grass on the side of the roads which are always covered with rubbish. Sometimes I do see cows and goats eating half burnt plastic bags (since the government is not working on the rubbish issue, people just burn everything) The funny thing is, when you are thinking there are 5 cows wandering on the street, as you bypass them you will find 15 more around the corner of the small side street. Surprise!

I even saw 3 camels when I was on my way to my "office" (which is actually a concrete little house with metal plated roof and with neither electricity nor water)... I am sure I was not anywhere close to a desert or a circus...

Yesterday I went to a Giraffe Centre and patted some nice, hungry, long-tongued, long-eyelashed Rothschild Giraffes... which was fun (like the experience of patting a chettah at Animal Orphanage), but not as fun as seeing something natural on the street.

Looking forward to my safari trip... and see some animals in the wild! (haven't even planned yet.... better work on my projects first!)


Week 2 - Mar 25, 2009 (Day 11)



When I was on my way to the clinic I work in this morning, I walked through a small alley, and then I walked pass 2 tiny puppies on my right hand side. They were very cute, so I said to my colleague, "Look at the cute puppies~", then the next second a jeep on my left crushed him when one of them tried to crawl across the street for his mama... it happened only in 2 seconds...

I covered my mouth and cried right away... that image is still sticking to my mind.

Plants die cause of drought. Animals die cause of drought and famine. Human dies cause of drought, famine, disease, politics, killing... everything.
Life is like nothing in here....


Week 2 - Mar 26, 2009 (Day 12)



Imagine... you are the breadwinner of a family of 7 (a wife, 2 sons, 3 adopted orphans). You are sick with complications brought by HIV virus and TB, and consequently out of job. No food. No savings. No nothing. Living in a small house made of iron-sheet in dusty Nairobi... what would you do?

I have met this tough and positive man named Francis living in the 3rd largest slum named Gatina. The above description is about him.

What he did was positively seeked for help once he knew his HIV test results, overcame the tough period when he just started with his course of ART (anti-retroviral therapy). Unlike many other patients, he has never given up hope on his health. He knows he need to work hard for his family.

Luckily, he got sponsored by a volunteer and he had a chance to start his small business from scratch. I just went to see him this morning, he and his wife Rose were sorting the products they have just bought for their "little shop" (made by nailing some wood sticks together) in front of their house - selling biscuits (targeting school kids from the school opposite to his home), laundry bar soap, tomato and dried little fish (targeting to their moms). Yup, the products are totally unrelated, but at least he has the idea of marketing and bookkeeping after attending the "Micro Finance Training" Amka organized last week.

I am so glad seeing his beaming smile... we kept giving him plenty of encouragement, telling him it's gonna be a big success. And truly, I am sure he will be able to earn a living out of it coz he is such a nice and hardworking guy. I can see HOPE on his face.

Amka is having a project called IGP (Income Generating Program), which is to lend money (Ksh 5,000 equivalent to HK$500) to HIV patients so as to give them a chance starting small business and earn a living, even when their health condition is not most desirable. This is a sustainable project to "help them to help themselves", which is way much better than offering one-off donation which is temporary.

The fund we have is minimal, so can only help a few people at one time. When the debtor pay back the Ksh5,000, the sum can be lent to another person in need, so most applicants need to wait for quite a long time.

I am thinking about helping them expanding the program... let's see.


Week 2 - Mar 27, 2009 (Day 13)

<My first African Proposal>

It is interesting that Africans are very much into marriage, and there are still a large amount of them still believes in polygamous relationships. Well, which man doesn't dream of having several wives and several mistresses at the same time? I read on a local newspaper about "How to tell if you are a wife or a mistress?", and I LOL with my volunteer friend. I guess in our world, we would only ask "How to tell if he feels the same as I do".

And yesterday when me and my 2 other girl friends were in the City Market in downtown Nairobi, we received 2 strange requests.

1) My Dutch friend Fleur was asked to have her long blond hair cut and trade it with this Kenyan shop owner for an elephant. Well, a mid-sized wood carved elephant.

2) I was talking to a Kenyan shop owner, and he said I should stay in Kenya and marry to him as his first wife (liar! no way he hasn't married yet, and I would probably be his 3rd or 5th wife, if not a mistress LOL). He stressed heavily on the good of inter-racial marriage, that OBAMA is a mix of Kenyan and American. Then he said, our kid will be the next OBAMA.... I said, haha great, Obama rules US, and our kid will rule China, so Kenya will eventually rule the whole world~

Actually, my colleague at Amka have already asked me to consider meet her younger brother who believes in monogamous relationship (she stressed heavily on it too!)

HAHAHA~