Thanksgiving in Kenya

Being in Kenya for Thanksgiving was certainly a unique experience. An American couple, Meg and Daniel, have been volunteering with my organization for a month and they invited me to have Thanksgiving with them at their hostel. We really wanted to re-create an American Thanksgiving as much as we could so we tried very hard to find a turkey. Of course being in Kenya, the only turkey we found was the live bird at the local market. We would then have to kill it ourselves, de-feather it, etc. We also ran into a major problem in terms of how we would cook a turkey. At Meg and Daniel's hostel, they only have 2 stove-top burners. Ovens in Kenya are not designed to fit a turkey. We actually got to the point where we asked the major hotel in town if they would allow us to use their oven to cook our turkey but they said it was against their regulations.

At one point last week we even looked into ordering a honey-baked ham from the States and having it mailed here. We figured the Kenya Bureau of Standards wouldn't let a ham through customs especially since I'm still waiting for my Halloween care package from my parents that was sent in the beginning of October.

On Thursday I was out in Ombeyi, a rural town a half hour outside of Kisumu, working on a USAID APHIA II training. I got back to Kisumu around 5pm, just in time for my parents from the U.S. to call to wish me a happy Thanksgiving. After the phone call, I went into town to check my mail at my host mother's P.O. Box and was excited to have two Thanksgiving cards from my grand-parents. I took a boda-boda (bicycle taxi) to Meg and Daniel's from town.

I have been getting very frustrated lately with the "mzungu price" which is when people inflate the price of a product or service for a white person. I got my haircut last week and the guy tried charging me 5 times as much as the typical Kenyan would pay. I spoke with men waiting in line to get their haircuts the day before so I knew exactly how much I should have had to pay. When I got the boda-boda from town, I was very blunt with the driver and told him that I live in Kisumu and that I know exactly how much I should pay for the distance I wanted to go. I told him to not even bother trying to give me the mzungu price and that if he was going to waste my time, I'd just go on to the next driver who would give me the fair price. This was very unusual for me because I'm usually not as direct and straightforward/demanding but last week had been especially bad with the mzungu price. The boda boda driver actually responded very well to it and gave me the fair price without me having to negotiate.

About two blocks after getting on the boda-boda, it started raining heavily. I still had about a mile and a half left to go and when you're stuck in a situation like that you just have to laugh and take it in. I started humming Christmas songs to humor myself. I arrived to Meg and Daniel's soaked to the bone.

At dinner there were the three of us Americans, the deputy director of OGRA, Gaby and his wife and then the organization's driver, George. As dinner was still being prepared, the three of us Americans took the time to talk about the history of Thanksgiving in America and then we each talked about what our families traditionally do on Thanksgiving to celebrate. Growing up, my family would always deliver meals to elderly people and visit with them. We would also always help with our church's food drive for our church's food pantry. A large part of what my family has taught me about Thanksgiving is to not only be thankful for what we have but to serve others who may not be as fortunate. This motto in general was a huge motivating factor for me wanting to come to Kenya.

After talking about the history of Thanksgiving, we each went around and said some things we are thankful for. This whole experience being in Kenya has really given me a lot to be thankful for. A simple thing like water is almost always taken for granted in America. My host family in Kisumu doesn't have running water. I have to carry water with me to the bathroom everytime I go. I bathe using a bucket of water that has to be warmed on the stove. All the water we drink is collected rain water. The last time it rained heavily, the househelp and I spent about an hour outside in the rain collecting water in buckets to store for later use. The househelp did this all clutching an umbrella while I had put on my swimsuit and was having a great time. I have never been in a situation where I have been so dependent on nature for basic needs. Although it is the rainy season, we haven't gotten a lot of rain lately so our stored water is diminishing.

There are so many people I have met in Kenya who struggle to make it through each day. I met the 82 year old woman who is the sole provider for her daughter and two grandchildren. This woman can only provide one meal a day, usually maize meal (ugali) for her family yet she welcomed me into her home and tried giving me food.

I've helped train Community Health Workers in rural western Kenya who do community outreach and home visits for HIV/AIDS patients in hard-to-reach areas. At the training I attended, 98% of the Community Health Workers were themselves HIV positive. The one training manual I read before the training advised Community Health Workers to treat the patients as if they themselves had HIV. I guess this is pretty easy to do in a province where the HIV prevalence is between 34-38% of the population. In the one rural village I work, the wealthiest man in the community is the carpenter who makes coffins along the roadside.

I've met with a woman who lives in Kibera slum living on less than $15 a month who told me how she saves up money during Ramadan to give to the poor. This left me wondering if not this woman, than who is "the poor?"

During one of my community nutrition classes at ISMAT where I teach, we were talking about the top killers of Kenyans (malaria, TB, HIV/AIDS). After we finished, one of my students asked me what most Americans die of. This was a very humbling moment for me as I stood in front of my class and told them how the top three killers of Americans are cancer, heart disease, and stroke. Two of these three are directly related to obesity. I come from a country where the biggest problem for most Americans is that they eat too much. I read somewhere before I came to Kenya that the amount of money that Americans spend on diet plans could feed the entire world's poor. Even according to my Development textbook, Development and Social Change: A Global Perspective, "the $17 billion spent annually in the United States and Europe on pet food exceeds by $4 billion the estimated annual additional cost of providing basic health and nutrition for everyone in the world." Even our pets are overweight and suffer from diseases like diabetes.

As I reflected on Thanksgiving, I really do have a lot to be thankful and being in Kenya has helped me see a lot of these things. It's something that I think a lot of us already know, but when confronted with situations like extreme poverty, it helps to put things into perspective...