Finally some pictures!

Here's a picture of the non-Minnesota/Wisconsin students. From left to
right (white people): Me, Meghann, Colin, Ashley (in blue), Marie (red
bandanna), Stephanie F., Kristen (in white), Andre (in hat). Africans
left to right: Simon, Jane and Abdul-Aziz -- they are all on the MSID
staff.

Here's the closest I've gotten to taking a picture that looks like
Lion King. This was taken at Babboon Cliff at Lake Nakuru National
Park - with Lake Nakuru in the background.


Giraffes


Here's a picture of me at Lake Nakuru with a bunch of pelicans and
flamingos. (This one is for Grandma!)





This is by far my favorite picture I've taken in Kenya. It's now the
desktop background on my computer.




Lake Nakuru National Park


Me at Lake Nakuru National Park

Me at Makalia Falls

Weekend

This Saturday was the first time I've felt sick since I've been here. I woke up in the morning feeling very ill and felt nauseous all day. I ended up napping a lot and working on my homework. I had 8 chapters of Swahili homework to work on so this at least gave me a chance to do that. It thankfully only ended up being a 24 hour illness and I felt nearly 100% on Sunday.

Sunday, I met up with one of the other girls in the program at Prestige Plaza (a large shopping center) to catch a bus downtown. We took a short bus ride into downtown Nairobi to attend mass at Holy Family Basillica. The man on the bus who collects the fare of course tried ripping me off again. He first told me that the fare was 60 KSH (the actual fare is 30 KSH). When I basically called him crazy, he said that it was 40 KSH. When I still refused he finally accepted my 30 KSH. We arrived at the Basillica at 10:45am and the Mass wasn't supposed to begin until 11:30am. The Swahili Mass at 10:30am went long so our Mass didn't start until 11:45am. The church is very large and several hundred people attended Mass. This was much different than the small Protestant service I attended the week before with my host family that was in an event tent with 35 people. They sang a lot more songs than I was used to and the people swayed, clapped and danced a lot as well. Me and the other girl from the program stuck out as 2 of 4 white people in the whole church. Communion was very random and arbitrary - basically, whenever people felt like it was their time to go, they would walk up to the front of church and receive Communion. There were definitely a lot of things that were the exact same as my church at home. I guess it is a universal Catholic thing to only give the sign of peace to the people immediately surrounding you. Church lasted about an hour and a half (3 offertory and 3 Communion songs certainly adds a lot).

After church, we went to Steers near the church which had fast food. I got an overpriced cheeseburger. When we were finished eating, the friend I was with reached for her bag and it was gone! Somehow someone managed to take her bag from between both of our legs under the table. It unfortunately had her Ipod, an expensive rain jacket, her cell phone and some money in it. Thankfully she didn't lose her passport or her ATM card. We reported it to the security guard at the restaurant but he couldn't really do much.

Monday morning before class we all compared out interesting weekend stories. One guy while getting his haircut at a salon had 2 armed men burst in and rob the salon. They grabbed the items from one of his pockets then left. Thankfully, they grabbed the wrong pocket and only took sugarcane from him. His cellphone, wallet and other items were in a different pocket! He said that he feels that the only reason the salon was robbed was because of his presence as a white person. We as white people in Kenya attract a lot of negative attention. Our skin color is viewed as wealthy no matter our actual financial situation. Just by being somewhere, we can attract crime.

Internship Info

As I have mentioned before, my study abroad trip has both an academic and internship component. I will be with a host family in Nairobi until October 24th while I take classes. The last week of October I will be moving to Kisumu which is in the far western part of Kenya on Lake Victoria. Here I will be living with another host family. The Kisumu host family is comprised of a mom, a dad who works primarily in a rural part of the country, a university student and the house help. The university student studies Public Health (the program chose to pair me with this family because of this).

For my internship, I will be working with the OGRA Foundation. They have a health clinic that I will spend some time at but I will primarily be doing community outreach health education. The OGRA Foundation does a lot of work with educating people about nutrition, HIV/AIDS and water sanitation. They receive some funding from U.S. government programs like PEPFAR and the USAID. The OGRA Foundation also works with OVCs (orphans and vulnerable children) and works towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals that were set by the United Nations. Another large component of the OGRA Foundations work is using sports to promote health. I was very excited to hear this since during my time in Belize during high school, I helped organize a soccer and music camp for the young people in the community to promote structured activities and healthy alternatives.

I will be working with the OGRA Foundation until December 5th before returning to Nairobi for finals and debrief. I will return to the internship on January 19th following a weeklong research seminar in Nairobi where I will plan out my second semester's research.

First Day of Class

Today was our first real day of class. I met up with the two girls who also live on Kayahwe Road to walk to class together. We had 4 hours of Kiswahili class in the morning with a short tea break. We covered basic greetings and some vocab. During the tea break I proudly walked around telling people the one Swahili phrase I remembered - Jina langu ni Dan (my name is Dan).

My host mom is a translator, so I tried practicing some of my Swahili with my family this evening at dinner. I started saying some of the phrases I remembered and evidently said, "I have one taco America" instead of "I come from America." The phrase is supposed to be "Ninatoka nchi ya America" and I instead said "Ninatako nchi ya America." They got a good laugh out of it and insisted that they would help me practice. I guess I need it!

In the afternoon, we had 2 hours of Country Analysis. The professor today focused on pre-colonialism because he said that most people forget that Kenya had a proud history and political system before the Europeans colonized.

After class several of us walked over to the MSID office to pick up textbooks and check e-mail. While we were there a huge storm started and the office lost power. 5 of us walked to YaYa Center in the rain to pick up some things and check e-mail. Internet at YaYa was three times more than what we paid for internet in downtown Nairobi because it is a very ritzy mall where a lot of the rich white people shop. I once again helped some of the girls navigate the roads and find their homes. We all once again were soaked to the bone and covered in mud. My host family claims that it really doesn't rain this much and that it must be the curse of the U.S. students.

Life in Nairobi

I returned to Nairobi on Saturday after a week in Lake Nakuru National Park. My host mom and brother picked me up at the African Nazarene University in Nairobi. My brother's name is Joshua (JJ) and he is 8 years old. He helped carry one of my big bags which everyone in the program thought was so cute. I received a quick tour of my new home in Kilimani (just southwest of Nairobi - check it out on Google Maps). For those of you who are worried about my safety and security in Kenya - my home is part of an apartment complex with a large security gate and a 24 hour watchman.

I brought with me 3 soccer balls, so I pumped up one of them and gave it to my host brother. He ran outside to tell his friends and before I knew it, I was playing soccer in the parking lot with 6 young boys. They use the security gate as the goal and there are signs of frequent soccer playing in dirty soccer ball marks all over the surrounding walls and the security gate. We played soccer (football) for about 2 hours and I think it was a great way for me to connect with the young boys in the apartment complex. The next day at church, I saw one of them and he was very excited to see me.

On Sunday I went to my family's church service at the Community of Christ church. The church had about 35 people at the service and was held under a large event tent. At one point in the service, the congregation split into two groups to study a chapter in the Acts of the Apostles in the Bible. My host father led my group's discussion. We talked about how Paul had to go before a judge and that the judge wanted a bribe from Paul. We each had to go around and talk about an example in our own lives where we have seen someone try to extort a bribe or an example of corruption. It was a great exercise and really brought the reading to life as many Kenyans live a life where "give me something small" is a way to get things done.

On Monday, I started classes. My family has a driver and he walked me to school my first day. I walk about 2.5 miles to class every day. We had a quick introduction to the faculty. I will be taking a Swahili course, a course on Country Analysis of Kenya, and International Development with a focus in Public Health.

After an hour of class, we caught a bus to downtown Nairobi and bought our cell phones. I bought the cheapest cell phone they had because students often lose or have their phones stolen. The women in the store tried to rip a lot of us off. They would try to charge people an extra 100 KSH connection fee if they weren't vigilent. 100 KSH is only about a $1.42 US but the idea is that people associate white people with wealth and try to take advantage of it at all times.

We went to lunch in downtown Nairobi and the 4 of us at my table all ordered cheeseburgers. When it came time to pay, we were once again met with someone trying to rip us off. After the bill came and we paid we stayed around as other tables finished their meals. After about 10 minutes the waitress came back to our table and picked up a receipt that she had left on the table and tried accusing us that one of us did not pay for our meal. The waitress then also tried claiming that two of the girls ordered their meals differently and ordered the cheesburger, fries and Coke each separately therefore adding up to 20 KSH more than the Combo that came with the same 3 items. We even had one of our Kenyan staff members come over to the table and discuss with the waitress and she finally agreed that we didn't have to pay more than we already did.

After lunch we went to the immigration office to get multi-entry visas and our Alien Registration Cards. The whole process was quite lengthy especially since we overwhelmed the office by bringing in 32 people at one time. I had to wait in 3 different lines, fill out a lot of different forms and have each of my fingers fingerprinted.

After we were done with all of our errands, 4 of us grabbed a bus that dropped us off at YaYa Center which is a large shopping center about 5 minutes from my home. By this time it was raining heavily so the roads that were dirt in the morning were now very muddy with many puddles/lakes. The 3 of us who live on Kayahwe Road made it back to our homes and the 4th girl thought she lived near us. We asked the watchman at my complex to point her in the right direction and he said that it was past YaYa Center which we had just walked from. She didn't want to walk home by herself, so all 4 of us walked about 2 miles in the driving rain and muddy roads to drop her off. Even though our shoes were caked in mud and we were all filthy, it really helped us learn the roads around us and helped us gain confidence.

(Please note that I have tried to build-in links to websites for more information on certain topics in my entries. The link will most likely navigate you away from the blog just so you are aware)

I have arrived!

Jambo from Kenya!

After a very long day of traveling, I arrived in Nairobi Monday night (Sept 1st) at around 10pm. I had to wait for about 45 minutes to find my luggage but several people from the group had either one or both of their bags lost. We all piled into a large bus provided by the Wildlife Clubs of Kenya (WCK) and drove about 30 minutes to the WCK Nairobi site. When we arrived, we all had tea and then went to bed. All of the guys in my room had trouble sleeping and I ended up purifying my water at 3am because I couldn't sleep. I think I got about 2 hours of sleep before we were woken up at 6am for breakfast. When we woke up there were over a dozen baboons running around the compound. At the time we were all pretty excited about them, but after being in Kenya for over a week now, I basically view them as if they were squirrels in America. Oh how quickly one can become an animal elitist!

We drove into Nairobi to pick up some things that people forgot. I made sure to purchase some toilet paper because I found out quickly upon my arrival that much of Kenya is a bring-your-own-toilet-paper kind of place. We had to go to the Immigration Office for our visas. As of Tuesday, I am officially a resident of Kenya.

We left Nairobi and drove about 3 hours to Lake Nakuru National Park. We stopped once at a look-out point over the Great Rift Valley. The view was pretty incredible! The stop was also a tourist trap so we white people were bombarded with people trying to sell all kinds of crafts and sculptures. When we arrived at the national park, we learned first-hand just how Kenyan officials ask for bribes as we were bounced around between offices for over an hour before we were finally allowed into the park.

Orientation went well. Each morning we would wake up and have breakfast as a group and then have orientation sessions. We would usually break for tea at least 3 times a day. The staff spent a lot of time on health, safety and security which I think worried a lot of the students. When we walk around town as a group - 32 white people certainly attract a lot of attention. One passerby in the town of Nakuru even said, "wow, that's a lot of white people!"

Three nights in a row we went on a "game drive" around the park. We saw just about every animal there is in Kenya - water buffalo, hyena, rhino, giraffe, water buck, impala, baboon, spider monkey and many more. I will try to post pictures when I can but the internet is very slow here and goes out frequently.

I started classes at the Nazrene University today. I will try to write about this soon.

Peace,
Dan

Leaving Today!

Well, after many months of planning, the day has finally arrived. I applied to this program back in October. In late December, violence broke out all over Kenya after the disputed election. When the dust settled in late January, over 1,000 people had been killed. For many months, there were talks that my program would be canceled. As I write this, I am finishing my last minute packing and will leave for the airport in 30 minutes.

I will be leaving O'Hare today at 5:30pm. Thankfully it's a nice, clear day so hopefully there won't be any delays. I have a 7 hour flight to London and then a 3 hour layover. I should arrive in Nairobi mid-afternoon Chicago time. Kenya is 8 hours ahead so it should be evening there. When I arrive I'll be taking a bus 3 hours to Lake Nakuru National Park for our week-long orientation. I will try to write as soon as I can but I am anticipating that it will be at least a week.

Thank you to everyone for your support. I know that I am bringing with me all of your thoughts and prayers.

P.S. If there are any topics/subjects that you would like to know about (ex. food, culture, music, etc), please feel free to send me an e-mail or comment on one of the blog entries.

Peace,
Dan