Work Week 3

Sorry for not blogging for a while - this past week was pretty busy! 

We got a lot done for our project - collected a good amount of organic trash and an oil drum, did two burns, made some briquettes (using paper pulp and old bananas as binders), got to know the youth group we are working with, visited a school that makes briquettes, and learned a lot! 

On Wednesday, after buying some art supplies, Daisy and I visited a small, one classroom, school in Kibera that we walk by every day. The kids were ages 2-10, some missing shoes, some smelling like they had never had a bath in their lives, and all pretty excited to see us. The teachers were very friendly, and wanted us to come in and see the kids. The older teacher, Benta, told me she is living HIV positive, and lost her last teaching job when they found out she had HIV. She said she started this school for kids who are HIV positive or who have been orphaned by HIV. It was really cool to see what she was doing, although the children were not very disciplined and didn't seem to be learning much. One of the ten year old girls barely knew how to read. Also, when I gave them some art supplies and told them to just color and be creative, none of them really knew what to do. They never had the supplies to just color, so the teacher told them to draw animals to get them started, and thats pretty much what they all drew. It was sad to see how poverty really prevents kids from being creative, or from being kids at all. I value my education more and more every day - can you even fathom having about the education of a first grader for your entire life? 

That same day, Daisy and I got home early, so in light of the fourth of July, and our unmet cravings to bake, we decided to make chocolate chip cookies and a cake to thank David for taking us to his farm. We used our host family's oven for the very first time (no one uses ovens here because electricity is so expensive and Kenyan food can all be cooked with charcoal or stove top). Our family didn't have measuring cups so we just eye-balled all of the ingredients. We also only had baking soda instead of powder, and made chocolate chips by cutting up a chocolate bar. The butter we bought at Nakumatt the day before was half moldy when we opened it, and the brown sugar had molasses in it. Despite all this, the cookies came out really good (taste wise, they were not very atheistically pleasing), and our host family loved the cake although I thought it was a bit funky (it had ginger in it). 

I also got to Skype my whole family for the 4th! It was very good to finally talk to them all - although it made me miss the Cape! Later, Jeffrey, David, Molly, Daisy, and I went to a Kenyan bar for karaoke…until we showed up and realized karaoke night was on Tuesday. So we ended up just hanging out (drinking age is 18 here but I still didn't have any…) and dancing for a bit. Apparently Kenyans party pretty much every night - whether its a Monday or Friday, they love their Tusker beer and dancing. 

On Friday, we worked with the Zulu Youth Group almost the whole day. We did two burns, and are finally producing charcoal! The members are so nice, and are really taking ownership of this project which is exciting to see. One of the members, Steven Karanja reminds me of my dad so much - he is a handyman, good at figuring problems out, and fine working alone and doing his own thing. His daughter came to our workspace after she got out of school, and it was good to get to know her a little. She was beautiful and joyful, and loved math - she kept writing numbers all over some concrete with a piece of charcoal. It was such a good reminder for me that the work I am doing is going to help these youth group members like Karanja make more money so they can better provide for themselves and their families. When Alice asked her dad for some money to go buy some food while she was waiting for him to be done with work and he gave it so willingly even though I am sure he had very little, it reminded me of when I ask my dad for money for things like a DQ ice cream, and he gives me whatever he has in his jean pocket. 

On Friday night, our host sister Edith took Daisy, Molly, her host brother Andrew, and me (Zach I hope you appreciate my grammar whenever I list people) out to the movies. We were going to see Amazing Spiderman at 9 pm, but since we were on KT and arrived at 9:45 pm, we opted to see Snowwhite and the Huntsmen which started at 9:30 pm instead. Even though we were late, Edith and Andrew still sat on a couch and talked for a bit before buying their tickets…its still funny to see how much more relaxed people are here. The movie wasn't too great…but it was still nice to be out at night! Essentially having a curfew at 6:30 pm because its too dangerous to be out at night has made this summer not really feel like a summer…but its forcing me to read a lot, and I've been enjoying sleeping 10 hours every night (and I still need an alarm to wake up…).