Where'd January Go?

You’ve probably wondered where I’ve gone…what mischief I’ve been up to here in Kenya. After all, with a rogue bull elephant on a safari to the Maasai Mara charging at our van, the post-Obama-inauguration ecstasy of the Kenyan people (including exuberant dancing in the streets of Nairobi), a 24-hour virus that had me hugging a toilet for the first time in nine years, and a startlingingly fast onset of a spring fever epidemic here at school, I could have been done in by any of a number of things. But all silliness aside, I’m happy to be writing to you again. I’d avoided writing for a while, thinking that all of a sudden, my life had become uninteresting. I didn’t want to bore you. But I’ve realized that there is plenty to tell—and even if there wasn’t, it’s always worth connecting with you all every now and then.

Famine and Fire

I’m going to start on a low note this time around. I feel that those of you thinking about and praying for me and my ministry here ought to know about some of the things affecting Kenya right now. Over the past several rainy seasons, Kenya has been experiencing failed rains after failed rains after failed rains. Farmers here are growing anxious and desperate, anguishing over every sprout that shoots up, only to shrivel under the scortching sun. We’re now in what’s been officially labeled a “food shortage,” “famine,” and “crisis.” And I’ll admit that I’ve been quite numb to the effects of this crisis on the Kenyan nation, as the shortage of maize and other large crops hasn’t affected major cities like Nairobi, except in slight raises in food prices. But the reality is that nearly one in four Kenyans are starving right now. Millions of people. Families don’t know where their next meal is coming from, and I read in yesterday’s newspaper that several Kenyan children have starved to death—one thirteen-year-old boy even poisoned himself by eating poisonous tree fruit he’d found scrounging through a thicket for berries to curb his hunger. It’s devastating [photo from MSNBC].

The church that I have been attending here, Emmanuel Baptist Church, is rallying together with a few other local churches to organize the distribution of food to Kenyans upcountry. The pastors are working closely with twelve churches in particularly devastated areas to identify the families in need and all of our churches’ donations will be spread out over the next several months so that people will be taken care of until the rains hopefully pick back up again. I was talking to my dad the other day via Skype and we discussed for a bit the effects of the economic depression back in the States on our family, friends, and the nation as a whole. It seems that the whole world is suffering. I’ve never been more aware of the smallness of my own needs, and the greatness of the needs of others.

And to hear the testimonies of people here who have seen the effects of this famine first-hand is overwhelming. Our friend Maureen visited the other day over lunch to visit with Becca, Jen and I. She shared her experiences of visiting family outside of Nairobi and the hardships that they are encountering. The local well had apparently dried up, and so she joined the women in their long hike to the nearest place to gather water. The other ladies carried fifteen-liter barrels atop their heads, but, knowing Maureen to be a “city girl,” they handed her a seven-liter jug and started out. Maureen chuckled at remembering several children squealing out, “Look at that big girl with that small bucket!” Maureen shared that she had been exhausted throughout the hike, asking to stop several times along the trip back. By the time they arrived home, Maureen had drunk most of the water in her own jug. She recalled that the weekend visit had been “fun” for her, but her countenance fell as she expressed that it’s certainly no “fun” for these people who live this way. She seemed to anguish over how difficult life has become for her fellow Kenyans. “I have taken so many things for granted. These people are living such a hard life,” she mourned. “It makes me so thankful for what I have.”

Additionally, Nairobi is reeling in the aftermath of a local disaster. This past Wednesday, there was a power outage downtown and so many businesses had turned on their backup generators for power. Unfortunately, though, the Nakumatt (like a Wal-Mart) downtown had a fire begin in its generator room and the building quickly caught fire. I remember meeting with my discipler, Kara, that evening and there had been a great deal of traffic coming out of the city centre—Kara’d explained that the fire was probably the cause. The next morning, my roommates and I bought a newspaper on the way to school and there still were no reported injuries or casualties at that time. But during our visit with Maureen, she shared that she had had a high school classmate, a local actress, die in the fire and that her story had become very public on the news. The death count had leapt to twenty-one. Maureen also shared the sad news that as the fire blazed, as in many other such crisis situations, Kenyan shoppers had begun to loot the store and the managers had the doors shut. Those twenty-one people might have lived had the managers not worried about a few thousand shillings’ worth of goods stolen from their shelves. Many people are mourning and angry about the call made by the Nakumatt staff (who, unfortunately, belong to a long-hated ethnic group in Kenya), and racist rumors are spreading quickly around Nairobi. It’s bad enough that the tragedy happened in the first place, but I fear that far worse will come from the hatred and resentment stored in the hearts of the people in this place [photo from africannews.com].

Please pray for the starving, angry, mourning, and lost here in Kenya.

New Semester

So I’ve officially been here in Kenya for six months. Big milestone, huh? I feel like I’m a little more “official” now. I got my official resident’s card a while back (my face fills the entire photo frame on the little orange card…I look like a blimp) and so now I can get into national parks and things for cheaper than a tourist. Vendors at the Maasai market asked how long I’d been in Kenya when I visited last weekend and when I said six months, they seemed to automatically gear up to lower their asking prices. It’s a small kind of accomplishment, I suppose. I feel like I’m learning and figuring things out.

I suppose that this also transfers over to teaching, too. After a successful first semester (and by successful, I mean that I don’t think I completely ruined any children), things are on the up-and-up. I feel a little more confident in my ability to plan lessons and teach well. Which is good, because remember—this is the semester that I somehow have to produce a yearbook by the end of May and put on a play before the end of April. Whoa, baby. If I can finish up this semester in one piece and come back to you in June, you’ll have my permission to heartily congratulate me. It’s going to be that big of a deal.

Actually, while Yearbook and Theatre Arts had been large contributors to my anxiety over the break and at the beginning of the semester, I’m finding that the good news is: I really do enjoy teaching these classes. NICS has been posting positions that its schools will need to fill for next year, and so some of us checked out the website the other day to see whether all of the positions we’re anticipating will need to be filled for WNS next year were up. I noticed that the NICS school in Seoul, South Korea had a full-time drama position open—and I thought to myself, “Hey—that would be kind of fun.” So at least I like what I’m doing. Even if it’ll kill me before I turn 23.

The freshmen are in the middle of a short story unit. I’ve got four new ESL students in my classroom, along with dear, sweet Mrs. Ommen (new to WNS, too—her husband is our principal), who has taken over as our ESL teacher. One student speaks fairly good English—the others are pretty clueless. So I figured writing children’s stories would be a good group activity to introduce these students into our class. What I got was a bit disappointing. One group of particularly goofy boys wrote a totally cheesy story about an Indian hamster who was devastated at losing his accent in an accident—and somehow gained superhuman strength somewhere in the story. Lame. These are the kids who had begun to master Shakespeare by the end of last semester. Just goes to show how much intelligence you can lose over a three-week Christmas break. Back to Poe and James Thurber.

My tenth-graders are reading Things Fall Apart as part of a thematic unit I’ve called “Worlds Collide.” The book is basically a narrative about a Nigerian man and his family’s tribal life at the turn of the century. About two-thirds of the way through the novel, Okonkwo watches his world change when white missionaries enter the Ibo village with the message of the Gospel. It’s a fascinating book, but this idea of “worlds colliding” and our responsibility to one another as human beings, regardless of our “tongue, tribe, or nation” really resonated with me as I read it. So as an initial activity to get things going in the class, I had the students write poems that either dealt with a personal encounter with their own worldview coming into “contact” with another worldview (either a positive or a negative experience) or as a response to our discussion of “normal” and “otherness” in our world. The poems I received were really interesting. One American student—a missionary kid—wrote a poem about her frustration with feeling as though she can’t fully belong in her Kenyan friendship circles, and that it’s the same when she heads back to the States and doesn’t completely fit in there, either. Another girl wrote about her frustration with being perceived as a tomboy and even accused of being a lesbian, simply because of her taste for rough sports, “wild” clothing and hair coloring choices, and the fact that she keeps company with mainly male friends. Another student wrote from the perspective of God, writing to his children, reaffirming them in their individuality and assuring them that they “belong” to Him. Totally interesting.

The eleventh-graders are reading The Great Gatsby. They hate the guy. I’m not surprised—he is kind of a loser.
Safari

Forgot to tell y’all about my safari to the Mara over Christmas break. I’ll be posting photos on Facebook soon—I think I took about 300. Most of them were pretty fuzzy or pixilated—I might need to invest in a camera with a better zoom one of these days. But the experience was fantastic. The Bussell family and another WNS teacher, Lynne, joined me, Amy P., Julie, and Jonathan at the Mara Simba Lodge and we had a pretty excellent time. Three game drives, good meals, and a firm mattress—mmm, bliss. Our driver, Charles, was a great guy. A member of the Luo tribe, he had tons of insight into the cultural and literal landscape of the place and I feel like I learned a ton from the guy. We saw some great stuff on our game drives—a mother cheetah and her two nearly-grown cubs, a huge herd of Cape buffalo munching on grasses at daybreak, that lone bull elephant I mentioned earlier (he charged at another safari van and we high-tailed it out of there), and a particularly amazing group of four male lions feasting on a giraffe breakfast. And I realized as we drove around that I was experiencing one of those vacations that some people can only dream about. An African safari. Pretty darn cool.

On our second day, Julie, Amy, Jonathan, and I visited a Maasai village. Needless to say, it was a pretty surreal experience. As we listened to “John,” one of the Maasai elders, explain the ritual, the four of us were dragged into a Maasai “welcome dance” involving a lot of jumping, grunting, yelling, and a hat made from a lion mane. I couldn’t help but feel a little silly. I felt as though a hundred thousand similar groups of mzungus had invaded before us with their cameras, shorts, and sunglasses…that perhaps some fat British lady once urged her husband ages ago to jump into the middle of the group of Maasai warriors so she could document the experience with her little disposable camera—and now they think that’s what all the crazy white folks like to do. Gawk and giggle. A woman thrust her baby in my hands at one point and indicated that Amy should take a picture. Beautiful little boy, but still a little bizarre. I remembered later that we’d paid the thousand shilling “entry fee” and understood a little better. It must be strange to have someone come into your home and invade your privacy and way of life. But I suppose the money comes in handy, so they welcome the white folks and their cameras in. John told us that our “donations” would be going towards building a school in the area for Maasai children. I told him that as teachers ourselves, we were glad to help. I’m happy to have had the experience, though. Definitely unforgettable.

Additional Prayer Requests

- I've got some "unspoken" ones this time around. Just some things that are weighing heavily on me lately and that I'd like to see the Lord use to help me grow closer to Him. I'm sure he can and will.

- Please also continue to pray for the students here at WNS and for their hearts to be receptive to the things we're encouraging them in. We've got some pretty rebellious kiddos--especially in the middle school--and it's been difficult to love them at times. I'm excited at the potential to see some of these kids really change their lives around.

Thanks, all--let me know how you're doing, too! I'd love to hear from you guys!