Welcome back to Nairobi!
For me at least.
There’s this very large main road that goes from Nairobi to Thika, called very imaginatively “Thika Road” and a company called also very imaginatively “China”(as it is from China) is doing a lot of construction on this road. They are also doing some destruction, because there was apparently this huge fiber-optic cable buried near the road that is responsible for providing internet to a LOT of people…and they cut it. So not only do none of the plug-in modems or routers work very well while they’re trying to repair this mess, even the wireless providers are having issues.
I don’t think this is related but also, the town water hasn’t been working for weeks so all the houses on the AG compounds have very limited water. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t, and you absolutely can’t take a shower at the same time the washing machine is going.
But at least there’s no electrical water heater smoking and shooting sparks at me like there was in Limuru. :-P
It’s been almost a week since I wrote! That is partially due to my internet deciding to run out at a very inconvenient moment, right as I was trying to read a facebook message from my sister…I tried to go and buy more air time. I like to buy air time in increments of 1000 shillings because you use the air time to buy packages. It’s cheaper to buy in bulk. So I went down to the nearest little shop and asked if they had air time. They had one card for 20 shillings. Ok, I bought it. That will give me about 3 MB of bandwidth, since no packages are cheaper than 250 shillings. If you don’t understand how much internet that is, I don’t really either but it is NOT enough to last very long. :-P So I went to the next stop. They had 1 scratch card for 50 shillings, and a bunch of 20s. So I bought them and when I got home had to scratch off 7 scratch cards and type the pin numbers into the computer and so on.
The first thing I did when I got back to Nairobi (After, of course, getting some fried food in the form of French fries) was buy air time in 1000shilling increments. But like I said, all the internet in the city is, I think, having issues.
I did manage to get over 100 new pictures from Limuru up on facebook, here:
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.971909453505.2523324.428882&l=5f33e43b44
Even if you don’t have a facebook account you SHOULD be able to see them.
The last week I was in Limuru I just felt…weird. It was a combination of a bunch of things that culminated in me being really restless and wanting to just get out of there. Some people were frustrating me, it was the longest I’ve been in any one place, and I think my patience for being away from home and all things familiar was wearing thin. In retrospect, I think a lot of it also had to do with the fact that I’d stopped writing in my journal for a while…just because I was bored of writing. But I didn’t realize how much it was helping me to get stuff out of my head. The closest thing to having a friend to make my sarcastic comments to and laugh at the same things with me was writing there, and when I stopped getting it out it built up. Whenever I came back to Nairobi and lived with Americans for a few days I never felt like writing and I guess that’s because I wasn’t experiencing new and different things I needed to debrief about. I started writing again…not a really detailed description of each day but just a “brain diarrhea” as I’ve heard it called of how I was feeling at the moment and it did make me feel better.
The best thing I saw in the clinic all week was this girl who cut her hand right over her index finger knuckle. I could see the tendon all white and glistening in there, and it was cut. Not all the way through, thankfully, but definitely cut. I would think that more would be done than cleaning and bandaging it but that’s what we did.
The original attempted bandage was one of those tiny circle Band-Aids that comes in any “assorted Band-Aids” box that you always have left over at the end because they’re not good for anything except…what, needle sticks and pinpricks and usually they’re not even big enough for over-scratched mosquito bites…but Naomi opened one up and tried to put it on a 2-cm, deep-enough-to-cut-the-tendon laceration, but thankfully for all involved she decided it was too small before she actually put it on. Sometimes I don’t understand her. :-p
But. Now I’m back in “Little America” and I got a box of Entenmann’s doughnuts that Chrissy brought back from the US with her thanks to my Mommy Dearest and they are a bit crushed by a lot delicious…and this morning’s breakfast. I’m sure Mommy Dearest doesn’t really like that idea but it’s a special occasion. I have to eat them before they go bad you know. And the only way to do that is eat them fast!!
Cornell’s graduation was this weekend. I can’t fathom that my graduation happened ONE YEAR ago, because it feels like forever and ever ago…but I still wish I was back there frequently. Not that I don’t love being here, moving on with my life, the exciting things that are to come…but Cornell was an experience wonderful beyond words and I don’t think I’ll ever look back at it and not wish with at least part of myself that I could experience it again. (Minus the chemistry, that is) I see pictures on facebook from the people that are still there and I’m half jealous, half ridiculously excited for them that they still have so many awesome experiences ahead of them.
I sometimes worry that I’m gonna be one of those people who spend the rest of their lives wishing they were back in the ‘glory days’ of college…I hope I don’t end up like that. It’s sort of exciting though...because if the rest of my life tops how wonderful college was, it’s gonna be a good life. Even if it’s hard. Because college was hard, and I still feel a great deal of nostalgia towards it.
Anyway. The next step in the right-now journey is a church called ICC (International Christian Church, or Center, or something) that has a ministry for HIV/AIDs testing and counseling, called “Zinduka”. The new clinic is going there, and is set to open this weekend, we hope. Starting Thursday I’ll be going there, and next next week (as in the week of the 13th) the Chicago team is coming to do a free clinic there as a grand opening/promotional sort of thing…then we safari! Get excited for that! Hopefully I will have awesome pictures to show you. :-D
as promised, I will now tell you whether Kathy, the woman I am living with for the 2 weeks I’m at Zinduka, is Kenyan or American.
She is Kenyan. :-P
And that is about all I know at this point, I’ll probably write again Thursday night to tell you all about the new setup. Toodles.
2 comments:
God bless you Danielle! Time is drawing closer each day until you come home. We really miss you.
What BIG THING is God doing in you as you look back over the mission? love you, kd
Danielle, I need more details about ICC. That's the church that we worked with in Thika. (although it was called something different then) Is Zinduka in the north? or close to Thika? If not where is it? Let me know the pastors name, etc.
Enjoy your last few weeks to the fullest. Keep focused!
God bless!
Post a Comment