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The New Tenderfeet Sign
Thanks Ry - it looks awesme! Tuesday May 22, 2007
Well we arrived thankfully after our 18 hour journey, no worse for wear. The second leg from Amsterdam to Nairobi was a longer trip, but more enjoyable since the flight was not full and Nicole and I managed to get 4 empty seats each to stretch out and sleep for a couple of hours. Once on the ground, we quickly got through the line purchasing our Visas and was surprised that our luggage arrived as quickly as it did. We were a tad worried about customs since out 4 huge suitcases, 2 carry-ons, laptop bag and 1 large purse drew a little attention, especially for people who are in Nairobi for 10 days! With a 45% duty on goods coming into the country, we were quickly calculating in our heads what that amounted to - quite a good chunk of change! Our customs official was a bit distracted luckily with a situation in front of us and looked at the bags, at Nicole’s pregnant belly and then back at the bags again and let us through without even asking if we had anything to declare. Whewwwww!
A little glitch and miscommunication meant that our
driver Johnson was not there to pick us up. Nicole and I walked up and down the tiny, overly crowded arrivals area looking for him and were approached at least 30 times by taxi drivers…we were a bit of a spectacle with the vastness of our luggage and Nicole’s belly. People were gawking openly - not even little glances pretending not to look, but really looking! I mean openly gawking like they’ve never seen a pregnant woman before! Anyhow, the Hilton shuttle was quickly located and we were on our way…
I was surprised to see that the sun starts to set very early here. It is dark by about 7pm, but for some reason I thought it would be the opposite. This was a shame since coming in on the plane and on the shuttle to the hotel, we couldn’t see anything of our surroundings. One of the few things that struck me on the drive in were the number of young men standing around in packs all over the place. There was barely a woman to be seen anywhere on the streets. Just a few standing on their own on street corners. There are also security guards
standing at every ATM machine close to the hotel. The Hilton Nairobi is definitely one of the nicest hotels in the city - the president of Kenya arrived the same day we did…and here we were thinking the red carpet was being rolled out for us :0) Nicole’s boss Andrew had us upgraded to the “Kenyan Suite” for our stay which apparently is twice as big as the other rooms and we’re on the 12th floor with a great view of the city. While it gets dark early, it also gets light early as well…I’m not exactly sure what time the sun comes up, but it’s well before 6am!
Looking out our hotel window the first morning we arrived, I thought initially that the city was very smoggy. I later realized though that the smog was actually clouds…we are after all a mile above sea level!
Monday rolled around and after a good night’s rest, we were up early for breakfast and to organize for my trip into Kibera to visit Tenderfeet. Nicole would be spending the day catching up on sleep, organizing and reviewing for her first class and running a few errands with Johnson whom we
finally met up in the lobby while waiting for Margaret. With a big, heavy duffle bag filled with a fraction of the supplies we brought for the school and the children, we sat in the lobby of the hotel and waited for Margaret to arrive. I was absolutely beside myself with anxiety and excitement which honestly dissipated in the first 3 minutes I was in Margaret’s presence. She brought Frank with her, one of the volunteers from the school and I suppose in many ways she might have felt the same anxiety and excitement as I think is only natural when meeting someone new. We hopped in the cab and off we went…
In the daylight I finally got my first glimpses of a bustling city. We are staying right downtown and I’m impressed with the cleanliness of the downtown core around the hotel. There are some beautiful buildings that house parliament, courthouses and city hall, but the other buildings look tired and worn, like the whole downtown core was developed in the ’70s and left with no updating or modernization in 30 years. The streets are very busy all the time and the traffic makes the 401 and
the 400 on a long holiday weekend look like a piece of cake. Old cars running on diesel with no air conditioning means your windows are down and your lungs are coated with a layer of black diesel fumes in a matter of minutes. I appreciate now emission testing at home and will never complain again about the cost or inconvenience of emission testing every 2 years!
Margaret and I immediately hit it off - she’s the kind of person that you feel you’ve known forever, but just met an hour ago. I feel at home with her and she has an incredibly contagious smile that never falters. I told her about our journey to get to the point where I was sitting with her in the back of the cab - from the initial email entitled “Help” that was sent to everyone in my address book and the incredible response from our friends, family, coworkers and even perfect strangers that donated money and supplies to help the children at Tenderfeet. She is a grass roots social worker that believes change must come from the core of the community and I as I quickly found out - she is
the core of her small community.
There was a marked difference from the bustling, somewhat thriving city to the outskirts and beginnings of Kibera. The roads are bad in the city, but get progressively worse into Kibera. It’s imperative to close your eyes while driving in the back of a cab - kind of like not looking down at the top of a cliff…there are streetlights and stop signs that no one pays attention to and no such thing as lanes…cars just merge into one and move along weaving in and out and around the roundabouts.
Just as you round the corner from the Polish and Sudanese embassies, Kibera smacks you up the face. We arrived around 11 am and there are people everywhere walking and sitting. Walking where I have no idea and sitting wherever there was a space to sit. I observed people selling fruits and vegetables off dirty clothes strewn on the ground just 2 feet from mounds of garbage, people roasting corn and deep frying food on the side of the road and a man sitting at a table with dozens of eggs roasting in the heat. No refrigeration here. The cab driver dropped
us off in front of the Tenderfeet school with our huge duffle bag and curious onlookers stood openly gawking. Margaret and Frank introduced me to several of them as we walked up to the school and they all smiled, shook my hand and welcomed me. There is a large pile of garbage baking in the heat of the sun and a narrow path to walk by. Two mangy dogs are on the top of the heap digging through the garbage looking for something to eat. The smell is like nothing I can put into words and I struggle to not make a face although I can feel the corner of my lips curling into a grimace involuntarily. I wish we could move this somewhere else since the children have to walk by this to get into the school.
We then walk through a yard belonging to the landlord who operates a small recycling business. There are glass bottles, plastic bottles, heaps of cardboard and tin everywhere. It’s organized chaos. She buys all of this from the locals and in turn sells it to the city who come and pick it up from time to time. Based on the amount
collected in that yard right now, I would suspect that a pick up should be coming any day now. Just beyond her yard lies Tenderfeet - a little oasis in the middle of the chaos. Although meagre, I can see how fortunate the children are to have a clean, quiet place to come to everyday. The rooms are small, but everyone has a little space. One more classroom is yet to be finished, but I can see that the concrete floors, doors, windows and latrines are a luxury that many around these parts do not have.
I meet all of the children and become somewhat of a distraction for them…they should be concentrating on their studies, but instead are busy taking peaks at me through the window. Each and every one of them are gorgeous - lovely kids with infectious smiles. I can already tell who the characters are and who are more shy and reserved. I help serve them their lunch of rice and beans. Some of the kids have uniforms, many do not. Some of the kids have a schoolbag and bring a little snack from home, many do not. I watch as they eat, happily chattering
to their neighbour and even though I can’t understand what they are saying, I know they are having the same conversation that kids all around the world would be having with each other.
Despite the windows, the classrooms are quite warm - Nicole and I are going to purchase fans to move the air a little now that the electricity is in. The wiring was all in place thanks to Frank, but not connected. I helped him thread many feet of the wire through narrow plastic piping to partially bury underground and extend to the source that would provide the power. No easy feat, especially around that yard filled with cardboard and tin. It was a dirty time-consuming job, but to come back the next day and see the lights on made it all worthwhile!
The water installation should be happening any day now as well and Margaret purchased the glass for the windows yesterday. I can’t wait to take photos to send home to let all of you see what kind of difference your generosity has made. The water is carried in now from a source not close to the school in 2 large plastic containers. The
kids wash their hands before eating and the floors of the latrine are scrubbed out throughout the day. Once the water is in, life will be that much easier.
Margaret was overwhelmed with the supplies that we brought. She couldn’t believe that so many people came together to make this happen. We filled her empty filing cabinet with crayons, pens, pencils, markers, paper, games, toys and teaching aids. The sign my brother Ryan made was a huge hit - I’ll send a photo of it as well as soon as we get it hung up. We haven’t even got to the Smile Packs yet! Dax Mitchell, the Tenderfeet contact in Houston Texas I’ve told everyone about arranged for a night watchman after all the plywood was taken from the school in the middle of the night. Absolutely anything around here will be stolen even with locks on the doors, so we can be assured that everything will be well taken care of! Thank you again for the umpteenth time to everyone reading this right now - you directly impacted and benefited the children and teachers in this little corner on the other side of the world.
Margaret was
kind enough to invite me to her home across the street from the school for lunch. When I arrived, she had prepared a traditional Kenyan mean of ungali and chicken. What an experience! There is a great tradition here that I’ve experience just about everywhere we have eaten - everyone washes their hands together. At the hotel, we are handed hot washclothes before eating and at Margaret’s we washed our hands in a basin with fresh water. Ungali is a spinach dish fried in a pan with oil and onion. There is also a kind of bread that has a paste-like consistency that accompanies the ungali. You take a piece, flatten in your hand and scoop the spinach with it. No utensils…I don’t think I’ve eaten a meal like this with my hands - hamburgers and fries yes, but nothing ever like this! Margaret also made deep-fried chicken that was delicious as well. I was a bit curious as to where the chicken came from since several live ones were tied up by the leg along the pathway to Margaret’s house…! I think some things are best kept secret. Margaret also invited Frank and one of the teachers and her
husband for lunch. I learned so much in that hour about Kenya and it’s history. I loved every minute of it. I respect these Kenyan people so much - they are soft-spoken, hard-working and so proud of their country and heritage, despite the little they have.
Frank and Sandra took me for a long walk through Kibera. I had a hard time determining what direction we were walking, how far we went or how to make my way back from where we came. Everything looks the same and there are few distinguishing features that you could use as landmarks. A sea of tin haphazardly attached to more tin makes walls and barriers to separate you from your neighbour. There is rotting garbage everywhere, although concentrated more heavily in some areas where people have obviously made some effort to keep it in one place. The paths are uneven and washed away by the heavy rains in some areas. The heavy rains fall and then dry under the heat of the sun baking the garbage right into the dirt. You couldn’t pick it up if you tried since it has become a permanent part of the landscape. There are children everywhere
at that time since school is out for the day. Some families who can afford it have bought school uniforms for their children, many however are dressed in bits and pieces of clothing with holes, shoes with no laces and socks if they’re lucky.
The majority of the children speak no English, but they all shout “How are you?” to me as we walk by. I shout back “fine thank you”, but they just giggle and laugh, not knowing how to respond next. Some of the kids are bold and run over to shake my hand or touch my arm, most are shy however, but smile nonetheless. There are no open areas for the kids to play, only ditches filled with fetid black sludgey water which I was horrified to see 2 young boys playing in, filling plastic water bottles with the stuff.
I didn’t realize I had withdrawn somewhat, being overwhelmed by the sights and sounds until Frank asked me if I was okay. He said I became very quiet all of a sudden and I didn’t know how to respond. Frank is 23 and grew up in Kibera. He has barely been outside of Nairobi and
I was so conscious about offending him and the place he comes from. He is also an incredible human being with an amazing story that I promise I’ll fill you in on in days to come.
There is so much more to say - I feel like I’ve been away for months and can’t wait to write more about my experiences in the days to come.
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Trish MIlls
non-member comment
Amazing Kathy and Nicole
Absolutely Amazing. Thank you for sharing your experiences I feel like I'm there with you.