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Published: October 6th 2009
HABARI!
It’s mind blowing that another week has passed, each week going by faster than the last. I am now counting down the days left and they are coming at me way too fast. Only 10 more days left in Kakamega. I thought that the closer we would be to leaving the more excited I would be go home since I miss everyone so much, but I am finding myself in new territory, one that I have never experienced before and don’t know what to do. I don’t want to leave just yet...
Today I sit outside in the garden reading my book “Always Looking Up” by Michael J. Fox. As I’m avidly reading, captured by Michael’s optimism and biting into my tuna sandwich I get this feeling that many call deja-vu, but this time it felt different. It truly felt as if I was supposed to be there at that exact moment reading that particular book at that exact time while here in Kenya. Such an odd feeling to explain, but it made me feel good. It gave me a reassurance with a “yes, I’m supposed to be here” feeling. It didn’t even feel like it was a
coincidence that I was reading about the trials and tribulations of Michael J Fox battling against the horrible disease he was diagnosed with, Parkinson’s Disease, yet how optimistic he was on life. He says his life started when he got Parkinson’s. I feel like my life is just starting now too. As if my eyes have just opened and seen life. This leads to me to think that I need more time here, more time to help and lay a solid foundation in my new life.
We visited three more schools; the last 3 out of the 9 ACCES schools. The first school, Inkonyero, which is run on the church grounds of the community as they don’t have their own land of buildings, was a small school with bright learners and teachers. I spent time with each classroom, played soccer with their new soccer ball Candace and I donated along with skipping ropes and had the opportunity to interview 3 learners. Each of their stories brought tears to my eyes. Asala, Level 8, has 3 younger brothers and they walk over 7km’s for over an hour to come to school because their parents cannot afford the additional school fees
and uniforms to send them to the formal school that is close to their home. Then there was Ruth, in Level 6, who is an orphan. She lives with her grandmother and says she was too young to remember what happened to her parents, but that her grandmother doesn’t have the means to support her to go to formal school. Ruth wants to be a doctor when she grows up and likes playing volleyball and singing in her church choir. Then finally I met little Josephat, in Level 2, who was very shy but wanted to talk to me. He told me that he has two older brothers and they live 30 minutes away from the school. They carry water they fetch from the river and fire wood every day so that Mama Uji can make Uji for them at break time. Josephat’s father died when he was young and his mother is left to care for her 3 boys on her own. She does casual labour at the local farms to try and support her family. Josephat dreams of being a teacher when he grows up. I asked him if he wanted to be a teacher for ACCES one
day and he gave a big smile and said “Yes!” He likes to play football/soccer (like every Kenyan boy) with his older brothers. He comes to ACCES’ Inkonyero school because they feed him Uji, which if it weren’t for ACCES he wouldn’t eat. It touches my heart of how many children and families ACCES is helping in these communities.
Then on another day on what felt like the longest day ever, we went to two other ACCES schools, Imbale and Shivagala. It took at least two hours to get there. We went to the main area in Kakamega to catch a bus to go to Shivagala and waited there for over an hour for the bus to fill up before leaving. It’s different than back home where the bus leaves on a schedule regardless of how many people are on the bus or not. Here, buses or matatu’s leave when the bus is completely full and it doesn’t matter how long it takes to fill it up. If they don’t fill it up then they lose money thus everyone must wait until the bus is at full (or overfull) capacity. As we are waiting for the bus to leave
I watch the people in their day to day lives walking around the town, selling items, carrying items to sell at the market. Vendors come to my window to try sell cookies and lollipops with Obama’s face on the wrapping. I look down to the sewer and see all the garbage piling up and water still not drained from yesterday’s rain storm. Finally the bus starts to move and we are on our way to what is the bumpiest trip I’ve ever been on. I don’t think the cars/buses have shocks here or they must be worn out because you can feel every single bump and the potholes in the red dirt road don’t help. We finally arrive to the first school where the children peer out of the windows smiling and waving and saying in their adorable accents “how are you?” They are excited to see us! We greet them and tell them how proud we are of their hard work and encourage them to continue studying and getting good grades. Due to the wait in the morning for the bus to leave, we don’t have much time so we have to go to the second school after we
meet and have a brief discussion of challenges with the teachers. After, we walk back to the main road to get motorcycles and go to the next school which is about 30 minutes away. Candace and I share a motorbike and we sit on the back on one with a young Kenyan driver. It’s not as if it was the first time I was going on a motorcycle here, but I was truly scared this time! Normally we go pretty slow due to the road conditions being bumpy, but this time the driver was going really fast regardless of the bumps on the road. We made it safe but that definitely felt like the longest bike ride I’d ever been on and not having a helmut made it feel even longer! We spent some time with the children and teachers at ACCES’ Imbale School which is also hosted by their local church.
After visiting these two schools we also had the rare opportunity to visit Stephen’s (ACCES’ Programs Coordinator) parent’s home, which was about a 5 minute walk from the Imbale School. His parents were very kind and proud to have us there. They said a prayer in Swahili
which Stephen translated that they thanked ACCES for all the help they have done in the community and prayed for the donors in Canada to continue supporting the community. They even gave us fresh eggs from their farm to take home!
Then on Thursday we had the greatest pleasure to watch Shitaho level 8 students perform their live poems and singing and dancing routines while being video taped. The video will be coming home with us so that ACCES in Canada can show it to it’s local donors to illustrate what their donations are doing for these children and to continue to support them so that they go on to compete with other schools; there is lack of funds available to send the kids to go to nationals to compete. These kids are just so bright and talented and have so much passion. It’s unbelievable to watch these kids perform at such a high level and with such dedication. If you only watched the video you would think they were normal children like back at home, smiling and dancing, but shielded behind these smiles are their stories as many orphans in poverty. As they were performing their last routine
with drums, singing and dancing, I drew tears to my eyes which I tried to cover with my sunglasses from the kids as I didn’t want them to see I was sad as they were performing their happy song. They made me so happy and sad at the same time. Sad that they are so poor, yet happy that although they are so poor they can be so happy.
The people here like I’ve mentioned before are very happy and kind. They are also so very humble and gentle. Every time I’m walking and trip or I tell one of the ACCES staff of some bad incident, they say “I’m sorry” as if it were their fault. It’s very endearing and I want to tell them not to apologize since it’s no where near their fault that for example I tripped but figure that this is just their way of ensuring that you know they feel bad for what happened. Also, when we meet someone new, they greet us with a hand shake that is not really a shake, more like a hold of the hand for a few seconds. As I greet them and say hello they say
hello back, however, they never look into my eyes as we do when we greet each other back home. Everyone here also just wants to shake your hand whether you are walking in the town or there is a visitor to the ACCES office, you always greet anyone with a shaking of the hand. Many people that we meet when we are out and about running errands want to formally meet us and know which NGO we are with. They assume we are with an NGO as we look like definite foreigners. I now have a friend, Alex, at the local supermarket who always tends to startle me by calling my name “Karen!” as I’m looking at grocery items in the aisles. He always asks if I can sponsor him or help get him a job at ACCES. Alex is not the only one that approaches us for sponsorship or help. Each time we are out in the town we are approached by at least a few children. It’s definitely hard as you can’t help every child as much as you wish you could. I think if I could only bring one or two of them home what kind of
different life they would have and the opportunities that could lay ahead of them.
One other cultural difference here is that polygamy is a normal way of life here and it is quite common for some men to have 2 or 3 or 4 wives here each having 3-5 children. Although it does seem that nowadays with more gender equity rights and more women empowerment, polygamy is not as common as it used to be. Now you men out there reading this may be smiling and thinking what's wrong with this cultural difference, but this can put a burden on the children since there are more children per father thus less money per child thus little chance for the children to get the opportunity to go to school.
And now I turn myself back to Micheal J. Fox and relate these children to the struggles that he faces and then think of my Father who also suffers with Parkinson’s. My Father and Michael did not chose to get diagnosed with a life crippling disease, however, as I read through Michael’s memoir and also watch my Father live his life, they don’t complain with their situation, they have embraced
it and made the most of what they have with it. And so have these children and people of Kenya. These children should be sad and depressed, but instead they are happy and have so much hope and faith for a better future. They wholehearted go to school to follow their dreams, so that they may be one of the lucky few that can have a better future.
I hope that you too can embrace everything that you are and what you have and create your challenges into opportunities. I hope you have a beautiful day!
I leave you with a couple quotes that have inspired my week:
"Be the change you want to see in the world."~Ghandi
“Nobody would choose to have a disease visited upon them. Still, Parkinson's forced me to make a fundamental life decision: adopt a siege mentality - or embark upon a life journey.” ~Michael J. Fox
Thank you for reading my blog
I miss you all!
Karen
Please visit ACCES’ website:
ACCES
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lisa petrucci
non-member comment
tears uv joy
u sweet smart girl, u have inspired not only me, to embrace todays challenges with an open heart, and mb even a smile but also my mother, who listening to me read ur blog, has just told me to tell u, " tell her i understand what ur talking about because my brother had parkinsons disease". sweetie i send u big blessings and huge props! lol~! for this courage ur finding to dig deep and lay foundation on sturdy land! luv u lots!