Have you ever seen a dog in a matatu?

Yesterday was the most bizarre day of my time in Africa, if not the most bizarre day of my life. Stick with me to the end…I’ve got to give you context. The day started off innocently enough—a few of us were going to hike in the Ngong Hills, about a half-hour’s drive outside Nairobi.

We successfully caught a matatu (the little van/bus) and made it to Ngong with only a few sketchy encounters with fellow matatu passengers. We wove our way through the street markets up to a wildlife facility, where we were told how to reach the ranger’s station at the summit of the hills.

Midway through the hike to the ranger station

After about an hour’s hike to the ranger station, we figured out we didn’t have enough money to hire the required armed guards to escort us. We ate our lunch and started back down the hill.

At our picnic spot

And that’s when the fun began. A trio of Kenyan children headed to the market began to walk along with us. Then a stray dog joined our little parade. So imagine, if you will, our group of 6 out-of-place white girls, holding hands with 3 African children, being escorted by a mangy dog, and navigating a bustling village market.

We reached the matatu stop and said farewell to our children. We attempted to get into the matatu that would take us back to Nairobi…

…and the dog got in too.

"Umm...what now?"

In the chaos surrounding this situation, Lisa, a fellow SIT student, was pickpocketed. A man snatched the iPhone right out of her pocket. We evacuated the matatu and our canine friend came with us.

The matatu drivers, hoping to regain our business, located the culprit. They yelled at him and shook their fists as he attempted to say that she had dropped it. I think they were within an inch of beating him; hopefully they didn’t do so when we left.

After nearly provoking mob violence, we found ourselves back in the matatu. With the iPhone...

Lisa and Odoe

...and with the dog. Meet Odoe (named affectionately after our academic director, Odoch).

Odoe rode all the way back to Nairobi with us. We got some very strange looks from our fellow matatu passengers. We stick out enough already ourselves just existing, and our canine companion drew even more attention.

He’s now sleeping at Lisa’s house. Whoulda thunk her host mom was in the market for a dog? It's up in the air as to whether they will keep it. I’m hoping the guy doesn’t have fleas or any other vermin because we got mighty close in that matatu.

Odoe and I safely in Nairobi

"Jennie, are you open?"

I finally took a picture at home! This is Hannah, my 3 year-old host sister. She’s adorable but can be a handful. The first morning I woke up in the house, I opened the door to me room and heard her exclaim, “Jennie is open!” (People hear seem to have a very difficult time with pronouncing my name. Go figure.) The rest of the day was exhausting. She jumped around in my room and went through my things. When she grew tired, she stood behind me and pulled on my hair.

She can be sassy. Whenever I try to lay down the law (ex: “Hannah, don’t bang on my computer please”) she responds with “You are not my friend today. Mommy will beat you!”

I nabbed this picture during one of her daily explorations of my room.

“Jennie, may I put on yo’ specs?”

“Jennie, I wear yo’ specs upside down.”

Speedy Swahili

During the first part of this program, a major focus is learning Swahili. Each day this week, we’ve had 3 hours of intensive lessons. We’re broken down into groups of 4 or 5, and the Swahili teachers meet with a different group each day. The goal is that we become fluent enough to communicate with most people in Kenya during our independent research.

We’ve moved pretty quickly so far. In just three days we’ve moved past simple greetings and introductions to the past perfect tense. A bucketload of verbs and nouns is swimming through my head right now. It’s tough to keep them straight, but here are some favorites that have made me chuckle:

Lala salama: goodnight

Pilipili hoho: bell pepper

Nyanya: tomato

Kahawa: coffee

Mzungo: white person

(tough to forget when you hear it every day!)

Rafiki: friend

When learning any new language there is the potential for blunders; hopefully none of mine are too offensive. My host family told me of a previous student who had been proud to showcase her mastery of the word for milk. But instead of correctly saying ‘mawiza’, she blurted “mah-weezy”—my host brother still uses her pronunciation pretty often.

Overall, Swahili is a fun language. The sounds are just so bouncy—and different from the other languages I’ve studied. I can’t help but smile when I say

“Jina langu ni Jenae. Katika Kenya ninaishi barabara ya Ngong.”

(My name is Jenae. In Kenya I live on Ngong Road.)

I’m a little worried that, when I get back to America, I’ll speak some sort of Swahitalianglish because my brain’s a language-mess right now.

So how’s the food?

Before coming to Kenya, I was apprehensive about the food. I had read all about the abundance of starches: potatoes, rice, plantains, fried dough…maybe all at the same meal. Kenyans ate with the goal of getting full enough to power through the day at the lowest cost possible. And at first, Kenyan cuisine was in line with my fears. While we stayed at hostels, a typical meal included at least three starches, some of them fried, and chewy red meat in broth. Morning tea was accompanied by the Kenyan equivalent to doughnuts. I imagined the four months stretching out ahead of me and pictured my waistband stretching out along with them. 

Mandazi=doughnuts

But now here I sit at my homestay waiting for dinner, and I’m really looking forward to it. My homestay parents go to the market each Saturday and return with loads of fresh fruits and vegetables. Our evening meal is typically chock full of bright, colorful veggies like okra, butternut squash, eggplant, and lentils.  A little more oil goes into the pan than what I’m used to at home (I haven’t seen Pam cooking spray in any supermarket), but overall this is amazing food. We had chapati, Kenya’s trademark fried tortilla, with our meal last night, but it was prepared with whole-wheat flour rather than the typical white.

Chapati

How did I end up in a health-conscious household with wifi and hot water? I hope I don’t jinx anything by writing this :S

Thankfully I’ve steered clear of matumbo. As in tripe. Which I know from my meat-judging days is cow intestines. I said coming in to this that I would give everything a shot, but I might have to make myself a liar on this one.

There are a few other traditional dishes I have yet to come across, but I’ve liked most of the ones I’ve tried. Ugali, a thick, millet-based staple food, is very filling and not unpleasant. Some of my classmates are being force-fed the stuff, so their opinons may differ from mine. Sukuma wiki, a slaw made from kale and onions, is pretty tasty too, despite its similarity to seaweed. 

Sukuma wiki: Trust me, it's better than it looks. Especially if you douse it in ketchup.

One thing I’m excited to try is nyama choma, the roasted meat that Kenya boasts as its specialty. Actually, I think mama Agness is making it tonight. I’m typically weary of meat here, but my Swahili teacher said today, “you will try nyama choma and, mmm, you will just die.” Apparently that’s a good thing.

Home Sweet Home

This weekend I moved in with my homestay family in Nairobi. The house is just a 5-minutes from the SIT office, so the walk to school each morning will be no problem. I have an 8 year-old brother, Matthew, and a 3 year-old sister, Hannah. They’re adorable and full of energy. Yesterday both parents were out of the house, so I was home with the kids and the house help for most of the day. The kids love to watch TV (iCarly, Drake & Josh, Spongebob) and go through my things—I’ll have to keep an eye on that!

The house is very modern. It has wifi, running water (even hot water), a microwave, etc. It might seem weird that I mentioned this, but my homestay is not typical of all homestays in the program. At school this morning, many of my classmates shared stories of bucket showers and sleeping in rooms with the entire family. I’m extremely lucky to be in the situation I am in. My family is very young compared to many of the host families, and I think this is the reason they aren’t a traditional African family.

We started our full class schedule today with Kiswahili lessons in the morning and a field study seminar in the afternoon. Now I’m hanging out at the school for a few hours before I walk home for dinner. I’m quite lucky to have such a short walk; I don’t have to leave quite so early to get home before dark. I felt safe walking here this morning, but I was hyperaware of everything going on around me since I’m walking alone. The only downside to my homestay placement is that I’m not really close to anyone else in the program.

I’ll post pictures as soon as I take some :\

Peanut buttah (Sept. 2)

I really wish I could post more pictures. We haven't had internet for the last couple days, and what we have now is slow. So for a while, the blog may be wordy and boring :( I actually haven't taken many pictures because it hasn't been a good idea to carry a camera around the city. Hopefully I can manage to upload some soon.

Exciting start to the day…we had peanut butter at breakfast! Seems like a small thing, but you’d be surprised how many of us had been commiserating over missing it. The food has been pretty good for the most part, but protein is the one thing we’ve been a little short on. We’ve had a lot of beef (at least we think it’s beef—it might be goat) but it’s nothing like American meat. After this protein-packed breakfast, we walked to the SIT office. We’ll be spending most of our time there over the next couple months. The building was a lot smaller than I expected. I’m not sure where we’ll have lectures because none of the rooms looked big enough to house us all at the same time. Could be cozy!

We broke up into small groups for formal Swahili lessons. We were in class for 3 hours, broken up nicely by the standard chai break at 10:00. I could get used to this steady stream of caffeine. We returned to the hostel for lunch, and then a few of us took a quick walk toward the Toi Market. This area reminded me of Kibera with its dusty streets, and bustling markets. Here, instead of produce, the stands are piled with secondhand clothing and shoes. I’m nervous about trying to buy anything, but eventually I’ll get up the nerve. Clothing from shopping malls is super expensive here, and most people buy their clothing from these markets regardless of their social class.

During the evening we got a lecture on staying healthy during our time in Kenya. Malaria, schistosomiasis, snake bites, tetanus, HIV—our heads were swimming with scientific words. It was a little scary, but it’s better that we are aware of even the rare diseases.

We received the names of our host families. We’ll meet them tomorrow afternoon! I have two young siblings (a boy and a girl), and I can’t wait to learn more about them!

Baby Steps

Today (Sept 1, wow time is flying) we moved closer to the city center of Nairobi. We’re staying at another hostel for two days so we can become familiar with the area surrounding our homestays and the SIT office where we’ll have classes. We ate lunch here at the hostel, had a brief Q & A with our Swahili teachers about how to be culturally competent in our homestays, and went on a walking tour of this part of Nairobi.

We walked through Kibera along a route we may walk to school each day, depending on where our family lives. My group walked further into Kibera, through the slum areas. It was a surreal experience navigating the dusty, narrow streets and seeing all the tiny shops. Though my group was only 4 students and a Swahili tutor, we were far from inconspicuous. I’m beginning to adjust to being so obviously the minority group here. It’s strange to be stared at and feel so out of place. A white person here is referred to as a “Mizungu” in Swahili, and I certainly heard that word enough today to remember it.

After the tour, a few of us tried our hand at navigating the neighborhood without our instructors. We made it to Java, the American-like coffee chain, without a problem. They have typical coffee drinks, milkshakes, desserts, and American food. It’s within walking distance of the school and I have a feeling it will be a popular lunch stop.

My feet have never been so brown as they were after we returned to the hostel. It was an exhausting day and I can barely keep my eyes open.