Quick update: Life is Kenya is hectic but amazing.
-I've been working from about 8-7 the past week-and-a-half doing the trainings (last week) and working with the soap group (last week and this week). The training was amazing. We had 27 graduates, laughed a lot talkind about poop and water, and learned a lot from Elizabeth... she's great. Exciting news with the business: we've successfully made soap! And it's going to be economically viable! And the whole experience is like a mix between a chemistry project, a business, and a meeting of friends... mix in the fact that everyone speaks english as a second language and that the culture is completely different... it's crazy. It's been fun. Working with these people is teaching me so much about myself (and about working in a group.) That sounds cheesey, but it's true. I want SO badly for the business to be a success. Today we experimented coloring the soap with some local plants, adding scents with rosemary, citronella, and lemongrass, and working with local materials (lime and sodium carbonate) instead of wood ash or commerial lye. I'm going to bring some bars home to sell here so they can hopefully buy a bike to transport the soap to other markets!
-My friends here are amazing. I had a sleepover with a 21 year old and 40-something year old this past weekend because I was alone at the guesthouse. At church they do "fundraisers" for different causes/projects. People can bring money or gifts to give that are auctioned off during the service. I bought Jael (our cook) a chicken. She decided to keep it and name it Happy, because she knows I'm vegetarian and decided it was a happy chicken because it wasn't eaten and that she could use it to lay eggs for a while.
-Sunday a bunch of us when to Homa Bay to find some resources for the soap-making. We went to this volcanic area with hot springs and boiled an egg! And we met a former MP for the area, and we got tons of aloe vera plans (literally just pulled them out of the ground, threw them in the land rover, and replanted them to use for the soap), we were led to this stone that "looks like an alligator"... after a really long walk I was not too entertained... the story is that an alligator escaped from Lake Victoria and walked up to this rock and then got too tired and died there and was turned to stone in the heat. It was hilarious. It looked nothing like an alligator. Also, we all got in the lake and it was amazing! So beautiful! Hills and the water all in one place...
The real blog entry: Sitting on my bed, under my mosquito net with the window open behind me, the sound of kids playing soccer outside, birds, cows, chickens, the smell of the pineapples that are arranged on my chair, ripened and ready to be eaten, and the most beautiful sunset somewhere out there... I say it's beautiful even though I can't see it at the moment because it's beautiful every single day. This is my reality. For months (the past 3 years really) living in this reality has been an idea or a dream of mine. It's unbelievable to realize that in just 5 and a half days I'll be flying away from this reality to land only hours later in another reality that is equally my own. All of these... the dreams and the realities... are equally beautiful to me.
Side note: The past few weeks I've really struggled with knowing that wealth is so abundant in the US, that it seems as if you could reach out, pick it off a tree, and just give it to someone here to taste it.* I laugh (not really laugh) when I think of these 8 people who have become friends, working every day for hours to learn how to make soap, advertise, run a business, etc... all for a product that they will sell (if they are successful) at 10ksh/bar. This is about 15 cents/bar. I laugh thinking if I got a grant or a donation for $1000 dollars (80,000ksh), that it would be the equivalent of them selling 8000 bars of soap... or really 16,000 since they'll cost about 5ksh each to produce.
To continue: I've struggled with this so much while I've been in Kenya... the disparties... that all the hardships and frustrations and atrocities that I've encountered... from hearing of so many preventable deaths to witnessing car accidents to hearing about post-election violence to experiencing corruption first-hand at the post office... I will leave these sorts of issues when I fly back to the US, but this life is a reality for so many people living in less-developed countries. For these 2 months, this is my reality; I take the good with the bad, the delicious fruits with the heart-breaking stories, always knowing that it is temporary, but also thinking it beautiful (maybe because I know it's temporary?) However, this is thier reality indefinitely. While a lot of them wouldn't have it any other way, and seem at home hanging onto the backs of matatus**, eating Kenyan food with pride over the way they make it better than those in other parts of Kenya, and using thier meager resources in ways that are absolutely fascinating***, there are a lot of people here who dream of living in the US or Canada or the UK. The idea of the US/Canada/UK is beautiful to them... maybe their reality isn't beautiful, or maybe certain parts are, but would living in the US/Canada/the UK really be as beautiful as they imagine?
I'm quite in love with an author/poet Brian Andres, who writes poems called "Story People." When I was in Shimba Hills, sitting ontop of these beautiful rocks that overlook the village and the rolling hills and the houses like dots, where you can see the ocean peek through between the hill crests, I was reminded of one of the poems. It just came to me like a good idea or the feeling hunger... so naturally. The poem is "She said she usually cried at lease once each day not because seh was sad, but because the world was so beautiful & life was so short." Sitting on these rocks with the amazing view and the hot sun and the breeze and the kids playing just overwhelmed me with an appreciation for the beauty of Life and of Living. Since that day I've been reminded of the poem each day. I wonder if Kenyans become overwhelmed with how beautiful the world is. I think they do. This is their reality but it's a beautiful one... I think it's normal to romanticize ideas/dreams, but reality is normally a lot less glamorous than we'd expected. Life, my reality, is much more beautiful than even the way i dreamed it.
In a similar way, I think we glamorize faces and stories until we really get to know the person and the identity behind them. A face becomes a friend when you've looked close, seen the flaws, and still are able see the beauty. I think it's a lot more common to idealize a face or a story when it's distant than to still see it as beautiful when you get up close. My friends here (and my friends are home) are so incredibly beautiful. In the same way, thier identities are beautiful. I can glamorize thier faces and stories... tell you about incredible perserverance against all odds, and creativity and intelligence and amazing singing and physical beauty, but honestly, these people have flaws too. They're beautiful all the same. I feel so blessed to have gotten close enough to them, to have shown them my flaws and still be accepted by them, and to have seen their flaws and still seen the beauty.
This blog made no real sense. But it's okay!
*I have this incredible urge to just GIVE people money because so little goes so far. At the same time, I know this isn't the answer.
**a mini-bus with about 12 seats that usually is filled with over 20 peoople, including several hanging out the sliding door (door opened) and a few holding onto the back (completely outside the vehicle as it flies over potholes, around slower vehicles, etc).
***I'm the first to admit that i don't have the most "common sense" of any person out there. But the resourcefulness that Kenyans have is amazing. I saw a guy carrying a full-sized wooden bed fram on the seat of his bicycle as he stood beside, guiding the bike, and wheeling it home. Working with people who have SO MUCH common sense about EVERYTHING is beautiful and humbling.
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