That basically sums up the men in the bush. Threw this together pretty fast so sorry for mispelling or confusion.
Day 6: Into the Wild
This morning we loaded up the trucks and headed into the bush. I thought we had left civilization when we stayed in the village, but this is a whole new level of roughin’ it. I got dropped off at the school where my new host dad Daniel teaches and lets just say I didn’t make the first impression I was hoping to make. When I got out of the truck, the kids started crying and took off running. A few even hid behind the chalkboard on the ground! Daniel told me the kids were afraid of my beard. I mean, I know the beard might not be the biggest draw for the ladies, but geez- I never thought my face would actually bring people to tears! I guess, beauty can sometimes scare people ;) But I made some goofy faces and did some dance moves & it didn’t take long for them to start laughing & wanting to pet my hair like the kids in the village…I am staying with the Ekisokiria people of Kakamat. These people remind me a lot of the people from the video we watched during PDO. Their huts are made of palm trees and leaves & are awesome. Below is where I stayed…
The flies here are insane. They are like suicide bombers for chai- I had to fish some of the extremists out of my chai. Really gives you a peaceful feeling about germs and diseases…For lunch we had uji which is like oatmeal only you drink it. It’s not bad but let’s just say I wouldn’t be too excited if I heard it’s on the menu for tomorrow (which it was!)…Daniel is pretty cool. His English is great and he’s very talkative. He even knew about Osama being killed. I forgot about the bombings on the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi and the effects terrorism had on Kenya…The place is Ekisokiria, which means donkey and I learned why. They were everywhere by the “river.” I say “river” because there was no water in it and I don’t think there has been for a long time. There were probably 50 donkeys and I saw a group of camels too…
I finally got to see one of CMF’s farm irrigation plots and it’s pretty impressive. They have a solar panel that pumps water, so they can keep the different crops crowing. The garden is pretty incredible. I mean in the middle of the African desert sits about half a football field of sorghum, cow peas, and a few other crops.
And the people are really proud of the their garden…It’s funny how cultural differences seem to fade when people look at their pictures. Some teenage mothers kept wanting to get their picture taken again & again & they would point & giggle just like American teenage girls. They even asked Kyle to get a picture with him. Apparently the African ladies love them some cat daddy (Kyle’s signature dance)…Definitely had some funny Sammy moments today.
Sammy is great for translating but he always thinks we’re trying to get him to translate. So sometimes we’ll ask him a question & just want the answer, & he’ll respond back with how to ask in Turkana. We joke that we need an intermediary between us & Sammy to make sure we understand each other! For example, we’re in the middle of nowhere & I wanted to know if we can just urinate wherever. But if you say you need to go to the bathroom, people generally assume “number two” & tell you to go way out in the bush. So I was trying to ask Sammy and told him “I need to pee right now! Where do I go?” And of course, he told me how to ask in Turkana. We all started laughing, but eventually we got it figured out. Here's Sammy
We each took a bath later in the afternoon near one of the wells. Not sure why because there’s a bath at Daniel’s. But he just told me I could pee in there so I’m glad we bathed elsewhere. I guess peeing in the shower is not only normal here, but also encouraged! The bathing rooms are basically roofless huts of palm leaves. It’s a pretty interesting experience to be butt naked in the middle of Kenya under the shade of palm tree bathing yourself
…I don’t think I’ve ever been somewhere so silent. If no one is speaking, you can hear the wind the stir up the dirt. There’s no animal noises, no vehicles, just pure stillness. It’s almost eery.
Sammy is great for translating but he always thinks we’re trying to get him to translate. So sometimes we’ll ask him a question & just want the answer, & he’ll respond back with how to ask in Turkana. We joke that we need an intermediary between us & Sammy to make sure we understand each other! For example, we’re in the middle of nowhere & I wanted to know if we can just urinate wherever. But if you say you need to go to the bathroom, people generally assume “number two” & tell you to go way out in the bush. So I was trying to ask Sammy and told him “I need to pee right now! Where do I go?” And of course, he told me how to ask in Turkana. We all started laughing, but eventually we got it figured out. Here's Sammy
We each took a bath later in the afternoon near one of the wells. Not sure why because there’s a bath at Daniel’s. But he just told me I could pee in there so I’m glad we bathed elsewhere. I guess peeing in the shower is not only normal here, but also encouraged! The bathing rooms are basically roofless huts of palm leaves. It’s a pretty interesting experience to be butt naked in the middle of Kenya under the shade of palm tree bathing yourself
…I don’t think I’ve ever been somewhere so silent. If no one is speaking, you can hear the wind the stir up the dirt. There’s no animal noises, no vehicles, just pure stillness. It’s almost eery.
Day 7:
Romantic stage is starting to wear on me. It’s definitely more primitive here. My host mom just walks around topless & most of the boys don’t wear pants. In Lodwar, there were breasts everywhere. Now, it’s that plus an abundance of penis. What ever happened to wearing clothes?...I woke up to the fury of “Little Jerry Seinfeld” this morning. He started crowing around 3:30 AM. He crows again every hour until about 6 AM when he just goes insane for about an hour or so. I thought he was right by my head, so I was getting prepared to strangle him. But it ended up that he’s in an elevated cage in the middle of camp. I thought this was to avoid snoozing, like when I put my alarm clock on the other side of the room on the day of a big test, but I discovered it was because a dog ate many of Daniel’s other chickens. If I could find the dog, I’d probably pay him off to take this one out too!...Daniel’s wife found my morning routine to be really funny. She keeps laughing at me and all my luggage (my one pack!). I woke up this morning & saw their baby covered in flies.
It’s disturbing to see it not even phase him. I can say he because he’s never wearing pants and almost always naked. I thought Daniel’s two boys were the cutest boys I’d ever seen but discovered the next day that they were girls when they’re mom put dresses on them. Otherwise, they are very confused boys! Regardless, they’re adorable. I gave them Auburn keychains & Toto added it to her necklace.
So now I’ve got Sammy repping an Auburn hat & kids in Kakamat & Lodwar repping Auburn keychains-Gotta keep spreading the good news!...The African girls are definitely after Kyle. One even told me to greet Emoru (his Turkana name) for her!...…A few of the girls wanted to braid my hair & we talked them into braiding my beard. They were afraid at first and said the hair was rough but eventually they braided a strand and eventually almost the whole thing. It looked ridiculous. I looked like I needed to be smoking weed or eating shrooms or something. It was pretty uncomfortable, so I eventually unbraided all of it
…More good Sammy moments today. Some of his responses remind me of Borat. We tried to get Sammy to admit that the women are mistreated. Sammy (& most Turkana men) will tell you that the women like to work all the time & carry heavy things. We asked Sammy if the women were stronger than men, and he said yes. We were a little surprised and asked who would win in a fight, and he said men. This didn’t make sense but he explained that all the carrying & working made the women tired, which gave the men a chance! We couldn’t stop laughing! I asked Sammy which ranked higher in Turkana, goats or women, & he thought about it and said, “I don’t know.” It’s funny to hear him say but it’s really sad. Women do everything. They even build the houses. The men seriously just chill and walk with their animals. We joke with Sammy saying the Turkana men are living the good life, but it’s really pretty boring. I would feel worthless…Sleeping on the ground with no sleeping pad is tough to get comfortable…Kyle pooped in the “shower hut” this afternoon. They call it the bathroom but it’s only for bathing, & surprisingly, urinating! But Kyle pooped in there, & even left toilet paper. Imagine if the tables were turned and some African visitor came and pooped in your shower. It would be a little strange…Hopefully I can get some sleep before Little Jerry starts screaming in a few hours.
It’s disturbing to see it not even phase him. I can say he because he’s never wearing pants and almost always naked. I thought Daniel’s two boys were the cutest boys I’d ever seen but discovered the next day that they were girls when they’re mom put dresses on them. Otherwise, they are very confused boys! Regardless, they’re adorable. I gave them Auburn keychains & Toto added it to her necklace.
So now I’ve got Sammy repping an Auburn hat & kids in Kakamat & Lodwar repping Auburn keychains-Gotta keep spreading the good news!...The African girls are definitely after Kyle. One even told me to greet Emoru (his Turkana name) for her!...…A few of the girls wanted to braid my hair & we talked them into braiding my beard. They were afraid at first and said the hair was rough but eventually they braided a strand and eventually almost the whole thing. It looked ridiculous. I looked like I needed to be smoking weed or eating shrooms or something. It was pretty uncomfortable, so I eventually unbraided all of it
…More good Sammy moments today. Some of his responses remind me of Borat. We tried to get Sammy to admit that the women are mistreated. Sammy (& most Turkana men) will tell you that the women like to work all the time & carry heavy things. We asked Sammy if the women were stronger than men, and he said yes. We were a little surprised and asked who would win in a fight, and he said men. This didn’t make sense but he explained that all the carrying & working made the women tired, which gave the men a chance! We couldn’t stop laughing! I asked Sammy which ranked higher in Turkana, goats or women, & he thought about it and said, “I don’t know.” It’s funny to hear him say but it’s really sad. Women do everything. They even build the houses. The men seriously just chill and walk with their animals. We joke with Sammy saying the Turkana men are living the good life, but it’s really pretty boring. I would feel worthless…Sleeping on the ground with no sleeping pad is tough to get comfortable…Kyle pooped in the “shower hut” this afternoon. They call it the bathroom but it’s only for bathing, & surprisingly, urinating! But Kyle pooped in there, & even left toilet paper. Imagine if the tables were turned and some African visitor came and pooped in your shower. It would be a little strange…Hopefully I can get some sleep before Little Jerry starts screaming in a few hours.
Day 8:
We made it back to civilization! Our trip got cut a little short due to some stomach sickness by Kyle & Mike (not saying I was disappointed it got cut short!) Life in the bush is difficult. It’s definitely more primitive, but it’s also really boring. There’s just not a lot going on. Yesterday & today we seriously sat in the same spot under a tree for like 5 hours. We joked and said we felt like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day—what do we need to do to get things right?
I feel like I grew a lot over the past few days. I used to joke with people that food was only a meal if it included meat. I went most of the past 3 days without meat, & now I realize what a blessing proper nutrition really is…I think I expected to see death and poverty up close and personal in the bush, people unable to walk or stand. But instead I saw something else. I saw people dieing more slowly, unknowingly. These people are unaware that there food intake contains almost no nutritional value. Most of their food is from maize & does nothing for them other than fill them up. I ask Gene about the bloated looking children & he said it’s from a continuous malnourished diet.
These children are being served uji, thinking it’s providing them some substinence. But uji has nothing in it, no nutrients, pure starch. It will fill you up; it definitely filled me up. And it taste so bland, there’s nothing to it. I could understand if it was really good for you & tasted bad like protein bars, but it’s not even good for you. But these people are unaware. Both Kole & Toto have bloated stomachs & Sammy said it’s from malnutrition. Daniel keeps pointing to their stomachs saying “Emwonit,” which means satisfied. I think he thinks they are full and doesn’t understand the harm that’s being done by their improper diet. So they eat the same things over & over again not knowing the damage it’s doing to their bodies….I don’t know how these people make it through life. It wasn’t bad for a couple of days, but it would be depressing if it was your whole life. And if you’re a guy, life seems pretty lame. You just sit around all day, maybe go to look for your goats. But most of the time, just sit around…Sammy changed his answer yesterday & said Turkana men were stronger than women. But he said the women were stronger for carrying things. How did these guys possibly convince the women to believe this. Geniuses—teach me! Completely kidding!...I got to meet the elder of the Kisiriak people. His name is David but everyone calls him “the old man.” Supposedly almost all of the land of Kakamat is his, at least he says it is. The Kakamat people would agree, but Gene says the government would say otherwise…We went back to Daniel’s school today. We learned some things along with the 3-8 year olds like colors and animals in Turkana. It’s encouraging to know we’re on about the same level as them! I taught the kids how to say War Eagle. It was pretty awesome to see a ton of African kids yelling, “Waaaaar Eagle! Hey!” Now whenever I start to wave my hand in the air they’ll start to do the cheer—just spreading the good news!
These children are being served uji, thinking it’s providing them some substinence. But uji has nothing in it, no nutrients, pure starch. It will fill you up; it definitely filled me up. And it taste so bland, there’s nothing to it. I could understand if it was really good for you & tasted bad like protein bars, but it’s not even good for you. But these people are unaware. Both Kole & Toto have bloated stomachs & Sammy said it’s from malnutrition. Daniel keeps pointing to their stomachs saying “Emwonit,” which means satisfied. I think he thinks they are full and doesn’t understand the harm that’s being done by their improper diet. So they eat the same things over & over again not knowing the damage it’s doing to their bodies….I don’t know how these people make it through life. It wasn’t bad for a couple of days, but it would be depressing if it was your whole life. And if you’re a guy, life seems pretty lame. You just sit around all day, maybe go to look for your goats. But most of the time, just sit around…Sammy changed his answer yesterday & said Turkana men were stronger than women. But he said the women were stronger for carrying things. How did these guys possibly convince the women to believe this. Geniuses—teach me! Completely kidding!...I got to meet the elder of the Kisiriak people. His name is David but everyone calls him “the old man.” Supposedly almost all of the land of Kakamat is his, at least he says it is. The Kakamat people would agree, but Gene says the government would say otherwise…We went back to Daniel’s school today. We learned some things along with the 3-8 year olds like colors and animals in Turkana. It’s encouraging to know we’re on about the same level as them! I taught the kids how to say War Eagle. It was pretty awesome to see a ton of African kids yelling, “Waaaaar Eagle! Hey!” Now whenever I start to wave my hand in the air they’ll start to do the cheer—just spreading the good news!
Heading back to the bush tomorrow…at least this time we will be working on wells and doing more than “goat watching!”
Peace
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