Trials – Banana Bread Style

So it’s been a bit now since I said I was going to update the blog. Let’s just say a year. After a few minor life milestones like graduating college and traveling India for 3 weeks I feel as though I have officially entered the working world. That 8 to 5 grind that is so desired or loathed, depending on your personal outlook. Well, I’m already bored. So… I purchased a cookbook by Christina Tosi (Owner of Momofuku Milk Mar which I have never been to but drool and admire from afar dreaming of whipping in their kitchen). Not sure if I’m going to pull the whole Julia Childs make everything in the book or just start somewhere but there are definitely recipes to come. I just need to budget into my intern income the supplies to make it all happen. For now, heres the banana bread recipe I just made with the rotting bananas on my counter. Sorry fruit flies.

Banana Bread. I think its one of the easiest breads there is to make. No yeast or kneading or anything like that. I’d really call it more of a cake than anything except for its loaf shape, it’s bread identity is difficult to really decipher. I’m pleased this is my first recipe to be posted because it’s a classic homestyle use-what-ya-got dessert (or breakfast). So here it goes…

Oven= 350 degrees

The most important ingredient is the butter, room temperature, like most recipes or at least softened so you don’t have to beat it for 20 minutes (Disclaimer: thats an exaggeration for anyone trying to make banana bread for the first time. You should not beat the butter for 20 minutes). Next the sugar, just a cup will do. Cream these guys together past the lumpy stage until they form a creamy blob. While this is going on (or after if you still have a hand mixer like me) mash up the 4 really ripe, stolen-from-the-fruit-flies bananas and in a separate bowl beat up the 2 eggs with a fork. Pour these both into the creamy blob and keep whipping (It’s really not whipping beating but I wanted to get the nae nae video in this post any way that I could).

There we go.

Once those are combined, add in the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda and salt) and fold them in by hand. I’m a fan of not over beating anything so once the really hard stuff if done, I switch to a spatula A$AP Rocky. Throw in the tablespoon of vanilla at the end. Vanilla usually goes in with the butter and sugar but for some reason I do it at the end for banana bread. Superstition? Maybe.

In a bread pan lined with parchment glob the blob and flatten out the top so it looks smooth. Now for the whipping hack of the day… sprinkle a pretty generous serving of granulated sugar on the top of the bread just before throwing it in the oven so you get that crunchy sweet top like a muffin. 50-60 minutes in the oven and you have a moist and delicious banana bread. Stick a Toothpick or a knife in to make sure it’s done.

The Fruit Flies won’t know what hit em.

Ingredients

• ¹⁄₂ cup butter
• 1 cup sugar (plus tablespoon or so to sprinkle on top
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 4 bananas, finely crushed
• 1 ¹⁄₂cups flour
• 1teaspoon baking soda
• ¹⁄₂ teaspoon salt
• ¹⁄₂ teaspoon vanilla

(Inspired by Food. com Banana Bread Recipe)

(Photos with the next post)

Reflection

So here I am, 162 days after boarding my flight to a far away continent full of dangerous insurgents, dreadful infrastructure and desperate poverty, wishing I could be standing at the TSA line in the international terminal at JFK with my shoes off.

We talked about culture shock a lot on the trip, how hard it would be to go into the ice cream or toothpaste aisle of a grocery store without bursting into tears or wander through a mall without glaring in disgust at the amount of over-consumption that’s become an incurable virus within the “developed” world. It was odd because the first time I stepped into one of these old-but-new environments I wasn’t as angry and appalled as I wanted to be. Just a few weeks ago I was in a tiny village of Ayalaliyo trekking from mud hut to mud hut asking people questions about their crops and household roles. I should be furious at how we can live with such ease and prosperity while there are people STARVING in Africa. I have realized the past few days, as I’ve had to settle back into my San Diego life, looking desperately for a source of income, that I had an expectation of coming home and being a changed person. But when I came back, I so easily fell back into the way of life I had left behind a few months earlier, with barely a speed bump. But it’s now, after a busy visit back home, where I finally have some free time to myself that I start to really reflect on my time in Kenya and Tanzania (and South Africa). Although at first glance I don’t really feel like a changed person, other than knowing a few more words of Swahili than when I left and having some pretty cool wall decorations, I do think that I have changed. As I get farther away from the experience I find myself relating to it more and trying to grasp on to more things that remind of my time there. I have some ideas brewing in my head about how to give back to the communities there or allow me to go back, but I think those will come at the right time.

For now, I decided to put myself to a challenge to think of three major takeaways from my trip and here’s what I got…

The first conclusion that I came to is that you really need a lot less than you think you need to be happy. Granted, the campus we SFS students were staying on was the best accommodations around, aside from the lodges, but still it was a change from the norm back home. The cold showers were best if you ran or played ultimate Frisbee before jumping in. You need way less clothes than you think, I feel a little uneasy in urban outfitters nowadays. You only need about a third of a Nalgene bottle of water to brush your teeth. Using the same towel for three months without washing it is possible; I would however give it a 2-month limit if mildew weren’t something you’re a fan of. Returning home to where all these minor adjustments aren’t necessary has made me slip back into some habits of overconsumption and laziness, but I’m trying to remind myself that simplicity is good and I really don’t need any more clothes.

The second conclusion I’ve come to is that it’s extremely important to live in the moment. It’s a silly phrase people post on their Facebook walls and re-pin on Pinterest in pretty hand-lettering but I feel like during this trip I really grasped the concept and the importance of it. The statement is much easier said than put into action, as many things are, but once you are able to remove yourself from the past and stop worrying so much about future events, you’re able to free up some space to take in the present. I think I was able to do that a lot on this trip and really create great images and moments that may have not been so clear if I had been focusing on the tsi tsi fly bite from yesterday or what I’m going to be doing with my life in 8 months. Whenever I found myself worrying about home or friends or whether a snake was going to crawl into my bed, I’d kind of whisper this phrase in my head and remind myself that whatever the worry was, it would pass. I’d also use that reminder when I had my head sticking out of the green safari cars while driving through the Serengeti with the wind whipping my ponytail and the sun beating down on my light skin, surrounded by every keystone species there is in Africa because, well,  that’s a pretty awesome moment.

The last conclusion that I came to is that the spirit of Africa is unlike anything you will feel. I always say that one thing I love about the east coast is that you can feel the history and the depth to the place. I miss that out in California sometimes because everything seems so new. In Kenya and Tanzania, I really felt the presence of the past, if that makes sense (keep in mind I’m still trying to live in the moment here). There was so much life that had lived where I was living. There was pain and happiness and struggle and success. People for millions of years had walked where I was walking (especially at Oldupai Gorge- Google it). That’s special. That makes you feel special. I think that’s one of the reasons I loved it so much; everyone can belong there because we all came from there. Ernest Hemingway couldn’t have said it better when he said he was homesick for Africa before he even left the soil. When you’re there you find a piece of yourself you didn’t know was there and when you leave you miss a piece of yourself you never knew you had.

 

Serengeti

The Serengeti is one of, if not the most beautiful landscape I have ever seen. Most of the things people associate with the Serengeti are animal related, like the big cats or the great migration (both of which were incredible). Maybe it’s because I’m not crazy about big cats or really obsessed with any of the animals as some of the future wildlife managers on this trip are, but I’ve found myself being more conscious of the types of vegetation, the soils, the rock formations, the cloud shapes and the landscapes than I ever was back at home. As far as these normal expectations for Serengeti go, we had two perfect days there. These two days involved sightings of lions, cheetah and leopard, as well as a viewing of the magnitude of great migration. For the migration, it looked as though Pixar had set up a green screen and pressed the multiply button to create the effect of hundreds of thousands of wildebeest and zebras filling the plains as far as the eye can see. The farthest visible were just dots on the horizon.

Before I get too far ahead of myself, let me tell you a little about life in the Serengeti for the week. The drive from Rhotia (where our home is while in Tanzania) to Serengeti took about 4 hours, with a few stops and some car troubles. We stopped at one spot on the way called Oldupai Gorge, which was just before the beginning of the Serengeti plains. Oldupai (usually found written as Oduvai but was translated incorrectly) is known as the cradle of mankind and an extremely important ecological site. It was a pretty amazing place. We had a woman who works there talk to us about all the archaeological findings in the gorge including a remain from every chain of human evolution. We had a campsite for all 30 of us plus about 15 staff members. Our tents were big army size ones with four of us to one tent. There was a big room used for cooking and eating with ledges to sit on. The bathrooms were pretty nice; we had running water, two normal toilets and two porcelain holes. I’m actually starting to prefer the holes; my aim is getting pretty impressive ☺. We had two askaris travel with us like our last expedition but since this campsite wasn’t fenced, we had to be walked by an asakri anywhere on the site after dark. There were hyenas behind my tent every night, probably no more than 15 meters, and a few people saw them on their late night walks to the bathroom. I was lucky enough to only hear them, but even that was a little startling. Their whooping and laughing was not a comforting noise.
Back to the park itself though, we were able to get out and game drive everyday for almost the entire day, other than a short talk from the warden in the afternoon on Wednesday, we were in the land cruisers and on the move. Wednesday and Thursday were easily two of the best days of my life. Sounds crazy but there was barely a moment where I wasn’t in awe whether it be the clouds or the lighting or the lion two feet away from me, I was in a constant state of wonder. My favorite sighting from the trip occurred on Wednesday’s afternoon game drive. There are these groups of rock formations in a certain part of the park called kopjes, and they happen to be nestled on the top of the gradient incline above where much of the migration was occurring. It was the epitome of pride rock and just as we drove up to it, a male lion rolled to his side and sauntered to the tip of the highest rock. He stopped and just gazed off into the plains in front of him with his mane blowing in the wind. Surrounding him on various rocks were at least 6 females, 2 other males and two juveniles. After the male presented himself to us, one of the young hopped up on a dead tree behind the male and lounged like samba would on the outstretched branch. The lion king references were unavoidable. I felt pretty complete after that lion siting but we had still yet to see a cheetah. On Thursday we ended up seeing a total of 3 cheetahs, 6 lion prides and 3 leopards. Without spoiling too much for the two lucky people who I get to return to the Serengeti with (rowan and mom *cough cough*), I’d say that’s my trip in a nutshell. I can’t wait to go back!!!

Leopard in the grass

Mama lion who was perched on a rock alone

The sunset after Wednesday’s game drive

Some really awesome cloud that formed wile the double rainbow was across the sky

The bottom of the double rainbow on Wednesday with some tembo (elephants) as the pot of gold!

The Great Migration

WIldebeest and Zebra all bunched up

A munching giraffe

We had a celebration at the lodge on Thursday for the completion of my rabies vaccines. My friends made me a rabies free crown and bought me a mimosa 🙂

Cheetah

The view behind my tent (theres some hyena’s out there somewhere)

Mama and baby giraffe nuzzle

Tree climbing lions!

A baby elephant nursing

Mufasa on pride rock

Simba in the tree

Mufasa

Final Days in Kenya!

So a lot has happened since my last post. We went on expedition to Lake Nakuru National Park, I got attacked by a baboon, scratched, vaccinated, sent to South Africa for an extended weekend, then took 3 exams, wrote a paper and packed for my journey to Tanzania. I guess you could say I’ve been busy. Back to the baboon though, who knew a banana could stir up such a raucous. Most of you have probably seen on Facebook or heard from my frantic mother of the fate of my banana on that Tuesday afternoon. It ended up that in order to take every precaution against rabies the closest place that offered the human derived anti rabies immunoglobulin was South Africa. Kenya offers the Equine derived version but that’s more risky for people who haven’t previously been introduced to horse proteins (basically they asked if I’ve eaten horse meat).

As for that Tuesday it’s a pretty great story looking back. Definitely stressful and nerve wracking while in it but with a little distance now I can see myself telling my grandkids about that time I got ambushed by a hungry baboon. SO here’s the real story…

We were up on Baboon cliff (I guess pun intended now) wrapping up an exercise for our environmental policy class and as we were discussing our findings, the class suddenly became distracted by a baboon who had decided to walk up to the fence dividing us from a cliff of point rocks and then a 100 ft drop to the lake shore below. The baboon seated himself a foot from the fence and was watching us. A KWS ranger ran over towards him and the baboon scurried away quickly. Some of the class was disappointed since that meant they couldn’t be distracted by the baboon and had to continue paying attention to with but the ranger said what the baboons do is sit close to the fence and scout out the item they want to retrieve. They can understand some English and read our body language to know when the right time to jump is.

We continued on with class and then proceeded back to our safari cars, organizing to head back to camp. I was standing next to the car I had come in with my back to the fence. I opened up the back window and reached into my backpack to grab the banana I had gotten from the kitchen for an afternoon snack. A bit distracted and chatting, I took a bite and started to turn around toward the fence. This is when life started to move in slow motion. As I started to turn towards the fence I saw a giant baboon flying towards my face. My eyes dashed to his, then to the banana then back to him. By that time he had landed on my arm, eyes fixated on the banana. His hand reached for the yellow thing in my hand and scratched my upper wrist up to the knuckle of my pointer finger with three separate scratches. I released the banana semi-willingly and proceeded to punch him off me and then I ran, fast. I managed to keep from screaming but the girls that were in the safari car behind me let out some impressive screeches. From there I went to Moses, our stand-in SAM (student affairs manager) while Mike was out with a student visiting the doctor, his favorite past time. He cleaned up my bleeding hand and put some anti-bacterial cream on there with a Band-Aid. I asked if this meant I needed rabies shots and he said no. Little did he know this little incident would soon lend me to a night in a Nakuru hospital with a saline drip IV, a long wait for a clearance on a medicine that ended up to be the wrong thing and then an all expensed paid trip to South Africa to be injected with anti rabies immunoglobulin in the same hospital where Nelson Mandela was treated. You really can’t make this stuff up.

I’m now back safely at KBC (Kilimanjaro Bush Camp) and have passed all my exams with flying colors. I just finished packing and am sitting here pretty sad that tomorrow I’ll be leaving Kenya until the next time I can come back. I’m excited for Tanzania, but all the staff here has really started to feel like family. It sounds cliché and corny but they really have been amazing. I’m hoping to get pictures of all of them to remember. It’s weird to think I will never be back at this camp, never sleep in my banda or take a class in the Chumba. It’s definitely hard to say goodbyes and I’m not looking forward to tomorrow afternoon when we make the switch with the Tanzania group at the Kilimanjaro Airport. I’m excited for the second part of my adventure though, a little hesitant around the baboons but definitely excited.

 

Here’s the baboon that attacked me! Also I threw in some pictures from Lake Nakuru and Our non program day hike in Chuylu Hills!

Here’s  a picture of the baboon that ambushed me while on Expedition in Lake Nakuru, pre-ambush.

More pictures from Lake Nakuru…

Pictures from our last non-program day!

          Daniel our swahili teacher and I                      Sapaya and I (our program assistant)

Our Loyal SAM, Mike, who accompanied me to SA

Sapaya napping in the grass

Academic Update!

We’ve had the opportunity to participate in two field exercises for our environmental policy class in which we went out into the local community and asked questions about specific topics. The first exercise we did was a transect walk perpendicular to the main road. We were separated into groups of three students and each group had a guide who helped to translate the questions and responses. We took note of the types of soil, land use, geographical features and overall socioeconomic appearance of the area we walked through. We also had the opportunity to stop and interview any people we came across during the 4 km walk. It was the firs time we were able to talk with the locals without them expecting us to purchase something which was a definite relief. One of the questions we were supposed to ask was what resources were difficult to obtain. One of the most common responses was the lack of water, especially in the dry season. Most of the Maasai people in the local community practice pastoralism but as a result of modernization and the growing need for cash; many people have started to integrate agriculture into their livelihoods. There have also been a lot of immigrants from other parts of Kenya and East Africa who have started farming on Maasai land. This increase in people and change of land use has put a definite strain on the resources of an already arid environment. Another answer to the resource question, which I found most interesting, was when one man said that there was a lack of maternal care and vehicles to send women in labor to the hospital. The transect that I walked had a hospital not too far from the bomas but definitely not walking distance for an emergency like childbirth. He also mentioned the general lack of medicine and staff at the hospitals making it difficult to get what was needed. Traditionally illnesses and health problems would first be treated with home remedies and the hospitals or modern healthcare would be the last resort but with increased education and increased apparent availability of these resources, many locals are seeing their benefit.

 

The second exercise we did was on March 6^th and for this exercise we again walked perpendicular to the main road, into the bush, but the focus this time was on human wildlife conflict. We had the same small groups and guides and were provided with a list of 21 questions (no pun intended) to ask any residents we came across. We ended up interviewing 6 different people, 2 men and 4 women, and received generally the same type of answers. Every person we crossed either owned or rented the land they were cultivating and only one of them was a native Maasai; the rest were either Kukuyu, a different Kenyan tribe or from Tanzania. When we asked if they have had any conflict with wildlife, it was unanimous, all of them had crops destroyed by wildlife and majority blamed the elephants. People estimated that anywhere from 50 to 100% of their crop yield would be destroyed by a single invasion of elephants. Kimana, the town I am living in, is within 20 km of Amboseli National Park, which is notorious, worldwide for their elephant populations. The Kenyan Wildlife Service (KWS) runs the park, but all of the community members we interviewed said they do nothing to help the farmers in the region. There are generally wet and dry season here in Southern Kenya where during the dry season the large herbivores remain in the park since it offers a permanent water supply. The issue comes during the wet season when the animals leave the park in search of better food sources. The last question we asked was if the residents thought there would be a potential resolution to this issue in the future. All of the people we interviewed said that if the government or KWS paid for school fees in return for crop damage than that would be enough. The logic of most people was that if their children could go to school and get a job than the wildlife conflict would not have such a negative effect on the family. Most people rely solely on their crops as an income making wildlife damage extremely detrimental. A huge percentage of Kenya’s income is due to tourism, from millions of people coming to view these incredible animals, especially elephants and lions, which are often the biggest culprits of human wildlife conflict. The government pours billions of shillings a year into conservation and tourism but yet there is no waste control, there is a lack of water sanitation, extreme poverty and expensive secondary education.  Much of the community feels that they receive the burden of the animals but never receive the benefit that the government collects from tourism. It’s a complicated and multi-layered issue with no quick solution, but it was fascinating to learn what the local people felt about the wildlife. The last woman we interviewed had all the same sort of answers I discussed above but as we were wrapping up the interview her and our guide had an abnormally long conversation in Swahili in which our guide didn’t break to translate to us as he normally would. He finally turned to us and said the woman had asked if we would like to buy any of her beads. We hadn’t brought any money since this was a field exercise, not a time when we would be purchasing items. We apologized, said our goodbyes and started to walk back to the road. Just when we got out of earshot from the boma, our guide came up to me and said that the woman asked what she receives in return for giving us her time to answer our questions. I was really taken aback. The interviews took about 15 to 20 minutes of the resident’s day, which is a substantial amount of time when there’s water to be collected and livestock to be managed. She obviously had a point and I had no immediate answer. SFS donates money to nearby schools and we also have community service days, but again, the people fail to see the direct impact on them. I initially thought about maybe giving a bar of soap or something to the people who give us their time but there are flaws in that type of service as well.  It’s unsustainable in the long run to give objects of monetary value to people who offer their time. It seems that the work SFS does here is unquantifiable, there is no fiscal value you can place on it. Humans will be humans and we, as a race will never be satisfied. In the end you give what you can and hope you can make a positive impact.

 We are going on expedition to Nakuru National Park for the next 5  days so I won’t have internet access but I will definitely give an update when I get back. And of course, pictures! 

Here are some pictures from our last non- program day! We went to Amboseli in the morning and had a few close encounters with elephants and then relaxed at a lodge in the afternoon! 

FOOD!

So recently a few of my fellow voyagers and I have started to think a lot about food. Don’t get me wrong the food here is very good for the resources they have but their resources are no where near the level we can get our hands on in America. I’m really starting to see how spoiled we are on the food front. Here at camp my friend Lucy has started asking people at random times what their favorite food is or their favorite meal/dessert from home, really any question to get the saliva glands running. She’s using her iPad to film these priceless interactions and going to compile them all later to form a video. A normal meal here usually includes a form of bread, either rolls or chapatti; Chapatti is a newfound love of mine actually. It reminds me a lot of Naan bread you can get at Indian restaurants. There is also usually a steamed vegetable with maybe pasta or rice, sometimes a tomato sauce. Cabbage is a staple, usually sautéed with some onions. They’ve attempted to make pizza and mac and cheese both of which are halfway decent. My favorite meal so far is when they serve grilled cheese and tomato soup with fried okra on the side. Another good one is when sauté eggplant. As you can tell from above I’m almost a vegetarian here and not really by choice. I just haven’t really been eating much meat; it hasn’t really appealed to me. The chicken is really good when they serve it but mostly they serve us tough beef. I’m a little nervous for the adjustment back to the states because people say the culture shock going back and the change in diet is harder than coming here. For those of you who know me know that I love my milk, even though we do get fresh milk the only time I drink it is with my tea. I miss my tall pint size Guinness glass of milk at dinner. Also cheese, there is not much cheese here at all. I’ve really only seen it in grilled cheese and even that was questionable. A nice baked Brie with fig or raspberry jam and sliced apples would really do the job!

That was just a brief over view of the food since so many people have been asking me. Don’t take food variety for granted!

This is the buffet where we eat every meal! And that’s Judy one of our cooks!

Amboseli

Obviously the biggest attraction to East Africa, particularly Kenya and Tanzania are the animals; the keystone species elephants, giraffes, zebra, wildebeest, hyena, warthogs. Well, I saw all those animals, in their natural habitat all in a days work. On February 15^th we had a really unique opportunity to participate in Kenyan Wildlife Service animal count in Amboseli National Park. The Park is about 30 to 40 minutes away from KBC (Kilimanjaro Bush Camp) and it’s divided into 8 blocks. The survey’s are done 3 times a year and since we have 30 students in our group, KWS loves to have us help out. The more eyes the better. We had a safari car filled with 7 students, a driver (in our case it was our Wildlife Management professor Shem Mwasi) and a KWS worker. My group was assigned block 6 and we took majority of the day to count the block. Block six in the map below is to the east of observation hill and south of Lake Amboseli.

 

            This was a really unique opportunity because very few people have the chance to participate in a KWS count when the data is actually used in studies with their permission. The day we were in the park was beautiful. In the morning, the temperature was about 74 degrees (Fahrenheit J) and progressed to about 80 with around 20% cloud cover. Since we were always moving in the safari cars the breeze made it the perfect temperature. We found out at the end that our block was the longest one with the most data so we were able to see a wide variety of animals. I put some pictures below of the coolest species we saw but my favorite was definitely the baby elephant. We saw a mother African bush elephant with a sub adult and a calf, which our professor said, was no older than 2 months old! You could barely see it since it wasn’t over the height of the grass. For a size comparison I’d say it was about as big as a large dog, maybe a mastiff. The count was really fun but a little stressful. We had 7 people in our car with two people writing down the data, two counts, one GS mapper, a direction and distance estimator and one just helper. We were all calling out what we saw and the directions and distances of the animals to get as much data down as possible. We were also able to off-road which is against the law but since we were working with KWS and collecting data, it was allowed. We ended up seeing so many more animals because we were farther away from the busy tourist path.

            Besides the Big keystone species I really like the wildebeest and the warthogs. The warthogs, which a lot of people here call pumba’s, are adorable. When they run, their tales stick straight up and they just scurry with seemingly no direction in mind. We also saw some baby warthogs, which are some of the cutest things I’ve ever seen. They are definitely an underrated species but the lion king did a pretty good job of getting their personality across. Hakuna Matata!

Male African Bush Elephant and Cattle Egret’s taken from Observation Hill

Common Zebra

Maasai Giraffe

 

 

 

Munching Hippo

 

 

 

Female Elephant and some youngins!

Thompson’s Gazelle

Wathog (not the cute baby though) 

hyaena chilling by the roadside

Maasai Ostrich

 

No caption necessary

Non-Program day

February 11, 2014

Today was a jam-packed day. It was a Non-Program Day which means we had no classes and we got to choose what we wanted to do for the day as a group. We started off with an awesome hike to a full-blown waterfall. The hike wasn’t too long but it wove through a beautiful cornfield and spiraled down a steep hill through a tunnel of some lemon-verbena-type plant that smelled absolutely amazing. We tried to work on a name for the plant and the consensus was something to the tone of “lemon mint green mist.” We were going for a candle scent on that one. The final descent to the falls was steep and slippery, so there were inevitably a few muddy butts. There was a tunnel of green leaves before seeing the falls. It was very picturesque. The waterfall was one tall drop, about two stories with a small calm pool below it that trickled into a smooth river. There was a very rainforest, jungle like feel. There was one large dominant rock that people climbed up onto; obviously I was one of them. The walk back was really nice too, we avoided the steep tunnel somehow.

Right after the falls we headed to a Clinic called the VTC (Voluntary Testing and Counseling). The Clinic is for people, mainly women who are HIV positive. It’s run by a really inspiring women named Mary who is HIV negative but has dedicated her life to others through working for the clinic. When we got out of the cars from the waterfall we all filed into a large room with wooden benches. Mary introduced herself and told us the background of the clinic. There was a sister named Patricia who came from the US to start the VTC. Then each of the four women told their stories. Most of them had multiple kids and ended up being shunned by their communities because of their diagnoses. The clinic became the only place of refuge and comfort for these people. One woman whose name was Joyce passed around a picture of herself when she was at her sickest point in the hospital and it was really startling. She was emaciated and looked like a completely different person. After our chat on the benches, we split up into two groups and my group went first to the actual clinic house where people can voluntary come to be tested. While in the testing room, Mary told us her very personal story of how she became involved in HIV an AIDS work. She talked about receiving a child as a wedding gift who had HIV and having a very close friend find out both she and her husband were HIV positive. It was difficult to understand at some points but it was very clear she had worked through many hardships. After visiting that part of the clinic, we switched with the other group and went to the small shop where the women of the clinicsell their beads and other handmade goods. During the chat, the women discussed how because of their stibma and the high price of a market stall, they can’t Market in downtown Kimana on Tuesdays. This shop is their only way of income. It felt really good to spend my money their because I saw directly where the money was going and Mary also talked to us about how they have lost funding from programs over the years. Also there were set prices which was really nice compared to the bargaining thing with the mamas at the Maasai Boma, way less stressful. I think it would be really cool to stay in contact with Mary and VTC to help donate more money and buy more beads.

After the Clinic we headed to the market in downtown Kimana. This was definitely one of the most hectic and overwhelming experiences of my life, all while being awesome. We were showed the restaurant we were to meet at and then dropped at the front of the market to fiend for ourselves. The second we got out of the car, we were definitely an attraction. People were pointing at us and trying to talk in broken English. We took a loop around the market to get a feel for what people were selling and then decided to dive in. The first scarf I got was blue, red and white (Maasai colors) with a repetitive block pattern. Then, the mamas came. Actually they swarmed. All the Maasai mamas come to the market with their beadwork, mostly necklaces and bracelets. They targeted us as a weak point and attacked. At one point my friends Rachel and Kelsey and I were waiting for our friend Jayne to chose a cloth and we were completely surrounded by mamas holding out their jewelry to us and using a Swahili/English hybrid fusion. There was one mama that was very determined and kept coming back to us. This mama observed Kelsey as the feeblest in the group. Both Kelsey and I tried to use all the Swahili we knew to tell her off but it came to a point when every time the mama came up to Kelsey and made eye contact we all started laughing, even the mama. Although the mamas were stressful and a bit annoying, that moment of making eye contact with that one mama and both of us knowing what was so funny was touching. We struggled to find words to speak to each other but the laughter broke down the barrier of the language and the stigma that surrounded both of our cultures.

Laughter is the global language.

The Maasai Life

      Sorry this is a late post from Monday!! Internet is quite Spotty!     

After being cooped up for 5 days I was feeling a little antsy. Despite being in a different country, on a different continent, we have all been inside the confines of about a mile around circular camp. We’ve now had all of our classes at least once; Wildlife Ecology, Wildlife Management, Environmental Policy and Swahili and East African Cultures. Swahili is a beautiful language and it’s really fun to learn. I’m also seeing how much easier it is to learn a language when you are immersed in it. I guess that’s what I’ve always heard and it sounds obvious but I’m real experiencing it first hand. The staff here are all native to Kenya except Mike our Student Affairs manager. Side note on Mike though he is incredibly talented when it comes to explaining things, for instance yesterday I asked for the whereabouts of the volleyball court and my exact words were “Hey mike, Where exactly is the volleyball court, I know they are over there [and I pointed “over there”] behind the Banda’s but that’s it.” His response was, “Yeah, it’s over there… behind the Banda’s.” Believe it or not, the volleyball court was behind the Banda’s. Back to the Swahili though here are some of the common terms I’ve learned:

Jambo! –  Hello

Hapana – “no”

Ndiyo – “yes

Mimi ni mwanafunzi – I am a Student

(handy in lowering bargaining prices)

Maana yake nini – What does that mean?

Samahani  -Excuse me

Tafadhali – please

Asante -Thank you

Ghali – expensive

(like Golly that’s expensive)

chai – tea

mzungu – white person

(not handy in lowering bargaining prices)

Maji – water

Habari ya asuubuhi – Good morning

            That’s probably enough to soak in, but at least it helped me with my studying! Every time we pass a staff member or someone outside the fence I always say Jambo or ask how they are. They make the effort too. It seems there is a mutual understanding of the fact we are here to learn as much as possible. Since we are 30 white people behind a fence in the middle of Maasai land in Kenya there definitely have to be some rumors floating around the community. It may kind of appear like a zoo, especially when we run in a group around the trail resembling pacing animals but SFS has done a very impressive job of integrating our community with the local community. Today was a perfect example of that. We went about a mile down the road to the nearest Maasai village. There are no tourists that come to this Maasai village that SFS takes each group of students to. When we go there we shook all the mamas’ hands and then all the mamas, about 30 of them, lined up and sang for us. The songs were really beautiful. There was an older mama who led the song and all the other mamas would respond. At one point, 5 of the mamas started jumping out of the line to the beat of the music. They started jumping towards us and then grabbed a person from our group to jump with them. I got to jump woo!! We then had to respond with our own song, which was way harder than it should have been. American culture doesn’t really have too many songs other than the national anthem and happy birthday that everyone knows. We ended up mumbling “This Little Light of Mine” and “We All Need Somebody to Lean On”. Our culture needs to work on that. Then the mamas got in a circle and spread out their mats to put out all their jewelry and other crafts. We all filed into the circle and started looking for what we wanted to buy. It ended up being pretty stressful. There was so much to choose from and every time you squatted down to look at a bracelet more closely the mamas would put about 3 bracelets on your wrist and say “sawaaa” which means okay. One woman kept putting a bracelet on while I was taking them off which was a fun little game. I ended up getting two bracelets and two necklaces. It was a unique opportunity because it wasn’t from a souvenir shop or a market stand, and we directly saw the community we were benefiting. When we got back to the camp, our Swahili teacher Daniel and Sapiah, the program assistant, showed us a real Maasai spear and demonstrated throwing it. They both had said, although they were now a conservationist, the human-wildlife conflict in Kenya is a huge problem. Daniel said he owns cattle to remain a part of his tribe while he is working at SFS and he is committed to being a conservationist, however if a lion or a hyena comes to feed of his livestock he wouldn’t hesitate a second to kill it. I’m really looking forward to learning more about this issue and hopefully working on some potential solutions.

The arrival.

Traveling to Kenya is no easy feat. I flew out of JFK on Monday, February 4th, flew thru Amsterdam to Kilimanjaro Airport in Tanzania and arrived on the 5^th around 8  pm Kenya time. When the plane landed the feeling was pretty surreal. I was actually in AFRICA.  The first thing I noticed was the scent. There was almost a grassy/smoky/warmish smell if you can figure that out in your nose. After going through a visa dilemma and a few bag dilemmas, not mine fortunately, we finally made it onto the safari trucks. That night we made it to a town about 40 minutes from the airport called Moshi. The next morning I opened my third floor hotel door to a sight of Kilimanjaro that will forever be engrained in my memory. I had this weird phenomenon when I was a kid, which my mom can attest to, where I thought Mount Haleakala in Hawaii was talking to me. Not in a creepy way or an over-spiritual way but in a pretty casual friendly way. Ever since then I’ve had this deep love for mountains, especially volcanic ones, and Kilimanjaro fits the bill. After a hearty breakfast from the hotel staff we hit the road for the long journey to Kilimanjaro Bush Camp (KBC) in Kitana, Kenya.

It was probably the most fascinating drive of my life. Since it was the first time seeing the country in light, I couldn’t take my eyes off the road. All the buildings were colorful and so were the people. Many women were walking with extremely impressive amounts of food and baskets and water on their heads. One woman had a giant white sack at least a meter long balancing on her head like it was a paper clip. It was interesting though because we were clearly more than just tourists, we were an attraction. Most of the adults just sort of stared, especially the men… but the children were incredibly enthusiastic. There was not one child that didn’t wave and most even said hello. I am really excited for when we get to go out into the local town and talk with the residents. The people of this region of Kenya are called the Maasai. They have been native to the land for thousands of years but within the past 40 or so much of East Africa have started to shift from a pastoral to an agricultural society. Along with that, the countries have been shifting to a more cash based economy. I still have a lot to learn as far as that stuff goes but that seems to be the root of many issues. We are studying these impacts on both the people as well as the wildlife. There are many wildlife/human conflicts that are multilayered and extremely complicated. The local people such as the Maasai benefit very little, at least directly, from the tourism, all while the government and private business owners rake in the cash.  The animals invade their land and destroy their crops and the maasi people fight back by killing the animals. If they didn’t there families and livelihoods would be ruined. The question posed to us today in our introductory course was what can we do about it. With a world of finite resources and a rapidly growing population, these sort of issues are becoming more and more urgent across the globe. I’m hoping that here in Kenya and Tanzania I can get a better feel of both sides of these sort of issues and not just the westernized version.

 There are a lot of things to scare you in Africa and sleep the past few nights has not been easy, but there is so much history in this lad you can really feel it.  The people are full of hard work and suffering but also of so much joy. It can be different and hard and uncomfortable at times but that is 100% a part of the experience. You are forced to be aware of the land. There are black mambas in the grass, potential scorpions in your shoes and bristles on every tree (so far just the bristles for me) as a constant reminder that nature is here and it is strong. I think that’s a very important realization because back in the States, nature takes the back burner and as a result, it is being destroyed. Here, nature is fighting back but without support and nurturing from the natives and even more so the global community, there is not much hope. That’s why I’m here though, to bring and find hope. I plan on learning as much from this experience as I possibly can but if I can leave anything, it’s hope that there are people who care and people who are willing to get a few, more like a million, bristles in their socks if could better the life of just one. So far, my socks are full of bristles, and its only day 5.

Here are some the pictures from the first few days. There is a baboon problem on the site…apparently the steal things but so far they are just cute. Those are some of the local kids outside the camp waving on our walk as well as; my view from my hotel in Moshi and a man walking while we passed by in the safaris on the way the KBC. The hut is my living quarters for the next month and a half until we move to Tanzania!! Talk soon. (Hope Carly likes the pictures 😉

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