Cutural Confusion

Sunday 11th January

My 3 months with A Rocha have all been clearly different. It’s so quiet at Mwamba now I can hear the snorkelling boats in the bay and our neighbours shouting at each other on the next plot. After I got back from Lamu Aaron and Suzanne went to Kakamega (spelling?!) with Albert – a rainforest in the west of Kenya – to watch birds and won’t be back until Tuesday. Our moderate number of guests from last weekend has dwindled to just 1. Even Robin eventually left on Friday and it was hard to see her go. She’s planning to come back with her daughter in February it will be after I’ve left.

I’ve been keeping myself busy with all sorts – learning some more Swahili, helping Lispa in the kitchen, reading and making travel plans for after 3rd Feb. The peace and quiet is a welcome change but I feel I could lose my mind slightly if the isolation continues. However, the staff are due to start coming back from Monday and the Kigens arrived back as promised last night and seem happy with how this place has been managed in their absence.

I’ve been trying to get back into the projects I was working on before Christmas. I’ve finished the draft of the Volunteers’ Handbook (this was Aaron’s idea in my 2nd week here when I was despairing at the lack of organisation) and plan to send it to our director, Colin. I still really want to create a visitor information display for the front of Mwamba and make the place look a little more professional. I can order information but creating physical displays is not my strong point. With no one to work on it with me I’ve come to a stop and am procrastinating. Using your initiative here is welcomed but there's not always the support you need to go ahead.

On Friday I was invited to Laurence, our night watchman’s house. He and his wife Tina had a baby girl a week ago and Friday was her official “coming out” party after 5 days at home. They live just up the road in a tiny house (I’m hoping the one room I went into isn’t the extent of it) with a fruit shop at the front which Tina runs during the day.
I was unsure of the protocol but Lispa advised me that instead of shopping for a present for the baby it was OK to take some groceries – tea, ugali flour etc. This proved to be a good decision when other women turned up after me with similar gifts. I stayed for tea and a popular snack (I've forgotten the name) which are like sugary doughnuts on the outside and just plain dough on the inside. I left before the rest of the “mamas” all turned up which I hoped wasn’t rude. Laurence said later it was fine as with Kenyan timing I’d have had to wait hours. He said when they’d all arrived they sang and then he said a testimony about how good God had been keeping Tina and the baby well.
They’re obviously struggling for money. One of Laurence’s sons, Issac was home from school, not because it was a special day but because Laurence had withdrawn him after the school had pushed the fees up at the start of term. He talked a lot about it and showed me the letter from the school and it was obvious he was hoping I was going to contribute something.

It frustrates me, like it does a lot of westerners here, that because I’m white therefore I’m expected to be rich. The culture here is different to the UK in that it’s OK to just ask people to give you money outright if you want it, especially if they’re wazungu. It’s refreshing to know that people can ask and to see how people share what they have - if you have a vehicle you watch the road for who you can give lifts to, if someone turns up randomly they stay for lunch without question- I wish the UK was like this.
However I’m constantly fighting my English sense that people are being really rude when there’s an underlying expectation that you must give them something. What I can’t get away from though is that although pressuring people to give you money is wrong it would be just as wrong of me to ignore the poverty that I saw. I could use Laurence’s behaviour as an excuse to give him nothing or I could see that behaviour like that is born out of desperation. And of course he's right, compared to them I am rich.
I can’t afford to pay school fees and I left without offering. That night I gave Laurence about 1,000 KSH (about 8.50 GBP) for his oldest son who’s just left school. He’s been offered a place on a 3 month course in Nairobi all expenses paid but still needs to find the bus fare to get there and 1,000 KSH should cover most of it. Laurence took the money like he’d clearly expected it, thanked me briefly and disappeared. I was left in confusion, not sure if I should have given it to him at all or if I should have written him a cheque for, 10,000 KSH instead.

For Those Who Pray

Pray that I can make the most of my last 3 weeks here and finish the work I've started. I'd like to leave with the feeling that I've contributed something lasting.

Pray for Laurence and Tina that they can find the money for Issac's school fees or another school for him which they can afford. Pray for me that I can use my money wisely and be prepared to sacrifice - especially after people have been so generous to me!

Please pray for Rachel who I think has been searching.