On my last day at Faraja until after Mombasa (remember, I extended my stay, so I am coming back for at least a few weeks) Moraa and I took the trip out to Roinguy (sounds like wrong guy) to make the first live drop of the newly finished, and certified by the Ngong Township District Children’s Office, grand proposal. We were taking it to ADRA, a Christian-based African Organization with goals of helping to improve the lives of children. I got dressed up and boarded a matatu (oxymoron) and had a successful (albeit short)meeting with an administrator after the 2 hour journey to ADRA. On the way home Moraa, who admitted she was not good at goodbyes, told me she had a meeting in Kiserian (she does work 24/7) and when her stop came she gave me a hug and said “see you in a month! Be safe and God bless” and was gone.
As soon as she was gone, the conductor saw a well-dressed white man in his van and attempted to almost triple the price of fare on him… Granted I would have done the same if our roles were reversed, but this time I caught him off guard. He said “80 bob” which would have been the most expensive matatu ride I’ve ever been on by far, for a ride that was not very long (granted it totals out to be about a dollar). I said “Wewe! Wacha! Una sema thelathini!” (you! Stop! You said 30!). He laughed, knowing he couldn’t pull a fast one and shook his head, smiling, as he accepted my 30 shillings.
I arrived back at Faraja to say a quick goodbye to the kids before I went to go pack and board the night bus to Mombasa. This quick goodbye was a brutal preview of the horrible goodbye I am facing in a few months when I leave for good. I explained to all of the older kids that I was leaving for Mombasa and I would be back. Easy enough. I was playing with Kepha, preparing to say goodbye when he told me to come to the chickens. I told him I couldn’t and when he asked why I said “Ni me enda.” (I am going).
“Wapi?” (Where?) he responded in 2 year old Swahili
“Mombasa” I told him.
He grabbed my hand, pulling me towards the front gate and said excitedly “twende!” (Let’s go!)
Although my Swahili has improved, I have no idea how to expain to a 2 year old that I am leaving and he isn’t. Probably even in English. One of the older kids came to rescue and explained what was happening. He looked at me with tears in his eyes and when I put him down he started hysterically crying. He could not be consoled by his brother and sisters picking him up and only stopped when I picked him back up. Eventually, the kids told him that he could have a sweet if he went inside, giving me time to sneak off, but halfway down the street I heard him yell “GEN!!! Natacka enda! (I want to go!)” and start crying. I almost didn’t go to Mombasa. My only saving grace is that I will see him and the rest of the kids again in a month. But that goodbye will be harder.
After an uneventful and sleepless overnight bus to Mombasa, I finally arrived at my new home with Nikki and Jack. Instead of living on the beach and being a matatu ride from the school (and rough neighborhood) that we work at, we are living next door to the school and are a matatu ride away from the beach. Not what we had expected, but I kind of like it this way. The neighborhood is a suburb compared to Ngong, but still, I wouldn’t walk around alone too late at night… it is still Kenya. I have become very comfortable here because nothing has happened to me, but I have to remember that nothing has happened to me because I have been smart.
In Mombasa I live with a huge family. My house mom is a woman with 6 children, 3 live with her, one lives next door and 2 live in Nairobi. The 3 that live with her have 2 kids, the one next door has one and there is chris, a cousin who is visiting from Nairobi. My house is a mini compound, behings a gate and cement walls with broken bottle pieces lining the top as barbed wire/ There is a tree in the “yard” that I climb at least once a day to relax, read or watch the sunset over the perforated aluminum rooftops that run, rusted, until they meet coconut trees in the distance. It is a perfectly choreographed scene of the natural beauty of Kenya, side by side with the intense hardships of the people that live here. The rooms of the house are not connected, they are encompassed in the same walled-in expanse, but you have to walk outside to get from room to room. Jack and Nikki said I share a tiny room, but ats least we have a fan and individual beds (not bunked). The food is incredible, the people are incredibly friendly and there is constant stimulation. They have 4 dogs that roam the yard, accompanied by 6 ducks, 2 rabbits and 2 or 3 turkeys, one of which is enormous and UGLY. I have become close with the son who lives next door, Moya. We spend nights in the tree talking about politics, cultural similarities and differences and just generally shooting the shit.
The school that I teach in (yeah, I teach, God help these kids) is less than a minute walk away from the house. It is a TINY school with my classroom, consisting of a few desksm two iron clad windows and a small “chalkboard”. The kids are on break right now, so only about half of the class comes to school as part of a summer school-type program. Again, this is not a regulated part of school, so I am not taking a job away from a Kenyan, although the legality of this “tuition period” seems questionable in my westernized mind. Either way, the kids are great, eager to learn and energetic. They get shy when you call on someone or single someone out, but at 10-13, who didn’t? They all have great attitudes.
The challenge with this group of kids is that they are a hodgepodge of students. Tuition is meant to keep kids off the street and out of trouble, but in doing so I have a group of 5th to 8th graders who are at very different stages of knowledge. I may teach science and some kids have alreaday learned the subject while others are clueless. Or one of the younger ones is learning it now and the older ones haven’t touched the subject in over 3 years. It is a struggle and it is draining but if you look for the little things, the smiles and the right answers from a kid who has been previously struggling, it’s worth it! I like teaching, but the last few weeks has made me question whether I could make it as a teacher.
As you can probably tell from the way that I am writing, I have been in Mombasa for a little while (2 weeks as I sit here writing). Mombasa as a city… is HOTTTTTTT. Almost everyday reaches 100 degress and this isn’t even the hot season. Other than having to buy a mini towel to wipe the constantly developing sweat from my face, the city is great. I spend my afternoons on some of the world’s most beautiful beaches, swimming in the Indian Ocean (bucketlist, check), have scope out Fort Jesus and Old Town (scene from Inception in Mombasa which looks more like the Middle East than Africa) eaten the street food, am currently sitting in the beautiful Uhuru Gardens, have seen dolphins on a makeshift wooden boat, visited a remote island near Tanzania with my house family and have generally started to adapt to the wayyyyy slower lifestyle here. Besides developing pimples on my forehead like a 13 year old despite taking 19 showers a day, I have no complaints. A few days ago I was exiting a matatu near my house when I heard “Hewitt!” a name I hadn’t heard since before I went to Israel. I turned and saw Ben Levy, a friend from UW. A familiar face in a foreign world. He has been volunteering here for a little while and even though I was planning on calling him the following day to meet up, having known he was in Mombasa, the unexpected sighting blew me away! It made me remember my life before this adventure and was a great feeling as well as a good person to have around in Mombasa because I have always really liked Ben and he has been in this city for long enough to know the ropes.
As for now, I’m settling into Mombasa, the heat and the beach and the school and as soon as I have more to report, the stories will keep on coming!
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