Happy Halloween

10/31/05

Happy Halloween. This year I went as a mzungu. It got me lots of looks.

I went up to the nursery school around 9am. I saw the kid I am 'sponsoring' (it cost $5 or so to get him a new uniform and pay the fee for the last three months of school.) It was my secret objective to get a shot of him smiling, the three times I have met him, he hasn't. But there at break, a few hours into the day, I got him going by making funny faces and all like that. But I was working so hard to get the guy smiling, that when I reviewed the footage, I realized that I had let the camera fall and it wasn't pointing at him! So, I'll have to go back if I have time. Anyway, footage or no footage, it was nice to see this guy smile. He always seems so depressed. So shy, so introverted. Robert took off for Migori to help his sister out, and I stayed around, took a few more pictures. Nothing amazing. I came back around noon and stole a twenty minute nap lunch.

Afterwards, Robert came back around and we walked up the main dirt road, about 2km, heading south, to Kitere, to meet with some people from C.A.R.E. Kenya who were apparently coming to meet with grassroots aid groups. This was the first time that any NGO had said they were coming to this area, and we were excited to see what they had in store. We got to the primary school where it was supposed to be held, but no one there knew what we were talking about. We waited around and after a few minutes the headmaster came and found us (I get really good service), but he hadn't heard about it either. Robert went to call the people that had notified him and I sat with the headmaster. We talked about the importance of HIV education in the schools, but basically he was telling me what I had heard before, that he personally believed that it should be taught, but that he couldn't because of opposition from parents and teachers. We sat there for ten minutes, agreeing about how devastating the HIV pandemic was, and how education, especially of the youth, was the way forward, and then he tells me that he cant include it on his syllabus because of pressure. Finally he agreed to have Robert and I come back and do a sensitization session for the parents and students. The headmaster said something which I found amazing, at the very beginning of our conversation, he was talking about how HIV was God punishing man, and then said that without man, the earth wouldn't survive! The f*cking headmaster! I wanted to call him out but I have been avoiding arguments about religion, because I figure if anything would get me nailed to a cross here or sold to witch doctors it would be questioning the villagers Christian faith… But that comment, that attitude I actually find a little dangerous, and it so firmly goes against everything I believe. Its almost too bad that none of us will be around to see how well the earth can survive without man… When Robert came back he said he was unable to reach anyone at any of the provided contact numbers.

We were walking back, disappointed that the C.A.R.E. Kenya meeting was a bust, but happy that the headmaster had offered to set up a sensitization session for the his people. We were walking back down the dirt road, we met up with another guy who had tried to go to the meeting, and we shared our disappointment. Dark heavy clouds were forming above us. It was around 3pm and it had been very hot in the morning so it was obvious that those clouds were going to open up wide. I was just hoping that I could get back here before they did. I had my video camera in it's bag, my ELPH in one pocket, and my mobile in another. I didn't really feel like taking a swim in the mud. We saw some old men at a crossroads, leaning against their bicycles and sitting in the grass, their backs against the sign post. They called us over and we went and greeted them. I noticed as I shook the last guy's hand that he didn't have any finger tips, on either hand, and I wondered if it had something to do with the tribal conflicts, like Daniel's missing thumb. One of the old men had heard about the meeting, he had heard that it had been moved from the primary school to another location, back up in Kitere. Robert wanted to go and check, I said I was going to try and beat the rains home. We parted, I started walking fast, there was maybe 1km of the return journey remaining, and about two minutes down the road the skies started opening. At first it was just a drizzle, and I picked up my pace. But then it started coming down hard. I put my cameras and phone in my trusty waterproof bag (I'm very high-tech, with my 40 gallon hefty bags.) Then the clouds opened wide, and the rain came down hard. Then the hail. The road turned to mud and soon I was sloshing through ankle deep mud, totally soaked. I made it back alright though, toweled off and changed and made sure my cameras were fine (they are, those hefty bags are great.)

I'm getting worried, more and more worried, about the film. As days keep on slipping by and the clouds have yet to part and reveal to me the miraculous vision of my salvation, as the resurrection, the lazarus effect has yet to come, I find myself wondering how to proceed. I don't know why I have been waiting for this miracle to occur, I guess just because sometimes they do. But for all my efforts, all the times I take that step, dive in to the cold waters, I'm still afraid I'm just left with a hodge-podge. And so I sit here and listen to the posho mill and watch the cows and cock and hens graze. Chickens are polygamous.

See, the project is going from infinite to finite. Before my vacation, I couldn't really believe I was ever going home. Everyday felt like forever and I would look at a calendar and the weeks just went on and on and on… But now that I'm on the backend, its scary.

I wonder if in three years we could have internet at the health center. Even if we couldn't get a ground line, wireless internet via mobiles will have to be coming here soon.

I need to get the church elders together again and sell them on the health center once and for all. No more of their 'maybes.' If they cant commit to let us have that building, we will use one of the sambas in Robert's homestead. He already agreed as their all vacant, due to so many deaths. If there is one thing that there is no shortage of in Kanga, its empty rooms. There are a few in almost every homestead. But the elders will agree. All I have to do is convince Mzee Elisha and he will convince the rest. He is the big man.

Oh… so much to do…

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