Simon's Nairobi Diary - Archive 21

10 April 2006 7:41pm

The dirt road out of the compound gets sporatically attacked by termites. Often, especially after long night, the road will literally be blown full of holes. Termites will have, from the ground:up, created a spaced out set of entrances. I guess it is just strange to see these holes appear abnormally from down:up and not the opposite. And its strange to see holes that are so wide for an insect lair. The entrances at the tops of their mounds are wide enough to fit a broom handle in. When we drive places you can see what the termites do when they aren't knocked down by treaded tires. Their mounds grow into massive buildings. Five, six, and seven foot termite towers can be seen sprouting throughout the roadsides.

5 April 2006 2:57pm

A week ago I was sitting in front of a monkey. I had been relaxing on a porch and reading Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible when the simian jumped on the table in front of me, an armreach away. I just stared at his monkey face and he stared at my human face and it was a couple of seconds. Then he slowly reached down and grabbed a handful of the bowled peanuts and tossed them into his gaping monkey mouth. Well, that could not be tolerated. I swung at the monkey with 650 pages of softcover, but he easy dodged my swing and grabbed a second handful of peanuts. I was sort of leery about getting bit by his monkey teeth because their monkey diseases can sometimes make the human switch, so I just sort of stood up and swung my arms in the air. He backed off, leaned in for a third handful, and then scampered off on his monkey legs.

And a week ago it was 95 degreez and sunny and hot. This week has marked the beginning of the rainy season. Needless to say, its been rainy. The power is especially spotty and the internet has been broken. Often the email inbox is replaced with 'ERROR 404: The world has died'. But its good. God is big and loving and beyond the comprehension, so its good.

25 March 2006 8:34pm

One time my dad and his friend Tom were fishing in the Manistee River, like we have throughout the years. The day had just begun, and instantly the line went tight and my father's friend had a fish on. He fought it a little and reeled in a mighty four inch brown trout. Now, this fish would have been an instant throwback. However, it had swallowed the hook which meant it was all gutted out and was going to die anyways, so they kept it. Plus they figured that they could eat it with the masses of fish that would come throughout the remainder of the day. But the end of the day came and no other fish were pulled in, so all they took home was that dinky trout. As Tom was about to begin the four hour drive back to lansing, he told my dad he could keep the fish, but as his car pulled out the driveway my dad wedged the fish into the crack between the trunk and the rear window. We didn't really know what would happen, except that a week later a package arrived on the back steps. Inside was a freshly varnished crusty four inch brown. So my dad gave the fish a clear coat of shellac and mounted it on a walnut board with brass screws. The fish went out in the mail the next day.

Today the fish hangs in Tom's office. Underneath the fish is a plate stating: "Four-Inch Brown". We imagine that some day it will arrive at our house in a coffee table.

24 March 2006 8:30pm

I cannot have wrapped my mind around the difficulty of leaving home, the family, the friends, the US to come here. I think I just surrendered to even being able to know how it would all pan out. There was simply no way to know the coming adjustments, hazards, and difficulties. However, it was God I was walking to. I felt a whole-feeling whenever the consideration of leaving entered my mind, and it coupled with fantastic facts and interviews to make the boarding of the Traverse City plane something confident.

I have, this whole life, had only one grandparent. My grandfather died when I was two, and my dutch grandparents (Opa en Oma) could only do so much considering the linguistic and Atlantic divide. All I have had is my grandmother Edith.

And my grandmother died today. My father and family surrounded her bed in Grand Rapids, sang with her, prayed holding her hand, and soothed her struggle as her body shut down from years of ugly cancer.

It is harrowing and awful to be seperate from the struggle. All these people I love are aching, and I am an impossible distance away from being able to sooth. This asdf email is a lousy alternative. To be perfectly honest, I could easily spend this day in anguish and chaos. It would be a simple chore to get angry about the state of physical seperation from all the waves back home. Boarding so happy and lucky on that plane now means that I will absent from my only grandparents funeral.

But, oh my Lord, I am so soothed right now. Deep in the furthest recess from the surface of my skin is the Spirit of God, and it is sweeter and harder and more stable than its surrounding cells and tissue - soon to return to the ground from which it came. Passionate concentric expressions of support it whispers to me as I type these characters. Silent as breath he sings 'everything is going to be ok' and 'let your fear run off the sides - i know the way'. And, oh how can this be, my foot taking another step and my diaphram muscle contracting to bring air into these beautiful lungs.

Set me as a seal upon your heart. For love is as strong as death. Just: thank you. Oh my God,

23 March 2006 10:55pm

We asked her if we could come to her house if we had any questions regarding the paper. "The last time a student came to my house, snakes appeared," my Singaporean professor says slightly tipping her head and twisting her cheeks, just enough so that you could not interpret if she was serious. The room flooded with laughter. "Email or call my cell."

The humor here is so simple and plain, but chock full of blantency and rancor. At first it was silly and fun, then it was stupid and boring. But now it has almost evolved into a new standard which has its own styles of clever and nuance and delicate simplicity.

22 March 2006 8:54pm

There is revisingocity and examedness current occuring in this here secsion of Kenya. The second term is in it's final throes. I'm proceeding with cautious optimism (boo!). Just a couple more papes (Newsie terminology) to drop and one more exam tomorrow 2pm, which means ya'll will probably be just getting up. Oh, the beloved exam time;

The beloved 3am bedtimes :::

7am wake ups :::

the steady IV drip of Kenyan coffee into my veins :::

bleary eyed muddled mind conversations that serve no purpose but escape from the history of the anabaptists :::

mutated humor - example

Revising a Semantics paper on Swahili lexical polysemy (big words that really only mean how nya nya means both tomato and grandmother) brought a mammoth half-foot moth flopping on my keyboard. I pick it up and hold it to my mouth, wide eyes, 'Silence of the Lambs' style for my Kenyan co-typer. He gives me a confused look, shakes his head, continues his work. I sigh and drop the moth on the floor.

What do you get when you cross a photographer and a magician? A lot of hocus-focus.