Simon's Nairobi Diary - Archive 48

27 June 2008 11:42pm

Today was the last day of class. It was a discussion on leadership, specifically why leaders have historically (esp. pastors) been those whose position did not allow them to have equal footing with those around them, resulting in a lonely and difficult struggle for community, like an Old Testament prophet. I have known pastors who, after a lifetime of work, retired with not a close friend but their own spouse. But the prof insisted that close company and deep friendship are not only possible for those who lead, but necessary if they want to stay healthy and grounded. I think most of the stories of famous leaders being caught in crazy sexual scandals, or in horrible situations of corruption have come because they didn't have people they could call when they had a bad day.

I put the notepad and pencil in the bag, zipped it, and walked out of classroom 3 for the last time. That room had been the environment for the majority of my classes. Intense discussions on subjects ranging from ethnic cleansing to communion have been inside its walls, and as people left, the room returned to just another dusty stone and wooden desked room. There is ridiculous contrast when I remember the discussion we had last week on female circumcision against that emptying room without the clamor. It seems like the discussion itself was something solid next to that empty place, like our minds and questions and answers were mixing around to create an environment that had warmth and at times fire. Without the conversation, the room was only stone with wooden desks. The movement was everything.

Fortunately the movement is not over yet. The graduation dinner on the tenth is followed by dancing, and the ceremony on the twelfth with a parade. And after it all, I hope the movement will exist permanently etched in my mind's eye, humming on from discussion after discussion, ringing from shout after stamp, reminding me how to bring life to those without it back home.

26 June 2008 11:22pm

If one drives a day west of Kampala to a mountain village called Nkuringo, and if one arrives at the Virunga campsite in the dark, one might wake up to something like this.

25 June 2008 11:06pm

In the spring of 2005, working at Lawndale Clinic within Farragut High School in Chicago, one of the secrets I learned was that once patients with HIV began taking ARV meds and lowered their viral count enough, they could largely have unprotected sex without transmitting HIV to another person. This was something we were not to tell our patients, because it would only do more harm than good.

I feel government is something like this. It took us hundreds of years in the United States before our government was appointed by a population of voters that was large enough to represent the entire country (1840 election of Harrison had 11% of the country vote). And we're still working out the kinks, despite the hundreds of years of democracy.

Living in Kenya, at first, was simply overwhelming. At first I simply was too fresh and new to have opinions. But after a year I began to feel qualified to make judgments about the place, like that Kenya can't have a working democracy because people simply vote along tribal lines. Now I've come to abandon these simple ignorant views, and realize that things take time to happen. And at first, like with the ARVs, most governments will realize they have a lot to gain by using their power in the wrong way. But with time a maturity and ownership grows on people and their leaders, especially as they leave (sadly) their ethnicity behind in favor of a national identity (like the US). I know some of the younger generation who grew up in Nairobi, are Kikuyu, and voted for Raila Odinga (voted against the Kikuyu incumbent Mwai Kibaki).

I think the church is a lot like this as well. The cultural sensitivity in overseas missions didn't nearly exist in the past like it does these days. Christians globally are beginning to awaken towards ecological responsibility as God's desire for mankind, and that changing a person's heart and helping them get a job in the community go hand in hand.

The most worthwhile, most rewarding things on this earth take a long time to accomplish. I mean, when I went to college it was almost not even a big deal, but when my parents saw it happen, it was like eighteen years of homemade meals and diaper changes and baseball practice pickups and homework help all coming together.

It is easier for me to commit my life to something like God when I think along these lines.

24 June 2008 9:13pm

We are sitting at dinner, and despite the unAmerican food I am totally at ease, enjoying the company, eating like its any other meal. My roommates are laughing about small things of their day, and we're talking about nothing in particular. Then somehow we get on HIV prevalence in the country and my roommate says both his parents died of HIV. And the room shrinks around me. I get the slight feeling of a stomachache, and I remember where I am. Despite the normalcy having bled onto the surface of this strange place, despite the acclimation that has saturated this world's daily ins and outs, the truth hasn't changed.

Moments like these happen about twice per week, moments where I get slapped in the face with the truth that I really am in Africa. HIV is not some stat on a billboard sponsored by some aid organizaiton. It is a contagious virus that killed the parents of this good friend of mine across the table eating dinner with me. "I would have been borne with it too," he says to my wheeling eyes. "But the doctors knew how to keep it from the baby." He stands, dollaps a drop of soap, and washes his dinner plate while asking me how my final papers are coming along.

22 June 2008 2:53pm

Layers: two tshirts, a collared long sleeve, a wool sweater, pajama bottoms under pants. It makes little difference. The ringing brisk air subtly sinks into my bones and empties my joy from the inside out. Yes, its the cold season. It is winter in Nairobi.

Speaking to others who have lived all over, they all say that Nairobi has the best weather in the world. 300 days of unbroken golden sunshine, mild heat, no malaria. It has zero humidity because of its elevation over a mile above sea level. But those last sixty days are on a band wagon. They are the winter months of mid-June through mid-August.

I grudgingly refused to acquiesce towards these cold seasons. Others took on the arduous task of wearing layers and removing one or two if the room gave such lenience. But I was not to do this. Nay, I was going to wear my sandals and shorts year round, because I felt that wearing winter clothes and woolen accessories was unAfrica.

And wear them I did not. The chill of June/July 2006 came and I wore bagged shorts. Despite the mild autumn breeze, I shouldered my way triumphantly through campus. "Put some pants on," my classmate Johnnie told me. "I'm from the snow lands," I told him. "This is like our summer."

June/July 2007 it became winter again, and I added a long sleeve shirt. No big deal, I said. I'm still from the snow lands. Look at my exposed calfs! "Put some pants on," Johnnie said that year. "I'm from the snow lands," I told him shivering. "You look cold to me," he responded.

Le resistance was futile. Thirty some months and three Dec-Feb summers later and my blood thinned from its viscosity, relaxing from its original condition, becoming one with the climate. And the winter is now here. I am wearing layers: tshirts, long sleeves, pajama bottoms under my pants, (ugh) wool accessories. And it makes little difference. The effervescent chill in the oxygen is callousing the marrow of my soul. "How are the snow lands?" Johnnie asks, passing me on the path. I try to chatter out an answer, but its incoherent mumbles. Johnnie curtly zips his fleece jumper and passes me by, and I am pulling my sleeves over my fingers. I am closing my eyelids for the warmth.

19 June 2008 10:09pm

Cross cultural contexts are a harbor of contrast. Each and every day I walk past people who cook different, or are talking different, or relaxing different than I am used to. Enough time can pass where one becomes completely disconnected from everything. Two things happened for me personally that helped me not go nuts. First, I had warm friendships I found here who helped me anchor myself in this new context, helping me to live and leisure anew. But secondly, I had a family back home who consistently reapplied themselves to being there for me. At least once a month, for three years, I've received packages in the mail. At least once a week my phone rings. Everytime it was the same thing: a repainting of home through their update and a reapplication of their love. With this I was fine.

I've heard horror stories of people who try and fail at cross-cultural environments. I've heard of Peace Corps workers or missionaries who got so unanchored that they lose their minds, or became addicted to substances, or get so crosseyed by the world out their window that they never leave their house for the whole year. Honestly, I can see where they're coming from. I could have become that. Easy. To be honest, I would have enjoyed the escape.

But instead I was buffeted from such danger by a sustaining voice on the phone, because when people care about you, and do it with consistency, you care about yourself.

I wrote my parents an ILoveYou letter at the beginning of this month, because Emmanuel the motorcycle taximan accidentally brought me that night into a warzone where the Ugandan military was fighting Congolese militias. I was escorted out by Ugandan soldiers, who took me in their pickup and laughed as they told me I would have died had they not been randomly patrolling that road. We were all shaking, but only they did so from laughter. Alone at the end of it all, tucked into a mountain rural campsite, I reached out for the family and wrote a letter.

It's been difficult for me here in Kenya, despite the illumination I've gained toward life and God, despite the magnificent thrilling experiences. But I imagine its been pretty difficult for my mom and dad back home too, because they have had to deal with knowing my haphazard nature was bumbling within the hills of such a chaotic land. I cannot form the words enough, when I think about it, of how thankful I am for my family to not only let me come here, but love the idea of it too, despite the worry that comes with it. I almost begin to apologize at times. It seems though, that as this time is drawing to a close, and as the difficult walk of living in Nairobi begins to wind down, I imagine they too are viewing a distant coming rest - from the worry of having a son living abroad.

So may the sunrise bring hope where it once was forgotten.

Sons are like birds, flying upward over the mountain.

18 June 2008 11:59pm

The way the slow old man and his hat and cane was tilted like a board to look through the gap in the fence, legs akimbo, not a muscle moving as he watched whatever it was. The way the shepherd who tends the school's milk cattle holds his radio like an infant, with its lost battery cover and assorted battery brands and flow of Kikuyu music. The way girlfriends walk upright tight side by side, throwing forward full hearted smiles. The way matatu workers who are off duty get free rides by standing on the slidingdoor ledge of the vans, four at a time tight fitting their feet on the footlong ledge, jostling one other, urging the driva to gas (Endeshe!), riding it something like a windsurf with a leaned back and a forward stare.

These things are normal to people here, a consistent ornament to the going ons of this world. But to me they are beautiful.