"It is difficult to
describe my journey to Kenya in one word, or even in one sentence. However, if
I were to attempt to summarize my experience in one word, it would be
“extreme”. If I were to summarize it with a sentence using a quote from the
famous Nelson Mandela, it would be: "We must use time wisely and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right."
After having
already lived in Munich for almost six months, traveling to Nairobi, Kenya for
five weeks was one of the most incredibly challenging adjustments I have ever made.
I left a world of pristine and immaculate “Ordnung” and entered a country of disorder,
chaos, and more dialects than there are words in the English language. I went
from being the awkward American meshing with German culture to the “mzungu” (or
white person in Swahili) that was constantly gawked at. I stuck out more than I
ever have. I understood not one world of the language. I left a country with
snow still on the ground, and entered one in which most people have never even
seen snow.
For five weeks I
worked with a faith-baised organization called HOPE Worldwide Kenya, in
Nairobi, which serves to better the community in as many ways as funding
allows. The three programs I worked with while I was there were Orphans and
Vulnerable Children, Shujaa, and Blood Safety. The OVC
Program works with the Nairobian kids living in the Mukuru Slums, a city just
outside of Nairobi. I was able to spend the week getting to know the kids,
doing home visits, taking pictures, and seeing firsthand how they live and
survive day-to-day. I learned that these kids hardly ever have enough to eat.
Some of them are orphans. More than half are infected with HIV or AIDS. Most
die before they become adults from disease, sickness, or hunger. Only a few are
able to move on to high school because they cannot afford any higher education.
But I also saw that outside of the slums was a completely normal lifestyle,
with malls, a city skyline, grocery stores, etc. Nairobi was actually a lot
more developed than I had previously thought.
In the second week
I worked with Shujaa, which is Swahili for “Hero”, and aims to help decrease
the number of sex workers and truckers infected with HIV and have a greater
awareness of the repercussions, side-affects, and dangers of infectious
diseases. We travelled to the northern parts of Kenya to check on different
counseling centers, namely Eldoret, where many of the Olympic track champions are
from.
Blood Safety, with
whom I worked in the third week, is a program that serves to help raise
awareness of safe and responsible blood donations throughout Kenya. Here we
worked with teens and college students in teaching them how to effectively
communicate safe blood donations with various tribes throughout Kenya. I
learned that there are very religious tribes throughout Africa whose religion
does not believe in donating blood because it is holy, and should be left in
the body.
If I were to paint
a picture of what I personally experienced after living in Nairobi Kenya for
five weeks, these are the words I would use to complete the portrait:
Matatus (or buses)
that drive way too fast, on sidewalks and (almost sometimes) over people,
coffee so good that it gives Germany a run for their money, children with
beautiful faces in sad living conditions that smile more than people I know in
good living conditions, friendliness beyond compare, battles with mosquitos
that I always lost, going to the city center and actually thinking that I would
be able to find my way around, people selling food, drinks, and anything you
can really think of on the side of the road (and knocking on the window of your
car when you try to avoid looking at them), three hour traffic jams when it
should only be a fifteen minute drive, a very large faith in God with Bible
scriptures posted everywhere, Ugali (staple food, made of flour and water) that
sticks to your stomach like super glue, washing laundry by hand and dishes in
the bathroom sink, ruining my new shoes from Paris while walking home in the
mud after a monsoon, long dresses and covered shoulders in 100 degree weather,
incredibly beautiful dresses from Ghana of every striking color, weddings with
thousands of people and somehow still plenty of food, searching far and wide
for normal foods like pizza and ice cream because I could not recognize
anything else, Manji Digestive bisquits, DUST EVERYWHERE, wearing my Rafiki
tank top during an African Safari, Spanish soap operas translated into English,
an incredible national pride in Kenya, a rhythm so good with dancing that makes
us all look bad, Shang (equivalent to Bayrisch or the Southern Accent), constantly
being asked how many words in Swahili I remember (which were none), freaking
out with joy after realizing half of the words from Disney’s “The Lion King”
are actually Swahili, AFRICAN SAFARI in Maasai Mara, seeing a crocodile eat a
dead hippo, almost being attacked by a monkey, calling home for only two cents
per minute, no Wi-fi anywhere, getting
up at 5 am and going to sleep at 9 pm, thinking I was going to blow up every
time I lit the gas stove, consistently random power outages, driving all over
Kenya and seeing the country side, mud houses, the best mangos in the world,
genuinely real deep-hearted conversations (due to no distractions), and even
partaking with the kids in begging the adults to finish one more episode of
Spongebob Sqaurepants (oh, the things you miss when you are far from home).
The five weeks I
spent there passed alarmingly quickly, and the above list will never be able to
fully describe the incredible time that I had in Kenya. Living there genuinely
helped me grow as a person with every new experience, good or bad, allowing me
to see life differently than I had seen it before. I was able to learn about a
culture that I had only ever seen on television or read about in books. I gained
my own perspective, instead of simply accepting the perspectives of others. Not
only did I gain that outlook, but I also took part in their lifestyle, which is
a lifestyle that some of them will never know anything outside of. I built
relationships with lovely and genuine people, which included everything from
chatting with strangers in Mutatus, worshiping with friends at church, and
sitting in the dirt in slums with kids while singing songs and playing games. I
lived in a way that pushed me out of my comfort zone numerous times during the
day. I lived in a way that exhausted me to the point of going to bed every
night earlier than I did as a child.
Overall, I would
say Kenya taught me that there is no right way or wrong way to live life, one
way is not better than the other, and that a person’s living situations and
environment do not determine their value or worth. In Kenya I think it shows
their strength in their ability to endure unbearable heat and harsh living
conditions. Despite the odds, they find joy in the little things, and find joy
in life itself. Kenya taught me to value the time I have in life, whether long
or short, whether at home or far away, because there is always some time left
to do good where ever one is in this world."
