Superwhatever.

Oh my gosh! I figured it out...my camera was on the highest quality image setting, making the file size HUGE! So, expect more of these in the coming weeks, but right now, I only have time to upload a picture of the resort I stayed at this weekend for a retreat. Absolutely stunning. The picture doesn't even really do it justice. What makes me uncomfortable, though, is seeing this amazing atmosphere that is booming with tourism (or was, before the winter violence) and then walk outside this compound to folks begging for change. The financial disparity is astounding...we thought there was a large wage gap in America...folks, we haven't seen anything.

I'm stealing the title of this post from Rob Bell, who's book I'm reading right now. He just got done talking about how we try to become Superwhatevers in our lives - you know, Superdad, Superstudent, Superfriend, SuperRA, Supergirlfriend, etc. In reading his words about such things, I realized one of the things I like most about Kenya is the lack of people trying to be Superwhatevers. Competition isn't dripping from relationships or workplaces. There is a drastically lower population of folks sacrificing people for a paycheck. Being 'Super' is just not a priority when we're trying to get food in mouths or medicines into bodies.

Now, when I type these blogs and talk in generalities about Kenyans or Americans or whomever, realize that I fully understand this is not true of all people - there are amazing people in America not trying to outshine others or take on the world and some folks in Kenya are placing orders for a spandex uniform with an "S" on the front. But...

I am more than guilty of trying to be Superstudent, Supersister, Superdaughter, Superwhatever. It becomes a game: how many meetings can I attend around helping friends, investing a few hours in homework, going to classes 5 minutes early, and travelling home for the weekend to surprise my family (which was a blast). But now that I've existed in this more lax environment for a good 5 weeks now, that seems so silly. I'm not doing anyone justice running myself into the ground, and neither are you. Putting in 90 hours a week doesn't make loved ones any more comfortable than your presence; spending a ton of money on a gift for your girl/boyfriend won't make them love you anymore; and for crying out loud, we've got to stop scheduling back-to-back meetings and such. Running out of one early to arrive at another late isn't helping anyone.

Rob Bell tells us to go out back and kill our Superwhatevers. To look at what we're trying to be, realize we're not doing a good job and never will, and accept the reality of our flaws, embracing them. Take a day off. Go play with some kids (because it's theraputic if it's not an obligation). Kill the Superwhatever. I'm working on it.

Unexpected Acceptance

When I was preparing for this trip, many experienced travellers or natives of this area warned me about holding my tounge - putting a filter on the liberal rants I am, at times, known for. I'm generally considered a liberal by all accounts in the States, so in the conservative Muslim area of Mombasa, I might as well march the streets in rainbow tie-dye, walking to the beat of Buffalo Springfield (if you missed the 60's cultural reference...go Google it now. I mean that Jodie).

Today I was sitting down to lunch with Roo and an older womyn from MUHURI - both practicing Muslims and from what I had gathered overhearing previous conversations, extremely conservative (even though they both work for a Humyn Rights organization, liberating womyn...go figure). The news was playing in the background, and I was transfixed on some story about a boat capsizing in Asia somewhere, and Husna turned around to see what grabbed my attention. It was a horrid story - 100+ people died in the random collapse of this boat, so the families were shown crying and such. I couldn't help but think about how awful it would be to die like that, to have family die like that. And, I kid you not, after watching a few seconds of the clip, this womyn turned around and said it's "probably for the best. They're overpopulated anyway."

I spit. Almost literally spit out my food. All I could do was stare.
For those that know me well, the fact that I held my tounge was an act of God. But I did. I'm proud.
Then, for crying out loud, she started talking about how God plans for things like that - about how we have to balance the world somehow, although "the tsunamis made me sad - so many people." I couldn't believe that I was listening to this extremely religous womyn - one whom I had a monumental amount of respect for - quantifying how 'sad' an event was based on the number of deaths. But, again, I held my tounge.

The next story on the news was something about futbol, and she quickly asked me what America was doing with Beckham (I guess we 'bought' him, or something - I'd heard other interns talking about it, so I had a vague idea, although sadly don't follow much soccer). I informed her of my limited up-to-date knowledge, and guessed he was in California somewhere, and the sound of that state set her off. She looked at me with a piercing gaze and explained that she'd been "following" the same-sex marriage laws (fully expecting me to jump on her gay-hating bandwagon) and couldn't believe that so many people were getting married like that. Roo jumped in, gawking at a story about "two old womyn who'd just married each other."

Bless her heart, Husna asked what I thought. I quickly told her with a grin that she didn't want to know. But she persisted. So...my tounge untied itself.

I told her that I had absolutely no problem with that - that I completely supported the actions of the California legislature in passing the law and was happy that individuals who had been in love for years could now share the same rights as their hetersexual counterparts. I told her it didn't bother me at all. Both looked shocked, and Roo's only response was "But Jenn, you're Christian!!"

Ha, I love that one.

I rationally and quite calmly explained that I really believed all religions worshiped a God who upheld love above anything else, and I know that God loves when we're happy, so if our happiness is found in loving someone of the same sex, that I think God is totally down for that. She seemed ok with this. In fact, she nodded.

Nodded. That's big.

So we continued to have this conversation for a few more exchanges, and at the end, she said "You know, I still disagree. Not only because I'm a Muslim and we disagree. Not only because I'm Kenyan and our laws disagree. But I do. It's ok though, that's ok. We can disagree." And that was that. We walked away still respecting one another (ok, I have a little problem understanding how she can empower womyn - that's literally her job - but disempower gay women...another battle for another day). I was floored - after I initially opened my big mouth, I was sure MUHURI would ask me to step down as their intern and Argarn would send me packing.

It's interesting how such different people - two womyn with 30 years between them, practicing different religions (that we assume are polar opposites), working in differnt capacities, living in different countries - can have a conversation about such a political 'hot topic' and end so passively...I can tell you that most of my rights discussions in the States don't end with smiles. It was more than encouraging - it was relieving. I hope I can return to to America, to Chatham, with such an ease about these things, leaving my soap box in Kenya to rot.

Don't hold your breath. But I'll try :)

Work Details

I am such a sellout. In my defense, I didn't have much of a choice, but nonetheless, and a sellout. After just spending the last 4 days and three nights in a hotel on the beach, I feel like a contributor to the cycle of poverty in Mombasa. MUHURI hosted a workshop for VIP stakeholders in the prison system - commissioners, magistrates, Officers in Charge - from all around Kenya, and the some 60+ of us were all hosted in a gorgeous hotel on the beach. It was absolutely lovely, but it's so bittersweet, living a life of luxury with hot showers and a beach-front view, then coming home to cold water in a bucket for bathing and being cautious of how much food I eat.

Thought I should explain a little bit about what I"m acutally doing here, since it's been 3 weeks and I have yet to do so. I'm an intern for Muslims for Human Rights (MUHURI) who is a very well known, very estabilshed NGO that works in the Coastal Province of Kenya. They have three different projects going on, and Im working on the newest component of their Prisons Reform Project, the childrens outreach program. Street kids in Mombasa are being rounded up by the police, charged with loitering or some trumped up accusation of crime, and since Kenya's legal system really lacks the means to deal with youth offenders, most are thrown into prison with adults while their trials are going on, usually for months at a time. As you can imagine, the worst happens to them in these situations, so MUHURI stepped up a couple of months ago and is getting them into a Remand Home with other youth.

This is all completely not what I thought my time would be spent doing, but I work with one other paralegal whom I adore, named Rweidah (pronounced Roo-ade-uh, but we call her Roo), and travel to all the prisons, screening new children remands and working to get them into the remand home. This place, mind you, resembles nothing of a home. It's really 2 cinderblock/tin-roofed buildings with 2 more under slow construction on 1/2 an acre of sandy land. There's one tree on the whole lot and an unguarded gate surrounding it all. The kids sleep on 4" foam mats on the ground in one of the buildings which has a wall dividing the girls and boys side. Of course, there are more kids than sleeping mats, so most share or sleep on the hard-wood floors. My first visit was an odd experience: there's absolutely no structure to their days, and at 10:30 that day, they had yet to have breakfast. At night, they're locked into the sleeping rooms because the home doesn't have night security, so they leave them there alone locked up. If it rains, which is often, they generally go back to their dorms and sleep. The day before I arrived, MUHURI provided some paper and pencils for them to draw with, and I've never seen kids so excited to show off their artistic skills, bombarding me with Kiswahili descriptions of their amazing sketches.

My project is going to be converting their "dining hall," which is really an empty room with removable benches, into a multipurpose room. We'll have a work weekend and paint the whole thing, giving the kids the chance to paint murals on the walls, and get a chalkboard, bookshelves, and tables so that volunteer teachers can come and continue their education while their locked up for months at a time. Roo also does rights workshops, educating the kids on their rights in and out of court so they are not charged again, since most of these kids are 'repeat offenders.' Understand, though, that the streetkids have run from something...some are IDPs, displaced by the post-election violence, some come from abusive homes, other from various circumstances that leave them few options other than surviving on the streets, which they're very good at. They're a great group of kids, and will have the chance to school me in futbol this week :) Once again, when I get computer access at work this week, I"ll try and upload photos.

Would love to hear some summer updates. Hope you're finding plenty of time to relax.
Thanks for reading.

Grace in Africa

World War III is being waged in my tummy. When they tell you that there's a timeline of vulnerability for being sick (as you adjust to the foods of a new culture), they're lying. I thought that after more than 2 weeks, I was in the clear. I was wrong.

That may be TMI for many of you, but since this blog is all about being brutally honest - telling of both my highs and lows of this grand adventure - I thought I would let you in on the cruel intentions of the food I ate yesterday. If you know me well at all, you know that I may be the worst sick kid on the planet, worse than teething babies and grown men. So the story I'm about to share should come as little surprise.

I woke up to a disgusting boxing match in the pit of my stomach, and barring the horrid details, I knew I was sick. But because stubborness is genetically encoded into my persynality (thank you Grandma, then Dad), I chose to go attend my first staff meeting with MUHURI. Now, it's a good thing that the ramblings of our mind are not ordinarily streaming live on an online feed, because the elitist, angry America, and at times, straight-up violent thoughts that wound through my consciousness were not pretty.

The meeting, which was set to start at 9 AM, actually began at 9:45 (which is early for a large majority of the African culture), and by that point, I had already begun to mentally curse every late individual who walked through the door - I was in pain. I was looking for any kind of relief: I must have drank 5 bottles of Dasani, gobbled up pain killers and stomach meds like Skittles, and mastered the art of the fetal position. But regardless of what I did to calm my very angry intestines, that long, and, at times, pointless meeting put me in more physical pain than child labor, I'm sure (we all know that's a huge exaggeration).

Immediately after, I called the Site Team, letting them know of my churning stomach, and my supervisor at work told me to go home. It was already 12 and by the time I got home, I was sure I had met my maker. Of course, my wretched physical state didn't help me to remember that all the kids were home today, getting off early every Friday. Worst mistake of my life.

All I wanted when I came home was to crawl into a comfortable bed, put on a movie, complain to my mother who would then stroke my legs and pat my back through the blankets as Ladi, my loving and clueless dog, licked my hand skinless. Or, geeze, to plop onto the crunch Chatham matresses and fall into a sleep coma, feeling badly for Lyss who would, like a great best friend, sit on the edge of my bed with a look of sorrow like I was going to die. But no. I had to retreat to a sun-soaked bed, plain walls, and children who broke the decible level of Air Force rockets.

Folks, I could have killed them. Hard as my house mama tried, those little children had way too much energy to even muster heavy-metal rock beats. As I tried to sleep off this death disease, I lied there, sweating, cursing, and thinking of how easily I could lock all of those wretched children in the basement of the apartment complex. Although I try (desperately, but always failing) to live in such a way that doesn't make Jesus shake his head in shame, I knew I hated those kids. But alas, grace stepped in.

Now, my non-religious or spiritual friends will have to hold on to that respect that I know you have for me and all beliefs I have, including those of devine intervention, because I knew that's how I woke up and didn't strangle 4 almost-innocent kids. I finally got to sleep, and although my slumber was interrupted by shrieks, shrills, and the sounds of a beating door as they anxiously awaited for me to crawl out of my hole of misery, it was a nice nap. I was not cured, by any means, and still sit here at the cyber in quite a bit of pain, but, friends, I came out of my make-shift sanctuary and saw all of those kids piled around their mother on the only couch in the living room, watching a movie, peering down the hallway to wait for my homecoming. As soon as I stepped out, the youngest one ran over to me, and in Kiswahili, asked if I was ok, and hugged my leg like a toddler at Field Day.

I cannot even describe how freaking cute they all looked, piled like cold puppies on that floral print, using all of their might to not make a peep. They genuinely cared for me. It must have been so hard for my mama to let them watch a movie (something that rarely happens in this household) and I can only imagine how many urges the 4 little monsters had to fight away with stickes to stay seated and silent. They were all trying to stay as still as possible for the last leg of my coma, knowing but not understanding that's what I needed. Thank God for grace, because had it not stepped in to intervene, I might be in jail right now.

So no stories of adventures of tales of work today. Just a simple story to help you all understand that even though the tummies of life are churning with sickness (with George Bush as the piolot, I'm sure) and we can't always find the sanctuary we want (in the laps of our dear Mothers who always know the right spots to rub on our backs), grace does find a way to weasle into our bad moods and prevent us from commiting a felony.

A Weekend of Highs and Lows

I've been trying to upload photos now for 10 minutes, and I think the connection at this cyber is just too slow...another challenge for another day.

I was especially excited to show pictures today because I had a weekend full of everything - both good and bad - that this city has to offer, I'm sure.

Yesterday, my breath was literally taken away on my first trip to the ocean - the Indian Ocean. Never having seen the Atlantic or Pacific, walking on to the white sandy beaches to see an endless line of water with beautiful waves was like a clip from a fairy tale. I went with another intern who has family in Haiwaii and grew up in Cali, and this place caught her off-guard! Words just don't do justice folks - even the few pictures I took were inadequate. The experience did make a bit uncomfortable though:

This beach was literally 20 minutes away from where I live, nestled between resorts and what I assume were 5-star hotels. People near the tiki bars were sipping on wine coolers and lounging around on huge rocks, all the while the hustle and bustle of impoverished city life lay just beyond these gated communities. I wonder how such a lucrative tourist industry, clearly booming with business, can exist so closely to people who sleep on dusty streets and drink the rain water. Moving so quickly from one end of the wealth spectrum to the other confirmed my fears of coming back to America and experiencing straight-up emotional culture shock.

After such an interesting excursion, I had work to look forward to this morning, but was caught off guard as Dennis drove me up the main road. It intersects at a round-about that is the center of town, always drawing traffic and congestion, but today there was a huge commotion. As we drove, there were folks on rooftops looking down to the center of the intersection, people were peering through windows, and - no joke - hundreds of people were running to what Dennis called a riot. The whole situation got worse as we inched towards the mayhem: loud screams, two men walking away from it all holding rags to their bleeding heads, cars jumping the median to turn away from it all. All Dennis could say was, "Holy shit, man. Holy shit," but he's Irish - cussing is like breathing for the guy :)

We turned around about 1 block before the edge of the crowd, windows rolled up and eyes straight ahead, not sure what the deal was. After we reached a coffee shop on the other side of town, Dennis called a friend and found out that the police ambused 3 thieves and killed them on the spot, in front of all those people. Apparently, such things are not uncommon but can become highly dangerous with the police just shooting and everyone running towards the conflict. He explained that Kenyans have a lot of pride in the peacefulness of their communities and don't want it corrupted by thieves and the like, so kill them in a community-enforcement type of way.

I wish the whole thing wouldn't have shaken me as much as it did, but we literally transitioned from calm to chaos in minutes - something not entirely uncommon - and although I would have been fine on foot had I just turned away from the commotion and walked away, I was extremely grateful to be in a car. I don't want to enforce the negative image that can easily exist of this culture with stories of violence, but it's hard to see how people have to revert to such horrid means of upholding their image because there is so much corruption in the legal system.

Work was a disappointment: showed up to a waiting room with 10 people already sitting down and was told that there was an all-staff meeting and we would have to wait. After 2 hours of sitting, I finally got up to go explore outside and realized that the office sits right beside a huge tourist attraction - Fort Jesus - just off an inlet from the sea. Once again, absolutely beautiful. A make-shift tour guide from MUHURI who showed me around said that's where I can eat my lunch everyday. Can we say "awesome!" After the meeting, I met a few employees and was sent home, asked to take care of some lame paperwork to ensure it's ok for me to work. So, I really start tomorrow morning :)

I'm in good spirits and have absolutely loved hearing from you all via emails and comments. Please keep the persynal updates coming - they're really refreshing. I"ll respond as soon as I'm able.