August 10, 2008 Flight to London A woman just walked by me down the airline aisle wearing a cheetah print jacket, a matching suitcase and a cheesy t-shirt saying “I love Kenya.” To me, she looked absolutely ridiculous. To her, I probably look even more ridiculous. I’m wearing a brightly colored shawl known as a [...]
August 10, 2008 Flight from London to San Francisco A few minutes ago I happened to glance out the airplane window and was startled to realize that below me was an image I had only previously seen printed next to disturbing newspaper articles about global warming. I’m on the flight from London to San Francisco [...]
August 7th 2008 The funny thing about going places is that you also have to leave places. Sometimes people tell me that I’m “going places.” It’s an interesting phrase, meant to be a compliment as if there was something inherently bad about staying in one place for too long. I love going places but sometimes [...]
August 4, 2008 The man’s shirt was torn, allowing it to hang loosely from his protruding collar bone. The remaining bit of shirt did little to disguise a body that was plainly wasting away. His glassy eyes stared somewhere above my head; clearly he could no longer see. From one ear poured a small stream [...]
July 31 2008 At around three in the afternoon I found myself standing under an overhang in a gas station, shoulder to shoulder with at least fifty Kenyans. It was raining hard so we had all come to the conclusion that wherever we had to be or whatever we had to do could wait until [...]
July 30, 2008 Unbeknownst to me as soon as I set foot inside my house my host Mom had set a goal for herself. Her goal has been to make me “kubwa, like a real African woman.” She told me that when she first saw me she thought that I looked like [...]
July 24, 2008 “You are going to make a horrible housewife.” George said this maliciously, he was done joking and now wanted to end the conversation, saying something that he thought would offend me and shut me up. He stared at me, confused, as I began to laugh. “Why would [...]
July 24, 2008 Today I received a comment from a guy on the street that I’ve never gotten before in Kenya. Usually, even if I’m having a bad day, I’m still smiling as I walk down the street. How could I not? Everyone says hello to me and I lot of the guys [...]
Thank you to everyone who donated, I’ve reached my fundraising target and I’m really excited about it! I’ll let you know how the biogas project goes! In the meantime, feel free to check out cardkakamega.com, we will be putting up biogas pictures soon!
July 21, 2008 Oh the irony of writing a post asking for money after I wrote a post talking about how much I hate being asked for money…Let me justify myself: After my last post about how I didn’t get the grant for my biogas project, a bunch of people commented/emailed me asking if there [...]
