Pole-pole

March 7th, 2010 by Alison Drummond

Hi all,

I literally have mere moments to write this, so I will be uber brief.

The past days have been wonderful as we continue to engage with people in the camp and surrounding communities. I have slowly been building my language skills (though they minimal at best) and am daily learning more about the culture and traditions here.

We just returned from a 3-day safari in Maasai-Mara, which was incredible in every way, but I will save that for later. It was awesome to see more of the Kenyan country-side and to meet many Maasai people. And of course the wild animals were…well, wild and mind-blowing!

As for camp-

Many regional representatives from the government were out last week to meet with inhabitants from the camp regarding food, shelter, land, education, and health-care. In short, many people felt positive at the end of the meeting, however it seems the promised land and building supplies (which the president committed in Oct. to be given within 2 weeks!) are no more available than they were weeks or days ago. The government officials simply asked camp members to continue being patient and that land and houses “will be available soon”. It was discouraging to watch as an ex-pat as we feel these are just more empty promises, however, hopefully things will change soon and the camp leadership will hold the government accountable.

We are definitely into the rainy season, and I know people in the camp spend many nights trying to stay warm and the days drying out their bedding and clothing. Last week we entertained about 30 kids in the UNICEF tent by the school as the rain came pouring down (even those of you from Vancouver would not believe the rain here!). We attempted to host a seminar for women, however, when none of them arrived we tried to organize an impromptu event for the kids. In trying to teach them safe and appropriate hand-washing, we ended up COVERED in filthy water as the kids thought it would be way more fun to wash the muzungus. Also, the kids quickly become quite aggressive when many of them are in one place together- which was a little overwhelming for us.

As for the women’s seminar, we were really disappointed, but as this is the 4th time Julie has tried to facilitate such an event, we figure we won’t try the same approach again as it does not seem to appeal to the women in the camp. We would like to design something for the camp women as there are many gynecological issues. Also, we have become increasingly aware of the number and nature of sexual assaults occurring in camp. As food is a hot commodity, it seems it is being used to bribe women for sexual acts. Please, please pray, as we don’t really know what else to do besides expose this behavior and offer safe counsel and support.

In regards to the kids, many are not attending school (not even the free ECD school in camp) so they are legitimately bored. As well, many of them were exposed to atrocious violence during the 2007-2008 political clashes. This weekend I am organizing a “Fun Day” for the kids. I really want the kids to play as kids, but I am nervous about how it will go over in light of the behavior. Please pray that it would be a wonderful, injury-free, fight-free day.

As for current projects, we are NOT going to be undertaking the coop project. I apologize to those of you who were stoked to participate. Unfortunately it would not be safe or responsible to carry out such a project without enormous funds and time, as it needs to be seen through to completion and that would take months on African time.

With time and relationships we have become aware that is will not be possible to complete all we had hoped. As this was initially disappointing, we have accepted that the most important thing is that the community feels valued, heard, and cared for in the projects we do undertake. Additionally, time and the value on time is very different here. I am learning so much from everyone I meet here, and from every experience- I really feel this is the most important thing I can do in my short time here.

We are working on several other projects which still require financial support. These include:

The “Fun-Day” for the kids this weekend

Helping Sonja in placing 12 camp orphans <8 years old in a beautiful and safe orphanage (this guarantees them food, healthcare, and education until they are 18!)

Employing Mr. John, and very knowledgeable and trustworthy man who has been helping us at every turn without ever requesting financial remuneration or support. Anyways, we will be employing him as a community health representative to continue assisting the community members with health issues. As volunteer presence is not continuous here, we feel it is important to identify key community members who show an interest in helping and are trusted and respected within the camp.

There are still many kids not attending school, especially those in secondary. Many are sent home when they cannot pay school fees. We are trying to help pay some of the secondary students school fees so they can at least re- enroll. Education is really the only way out and up for these kids, so we really want to support this.

We are still trying to track down appropriate malarial detection test. We had no luck with the Kenya WHO however, we will continue to pursue this as it is very much needed in camp as evidenced by the several severe cases we have sent to hospital recently.

I am sorry this message is brief and quite sloppy. The internet and keyboards here are ancient and in very poor shape.

We are hoping to post some pics soon as we were able to locate a USB cable- stay tuned.

Hope all is well at home.

Love,

Ali