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June 26, 2005
June 26, 2005
Exciting day for the kids yesterday. Naiboku got a new bed and as a result, the whole room was changed around to make it fit. In the evening watching them play in the new world that was their rearranged room, Rueben and I commented to each other how amazing it was that simple events in a child’s life can have such profound effects. Naiboku was so proud of being a big girl with a big girl’s bed, you could see her just glowing. It was satisfying to me also to see the success of my efforts to get her out of her trundle bed which had been getting to short for her. This hadn’t been easy and had taken much thought and careful measuring in order to make all the things fit in the tiny room that the children have. And the actual process of the sift was strenuous. It was combined with a thorough cleaning and attempt to de-flea the room. Having two dogs and four cats in a small house does have its draw backs. Loiweti’s high bunk bed is a favorite sleeping spot for the cats and many a kitten has been born and raised in the nooks and crannies behind the wardrobe and under the bed. These two heavy pieces of furniture hadn’t been moved since they were placed almost 4 years ago. Scary. During the whole process, the kids, including several of their neighborhood friends, swarmed in and out in a state of excitement. I was able to get them to help in carrying mattresses or big storage cases out to lay in the sun and then loose their assistance as they proceeded to jump on top or climb inside whatever they happened to be carrying. In the end, it all got done with a last rush in the evening to bring everything in and put it in place as the rain started to threaten. In the middle of this ‘spring’ cleaning, my friend Carolyn came by for a visit. I hadn’t seen her for almost a year as she teaches in a University in St. Louise. She is American with a Samburu husband like myself and has three girls. They are back here now for six months and it was really nice chatting with her again. A great addition to a wonderful day. It gave me a chance to show off our efforts in the bedroom. I’m taking it easy today as I can feel some of the effects of my household exercise. I had some schoolboys come to work on the yard, finishing up some of my improvements to the compound. Everything inside and out is starting to look good. That is my excitement. It reminds me that it is not only children that can experience the joys of life in simple changes.
Speaking of simple joys, some good news on the Seren project. It seems to finally be falling into place. Reuben went to Ngurunit today with some water technicians and will stop by the Seren project to check out one last thing. I have found what so far appears to be a reputable and efficient supplier for the goods and the paper work is getting sorted out. There is hope for the success of this project after all. I knew it would work out but sometimes I allowed myself to despair. I am happy that things are finally moving in the right direction. One step at a time and the destination will be reached.
June 23, 2005
June 23, 2005
Children are in bed. Reuben brought new solar batteries from Nairobi so now I have enough power in the house to use the computer in the evenings. A fire is lit in the fireplace. Even so, I have a blanket wrapped around my legs. It is cold tonight. June and July are Maralal’s ‘winter’. Of course, my idea of cold now is a lot different that it was years ago living in Wisconsin. Then I would have said this temperature is a bit cool but refreshing for a summer’s evening. Life is relative. The cold is brought on by the fact it has been raining all week. Really good for the garden. Today I did a practical agricultural science lesson with the boys. We looked at the germinating corn and beans and discussed the differences in the way they come out of the soil. It is fun to see the boys exploring the world of nature and being so excited by the things they find.
A mosquito just flew by and is now bussing my ear. Reminds me of the malaria problems. My malaria is finally cleared up. I had a clean test yesterday and have been feeling fine. Nice to have energy again. Unfortunately, tested Polisan at the same time, as he has been down a bit, and found malaria just beginning to take hold. So had to treat him. Tried a different one-dose medication this time. Today he seemed very healthy. Hope it continues that way.
Now that I am healthy, I am starting to get into the routine of staying in Maralal for many weeks at a time and enjoying it. It has been months and months, almost a year, since I stayed put in any one place for longer than 3 weeks or a month at a time. Nairobi, Maralal, Ngurunit, Maralal, Ngurunit, Maralal, Nairobi, Europe, Nairobi, Maralal, Ngurunit. Up and down like a yoyo. I have now been in Maralal since June 3rd and don’t have plans to go anywhere until August 8th or so when we head for Ngurunit for the school holiday. Amazing. I actually enjoy the sort of unsettled life with frequent changes of scenery, but lately it has been a little too much. Now I have time to really dig into the details of life and get done a lot of things that have been neglected or left hanging.
One thing I am working on is getting my gardens and whole compound into shape. That is digging deep, literally. It is so satisfying to finally see the rock borders around the flowerbeds with the grass cut down to a manageable height. The gardens look very nice without more weeds than desirable plants in them. I have discovered some wonderful things since taking the time to stop and look. Our passion vine has fruits maturing on it. My rosemary bushes were growing under the weeds. The boys’ tomato patch actually survived the extended dry period and now with the rains is actually starting to produce tomatoes. Wonderful. It is these simple things in life that can really bring a peace deep down in our souls that help us to cope with the tension and stress of this modern world. I’m very glad I have had some time to stop and remember that.
June 14, 2005
June 14, 2005
Finished my malaria drugs but still wasn’t feeling well. Went for a retest and have found it is still there. I have just started another course of a different drug. Hope this one works. I have so much to do. Uggh.
June 12, 2005
June 12, 2005
Today is a very lethargic day. In fact all week since getting back from the Ngurunit excitement has been mostly a week of fits and starts when it comes to my doing anything ‘useful’. The main factor in this state of things, I have discovered to be another case of malaria. Today is the last day of the latest course of curative drugs. I have been getting it so often lately. The doctor I go to in Maralal, using the term ‘doctor’ very loosely as they do here in Northern Kenya, said that there is a real breakout in repeat and drug resistant cases of Malaria in the area since the rains started in March. One problem I find with Malaria within populations that are regularly exposed to the disease, including myself and my family, is that the symptoms are not very overt and the disease sort of sneaks up on you. Classic malaria with the high fever causing chills and shivering seems a rare thing to me. My first hint that I am fighting the bug is very subtle. I start to get vivid dreams that are very ‘ordinary’ in content but slightly weird or skewed in perspective. Along with the dreams I feel like I have been busy all night and never really feel rested. I don’t feel sick but am very unmotivated and simply want to sit around talking or reading a book. I take a lot of naps Then my arms and legs start to ache a bit, like I walked a bit far or did a bit too much exercise, even if I haven’t done a thing in days. At night as I lay in bed, my joints ache. If by this time I haven’t taken the hint and gone for a test to check for malaria, I start to get light headed and dizzy during the normal activities of the day. Eventually my head starts to hurt a bit way deep behind the temples and I start to feel a bit hot in the hands and feet. This whole process can progress very slowly over a period of days, sometimes several weeks, until suddenly I realize that I better go get tested and do something about it if it is positive. I always go in saying I don’t really feel sick, just a bit funny, so can I get tested just in case…90% of the time it turns out to be a case of Malaria. Very frustrating because it eats into my productivity so much without me even realizing what is happening. Lately I wonder how much this same slow progress is affecting my kids in their thinking and performance. I’m starting to be able to detect their slight laziness and mild complaints as the beginnings of malaria and take them immediately for testing.
I am seeing that my family is not the only one affected by this disease in this way. I suspect that so much low productivity in the society at large is due to the affects of undetected low grade malarial attacks that go on and on without treatment. In many cases, as people don’t have a habit of going for testing, it eventually even leads to death through other complications brought on by the disease; urinary tract infections, liver damage, kidney failure. Several of our friends have died that way. That is why I am so fanatical about detecting the very first barely perceptible signs in myself, Rueben or the children. But that is me. Reuben, having grown up all his life with this disease, is more liable to dismiss it. That scares me as that is probably one reason how those we knew who died from it succumbed. They didn’t bother until it was too late. Reuben hates to be tested and in most cases, even when malaria is suspected, refuses to go. But he is willing to take the drugs when I suggest. So I watch for the subtle symptoms and keep the drugs on hand. Maybe not the best way to deal with his health, but I would rather give him unneeded drugs if there is the slight chance he has malaria than put it off as the flu or a bad cold and later get complications. Such is life here. One of the risks I am willing to deal with to live in a place I love and live the life I find so fascinating and exciting.
June 03, 2005
June 3, 2005
Wow! I was dropped off the airplane this morning at a small airstrip 20 minutes out of Maralal. The pilot flew over our house in town to alert Reuben to come and pick me up. We came from Ngurunit along the Ndoto mountains through fabulous scenery on a beautiful day. It was a wonderful ending for an exciting 5 days. I met Tim the cameraman last Monday and my first introduction to filming was technical difficulties. Tim, Leslie and I all met at the appointed place at the appointed time with the plan to do a quick shoot on the wholesale export/import angle of selling the baskets. Most of the filming was planned for Tuesday but Leslie was busy, thus the Monday meeting. All went well with the set up of the scene. We piled the baskets outside on the grass and prepared for the shoot. We all had places to run to, so were hoping to get done quickly. Then reality struck. It had been raining in the morning and now the sun had come out and the humidity was rising. The camera refused to cooperate. It had gotten some condensation inside and refused to work. Tim put the camera in the sun and assured us it would be only 5 or 10 minutes. 40 fidgety minutes later with Tim doing everything he could to get the camera dried out, we finally got started. The shoot went well but was harder work than I had imagined. Leslie and I had to repeat our conversation about the baskets 3 times over so Tim could get it from all angles. He then interviewed Leslie and she dashed off over an hour late for her next appointment. Tim then filmed an interview with Reuben about the family involvement in helping out the project and transporting the baskets. We finally finished the shoot two hours later than planned. But it was fun. It was also a taste as to how filming went for the next 3 days. Every shot always seemed to take longer than planned. It was hard work with many repeats. But it was fun. I met Robert, the producer, on Tuesday morning. Tim wasn’t available to film until 11:00 am so I took Robert on one of my attempts to get a new customer for the baskets. It was a lead Leslie had given me. It paid off and I was able to leave a number of baskets behind for a trail. During the discussions and showing of the baskets, I looked around and saw Robert with a mini camera following every move. A bit disconcerting but I had to just ignore him and keep on with my marketing as naturally as possible. It got me ready for the rest of the day once we met Tim. They followed me everywhere and interviewed everyone, except me. They said they were saving me for when we got to Ngurunit. In Nairobi they just filmed me going in and out of shops, driving my car in and out of parking lots, lugging bags of baskets around, talking to people and just generally doing what I do. They even took shots of my feet walking up and down a pavement. That was hilarious with Tim being pulled backwards by his assistance so he could get my feet as I walked towards him and not run into anything behind. I was exhausted by the end of the day! And that is when they decided they wanted one interview with me as I drove the car along. I was asked how I felt about the successes or failures of the day of basket marketing. Robert kept telling me to look at the camera now and then as I drove and talked. Doing that on the roads of Nairobi is a very dangerous thing indeed, especially during the evening when everyone else was rushing home from work. We are lucky to come out of that interview alive! Especially when it got darker and they set up a bright light shining directly in my eyes and expected me to keep on driving and still look at the camera. Crazy but fun.
I left Tim and Robert at 7:30 in the evening, totally wiped out from the day of filming. Maria, the research student, had called and expected to arrive in Nairobi by 8:00 so I rushed to Janice’s to drop all the baskets out of my car into her store. Maria called again to say they were close to Nariobi but stuck in a traffic jam so I went to find Reuben and our friend Charles where they had been hanging out waiting for me to finish the filming. The minute I had left Tim and Robert, my voice had started to go hoarse. By the time I reached Reuben, I could barely talk. To deal with this emergency, as I still had two days of filming and needed a voice, I was given a ‘treatment’ of a half of brandy. I drank this while eating the cold pizza I had saved from lunch and waited for Maria to call. It turned out that the car they were in had a slight accident in the traffic jam. Nothing series. Their car wasn’t even damaged. But as the other car was damaged a bit, even though it was that car’s fault, the police had to come and sort it out. Finally, Maria arrived and it was so good to see her, even if I could only croak or whisper at her. We made plans for her to come with us in the morning, as after Reuben dropped me at the plane in Gilgil, he could take her to a town a bit further along that she was heading to. This was the last time so see Maria and it was so short. But at least we got to meet once more before she headed home to Sweden.
We arrived with no problems at the plane in Gilgil Wednesday morning. 15 minutes before we were to take off, I got a phone call from Samwel, my Ngurunit field assistant. Not a good sign as I knew there was no phone in Ngurunit. I fearfully asked him where he was and just about fainted when he said Wamba. That is hours away from Ngurunit and it can take two days, or even a week, to travel between the two if one needs to rely on means other than your own vehicle. I furiously asked him why in the world he wasn’t in Ngurunit and informed him that we were flying there and would be there in less than 2 hours for the filming of the project. I had really needed him there to help organize everything and I also wanted him to be apart of the film as he was so helpful to me in the work. I realized it couldn’t be helped and told him that if he was lucky to get transport and could arrive by the next morning, come, otherwise just go and do whatever business he had come out to do. We got on the plane and arrived in Ngurunit a few hours later. Robert and I left Tim with the luggage and walked into town from the airstrip to find a vehicle. On the way to my house, I had the driver take the long way around to give the guys a chance to get a layout of the area. We encountered people being given relief food and the filming began. Robert wanted to get as much local life as possible and establish the environment in which the basket project was started and for what reasons and what benefits. That began 2 days of intense filming of everything from collecting the raw materials for the baskets to weaving them as well as the daily lives of the community and their other economic activities. To my great joy, Samwel showed up early the next morning after having traveled on a truck through the night from Wamba. He hadn’t slept in 24 hours but he said he had been determined to arrive on time and be a part of the filming. He was invaluable in helping organize and translate for the days of filming. It is dedication like he showed for this activity which I appreciate most in him. The women had fun being filmed and some of them, like Nankaya, were natural hams. Robert was amazed that they were able to keep cool and keep repeating over and over the same action or same conversation when it wasn’t gotten the first time. He was sure they thought we were crazy and asked me to apologize to them for all the trouble. They said no problem, they were used to people coming and doing strange things like filming. This morning, even as we were preparing to leave on the plane, we started filming at 6:30 am and took shots in different places all the way to the airstrip.
Now I am home and need to get back into my roles of mother and development worker again. The film star fantasy is over for now and I need to remember normal life. Though the tension of waiting for the features to come out in August is still in the back of my mind. The contest is not over yet and I think I will be a little bit on edge until the final results of the voting are out. Will I get a trip to London to receive the prize in November? Or will it end with the features. Either way I have had fun. During the filming Robert interviewed me on what we will use the money for if we win. So I have had to think about it. So much good could come from the prize. Transport, communication, storage and training. All so important to help the basket enterprise become fully viable and sustainable. I can only wait and hope for the best possible outcome.
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