Kids ... heat, and clothes

It was dusk and I was sitting on the porch of the little house on the Coast, delighted that my "newly-acquired" 3-year-old daughter, Natasha, had finally accepted me and wormed herself onto my lap for a cuddle.

The day had been humid and hot, 35°C, and I was enjoying the slight drop in temperature as I sat in the warm breeze off the Indian Ocean.

Natasha wormed and squirmed to get comfortable, then settled to look at the enormous moon hanging in the sky.

I was so content as I felt the heat coming off her little body, but we were interrupted from our contemplations by the house girl who insisted on putting a fleece on Natasha. That broke the spell. Natasha fidgeted and squirmed on my lap and would not settle, so I took her indoors, where she immediately divested herself of the fleece.

I went back outside to finish my contemplations and was again joined by Natasha, minus her fleece. She installed herself again on my lap and settled. In two minutes she was asleep.

The house girl again came out and insisted that she put the fleece on the little girl, but I refused to let her, telling her that I would bring her indoors if I thought she felt cold.

We sat, me staring at the Moon, and Natasha dreaming of ... whatever little girls dream of, hopefully something to do with her new Baba Mzungu.

It never gets cold in this spot. Night-time temperatures rarely drop below 22°C, which to me, a Brit, is warm.

But it got me thinking. My significant other, Natasha's mother Liz and her two kids were born and raised in this place, this holiday paradise of white coral sands, palm trees, blue ocean, coral reef and wall-to-wall sunshine. Liz left when she attended boarding school, but came back to her oven of a village.

The two kids had never been subjected to a temperature of less than 20°C in their lives. What would they make of England, even in Summer? Where even in Summer, nights are cool, and in winter, they are in the minuses.

Snow and ice, frost, fog, woolly jumpers and tights, socks, boots, quilted jackets, warm hats, underwear?

Ah yes, underwear.

Ian, who is six, insists on wearing a singlet and pants under his school uniform. The pants I can understand. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, wearing shorts without underpants can be, let us say, revealing to the others in his class. But a singlet, in an area where daytime temperatures are always in the mid 30s?

And when he comes home from school, he strips off and puts on a T-shirt and shorts. No vest, no pants, no socks.

Oh to be a child again.

Food Crisis in Kenya Pt III

Despite President Mwai Kibaki declaring the food shortages in Kenya a national emergency, and appeals for Ksh 37 billion (£321 million) in aid, a delegation of Kenyan legislators are making their way to Washington for the inauguration of President Barak Obama, despite the fact they have not been invited and will not be attending the ceremony.

Courtesy of Daily Nation 17/1/09

Needless to say, this little jolly is being paid for out of taxes, or to put it bluntly, the Kenyan people. This despite these same legislators refusing to pay tax on their bloated expense allowances.

The crisis is so bad that even areas considered the "bread-basket" of Kenya are suffering food shortages. The price of food is rising to staggering heights, so even if there is food to buy, it is expensive.

People are blaming corruption within the Kenyan Government for the food shortage. Far be it for me to comment. All I know is what I see, and what I see is a delegation wasting tax money on a jaunt to Washington to watch the inauguration on TV in their hotel rooms!

Kenya Tourism

From a Tool-using Thing-maker

In the UK, it is the season for TV adverts for the summer vacations. I have been told I need to go walkabout in Australia, escape to New Zealand, go on cruises to the Carib and Mediterranean.

But I have seen nothing from Kenya, the country whose tourist industry was decimated after the post-election violence a year ago.

What are they waiting for? People like Dr. Livingstone to rediscover Kenya by themselves? Those days are gone.

What I would love to se is an advert showing the beautiful Indian Ocean coast, the Maasai Mara, the Aberdares, The Ark and Treetops, hot dusty towns, full of Kenyan life, good food …

It is all there, but people need to be told, or at least, reminded.

It is all very well having TV programmes like Big Cat Diary showing the wonders of Kenya, but Kenya should be shouting about how wonderful it is as a holiday destination.

Come on, the Kenya Tourist Industry. Knock a few film clips together and get it broadcast!

Our Goals for 2009

As regular readers of this and the KCIS blog already know, we have several projects just waiting to be started up, but with the food crisis gathering pace in Kenya, I have had to juggle the priorities about a bit.

We have our plot just outside Kisii, a particularly fertile corner of Kenya, which is doing nothing worthwhile at the moment. We are going to start our River Cottage project here.

Our priority at the moment must be to produce food. With luck, we will be able to produce a surplus which can be sold.

We have a band of kids who are more than willing to work, but as most are 9 to 12 years old, and the soil is never really dry as it rains all year round in Kisii, I can just imagine the state they will be in after a short while, digging and preparing the soil for planting - filthy!

So, we need a means of letting them clean off afterwards. Needless to say, there is no tap water at the plot and the river at the edge of the plot is down a 1:5 path, so carrying up enough water to wash of half a dozen muddy kids would be a big effort.

So, we need water collection off the roof of the existing hut and anywhere else we can find. Then, behind the hut we can build a simple shower with bamboo screens.

All this can be done at a minimal cost, and falls in quite nicely with another project title, Scrapheap Challenge.

There is a UK charity in Kisii who gives out gardening tools to "worthy causes". I just hope that an orphanage trying to grow its own food will be considered a worthy cause!

Out of the Mouths of Babes and Infants ...

"When is Baba Mzungu coming to see me?" asked Benta this morning, her usual morning question.

"As soon as possible," replied Vincent.

"When do you think as soon as possible will be?"

Answers on a post card ...

Why Drugs Are So Expensive

By A Tool-using Thing-maker
and
Daily Nation 12/1/09

Food Crisis in Kenya Part II

How long before it goes from this ...

Courtesy of The Standard 12/1/09

... to this?

Food Crisis in Kenya

The BBC reports that the Kenyan Government is to declare a national emergency due to drought.

President Mwai Kibaki's government warned that nearly 10 million people - more than a quarter of the population - were at risk from food shortages.

But even where food is in reasonable supply, prices have already shot through the roof during the past couple of months and we are struggling to feed our kids, despite the fact that Kisii is situated in one of the most fertile areas of Kenya, supply and demand, I suppose.

Food shortages are believed to be caused also by suppliers hoarding, forcing the prices up - some people are willing to make a quick buck out of other people's suffering - not just in Kenya, but the world over.

We need help to buy food and also to get the River Cottage Kenya farm up and running. I am sure that we could be self-sufficient by this time next year with a little help.

Can you help us? Do you know someone who can?

Also posted on the KCIS website.

Oh to be in Kenya ...

This is a view of my garden in southern England at 11:30 today (10 Jan 2009), where the temperature is -4°C.

OK, so it looks pretty. I am warm inside with the central heating blasting away.

At my second home, on the coast of the Indian Ocean in Kenya, it is 32°C - a bit too hot for me.

But in Kisii, my "business centre", it is a pleasant 25°C, as it is all year round, give or take a couple of degrees. I can live with that.

As I get older, I find that I am less tolerant of the cold. And let's face it, last year's summer in the UK was nothing to shout about.

It was especially nothing to shout about after spending all of March in Kenya and coming home to snow in April - lovely!

This second photo is looking out from my friend's plot over the valley, west of Kisii. Yes, the sky really is that blue, and the countryside is always green.

Different Strokes

Benta, one of the orphans at Twiga, insists on going to school every day. She has even tried to convince us that she was well enough when suffering from malaria.

She wears her little blue gingham dress, white knee socks and black shoes with pride. She spends ages polishing her shoes every morning and has to look spotless. Unfortunately, when she comes back home, her socks are never white, but stained red by the dust of the school yard.

One day, she was getting ready for school, but could not find clean socks. This was a total disaster for her. She could not got school in grubby socks, nor could she go without socks. She may be an OVC* living in an orphanage, but going to school without socks just was not an option!

Eventually, we had to let he wear clean but still damp socks to go to school. Luckily, it was a warm day, and they would soon be dry.

Benta is not alone.

Contrary to popular belief by those who don't have a clue, African children do not go around in grubby, smelly, ragged clothes (or Heaven forbid, naked) through choice**. Most have a "Sunday Best" set and are proud of them. They like to look smart, well dressed. But family circumstances are often such that kids cannot have smart new clothes.

-oOo-

My significant-other-half's little boy, Ian, will not go out in public without a top on. He lives in an area where the temperature never drops below 22°C and daytime temperatures are usually well above 30°C.

He will happily run around the house naked after his shower, but he will not go outside in just shorts. He insists on wearing a top, even if it is 60 sizes too big for him!

Mind you, he did choose my "army colour" T-shirt over all the other, more colourful ones. He wants to be a soldier when he grows up!

-oOo-

So, what am I trying to say?

Just because a kid is scruffy, it doesn't make him a little savage.

It just makes him poor by the standards of the civilised world.

But it also makes him rich, far richer than most kids in the developed world. An African kid does not need a computer, Wii, X-Box, iPod, etc., etc., to amuse himself. He has friends and they react with each other, they amuse each other.

Give the average UK/European/USA kid a new toothbrush. They won't even say thank you.

Give the same toothbrush to an average Kenyan kid, and watch the delight on his face. He has something new, something that belongs only to him.

Different strokes for different folks, I guess.

* OVC = orphaned or vulnerable child
**There are, of course, exceptions. In certain rural areas, kids never wear clothes

Why Kenya?

I have often been asked why I have such a love for Kenya, and I have to say that it was purely accidental. But then, anyone who visits Kenya will fall in love with the country - and the people.

I have always had an interest in sub-Saharan Africa, so when I was given the opportunity to work in South Africa in 1989, I jumped at it. After it was made obvious that I was no longer welcome there and I returned to the UK, I have always longed to return to "somewhere" in Africa.

Then, a few years ago, I was approached to tidy up, maintain and update the website for Rhino Ark, a conservation charity for the Aberdare Mountains in Kenya. This re-kindled my desire to return to Africa. This job did not offer the opportunity to do so, but at least I was doing something "African".

A little later, for reasons I cannot remember, I was contacted by the director of another Kenyan charity, ACIS, asking if I could provide free or cheap computers for schools in Kenya. I couldn't, but during email conversations, it was agreed that I would build a website for the organisation, of which I later became a director, hence my first visit to Kenya in September 2007.

Before my visit, I was contacted by another organisation, Mercy Gate Champion Children's Home, an orphanage in Kisii. Again, I agreed to build them a website.

I also took it upon myself to help to get ITNs (insecticide treated nets) which had supposedly been supplied by the Kenyan Government, free of charge to all children under five. I made contact with the WHO in Nairobi as well as other organisations set up to fight malaria.

Also, at about this time, I "met" my Kenyan girlfriend - but that for another blog at another time.

So, armed with information, appointments, etc, I set off for Kenya. I stayed for a while in Nairobi with my ACIS colleague, meeting the people at WHO etc, and making arrangements to visit the Mercy Gate home in Kisii.

But I really needed to get over to Malindi, where my girlfriend lives. I spent about two weeks there - again, another blog for another day.

Upon my return to Nairobi, we started to plan an overnight visit to Kisii. We drove there, an experience in itself as we went the long way there (not intentionally), via Nakuru, Kericho and Sotik. It took the best part of a day to get there, but it was worth it just to drive across the Great Rift Valley.

In Kisii, we were well received. I met most of the kids and dished out gifts that had been collected by the people in my village in the UK, and a couple of Frizbees, which were put to very good use!

We returned to Nairobi the following afternoon, by a quicker route, through Bomet and Narok, skirting the Maasai Mara, and after a few more days in Nairobi, I returned home to the UK, promising everyone (especially myself) that I would return as soon as possible.

My next visit was in March 2008, when my immediate love of Kenya was confirmed.

I am now a director of ACIS, and have formed a new NGO, KCIS, with the directors of Mercy Gate home. It has taken over the running of the Mercy Gate home, which was renamed Twiga Children's Home (Twiga is swahili for giraffe).

I also have two businesses in Kisii, an IT consultancy and an export business.

And now I am sitting in the middle of an English winter, just waiting for the opportunity to return once again.

So, that is "Why Kenya?"

Shifting target? Or just expanding?

I have been approached by a businessman in Cameroon to shift the malaria-control project to Cameroon. He reckons that he could find financial backing for the project, and that is tempting.

But I can't do that. My loyalty is with Kenya. Kenya is my love, my mistress. Kenya is my second home. So, when the project gets off the ground, it has to be in Kenya.

But, that is not to say that when it is established and I have proven to myself that we are on the right track, I will not expand to Cameroon [or Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Rwanda, Burundi ...]

I am a bi-lingual English/French speaker, so communication will not a problem in Cameroon, and I am not against helping Cameroonians (is that right?) or any other people, wherever they are, but they have to accept that Kenya takes priority.

Or am I looking at the problem with blinkers?

Another Year, Another Resolution

I don't really hold with New Year's Resolutions. I am of the opinion that it is daft, making up resolutions that will not be adhered to for more than a couple of days or weeks (if you are really good!).

But this year, I am going to make one or two.

Firstly,my glass will always be half-full, never half-empty.

Secondly, I am going to attack (if this is the right word) the projects I have set up through KCIS with renewed vigour - somehow.

The most important, at the moment, is to find some regular funding for the Kids' Home, which is finding it difficult to pay for the food required to keep 38 tummies full.

Then, River Cottage and Scrapheap will have to be tackled.

Then there is the malaria control project. I have started this, working in the UK, but sooner or later, I am going to have to get out to Kenya. I need a friendly doctor, bio-chemist or similar for advice on this one, just to clear up a few questions that are bugging me.

On another tack, I will be promoting a new (-ish) project, commercial this time. But the excess profit (profit? What's that?) will go into the KCIS coffers.

So, short of finding a benefactor with deep pockets, with a particular interest in Kenya, the commercial project is probably the only way we are going to get funding. KCIS is too small for most foundations and other charities to take any notice of us - but watch this space. We are going to grow. We are going to make a difference, maybe just a small one, but we will succeed.

So, for the first time in ages, I have made my resolutions!

Heri Za Mwaka Mpya

I wish a

Happy New Year

to all who follow my blogs, and to all who know me in Kenya and the UK

A Christmas message

It was Christmas morning and I was sitting in the lounge with my Mum, looking at the [small] pile of discarded Christmas wrapping paper when the mobile shrilled out "Jambo Bwana", the ring-tone signifying that the call was coming from Kenya.

"Mambo, vipi", I said, knowing that the caller was my friend, Vincent, in Kisii.

"Mambo, safi, David", came the familiar voice.

We exchanged greetings and then Benta asked to speak to me.

"Baba, when you come to see me?"

The lump in my throat grew and grew. I cannot answer that. I don't know. I was planning to go out at the beginning of January, but the economic crisis has hit my family hard and I have had to dig into the money I had put aside for the trip.

All I could say was, "Soon. I will come to see you soon."

I could sense the disappointment.

I could also hear Josephat in the background, wanting to speak to me, but this is impossible as he speaks no English.

This little conversation gave a bitter-sweet sense to the rest of the day. Of course, I want to be with my Mum for Christmas, but I yearn to see my girlfriend Liz and her kids, Benta and Josephat - all my friends in Kenya.

Oh well. I will just have to build up the pennies in the coffers again and hope that no more financial crises hit the family.

Benta, Jojo, I will see you both soon.

In the meantime, I raise a glass to absent friends.

Krismasi Njema

On this festive occasion, I would like to wish my reader a

Very Merry Christmas

How to demolish a bunch of bananas

My Natasha hands out bananas to her cousins from a bunch that she retains control of (just look at that serious expression).

The three little girls feast on the bunch.

You are supposed to take the skin off first!

Natasha's brother, Ian, manages to get one.

The whole bunch disappeared within a few minutes!

The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft a-gley.

... or something like that. Apologies to any Scots if I got it wrong.

But I may have to put off my trip to Kenya as my son has been made redundant and is expected to replace his £350 a week wages with £60 unemployment benefit.

So Dad has had to step in and "lend" him some cash - that which was put away for my trip to Kenya.

Oh well, this recession can't last forever ...

Leap of Faith

I will not be ordering anti-malaria tablets for my next trip to Kenya in January. Apart from the fact that one month's supply costs almost £30, which is a big slice out of my meagre budget, they have horrible side-effects that I can do without.

No, I will be placing my well-being fairly on the shoulders of a solution for which there have been claims that it can prevent malaria, and if the user is unfortunate enough to contract the disease, on increasing the dose, will cure within a couple of hours.

This may be a dangerous action to take, but, I need to know if this stuff really works, and if I want to see the results first-hand, who better to test it on than me - not exactly scientific, but it's the best I can do.

If this stuff really works, then I will have in my possession a product that will flush the disease out of a body at the cost of a couple of pennies. Presently, treatment for malaria in Kenya costs Ksh 2,000, or about £17 ($25 US).

We intend to set up an education programme, aimed at schools. The idea is to show kids how the mosquito breeds in standing water, then show them where this standing water may be, in old discarded tyres, buckets, tin cans, puddles.

They will be encouraged to try and eradicate these breeding grounds, thereby offering fewer places for mosquitoes to breed.

We may also try a leaflet campaign in the town, as long as we can get support from the municipal council (we don't want to be accused of littering or fly-posting).

Ugali - or how to eat without a fork

Ugali is a maize flour mix, similar to polenta without all the flavouring. It is the staple diet in Kenya, and indeed most of Africa, in different forms and with different names.
On my first visit to Kenya, I was staying in the home of an extended family, and as a consequence, there were a fair number of kids.
Mealtimes were fascinating, with all the kids lined up on the floor, each with a plate of sukuma and ugali. The kids, of course, all knew exactly how to use the ugali - pull a little off, mold it into a spoon, scoop up some sukuma and juice and eat it.

That doesn't look too difficult, I thought and gave it a go. The kids burst out laughing at my attempts. The adults tried not to laugh and I reverted to using a spoon for the rest of my stay. It saved on having to wash shirts!

It struck me as very interesting, how certain societies eat with their fingers. I had a friend visit us from Lucknow, India. He and his wife could eat just about anything with their fingers and not lose a drop. Kenyans are the same.

Communal meal for orphans

We in the "West" seem to have made life very difficult for ourselves by "inventing" cutlery. After all, what is the easiest way to eat a chicken drumstick? By picking it up and gnawing at it, of course. But no, we sit there attacking it with a knife and fork to get the flesh from the bone. Ridiculous!
I am not saying there isn't a place for using knives, forks and spoons, but why did we have to re-invent eating? If fingers will do, then use them!