Day 21 v2.0

Sometimes I feel like a little fat kid. Today, I had one of those moments.

When I arrived at Dickson, I slinked into the kitchen and snatched a sharp knife and ran to the volunteer house. In the dark, I quickly sliced the mango I brought into three large pieces and shoved each piece into my mouth. As the mango juice dribbled down my face, I nearly choked on a large hunk of mango and thought "I'm a little fat kid." I had to do this all cloak and dagger because the kids are like basset hounds. They'll smell chocolate on my breath 20 minutes after I've eaten it.

Last night after I left the internet cafe, I came home to find John and his friend Peter were having some cocktails and they invited me to join them. I did and it was really nice. They asked me a lot of questions about America, some I could answer, some I could not, ranging from politics to geography to the immigration process. Of course Obama came up (he is Kenyan after all) and we chatted a bit about that and I took my usual liberal platform and broached the subjects of abortion and gay marriage and they had a few questions about abortion, but before we got to gay marriage something broke the conversation and thus I didn't answer any questions about it. I was nervous, but excited about the possibility of educating a little under the guise of general politics. Still, I think it's best it was left unaddressed.

After Peter left, I told them to go bring the laptop I brought them so I could start transferring my music library onto it. The amount of copyright infringement I've been party to in this country makes me physically ill. Although, sharing music with close friends is apparently a gray area in the law, so I'm ok there legally, but morally I don't really feel right about file sharing unless it's some specific situations, like my broke-as-hell Kenyan friends living in a third world country with limited access to, well, everything. So as I was sharing files, I realized that I have some really racy wallpapers on my laptop (in addition to the Huge Flaming Queen sticker on the top which, luckily, no one noticed). The whole time I prayed "Dear God, if anything shows up, just please don't let it be the Tour De Stade photo of a naked rugby player with his plump, gorgeous, naked ass beckening for a ramming". The only one that could possibly have roused suspicion was the Jake Gyllenhall photo but they didn't notice or didn't ask, so it was ok. Nonetheless, I've become closer to them every day and I think I'm going to tell them on my last day. They're very liberal and educated and open minded and this is one of those perfect situations where someone who might be homophobic might have their eyes opened by learning a friend whom they respect is gay. Or they'll ban me from their house. Either way, it'll be my last day so what've I got to lose?

I bought a travel sized pack of cotton swabs here. It cost 17 cents. There's no really story here other than that I don't think anything in America costs 17 cents so it was pretty crazy.

There was no water again at Dickson today. My hands are so chapped from instant hand santizier that I'm literally slathering them with Vaseline twice a day. Please appreciate running water every time you turn on a tap and remember to turn off the tap unless you're using it (like when you're brushing your teeth or doing dishes). Unless I'm super preoccupied, in the last year I don't think there was a single time I turned on the tap and wasn't amazed. When you go a few days without water, it tends to have a really lasting impression.

In the morning I taught Brian, Mary, and Nelson about contractions. Can not = can't, I am = I'm, and the lot. I use the word "taught" very loosely because today I realized that I'm not qualified to teach anyone anything. I can help them review work that they've already been taught, but when it comes to explaining something new (like today) I have NO idea what to do or where to begin. I tried to wing it but it wasn't working and in the end they basically just copied what I wrote on the board. Mad props to my teacher friends out there (Rana, Ross, and anyone else who didn't spring to mind immediately- sorry!)

Why are little straight boys so opposed to being clean? Showering, brushing teeth, cleaning their rooms, all the boys I grew up knowing were like this and the boys at Dickson are like this. So, another sign your child might be gay is if he's really fastidious about cleanliness. Speaking of gay, we watched some of "College Road Trip" with Raven Symone and Martin Lawrence today (worst...movie...ever) and Martin Lawrence's wife put on a sleeping mask before going to bed and Brian promptly turned to me and asked for one. Homooooooooo.

Is there anything here that isn't hazardous? Danger literally lurks every corner. I found out today that my rash was from a certain type of caterpillar that causes a really painful rash anywhere it touches AND that when you scratch it and then touch somewhere else, you spread the rash. Mine is gone now, but the day I got it I debated going to the hospital for treatment, that's how bad it was. Luckily the house moms told me to scrub it with laundry detergent and it helped and now it's totally gone. Anyway, the big tree in the yard is covered with these caterpillars (we just found out today) and two fell down Manu's shirt. He went ballistic. The better cure is covering the area in ash. (Dan- you must be so happy! Finally, ash is useful!) They didn't know mine was from the caterpillar, otherwise that works better than laundry detergent. So as soon as they found out they stripped Manu down and covered him in ash. He was shrieking and I felt so so so bad for him because it's really really painful and uncomfortable. I grabbed a candy and told him if he stopped crying he could have it. He settled down a bit and I gave him the candy. As soon as he had is candy, an epidemic of itching and crying broke out. Mwangi started it. He started to fake cry (to get a candy) and worked himself into such a frenzy that he actually started crying. Of course I didn't give anyone a candy, but we ended up treating Moses, Mwangi, Yvonne, and Dorkas- all of whom had the caterpillar rash. It was pretty hectic...especially because there was no water! We had to keep filling basins with drinking water and then using a washcloth to wash them. Ridiculous.

It's pretty crazy though. Last night when I finished "The Tipping Point" there's a part in the Afterward that talks about school children and imagined epidemics (there's a well documented case of "tainted" Coca Cola in Europe) where everyone imagined their illnesses. One child "got it" and all of a sudden hundreds and kids all over were getting it. Having read it last night, I saw it in action today. From Manu's rash, all the children were convinced they too had it when only Manu (and later we found a few others) actually had it. It was pretty nuts.

I settled everyone down by putting on "Horton Hears a Who." Manu was sitting in my lap, silently trying to scratch and I kept gently stopping his hands and he was so obedient and peaceful and sweet and all of a sudden I got this horrible feeling in my stomach and my heart started racing. I have 13 days left. 13 days. It's too soon and I'm not ready to leave them. I have to really brace myself because last time I was a mess for quite a while afterwards. I love them so much and I think it's going to be much harder this time. Last year I knew I'd return this summer. Now, my life is about to become a lot more complicated so there's going to have to be a lot of manuvering before I can return. Pray hard.

By the way, Horton was really cute, I totally recommend it. And, Seth Rogen does a voice in it and I have been obsessed with him since he was on the short-lived Fox sitcome "Undeclared"- which is actually BRILLIANT and you should buy on DVD immediately. But like "Arrested Development" it just never found a big enough following and thus "Undeclared" was cancelled after just one season. Still, "Undeclared" and "Horton Hears a Who" are great and you should see them.

I didn't eat lunch today because I was playing host to a visitor. We had these two women stop by today. They were doing a safari with Josie (that volunteer girl) and she told them about the project and they stopped by. At first we chatted a little, they're from Denver so it was really nice to talk to Americans, and then when one of the women found out I just finished law school she told me what her business was. She's retired now. She's the owner of Pre-Paid Legal Services, Inc. If you don't know what that is, all you need to know is that she's loaded. So of course I stopped everything I was doing and gave her a grand tour with lots of detail and spent every minute pumping her full of information (which she was rapidly assimilating and asking for more). If she could get involved with Dickson, that would be AMAZING. She came to see Dickson because she's been contemplating opening her own orphanage, so either doing that or helping Dickson would be FANTASTIC. I gave her my email and phone number and she said she'd email me (she may not, but I think she will) so this could be so so so great. I was starving by the time I got to town (I literally was getting light headed and feared I was going to pass out), but if all this pans out, it'll be really worth it.

After that, we went to see Elizabeth's baby. One of the house moms had a baby and so we took the kids to go see her. The squalor that she lives in was shocking. Suffice it to say that I've seen a lot here both last time and this time and so when I say it's shocking, it's pretty fucking horrible. It's sort of like a dorm (one room that functions as living rooom and bedroom) with communal toilets all in a mud and stone building. I mean, it was just unreal. Anyway, we went to see her and I figured out how the kids are all made of stone. They start training them from birth. The baby is 10 days old and Elizabeth gladly passed the baby around to all the children who were there. Mwangi, Moses, Manu, Marion, Rukia, Dorcas, Milka, Yvonne, Brian, and Nelson. I swear I thought the child's head was going to fall off. They kept not supporting the head and it would roll and Elizabeth would calmly go re-adjust the baby. I think most people try to limit visitors for the first few weeks (months?) because of the baby's fragile immune system, and here she's passing the baby around to dirty (remember, no water) orphans in her mud hut in Kenya with the child getting whip lash in between passings. It was crazy. I was really freaking out. Even though the teacher and Elizabeth were fine, this was one of my preconceived western notions that I couldn't shake. 10 day old babies are fucking fragile, PLEASE be careful. Still, the baby was fine and didn't even fuss when it was being passed around like a Teddy Ruxpin doll. I'm telling you, MADE...OF...STONE.

The air pollution here makes Los Angeles look like Anchorage.

Finally, something weird that's been going on is that Manu has become obsessed with trying to give me hickeys. He'll come up to me and ask me to pick him up or he'll be sitting in my lap and his head will be on my shoulder and all of a sudden he'll turn and start to suck on my neck. I rip him off with a popping sound best reserved for suction cups. I have no idea where this came from, but the last thing I need right now is baby Kenyan orphan hickeys.