Day 28 v2.0

Do I have "Sucker" written on my forehead? I mean, I know I have "Cocksucker" written all over my face, but seriously, do I just look like a fool?

Today Jacqueline texted me to ask for Ksh3,500 for some stomach problem she's having. That's like asking me for $500USD. I am so tired of people trying to take advantage of my friendliness and generosity. On Saturday, I paid for her mutatu ride both ways, bought her a coffee and donut at Dormans and paid for her internet usage. I thought I was wooing her to volunteer at Dickson when it turns out she wanted to "volunteer" so that she could hit me up for money. As many of you know, this is a recurring occurrence here in Kenya. I forgot to mention that at show ground the teacher hit me up for Ksh2,000 for some herbal supplements. Mind you I already photocopied her Christian propaganda for her.

I really don't understand why being nice, happy, and friendly puts me on par with being a fool. But it's not just Kenya. I take people at their word and believe what they say and believe they are who they claim to be. Obviously this has lead to me being burned, but not terribly often. I tend to weed out the bullshitters quickly (probably why I have so few friends and millions of acquaintances), but I'm not infallible and definitely end up not seeing some people's true colors for a long time (or short time in this case). Until recently, it was mostly with the men I would date, but there have been a few times when it was a "friend" or "colleague" who turns out to just be frontin all the time.

I'm not stupid. I know there's an easy remedy to this and it's to be more guarded and less trusting/open/etc but I refuse to do that. I'm not who I am to appease others, I am the way I am because I choose to be. I can stop being so trusting and I can be rude to rude people and I can wear a suit and tie and I can stop saying things like "I have cocksucker written all over my face" but I will not. There are enough good people out there to make it worth it, so fuck this dumb ass trick; she's the one missing out on Dickson and me as a friend and all the other great things in her life she won't see because she insists on being a user.

Whew. Sorry. I'm reaching the end and I feel like I'm getting my worst period ever during menopause in the same week that my mother-in-law comes to visit. I'm a roller coaster of emotion, which signifies to me that it's becoming time to leave. I think I could stay for quite a bit longer if I just stayed at Dickson, but with spotty water and no internet, I simply wouldn't last long. I am so not ready to leave the kids (today was pretty rough) but Mombasa is making me crack. The begging and the conning and the poverty and the corruption and the pollution- like I said, I'm really starting to crack. Not in the crazy sense, but in the I-don't-want-to-be-in-Mombasa-anymore sense. I wish there was a way to transplant Dickson to the US.

So, today. On the way to Dickson, this woman climbed into the mutatu with a 100 pound sack of potatoes and of course sat next to me. THEN she kept trying to inch over and elbow her way into my space. Mind you I had already conceded some of my space because I thought "This poor fat woman and her potatoes need more room than my emaciated self" so I scooched over. I gave her an inch and she tried to take a mile! So we ended up playing that "accidental" elbow-to-the-ribcage game the whole way to Dickson. I was able to disguise my fortitude because I was reading and thus had to have my elbows up, but I definitely could have lowered them a bit but feared losing even the small amount of space I had. I'm now reading "A Tale of Two Cities" by Charles Dickens. Although it's not literature I missed out on during the past few years, it is something I've been meaning to read, so I bought it. All books are plastic wrapped here so you can't flip through them to see if you're interested. Apparently if they weren't people would just stand around the book store (and I use the words book store loosely) and read everything. So, not being able to skim and see if I'm interested, I had to go with something I knew I wanted to read, so I bought "A Tale of Two Cities" and "The Kama Sutra" as translated by Sir Richard Francis Burton. I read "The Kama Sutra" yesterday (it's pretty thin) and it was pretty whack. I was hoping for more. I guess it was wild at the time, but the only part that interested me were the parts about S&M-like behavior (pretty tame), matching penis to vagina sizes (interesting theories), eunuchs giving blow jobs, and the acceptable reasons for having sex with a married woman (if her husband is your enemy, or a friend of your enemy, etc.) Anyway, there are 64 types of sex and none of them are anything new (doggystyle, putting the lingham in your mouth, side fucking, missionary), so I suggest saving your time. Just read "Letters to Penthouse". But I digress.

All the kids are back in school so the only kids at Dickson today were Manu, Mwangi, Moses, Milka, Marion, and Yvonne. Since there isn't much child attending to do, I decided to clean the volunteer house. It's pretty gross and I bought a bunch of groceries yesterday to leave at Dickson so I figured it's a good idea to clean. Plus, I'm hopefully spending Saturday night there and I want to clean every day this week so by Saturday it's habitable. So, after 4 weeks here, how much worse can it get? Well, there are cockroaches living in the refrigerator. I scrubbed it clean and put my food away and then went back in and there were 3 cockroaches. How they got into a sealed refrigerator, I'll never know. I killed them and cleaned the fridge again and put my food in bags and stuff and kept randomly flinging the door open with murder in my eyes in the hopes of catching and killing more roaches, but I think those three were an anomaly. Or at least I hope so.

Despite there only being 7 children, the morning was very trying. At 10am Ria and Matheka came and had a staff meeting for 3 hours (catching up on everything while they've been gone) so I had to handle the kids during that time. After playing and coloring and giving them their morning porridge (I don't know if it's the same as porridge in America, but if it is, porridge is disgusting), I took them for a walk with Florence. She's the oldest girl at Dickson and she and Monica went back to boarding school today, but she was around in the morning. While on our walk, we came across a howling 5 or 6 year old girl. I asked Florence to investigate and it turned out the girl was lost. I got a little panic-y because a lost little girl in the slums of Mombasa is not a good thing. Florence calmed her down and we walked her to the main road and then she knew where she was and ran home. But coming across a lost, crying little girl kind of did a number on my head. It made me think about all our kids. They were this girl, only they didn't have a home to go to. At some young age, our kids were dumped on the streets by their family and were lost and alone and scared and subject to all sorts of horribles (and those are the lucky ones, the unlucky ones were at the mercy of their guardians or purchasers) and again it made me furious and sick at the same time. Just thinking of Yvonne or Mwangi or Milka roaming the streets, crying, was really gut wrenching.

When we got back, this former volunteer Bridgette came to visit with her sister and boyfriend. Seeing the kids with her and the interactions also made me sad. My time is ticking and I'm not ready. She was on the brink of tears when she saw them again and they were so happy to see her and I just don't know how I'm going to do this! I want to bring them all home with me.

After lunch I walked Rukia, Brian, Dorcas, Mary, and Nelson back to school. All the kids go to the same school, but the little ones I just mentioned need to be picked up and dropped off otherwise they'll roam and be late and stuff. I was walking holding Brian's hand and Rukia's hand and we were just quietly walking together and again, it was one of those euphoric moments. The sun was blistering and the road was dusty but walking with these two was like walking through Central Park. They are probably my two favorite. I mean, it's impossible to pick, but if I had to, I think they'd top the list (with Vincent probably a dead tie for Brian's slot). I hate to say any of them are favored (and really, they're not) but I hate when people give some bullshit answer when you ask for their favorite child. Yes you love them all and yes you love them all differently, but let's call a spade a spade. There's one you like more. Guess who it is in my family? =)

I was talking to Ria in the afternoon and realized that I've kind of given up on Marion. She's so horrible and ungrateful and disrespectful of me that I just can't take it anymore. They say loving a child like Marion is the hardest thing because they test and try you ragged, but I'm not a machine and I don't know if I have the capacity to see past what a mean little child she is. She hits the other children, laughs at them when they get hurt, hits me- it's endless. I'm always getting her into trouble and it has no effect. There's obviously a lot more to it than her just being a fucking bitch, but it's really hard putting up with her. I mean, if she didn't like me or care about me being around she would just ignore me. This is her way of seeking negative attention and I've noticed that if I'm really strong and ignore her completely for a few hours she'll come and sit on my lap and try to get in good with me and of course I give in, how can I not? She's just a troubled little girl, but ya, I almost started crying when I was talking to Ria about her and I realized how much this little child has fucked with me. Funny enough, as much as I wanted to slap her across the face a lot of the time, when she shows pain or fear or is upset at my ignoring her, all I want to do is scoop her up and hold her. I'm telling you this trick-ass-ho knows how to work it.

I love Yvonne so much. She's just everybody's whipping child and is smarter than all of them (she always finishes her work first despite being younger than Milka and Marion). She's a heavy little girl (but not fat, I dunno if she eats sand or what) but I love the weight of her in my arms or on my lap. Such a sweet girl.

Kids can be so retarded. We spent like 20 minutes bailing sand from a pile in the yard to the sandbox. For fun. After 20 minutes I ended it by suggesting we go watch "Cinderella". That's a pretty low move, suggesting TV when the kids are contently playing outside, but 20 minutes of bailing sand for pleasure is 19 minutes too many for me. I'll give it 1 minute just to see if it is indeed fun. It's not.

More emotional rollercoaster came when today Milka begged, full on begged, me to stay until 7:00. I wasn't ready to today, but I think I'm going to start staying late which means my posting schedule will be VERY erradict, so don't fret if I'm MIA. I need some help. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to handle this: The kids don't get home from school until 6:00pm. It takes 40 minutes to get home. The internet cafe closes at 8:00pm. I have to go to Dickson in the morning because that's when we do all the cleaning. Should I just shirk off the cleaning and get my posting done first thing in the morning? That seems kind of fucked up. Any suggestions? I definitely want to start staying late because I don't get to see the older kids if I don't. So, ideas?

So ya, time is ticking, Milka begged me to stay, Mwangi asked me to hold him for like 10 minutes solid today, just hold him, nothing else, I walked Rukia and Brian to school, saw Bridgette reunite with the kids, and just said no to some street kids because I have no food with me. It was a very emotional day.

I CAN'T BELIEVE I forgot to mention yesterday that I rode the mutatu home from White Sands sitting next to the cutest baby ever. His mom didn't really speak English and I think I'm the first white person the kid has ever seen because he was fascinated with me. He was probably around 1 year old, so he's just becoming aware of the world around him but still seeing many things for the first time. He kept handing me his little bag of peanuts he was holding and I would take them and then hand them back to him. We did this for 20 minutes. Then he projectile vomited peanuts all over me.