two extremes

This morning we went back and did some house visits with lea toto one last time. Before we had been to slums villages of Kangemi, Waithaka, Kawangware, Riruta, Kariobangi , and Dandora, and today we went to Kibera...The outreach in the Kibera neighborhood is more extensive than all the others and the office/facilities are more spacious, as they are serving the largest population here. Being the largest slum in Africa, Kibera is home to about a million people...Today I learned that between the six sites, Lea Toto works with about 2,000 families (and provides food services, through WFP for about 900 of those families, of which are determined to be the most needy), and out of these 2,000 about 600 live in Kibera...

After a tour of the offices, the social hall, and the day care facilities, we split up into smaller groups and were paired up with some of the social workers and Lea Toto volunteers. Molly and I went around with two volunteers- Liz and Doreen- and this group dynamic enabled us to effectively visit and talk with many of the families who have children in the Lea Toto program. We visited about 6 or 7 homes and were able to speak with all of the mothers, and sometimes able to meet the children (the older kids were at school). Many of the conversations we had with these families were incredibly interesting and it was also nice to get to walk with and ask Liz and Doreen questions. One story in particular that struck me was this woman we met who was the first of her husband's three wives. The second wife passed away a number of years ago from HIV and left behind an HIV-positive daughter named Nancy, who is now 11. And the woman we met today currently lives with her husband and the two of them care for and live with Nancy. Although Nancy is quite healthy now and is living a full life, doing well in school and making friends, she wasn't tested for HIV until she was 9 years old. So for the first nine years of her life she was constantly sick- physically and emotionally, keeping to herself. In many ways it's pretty amazing that she is where she is today...Although all of our conversations and encounters with HIV positive children and their families and deeply saddening, angering, and upsetting, this converation was particularly heartbreaking. The woman who is now taking care of Nancy told us that she is currently HIV negative, which is a blessing. However, her husband has never been tested, and he refuses to do so. He says that it's witchcraft and he will die when he dies, independent of whether or not he has the virus. But the two of them are living together and sleeping together, and he refuses to use protection. In fact, Liz and Doreen were telling us that this is very common among Kenyan men. There is a common phrase in Swahili that represents this mentality, and it is the response men often give: "you can't eat a sweet with the paper on." And what's most heartbreaking about it all is that the woman we met is helpless to it all. She says it's a miracle in the first place that her husband knows about Nancy being in the Lea Toto program and that he's supportive of this (many of the men also refuse to have their children tested, so many of the kids in Lea Toto receive testing, medication, and care without their fathers' knowing of it), so she is willing to go along with his other decisions...I have often heard of and read about stories like this surrounding HIV/AIDS but never before the past few weeks had I ever made any personal connections. Speaking with this woman today and hearing her story was the most recent connection. And when the disease takes on a face, it becomes real, it becomes personal. To meet this woman and to hear that she is healthy, but at a constant risk, is heartbreaking...And although every time we go to the slums, it's difficult to understand, and even witness the extreme poverty- the smell the smells, to walk through the garbage, to see the children without clothes or food, and to sit in the houses without water, electricity, or even stable walls. Yet there always seems to be something calling me back here. There's something that feels honest and real about the humanness here, and the hope in the midst of it all. And it's extremely inspiring and encouraging to continue to see the work that Lea Toto is doing, the services they are providing and the relationships they are building...

On the other extreme from spending the morning visiting with families in Kibera, our afternoon was relatively laid back and we went over to the Giraffe Center. The Giraffe Center is a project of the Kenyann conservation organization, the African Fund for Endangered Wildlife, and was founded in 1979 with the vision of creating an educational center, and at the same time, rescuing the endangered Rothschild giraffe (which at the time there were only 120 left). The Giraffe Center today has about 60 acres of land where several giraffe live (we saw about 10 or so today), and the center continues to serve many purposes. It is primarily an educational center, so tourists visit, but many local school children also visit every year, as part of their curriculum. There is an informational presentation, during which I learned a lot of very interesting facts about giraffes. Among them are the following: they give birth standing up; they only rest/sleep between 5 to 35 minutes a day; they never close their eyes; babies are born at a height of about 6 feet tall and weigh between 65-100 kgs (between 130-200 lbs) and adults can grow up to 20 feet tall and weigh up to 1.8 tons; they can run up to 35 mph; one kick of an adult giraffe is so powerful that it can kill a lion! And as interesting as all this learning was, it didn't compare to petting and kissing the giraffes! A few of the giraffes that live at the center are tame, including Diasy, Betty, and K so they will eat out of your hand or even mouth (of which we definetely did!). So the experience of having a Daisy stick out her 35 centimenter tongue and lick my face was really cool! And aside from the education and the fun of the center, the primary goal is continue breeding giraffes and releasing them back into the wild, so that the species will continue to survive. On average, the giraffes stay for about 2-3 years before they are released back into the wild (usually somewhere in Northwest Kenya, around the areas we will be visiting this week). On the whole this was a really amazing experience- tons of fun and really educational!

Now I'm off to dinner and then packing tonight because we are leaving tomorrow for a five day excursion. Tomorrow we are heading to Nakyuru, which is about 3 hours north of Nairobi, and we will be stopping at several geological and envioronmental sites along the way. Then in Nakyuru we will spend a few days attending a lecture on environmental sustainability and current projects being done in Kenya, visiting a geothermal hotsprings, and going on a safari. On Thursday, we are then driving down through the valley to the Masi Mara (where there are no roads and the Masi Mara tribe still lives in its traditional setting), where we will spend three days on safari, before returning to Nairobi on Saturday night! So I will be completely out of contact until then at the earliest, but I hope all is well with you all and I will try to post again next weekend!