Monday morning after a big breakfast of bread, jam, boiled eggs, sausages and fruit (they seem to want us to get fat here) we were collected by Ann and Pesh, 2 girls from the youth group at the church. We all squeezed into one of the teeny weeny buses and headed over the pot hole filled, orange mud roads towards the local market, with African music blaring out the speakers the whole way. It was brilliant! We had a look around the market and the girls pointed out their local fruits and the different foods they cook with, which mainly involves a million different ways of preparing corn from the cob, which is more correctly called maize here.
After buying some fruit and appreciating the cheapness of what we would consider exotic fruit we jumped back on the bus to go to Paul’s (one of the elders, and Ann’s uncle) house for lunch. We were welcomed into a lovely house with a huge living room crammed with seats to allow for as many visitors as possible and were fed a beautiful meal of pumpkin, stew, rice, veg and chapatti (which I am happy we didn’t leave behind in India). We asked Paul about the land he attends to during lunch and we even had a nice song sang to us by his cows which were just outside. It seems to be a running trend in Kenya to grow as much of your own veg, and own as many of your own cows, pigs, goats and sheep as you can, as this is much more cost effective for them, and the result is the millions of food we are being given everywhere we go! The regular rain in the country means that they have very fertile soil, and so it is easy for them to grow their own veg and to tend their own land. However Laura and I were disgusted when we heard that Paul had not given any of his cows names, so we quickly ran around to the side of the house to name them for him. We agreed on the ginger one being called Sarah (after my beautiful ginger sister) and the others, Daisy, Brian and Buttercup. I have a funny feeling Paul might not remember these names, but we will maybe try and leave a note of them for him before we leave!
After finishing our meal I asked Paul how he would spend the afternoon, and he told me he had it to relax. Deciding to push the boundaries a tiny little bit, I teasingly suggested that maybe he could help his wife with the dishes, to which everyone in the room other than Laura cracked up laughing! Silly Jenn! We were quickly told by Jeremiah (another youth group member that had joined us) that men actually look very silly washing up so they couldn’t help. We explained that in Scotland the men that don’t help with the washing will normally be made to look silly in the future by their wives as unless one partner has left work to stay at home, the load is shared. Women in Africa really do work so hard for their families, often being expected to be the main caregiver and provider for the family. However I should say that this is not the case with Paul as he, like many Kenyan men, does seem to work very hard on his land and is heavily involved with his work at the church.
We spent the rest of the afternoon with the youth walking, eating fruit (that’s right more food) and sharing cultures. One of the funniest things we were asked was definitely “what is wrong with your skin that you have so many spots?” These “spots” were in fact our many freckles which are apparently extremely misunderstood by Africans, who think they are the sign of a skin problem! We giggled and assured them that we are not contagious! As Ann is getting married soon we were asking about relationships and weddings in Kenya. It turns out that it is not uncommon for there to be about 15 – 20 bridesmaids and groomsmen and then another big group of little flower girls and page boys! But thankfully for the couple getting married, the people involved pay for their own outfit for the wedding which the bride will choose. It is also still a rule here that a dowry is paid before a wedding, but conversely to British tradition, the man is expected to pay a sum of money to the parents of the bride. This will be the amount asked for by the parents, but is often paid over the course of the marriage rather than a lump sum before the wedding, which I get the impression would be quite unrealistic as I think it can often be a very large sum of money.
Pesh was also telling me later all about the many youth activities they have in their church. I was amazed and very impressed! They will all meet once a week for bible study one week and fellowship the next, then they have choir practice twice a week, they run things like the football on the Saturday and then additionally to all of this they have sports groups (mainly football I think) and drama groups that will meet regularly to practice and then are involved in ongoing competitions with other local P.C.E.A churches in matches and events that are decided by the General Assembly at the start of the year. It sounds like they have so much fun, and hopefully we will get to cheer on their football team this weekend at their upcoming game.
Around 6pm we headed to another one of the youth member’s, Stanley, and his wife Mary’s house for dinner. We had a brilliant night watching their wedding video and giggling as they failed to pull funny faces for a photo (apparently this is not the done thing in Kenya). We were then presented with an overloaded plate of even more delicious food! I ate as much as I possibly could, but just as I thought I might burst, Laura asked me if I was feeling ok because apparently I was very flushed! I took that as a cue to give up the fight and put down my plate. Luckily as yummy as the food here is, it is all very healthy and extremely fresh as it is literally from the back garden so although our appetites may become stretched staying here, hopefully our tummy’s wont be too much!
After a deep sleep we were collected on Tuesday morning by Terry who took us to her mum Lucy’s house just around the corner from the hostel. Lucy’s husband was the moderator for the P.C.E.A for 6 years and has only recently returned to his role as a Pastor. They have a lovely house with a pretty large farm off the back. We had some coffee and a nice chat with Lucy and we told her we would really love if she could just let us help them with the work they would normally do about the house and not make special plans for us. I almost fell off the seating and deafened Laura squeeling with excitement as I found out I could help them milk the cows later! I had never done this before and loved every weird minute of it (although I doubt the poor cow felt the same, and I don’t think I improved production much!).
We also got to help the women make mokemo, a typical Keyan dish. This involves picking the kernels off the cob of corn, peeling the bad bits off pumkin leaves then cutting them, peeling potatoes and then boiling all of them and kind of mushing them all together. It’s so yummy, I will definitely be making it for my lucky family when I get home! (Dad you will love it!)
The best part of the day though (other than drinking the same milk I had earlier squeezed) was the conversation. It’s so interesting talking to the women about their lives and the many culture differences between us. Christians in Kenya do not drink alcohol at all. At first we understood this as good role modelling, but it turns out alcoholism is a huge problem especially among men in Kenya and so is adultery, which generally follows from the men leaving the wives at home to go drinking and dancing and this of course adds hugely to the terrible HIV/AIDS problem here.
When the Pastor returned we continued swapping stories as he has actually been to Scotland to visit their partner church in Carluke several times and so he was able to make comparisons. The main theme that seemed to keep arising is the lack of community in Scotland. They find it so strange here that people in Scotland often are scared to give someone something or help them in case they offend them. And the idea of not getting in touch with someone so as “not to bother them” is completely foreign here. I agree that this is something really sad about our country and think that as society gears more and more towards money and independence we move further from the community and large family feeling that once defined our identity. So when we get home I think I might start a revolution...neighbours watch out, here I come!
One really funny thing we learnt was that although it is considered completely acceptable and normal to comment on someone’s weight here, to ask them their age or for them to talk about how many children or animals they have is very wrong. This is even stranger since it is seen as an honour and respectable to be old here. I hope we haven’t offended anyone as one of our first questions with the youth is normally their age, and apparently it doesn’t matter if you are 7 or 79, you don’t like to be asked this. I thought it was weird that some of the youth didn’t seem to know the age of some of the close friends! As for the not counting thing, there is a superstition ingrained in the culture here that by talking about the number of children you have, or animals you own, you are likely to lose one of them! So people are very afraid to talk about this...again something Laura and I ask quite regularly, after all if we are going to name your cows we need to know how many you have!
What an amazing learning experience we are having so far! I’m off to wash in a bucket whilst the water is still hot enough! I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings.
Jenn xx
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