Alarm 1: Each day starts fairly early for me here in Kisumu. I am usually awakened by at least 6 in the morning by the noises of a city waking up and the sun starting to shine. As we are just south of the equator the days are just about exactly 12 hours, 6 AM to 6 PM. The sky starts to lighten as early as 5 and though I have some covering over my windows they certainly aren’t shutters. Then there is the horn honking of the “matatus”, the mini-buses that are used for public transportation, on the main road 200 feet from the house. There are the sound of cars and people on our street as well as the night guard listening to the news on the radio or talking to the day guard as the shift changes. Some morning I am awakened by the sound of the rain, thankfully it mostly only rains at night and in the early morning. In case all that isn’t enough to wake me up and drive me from under my sheet and bed net, my alarm rings at 6:20.
Alarm 2: My watch beeps at 7:15 to remind me that I need to leave to meet my ride for work. My roommate and I walk about 300 meters from our place to the provincial hospital where we meet our driver. The hospital is known around town as the “Russian Hospital” because it was originally built during the cold war by money from the USSR. We are the first two in the shuttle to work in the morning; we then proceed on a route to pick up 6 to 8 other interns and visiting staff. Most of the staff, Kenyan and foreign (mostly American but not all), arrive by shuttle bus. The office is several kilometers outside of town on beautiful grounds shared with the premier Kenyan health research laboratory. We make it to the office around by 8:15. People start working fairly early here so we aren’t even the first ones in the office.
Alarm 3: My watch beeps again at 9 AM to remind me that I need to take my malaria medication. I usually take it in the morning with my breakfast but my alarm is my fail-safe just in case I forget in the morning. The region of Kisumu, especially during the rainy season such that we are having now, is one of the areas in Kenya with the most cases of malaria. It is one of the main research and preventative health project focuses of the organization I am working for. Probably half of our laboratory facilities are dedicated to malaria testing and research. The mosquitoes that carry malaria happily breed in any pools of standing water. There isn’t any malaria in Lake Victoria it self but anywhere be it on the road or in fields there are pools of water especially after larger rain storms.
Lunch: I never need an alarm to remind me that it is time to eat lunch. After having breakfast at 7 AM noon seems a long ways away most days. Even further way is that traditionally Kenyan’s only eat at 1 in the afternoon, at which time I am usually very hungry. On days that I am in the office there is the very important Chai tea break around 10 AM where you can buy tea and a fried dough thing whose name I can't remember. On days that I am in the field, which is 2 or 3 times a week right now, I try and carry a small snack because on those days I never know when I will eat since I am much more at the mercy of other peoples schedules. At the office there is a little canteen in a kiosk outside, most everyone seems to eat there which means that sometimes there can be a long line. I eat Kenyan dishes every day, usually a mixture of rice, cooked vegetables, some stewed meat, and some cooked greens. It is filling and usually very tasty, and very very cheap, so it suits me most days.
Alarm 4: At 5:15 my watch beeps for the last time to remind me that I need to get out of the office and down to the parking lot to catch my shuttle home. The shuttle leaves at 5:30 and since we are a fairly small group if you are running late and they know you are coming the shuttle driver waits for you. Everyone in Kenya seems to have a cell phone, even in some of the most remote villages you can buy cell phone credit to add to your “pay as you go” phone. The best part is you usually get cell phone coverage out in those villages too! I sometimes have far worse cell phone coverage in the US. Kenyans seem to have taken the art of using cell phone cheaply to a new level, not only are they proficient and prolific text messages (or SMS) users they also do this thing called “flashing”. This is when you call the other phone but hang up after the first ring, so the other person’s cell phone registers a missed call but it doesn’t cost anything to the caller. “Flashing” can be used in all sorts of different ways to communicate with people and I personally don’t completely understand the contexts very well yet. One way that it is used is by my shuttle driver, if you are running late for the shuttle the driver usually texts or flashes you as a reminder or to check if you are coming.
Last Call: In the evening we are dropped at our door step at around 6 PM. Sometimes we decide to get off in town so we can do some grocery shopping or meet friends. There is a fruit and vegetable market just a few streets from our house but we have to go to the center of the city for things like milk and bread. When we get home we often go for a quick swim and then cook dinner together. We often make pasta with some sort of vegetable sauce. After dinner we socialize with our neighbors, play yatzee or card games, write blog entries, prepare e-mails to be sent the next day, or just read. We usually go to bed around 10 and then the cycle starts again the next day.
I have added a new map feature to my blog for those of you who want to see where I live and work. You should be able to zoom in and out to see some of the other major cities in Kenya. Click on this link: Clara's Map of Kenya or click on the link in the column on the right of your screen.
Alarm 2: My watch beeps at 7:15 to remind me that I need to leave to meet my ride for work. My roommate and I walk about 300 meters from our place to the provincial hospital where we meet our driver. The hospital is known around town as the “Russian Hospital” because it was originally built during the cold war by money from the USSR. We are the first two in the shuttle to work in the morning; we then proceed on a route to pick up 6 to 8 other interns and visiting staff. Most of the staff, Kenyan and foreign (mostly American but not all), arrive by shuttle bus. The office is several kilometers outside of town on beautiful grounds shared with the premier Kenyan health research laboratory. We make it to the office around by 8:15. People start working fairly early here so we aren’t even the first ones in the office.
Alarm 3: My watch beeps again at 9 AM to remind me that I need to take my malaria medication. I usually take it in the morning with my breakfast but my alarm is my fail-safe just in case I forget in the morning. The region of Kisumu, especially during the rainy season such that we are having now, is one of the areas in Kenya with the most cases of malaria. It is one of the main research and preventative health project focuses of the organization I am working for. Probably half of our laboratory facilities are dedicated to malaria testing and research. The mosquitoes that carry malaria happily breed in any pools of standing water. There isn’t any malaria in Lake Victoria it self but anywhere be it on the road or in fields there are pools of water especially after larger rain storms.
Lunch: I never need an alarm to remind me that it is time to eat lunch. After having breakfast at 7 AM noon seems a long ways away most days. Even further way is that traditionally Kenyan’s only eat at 1 in the afternoon, at which time I am usually very hungry. On days that I am in the office there is the very important Chai tea break around 10 AM where you can buy tea and a fried dough thing whose name I can't remember. On days that I am in the field, which is 2 or 3 times a week right now, I try and carry a small snack because on those days I never know when I will eat since I am much more at the mercy of other peoples schedules. At the office there is a little canteen in a kiosk outside, most everyone seems to eat there which means that sometimes there can be a long line. I eat Kenyan dishes every day, usually a mixture of rice, cooked vegetables, some stewed meat, and some cooked greens. It is filling and usually very tasty, and very very cheap, so it suits me most days.
Alarm 4: At 5:15 my watch beeps for the last time to remind me that I need to get out of the office and down to the parking lot to catch my shuttle home. The shuttle leaves at 5:30 and since we are a fairly small group if you are running late and they know you are coming the shuttle driver waits for you. Everyone in Kenya seems to have a cell phone, even in some of the most remote villages you can buy cell phone credit to add to your “pay as you go” phone. The best part is you usually get cell phone coverage out in those villages too! I sometimes have far worse cell phone coverage in the US. Kenyans seem to have taken the art of using cell phone cheaply to a new level, not only are they proficient and prolific text messages (or SMS) users they also do this thing called “flashing”. This is when you call the other phone but hang up after the first ring, so the other person’s cell phone registers a missed call but it doesn’t cost anything to the caller. “Flashing” can be used in all sorts of different ways to communicate with people and I personally don’t completely understand the contexts very well yet. One way that it is used is by my shuttle driver, if you are running late for the shuttle the driver usually texts or flashes you as a reminder or to check if you are coming.
Last Call: In the evening we are dropped at our door step at around 6 PM. Sometimes we decide to get off in town so we can do some grocery shopping or meet friends. There is a fruit and vegetable market just a few streets from our house but we have to go to the center of the city for things like milk and bread. When we get home we often go for a quick swim and then cook dinner together. We often make pasta with some sort of vegetable sauce. After dinner we socialize with our neighbors, play yatzee or card games, write blog entries, prepare e-mails to be sent the next day, or just read. We usually go to bed around 10 and then the cycle starts again the next day.
I have added a new map feature to my blog for those of you who want to see where I live and work. You should be able to zoom in and out to see some of the other major cities in Kenya. Click on this link: Clara's Map of Kenya or click on the link in the column on the right of your screen.
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1 comment:
6:20???? You are slumming!
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