happy moi day?

today is a kenyan national holiday - moi day. it's named for kenya's second president, who, from what i can tell, wasn't a very good president. he was pretty corrupt, and the current president (who isn't that great, either) was a big step up from him. however, that didn't stop him from instituting his own holiday. and from what my host mom said, he didn't even wait until he was out of office, he just made it "moi day" from the very beginning of his presidency. i guess it would sort of be like if bush said "umm ok october 10th will now be known as george w. bush day... just b/c i feel like it." in 2001. hmm. i'm not sure how well that would've worked out.

anyway, people seem to be less excited about actually celebrating moi than they are about having a day of rest - which makes sense. for some of the people, the day isn't much different than any other day - they still have to work, clean, take care of kids, cook, etc... but for most of the white collar workers, they get the day off. i didn't even know today was a holiday until last night when my boss sent me a text message saying not to come to work today, b/c the office will be closed. sure. why not. i tried to do some research online for my project, but so far i've just been checking my email. so today has been pretty unproductive. i woke up, took my bucket shower, drank tea and ate my bread and butter, played with my host sisters and brothers for a while, and then came into town. i ate lunch w/ a few other interns - i've started eating breakfast food at lunch b/c it's the best thing on the menu, and it costs about half as much.

it's really interesting coming from my college life to this life. first of all, i am in bed by 8 or 8:30 most nights - i'm generally pretty tired from the day, plus we eat huge dinners so those always make me full and sleepy, and it's dark so there's not much else to do except sleep. then, i'm up the next morning around 6:30. it's funny to think about how hard it normally is for me to wake up before my 8 am classes, and here i'm wide awake at 6:30. part of it is the roosters crowing, part is the sunlight streaming through the window, but most of it is my 1-year-old host brother who begins crying and screaming anywhere from 3 am to 6 am each morning. it's always a fun surprise to see when he'll start screaming. at first i thought he was just sick, but my host mom informed me that he's perfectly healthy - just kind of a whiner. kind of... i've stopped using an alarm clock, b/c i'm fairly confident that his screaming is raising some farm animals from the dead, so it's definitely enough to wake me up. at first, he really annoyed me. i love the other children, but i'll be honest, i really didn't like this child. hearing him cry was enough to make me never want children. but now, i'm actually just more amazed at his lung capacity than angry at how loud he is. last night, he screamed so loud that i literally felt my ear drums vibrate. i've never heard a kid that loud. i think that, when he grows up, he'll probably be a shy kid who barely ever talks. it has to balance out at some point. at least i hope, for his mom's sake.

i love every day here, b/c no matter how much i plan, there are hardly any constants from day to day. at times, that can be frustrating, but it's also really fun. on sunday, i went to church with my host family. they informed me that we would be going to a different church than they normally go to, b/c the vice president (moodi awory - i think that's his name, probably the wrong spelling) was going to be there to "dedicate" the church. or something like that. so, we walked to the church and there were hundreds of people standing outside. i thought we were going to go in, maybe catch a glimpse of the vp, but my host sisters kept walking - they crossed the street and walked onto this big field area. in the middle of a huge group of people was a helicopter that the vice president had flown in on. there were probably just as many people gathered around the helicopter as were in the actual church. i wasn't really sure what we were looking at or why we were standing around this helicopter (which, granted, was a nice-looking helicopter) and then i realized that probably a lot of people there had never seen something like that. my host sisters then informed me that we would be getting our picture taken in front of the helicopter. i'm not sure who took the picture, or if my host family will ever see the picture, but we did it anyway. i guess it might be akin to meeting a celebrity and taking your picture w/ him or her. i'm not sure. in any case, it was quite an odd "church service." after that, i thought we'd actually be going to church, but my host sisters said, no we're just going home to eat lunch. while i was waiting in the picture-taking line, i talked to a police officer who informed me that he had friends in chicago and that he thought people should stop worshiping the helicopter and go inside to worship God. he laughed for a long time and thought that joke was pretty fun. it was pretty interesting - it was hard to understand the intensity of that event: having the vice president come to your church, and seeing any sort of aircraft for the first time in your life.

sometimes i just feel like i'm living in this crazy adventure and everything i see and do are just players in my adventure. like growing up, in english classes, when i learned about the components of a story - the plot, setting, characters, action, etc... but this isn't a story. these "characters" whose lives i am watching (and am privileged to be a part of) are my host family, and these are their lives. every day when i'm at home with them, i get to be a part of their lives and their stories - not the other way around.

i found clean & clear facewash at the store today. it is always both weird and exciting to find western products. it was way overpriced, but i haven't used actual facewash in a month and i can definitely tell that i need it. sometimes, i think i'm getting really tan, but then i realize it's probably just dirt. which is ok, i kind of like it. sometimes i take extra care to wash my feet in the morning, even though i know i'll be walking in flip flops up a dirt road in the next 20 minutes. paved roads would help a lot in these areas - for so many reasons, but the dirt roads aren't bad, either. it has started to rain now and i think i forgot my rain jacket. that happens fairly often. both the raining and the forgetting. my feet (and the back of my skirt) are going to be muddy. it's nice to not really care, though.