I love my office

I think my team is just hilarious.  We are 6 people from 5 different countries- so miscommunications are an everyday thing. 

Here's part of today's conversation:
Me: You sound like Yoda, Ams (she was talking in weird voice)
Ams: The bear???
Me: No.
Ams: The guy from Lord of the Rings???
Me: Noooooo

Then I showed her a video of Yoda on youtube.

Ams: He's so profound!!!

It usually takes us far too long to all get on the same page- and we are all getting better at anticipating the miscommunications.  But they are always entertaining! At least we all have a good sense of humor!

Language Surprises

 I was teaching yesterday and discovered that one of my teens is incredibly conversant in English.  He had never once spoken to me in English.  Ever.  Since I met him 3 months ago.  No one else told me he spoke English! (I'm not sure that anyone else knew).   One of the girls was translating for another guy and I noticed he was correcting her translation under his breath!! Ha!  Busted!  I guess he finally feels comfortable using his English skills!!  I understand, if you don't feel confident in your 2nd (or 3rd or 4th) language, its easier to just use the language you speak well.  But come on! He has heard me struggle through some painful swahili conversations with him- I'm sure it was quite entertaining!  My swahili is far from amazing. 

In other news, you know you're congested when you are eating Salt and Vinegar potato chips and you think they are regular flavored chips.  I mean I actually did a double take and checked the bag to see if I had bought the wrong kind.... But I am going to beat this cold! One of these days!!!

Nothing makes you feel better when you are sick then ginger/honey/lemon tea.

Well, tea and soup with stars in it.

And Sudafed.

In case you were wondering, it is the craziest feeling to have a cold/flu/fever/whatever when it is 90* out.  Its just plain weird!   At least I'm starting to feel like a person again! And I'm going to work tomorrow regardless, so my body had better just cooperate and get over this crud. 

Happy St. Paddy's Day!!

High Points of today:
-  impromptu singing/dancing with a group of teen girls to classic Bollywood (Indian musical) tunes.  Gotta love the Bollywood tunes!!
- eating goat after our meeting and the little kiddo next to me making her goat meat "baaaa" and run around her plate
- a friend of mine randomly breaking out in a rousing chorus of "I am 16 going on 17" as we drove down the highway- you'd have to know the guy to understand how amazingly hilarious (and completely unexpected) this was!

Not to rub it in but I wasn't forced lose an hour of sleep yesterday!! Haha! Pole sana for all of you North Americans who lost time!

Funniest Event Today (well so far):

I was teaching my teens and since we had a few teens with us who don't speak english , one of the girls was translating to make sure we were all on the same page. She's really good at translating so I'm teaching, she's translating and we are just bouncing back and forth between 3 languages, not loosing any time.  I, without thinking, said a sentence in English and then ended with "hakuna shida"- swahili for "its no problem".  I often mix english and swahili (especially when the word I'm looking for is better described in swa).  So I say "blah blah blah english sentence- hakuna shida".  She translates "blah blah blah S sentence- its no problem".  And we all stopped.  And looked at each other and tried to figure out what had just happened.  We all knew it didn't sound right but we couldn't figure it out for a minute.  We had switched languages!  And didn't notice!

Ok- maybe it is one of those "you have to be there to see what's so funny about it" because we all were rolling on the ground laughing about it for about 5 minutes.  But seriously, that is the mark of a good translator- someone who will translate back and forth without realizing she had switched.   Usually, its easier to translate one way but hard to reverse your brain and translate both directions at the same time.

And Another One Bites The Dust...

Today was incredibly normal and fine until I left work!! I left the office with the intent to do some grocery shopping. I had had a nice morning tutoring one of my teens and I spent the afternoon planning my lesson for tomorrow- things were good!

I took the bus from my office and got off near the store- I still had a 10-15 minute walk but that's nothing.  I'm walking along, minding my own business when I realize my sandal isn't walking with me.  Shoot.  It's broken.  And it wasn't just the "pop it back in" kind of broken- it was broken broken.  Now I have 3 choices, I can keep walking barefoot (and that is just dumb- there is broken glass everywhere, not to mention a million other things I shouldn't be walking on), I can find a fundi (a guy who repairs shoes) but I don't know of any on the road I'm walking on, or I can find a new sandal.  I've often thought I should carry an extra pair of sandals in my bag for just such a purpose but of course I don't do that because who has room for an extra pair of sandals??   I'm not too far from a place that sells shoes so I backtrack and find a new pair of sandals (and the sales people all giggle at my one sandal on, one sandal in my hand entrance to the store, but I was laughing too). Crisis averted.  And I continue on my way to the grocery store.

I walked the 10 minutes to the store and I had another errand to run at this mall.  I had dropped a spare key at the theater there 2 weeks ago and I'd been back at least 2 other times to pick it up but it wasn't there.  The employees could confirm that they had found it, and they knew it was mine but the manager had it or something and he was never there when I was (don't worry mom it wasn't a key to my house or anything).  So I was out to pick up my lost key.   Finally got that back!! Awesome!   So I'm thinking this afternoon has been inconvenient but still a win.  My shoe broke near enough to a shoe place that it wasn't a major crisis and I finally got my key back from the theater.  Great. Now on to groceries.

I shopped and the checkout lines were long, as they always are on Friday afternoons. I expect that. I was enjoying listening to my headphones and just waiting when the guy in front of me wants to chat.  That's cool.  He's got to be at least 80.  That should be interesting.  Yeah- he's been in-country since the colonial era. And he felt the need to loudly extoll the wonders of colonialism and British rule and how that had to do with the length of the lines.  AWKWARD!!!   Yeah the lines were long and yeah we would be waiting a while but that truly has nothing to do with who is ruling the country!  Its 5pm on Friday- the lines are always long!   Colonialism was no good.   All countries desire to be free of a foreign ruler- that they are better off with that freedom!! And even if you held colonial views (which I do not, by the way- freedom is good) perhaps the very long, crowded line isn't the place to be talking about it!! Where the majority of the people who will hear you are the very people you are insulting!!  I always take the view that I'm a guest in this country- I may have opinions but I don't parade them around.   So this guy goes on, and on and on- all the while I am looking for any escape. But there was none to be had. Until the cashier at the till closed our lane down because of a problem and I practically ran the other direction so I wouldn't end up in line with this guy again!!  

I have no patience for people who hold to ideas of "degrees of humanity".  People are people.  One group isn't better. One isn't worse.  One isn't smarter.  Its not always a black or white issue either.  People are always trying to tell me why one tribe is better then another.  Cultures are diverse and that is awesome- that diversity means we all have strengths and weakness as cultures.  But people are people.  Can't we just leave it at that??

March Is Reading Month....Isn't it???

Maybe March isn't Reading Month anymore.  It was when I was a kid- there were reading games and prizes and I loved it.  I love to read.  I don't just read books- I inhale books.  Seriously- I don't know what my parents did with me when I was a kid- how did they keep up with my habit??? I would bring a 400 page book home from the church library on Sunday afternoons and have it half done before supper.   My dad used to joke that I should read his seminary books and just give him the recap (I didn't, by the way. He read all of his own required reading.)

One of the teens I work with has had to put school on hold for a bit while she deals with some family things, so I've been supplying her with books.  To keep her English and reading skills up- but also because its fun!! And it is important to develop a habit for reading for your own edification, not just to pass a class.

For the past few months, I've been trying to track down books that would be at an appropriate reading level for her and be something inspiring.  I've been raiding friend's libraries, used book stalls in the market, bookstores- and this week I hit the mother load.  I had been finding interesting biographies like Frederick Douglas and Wycliffe, and while both inspiring an educational (and she has been enjoying them), I had another book in mind for her.  And I finally tracked it down.  The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. 

I love the Chronicles of Narnia.  If you've never read them, you should.  If you've only seen the movie, then you HAVE to read the books (the movie was fine- the books were infinitely better).  I never read them until I went to college but they are wonderful- and interesting for almost any age bracket.  And that was the beauty of this.  This teenager is FAR behind in school, so finding something that was at her reading level was often too immature for her and would be boring.  But finding reading material that was at her emotional level was far beyond her reading comprehension which would be frustrating. 

But C.S. Lewis came through for me! The Chronicles of Narnia was intentionally written for children but appeals to adults as well because of the intricate storyline and allegory.  Allegory can be confusing, but I think it is more like a game!! Its a puzzle! You have to figure out what the deeper picture is!  Fun stuff!! So we'll see how this works out!

Shiro Success!!

I love Ethiopian food.  I love food from all over the world, green Thai curry, these insane noodles from China that only people from a certain province would make, Indian butter chicken,  I’m really not that picky when you are talking about international cuisine.  I make most of these in my house on a weekly basis (not the Chinese noodles, but I’d try if someone could find me a recipe!) I love most ethnic food.  But I don’t particularly love most Kenyan food.  There is nothing WRONG with it, it just on the bland side.   It rarely has spices or heat.   I eat it- no problem.  I cook it too.  Its just not my absolute favorite or anything.  I prefer the food to the north or east of Kenya.  From the Horn of Africa.  Or Ethiopia.  These guys know how to use spices!!  

I have an amazing Ethiopian restaurant down the street from me (actually I have 7 Ethi restaurants within walking distance but one is infinitely better than the rest!)   So I end up there quite a bit.  This place is a common meeting place for friends of mine, we bring all visitors there (in fact we have a team that comes to help us every year and their goal is to see how many times they can eat there in a trip- they tell me they dream of the food when they are gone.  I believe them- I dream of it too!)   Its like an Ethiopian version of Cheers!  The guys there usually know who I am and what I will order when I walk in the gate.  

I’ve tried to make Ethi food a few times.  Absolute failures.  It just wouldn’t work for me!!   A friend of mine marched back into the kitchen at the restaurant once to ask the cook how to make shiro (Shiro is one of our favorites- its made from chickpeas that are ground into flour and then the flour is cooked into this loose, not liquid but not solid, stew kinda thing that you eat with flat bread.  Its one of those foods that you truly have to eat to understand- there just aren’t words to accurately describe it).  So the cook in the restaurant gave her a recipe but it never worked for me.   I was hanging out with a friend yesterday who was telling me that there was a new Ethiopian shop near my house.  I was so excited. You can buy shiro flour (its not something you can easily find here in Nairobi- there are areas of town where it is sold but I could never track it down).   So I made a trip there today.  I have a new favorite place!!  The shop was full of shiro, lentils (not my fave) and any dry Ethi food you could want.  The mama who works there said she also sells injera (a sour Ethiopian flat-bread that you use as your plate and utensils) but she was out for the day.  I told her about my failed shiro-making attempts and she told me her way of making shiro.  

I went home and made it for dinner.  Oh. My. Goodness.  Seriously, this lady is going to be my new best friend.  Her recipe, well not so much “recipe” because there were no measurements,  so her method for shiro making was awesome!! It turned out just like the shiro at the restaurant!!   And WAY cheaper.  The restaurant is pretty cheap as far as restaurants go- but I got 1kg of shiro flour for about the price of 1 family size portion of shiro at the restaurant.  I can make shiro for my whole building with 1kg of flour!  

I guess I’m going to have to add shiro and greens to my weekly rotation of ethnic food!! Yummy!!!   Next Ethiopian food to conquer: Ethi Cabbage.  I don’t know what I’m missing, it shouldn’t be so complicated, but mine never tastes like the amazingness that comes from the restaurant!

Blaze Orange Camo Shoes

I'm originally from MI.  And many of us in MI love our camouflage- or at least that's what everyone in the rest of the 49 states think.  But I don't mind camo. Or blaze orange.  I wore a blaze orange ski cap the entire time I was home on furlough - it kept me warm and alive (ie not shot by a hunter when I was out taking pictures in the woods). It was great!

A friend and I were browsing in a market today and found these amazing shoes.

I'm not sure if it would qualify for your blaze orange while hunting or how on earth would you hike out to a blind in these babies. But if you feel the need to slay a deer in style, these would be for you!! 

Makeover

I work primarily with youth.  And in Kenya, youth means anyone over 13 who isn't married, so a lot of my "teens" are actually closer to the age of a younger sister or brother rather then a 13 year old (although we have a pretty big age mix).

Today, the girls decided I was in need of a makeover because apparently the mascara I was wearing just wasn't enough.  So they attacked me with eyeshadow. 

After our meeting one the little kiddos decided I needed a new hair do too.  Several of the little kids didn't believe my hair was real- they were sure I had a weave. After confirming it was in fact my natural hair still attached to my head, they gave me a new do.  So I was just completely made over before I left!  I remembered to fix my hair before I the compound but I had forgotten all the eyeshadow I was wearing.  Oh well.  I'm sure I've looked crazier then this on the bus! 

Fun fun day (even if it involved a make up ambush!)

40 Days

I love Lent.  I know.  I'm weird.  Add it to the list of crazy things about Linds (and I think that list may be long...)  Lent is my 2nd favorite season of the Church year (Advent its the best, sorry!)  Can you tell I come from a liturgical tradition?? I have favorite seasons of the Church Calendar! 

I love Lent.  It's not fun in the traditional sense of the word "fun" but I love it.  Its all about contemplating the sacrifice Christ made. I love the contemplative seasons- during Advent you contemplate why Jesus was born.  During Lent you contemplate why he died.  You can give something up to help you remember or add something on to your day (like a Bible study) to help you keep the holiday.  But Lent is not about what you give up for 40 days (Lent is 40 days by the way- technically it takes place over 46 days but each Sunday we are freed from the fast).   Its not about how many days you can go without coffee or Facebook or how many books you can read and learn from (although there is nothing wrong with any of those things).

This Lent is pretty special for me.  I'm teaching a class where we are walking through the Gospels step by step over the next 27 weeks and right now we are at the beginning of Jesus' ministry.  It fits in so well with this season of Lent.  I love how even at the beginning, everything Jesus did was incredibly intentional.  Jesus knew where he was going and what was going to happen in the end.  The goal was always the cross.  It wasn't the surprise ending. 

Last year I posted a video for Ash Wednesday.  It was 40 pictures drawn for the 40 days Jesus was tempted in the desert.  Check it out!! My favorite picture is the one where Jesus is staring at the night sky (maybe that's just because I love to stare at the night sky too!)  Happy Lent! 

PIZZA PIZZA

A few girls from my teen group wanted to learn to bake and have been asking me to teach them.  So today I had a few of them over- soooooo fun!!! Oh my goodness. Seriously, it was one of the most fun, hilarious, random, enjoyable days I've had in a long time.  We talked about cooking, we laughed about learning language, and just enjoyed each other AND enjoyed the pizza and brownies they made from scratch.

Its great when even some of the quieter girls start to come out of their shells.  We are definitely going to have to do this again!  Although maybe not for a few weeks- by the end it was 7 and a half hours of fun and I'm beat!!!

Autumn Trees (who cares that its Feb!)

What do you do when the power keeps cutting in and out all night (after an entire day of power outages)??? Watching a movie is out.  So is taking a shower (no hot water).  Cooking is complicated by candle light.  You could read.  Or make shadow puppets.  Or sleep.  Or play I spy.  Or sit on the porch and enjoy the fact that Nairobi actually dark for once. (These are all things I've done during power outages by the way... you have to get creative or go crazy!!)  

But tonight, after the power went out for the 4th time in an hour and looked like it was going to be out for a while, I decided it was time to break out my Autumn Tree Photo Puzzle.  When I was home this fall, I took about 30 pictures of a big, beautiful tree near my house.  They are all close up pieces of the tree so when you put them together, you get a huge, layered, beautiful fall tree.  It started out as a "let's see if I can do it", silly kinda project but when it turned out so neat, it ended up morphing into a whole big thing.  My mom wanted to keep it (gotta love moms- they'll display your art work even if you are almost 30...) but she thought it would be cool if I put each picture in an acrylic frame and glue those together to add depth to the layers.  It took forever to figure it out but in the end it was awesome!! I decided I needed it at my house in Kenya too.  Well, the pictures- not the frames. Lets face it, there was no way I was making room for 30 acrylic frames in my luggage!

So with the power out, I got out all the pictures and a bunch of candles and started put the puzzle together by candle light.  Which was kinda tricky because you have to match up all the branches and stuff.  But it kept me entertained!  I finished it up just as the power came back on.

And in the end, it turned to pretty well if I do say so myself!  The finished picture I left in MI for my mom is better- the depth and 3D-ness the frames added was really cool but I'll take what I can get!  Now I've got my beautiful Michigan Autumn up on my door. 

Happy Valentines Day!

I love to bake.  And I will take just about any opportunity to bake for my teens.  They don't get a lot of sweets and they aren't able to bake at home (I'd estimate that none of our families have access to an oven, they all cook on either charcoal or kerosene stoves).  So they don't actually know how to bake- although that's going to change.  Some of the girls want to start learning to bake, so a few are going to come by my house for cooking lessons.  I'll teach them somethings (pizza, cake and cookies are all high up on the list) and they will teach me something too (we're talking about samosa, injera and pilau) Fun!!! 

But this weekend I decided to make my famous sugar cookie recipe, using my grandma and grandpa's old cookie cutters that I got when I was home on furlough (its more fun to use the old cookie cutters! Thanks Grandpa!)  and I figured out how to color the sugar on top to make them extra festive (Pinterest is just amazing!! You can learn anything on there!). 

You Know Its Gonna Be A Good Day When...

You know its gonna be a good day when you show up at your meeting and are literally run over by little kids yelling "LIIIIIIIIIINDsey!!!!!" as they climb all over you.  It just has to be a fun day after that!  These aren't even the kids I work with!  But I AM the human jungle gym for all the little kiddos, so I guess that's why they were so excited to see me.  

One of the little girls drew this picture of me:

Considering THIS is the picture she drew of me about 6 months ago, I think she's improved considerably!!  Either that or I've stated to look more like a person and less like a sea creature!

New Locks

So after several break-ins in my compound and in neighboring apartment buildings, we are beefing up security.  The compound manager is talking about CC tv and new guards and that's great (I'll believe it when I see it).  But ultimately I'm responsible for my own security.  I'm always careful to lock my house (and my room) but it seems like the culprit somehow had keys for all these break ins (definitely an inside job- no doors or windows broken but someone gets in and out with all their electronics and cash).  Nice. So far we have been blessed- no one's been in our house but who wants to chance it?  So how do you defend your home when someone apparently has keys to the houses?  Antigen locks.

I'd never heard of an antigen lock before but they are pretty nifty!  We use the big, old-school keys here in pretty much every door (like the keys in Cinderella- remember when the wicked stepmother locked her in the room and she had those massive keys??  They are like that). 

 

Big keys require big key holes, so there are big key holes in the doors (the kind you could spy through if you wanted- I believe that may have ALSO happened in Cinderella- not sure, its been a while since I've seen it).  The antigen lock fits into the key hole and blocks it.  No one can put a key into it or try to pick the lock until you remove the block that is locked into it (with a separate key). 

 Its really just one more lock to lock on your way out the door (lock your door as usual then put in the antigen lock, lock that and go) but it insures that no one can even try to get into your place while you are away (well they can't get in with a key at least).  Definitely worth the $7 I paid for the antigen lock!!   Why didn't I know about this before??

Bola's Birthday!!

Today was Bola's 2nd birthday!  Bola (the son of one of my teammates) had a blast and so did we.  

 

Here's the birthday boy dancing to his birthday song: 

I WON!!!!!!!

Ok, I'll get to what I won in a second- here is what I had originally planned to post today: 


Time to dust off the old Math skills!! One of my teens is having a rough time in school so she's coming in one day a week for some help.  We dove in today- long division.  How long has it been since I figured out LONG division- the writing out all your work and everything??!?!!  A very very long time.  And this wasn't just long division- this was long division with decimals.  It didn't take long to figure out that the girl really needs to go back to multiplication basics and learning decimal places, and work on those before we move on (phew!! I have a slight reprieve from long division!) 

What I don't understand is why to teachers continue to pass our kids onto the next class if they haven't mastered the material from the previous classes?? That is setting them up to fail!  At some point, if you don't understand the basics, it will be impossible to move on.  Its better to hold them back until they understand the material rather then pass them on and leave them confused! 

Now, for the contest.  I wrote the above post at work this afternoon and then I went to the grocery store to pick up a few things.  I was already getting a good chuckle over a new brand of shortening called "COWBOY Spesheli Cooking Fat"  Now I'm pretty sure "spesheli" isn't a swahili word- its a swahili-ized "special".  And why do cowboys love this particular brand?? Are there even cowboys in Kenya??? So I'm getting a good laugh over the Cowboy shortening and stuff.  I paid for my groceries and the cashier told me "You won!" then he told me to go get my prize from this table outside.  People were winning shampoo (jealous!) and snacks.  Guess what I won??  

2.3lbs of margarine!!! Woo-hoo!!!!! I'm not being sarcastic- I love to win anything!!   Now what to DO with 2.3lbs of margarine??? Not a clue.  I don't think I use that much margarine in a year.  I guess I'll cook it into something for my teens. 

Black History Month

I was laughing a little today at my inbox- everything is about Black History Month.  And that is great- there is definitely a need to remember all ethnic groups that make up America and to be honest about our past as a country.  But it just makes me laugh- because here in Kenya, we just call it history.  No need for a special month to remember it.