Roadtrip!

Last week I got the chance to visit Kisumu, a city in Western Kenya and the home of one of our CARE for AIDS directors, Cornel. The purpose of the trip was to check on the progress of CFA's expansion into this area, and I will describe the results of that in a later post. First, though, I want to share with you some of my experience in this very different part of Kenya.

The first adventure was the trip from Nairobi, in the central part of Kenya, to the edge of Lake Victoria in the Southwest corner of the country. This was my first time driving a long distance in Kenya, and I realized quickly that driving on the highway here is very different than an American road trip. It's just not possible to put the car on cruise control and relax - not only are the roads winding, uneven, and full of giant, unexpected potholes, but it is entirely normal to round a curve at 70 mph and come upon a truck driving 20 mph or a herd of cattle! While this can be stressful and even downright scary at times, it definitely makes the driving experience more exciting and engaging! Thankfully, we didn't have any problems on the drives there and back, and it gave me some very valuable Kenyan-road experience.

Kisumu itself is very different from the other Kenyan cities I've experienced. It is the third largest city in the country, behind Nairobi and Mombasa, but you would never guess that from looking at it. Because of a variety of reasons, Kisumu has never received much attention from the government in terms of development or investment, and there are very few big buildings or industrialized areas. The predominant tribe in the Kisumu region is the Luo tribe, historically fishermen who lived on the lakes and rivers of the region, and Kisumu still has a kind of fishing-village feel to it. The city is spread out along the shore of Lake Victoria, and most parts of the culture are influenced by the lake, with fishing remaining as a leading industry. In fact, the first thing we did upon arriving in Kisumu was to drive all the way to the lakeshore and eat lunch at a little wooden shack next to the water. We had a typical Luo meal - first we picked out two partially-fried whole tilapia from a range of sizes sitting on a table, and then the waitress took them back to the kitchen for preparation. We sat at a wooden table, enjoying the breeze off of the lake and a cold Coca-Cola, until the waitress brought out a bucket and a pitcher of warm water with which we washed out hands. Then, we were brought a big platter with the whole fish on it, along with some greens and vegetables that were cooked together into a sort of soup, in which the fish rested. Accompanying that were big slabs of ugali - the cake/grits/cornbread-ish starch that is the staple of the Luo diet. Two people shared each fish, and the strategy for eating was to grab a handful of ugali, dip it into the soup, pinch off a piece of the fish, and stuff the whole handful into your mouth. The fish itself was really amazing - some of the freshest and tastiest fish I had ever eaten! This was definitely one of the best meals I've had in Kenya, and it worked out to about a kg of fish each, along with a drink and ugali, for a total of about $3 a person - amazing!

Another interesting experience in Kisumu was visiting the fishing port, where hundreds of fishermen go out into the lake during the night and return in the morning to sell their catch of tilapia and Nile perch. We drove down to the port in the evening, so there wasn't a lot going on, but Cornel showed me the wooden, single-sailed boats and how 8-10 fishermen will go out all night long, hauling traditional nets through the water to catch the freshwater fish that gets distributed all over Kenya and even exported throughout the world. While we were standing by the lake, we watched as a huge storm came in over the sunset - really an awesome experience that doesn't fully come through in pictures!

A final portion of the trip that taught me a lot was a visit we made to Cornel's home on the way back to Limuru. Cornel grew up about an hour away from Kisumu along the lakeshore, in a small village where the men all fished each day and the women took care of the kids or grew fruit. The Luo culture has all kinds of traditions, and it was really interesting to see the house where Cornel grew up and the way that families relate to each other in their culture. Traditionally each son of a family will build a house next to his parents' house, so even though Cornel hasn't lived here since growing up, he has a small mud house on the same property as his parents' house where he was raised. Just next door is his grandparents' home, and I was priveledged to meet both Cornel's mother and grandmother during my visit. These women are absolutely amazing - Cornel's grandmother is in her 90's (no one knows exactly when she was born, but it was before WWI), but she looks no older than 70. She saw us driving up the path to the village and immediately called us into her house, praying a blessing over us before even saying hello or asking how we were. Cornel was like a celebrity in the village - relatives and friends came running from all over the countryside to say hello and give him some peanuts, papaya, or mangos for the road. I think you learn so much about a person from visiting their home, and I feel honored to have been to both Cornel and Duncan's homes now. I never cease to be amazed at how different life is for them now than it was growing up just a few short years ago!