The Seasons

I’ll be honest, the prospect of living within the tropics for the rest of my life is very low on my life goals right now. Though there is a lot of sun, some good rains (I love the rain!), and the ability to go outside at all times of the year, I’m still a sucker for the whole 4-season model. It is incredibly embedded into my psyche, so much so that I’m not truly realizing the passing of time these days. Yes, it is November 4^th but it might as well be sometime in the spring or summer. We’re in the short rainy season here. I swear, it really messes with your brain to think that the calendar keeps on changing, but the weather doesn’t. You see, my body doesn’t believe calendars so much as it believes in the cycle of getting colder and warmer over a longer time-period. So yes, my sense of time, in the long-term, is skewed. Cool

I miss the cold, and warming up. I miss seeing things like leaves, snow, and steamy breath. I miss frozen lakes, driving in the snow, and bundling up. I miss running and sliding on ice, weather slowing down our busy lives, and hot beverages (being a contrast to the cold, rather than attributing to the heat…). I miss the food that is cooked with the seasons! I miss all our food! I miss walking in the snow and messing around with my friends in it. I miss watching football (not fútbol) games, lying on the couch with my dad. I miss watching the NBA. I miss going to the stadium for baseball games.

There are so many things that I’m missing so badly that I thought I never needed while living in the US. I’m now realizing the things that have become so important to me as I’ve grown up. They haven’t always been altruistically the most meaningful, but the significance that these things have in my life are more important than that. It’s part of my culture. I never used to notice it, but I’m exploring that right now. I’m excited to look into what my culture is because it has seemed so non-existent for so long. I came here thinking I had no culture. I’m okay though cuz I think it might be tough for anyone from the US to articulate their own culture. And by culture, I mean something close to what James Spradley says: “Culture is the acquired knowledge that people use to interpret experience and generate behavior.” I’m not sure if I’m fluent in articulating my culture, but I’m getting there. It’s exciting to me, so I think I’ll keep trying.

As much as I miss things, I know I’m not coming back for another 7 months. I’m not dwelling on the things I miss. I can’t. I just know they are that much more important to me, and they will be that much more meaningful to me when I get back. Maybe I’ll live better that way. I hope you can experience the important things in your life and relish in them. Better yet, I hope you have the experience of not being able to do the things that are most meaningful to you but that it wouldn’t be permanent, so you could go back to them with a renewed passion! If you’re reading this, I probably miss you too! Do write.

Prayer and iTunes

I don’t believe I’ve shared much on the spiritual part of my life, though this may be entirely insufficient as well. I guess it’s always a struggle (my journey that is), but anyway, there have been a few things standing out to me lately. These have a lot to do with adjusting to life in Kenya. I’m certainly figuring out how to live here, just as I have done in MN and Guatemala.

Prayer hasn’t been an easy thing to keep up with. I’m still continuing to explore how I can keep my relationship with God going strong here. I felt like I had found it up at school with the opportunity to pray and go to mass with the monks. That sincerely filled me well. Even though there are so many religious here and they even pray morning and night in my place here, it feels so much different. Missing Sunday mass while traveling is hard for me too (I do get the readings sent to my cell by text message though!). Anyway, what I’ve found to be fulfilling comes from something I did almost a year ago.

Before leaving for Guatemala, I found myself sitting on my bed at home in Denver downloading every single podcast that I found interesting. It turned out to add up to some 700 tracks. I had no idea when I would listen to them or how they would even help me, but I was glad that they were free and seemed like good things. I listened to few in Guatemala and over the summer, but now, I’m listening to a few of the tracks on a daily basis.

I’ve pulled out all the ones that are prayer and all of them that give some kind of information or instruction. Now I enjoy at least one of both per day, and it’s been quite enriching for me. My favorite podcast to listen to is the U of MN Duluth Newman Catholic Campus Ministry podcast, which consists of homilies recorded by Fr. Mike Schmitz. He simply has a gift for preaching especially in a relevant way to college students. Otherwise, I’m really enjoying America Public Media’s “Speaking of Faith” podcast.

En(courage)ment

I would like to share with you all in the world wide web a heart-warming experience from Monday, October 26th. I was out around Hardy (close to my place here) doing research with my field assistant, and we barely managed to catch a matatu in the rain. We were in a spot where little traffic came by, and we would have waited another hour to catch the next one. Still raining, we reached my stop, and my field assistant, Joseph Kamweti made a joke about me needing to do some marathoning now. I jump off the matatu in my Tevas, gray slacks, and green rain jacket. From that stage to my front door, there is no pavement, gravel or anything, simply dirt (mud by this point). So I start running, head down, looking to dodge the puddles in the road, not being able to see more than 15 ft ahead. I have the thought to transfer the contents of my pants pockets into my jacket but decide against it in favor of getting back faster. I run for about 10 minutes, and I’m just dirty and soaked by the time I reach the guest house. Frustrated, I go in the back door, and the cooks welcome me to Africa, once again. I squeak down the corridor towards my room to go change. What do I find a the foot of my door, but one package and one letter?
I thank God as I pick them up with a smile on my face. “Ellory Eggermont” and “Kalene Morris” say the return addresses. “This can only be good,” I say to myself as I bring them to my desk. I remove the soaked clothes, dry off, and change into some warm PJs. I’m not going out anywhere for the rest of the day. I do find my borrowed cell phone not turning on, and later, it would turn on and off on its own will. Broken phone number three. That’s more phones broken than I had ever owned.
Sitting down, I find my knife and open both. I take a deep, calming breath and look inside Ellory’s package first. Inside the Celestial Seasonings chamomile tea box, the first thing I see is the most beautiful, red, sugar maple leaf, taped to the inside of the lid. It’s my only experience of fall. You know, it’s terribly tough to live without four seasons. I open the box to find the front page of the St. Cloud Times from Oct 7th. She says it’s “just for packaging,” but I want to read all the headlines. Newspapers are significantly different here. Next, I see a Snickers bar and wild berry Skittles, but what is this? There’s some yellow thing in front of it. It’s cut-out of the letter “E,” “You can share if you want, but you shouldn’t. This is for YOU!” Needless to say, I took the advice and paraded my permission in Martha’s face when she ridiculed me as to why my wrappers were empty. (which is an odd fact because when I showed her what I had received, I told her I wasn’t too sure as to why Ellory would send me empty Snickers and Skittles wrappers…weird. Must be trying to tempt me…) Next, I found some great tea (Numi, Berry Black Fruitea Darjeeling Black Tea), and the best homemade paper I’ve seen. What a smile I have on now, even as I was so upset a bit ago. Finally, at the bottom, I get the most perfect letter, especially on a rainy day. I think those girls from the box in the summer of ’08 really know how to write the most without too many words.
I couldn’t wait to eat the candy, so I read Kalene’s letter while chomping on a snickers and some skittles. Some people just know how to bring back great, comforting memories, and other people can really do a good job (this being some great timing) at encouraging me spiritually. Thanks! Hearing about senior year helps too, since that’s all I’ve really got left at CSBSJU. I’ve been thinking about that a lot since I left. I’m sure it’ll come up again, so I’ll delve into it there.
What a relief it was to get some snail mail on such a day! It’s become pretty important now that the internet is mostly gone and quite restricted. Now that I’ve got a few things done, I’m planning on spending a huge chunk of time writing to people and sending more things. It’s exciting :)

October in Kenya: Revelations, Realizations, and Reality

So! What has happened in the past four weeks in the life of Chris Morgan? Well, I wish I could have updated you more often, but here it is. I hope you enjoy it. Also, I plan on writing deeper on some of these issues and others that are important to me. This means you should tune-in in the next few days because I’m hoping to publish a blog once per day for the next however many days it takes to put all the topics up.

Lunch at St. Claire’s Student Hostel has become a bit of a fixture for me on Mondays. Martha goes from her Human Rights class with our friend Mary Anne back to her hostel, and I meet up with them to eat some amazing chips (French fries… that term doesn’t really make sense here…..ha!) and visit with the cooking staff with whom we’ve become good friends. They visit our place often and are friends with our cooks, so we see them often. Bertha, Beatrice, and Maureen work as the cooks there and are my age. Lunch with Mary Anne is a good time to just hang out and relax a bit. She’s been stressed lately being that she was about 36 weeks pregnant when we started this and starting CATs (mid-terms exams). Well, now she’s given birth, but I’ll talk about that later. We’ve formed a close friendship with her.

One of my classmates at CUEA, a priest from Malawi, told me that he could get me a really nice touch-screen phone just like his for pretty cheap compared to the original price, so since mine from the US was breaking, I decided to take him up on it. I gave him the money, and he went into town to buy it since he would surely get a better price while bargaining than I simply because of his skin color, and possibly superior Kiswahili skills. Martha sent for one too, and we waited patiently. Finally, we got them on a Saturday evening. The very next Monday, the first day I brought it out with me, I found that both screens had cracked. I had no recollection of hitting anything hard with my leg, so I was quite surprised and upset. Anyway, I started using a borrowed phone again until I think I ruined that one while running home in a rainstorm. (Stay tuned!) After that, I used Martha’s first phone she bought here, and she threatened many things would happen if I broke hers. I am happy to report that the phone is still in good condition. She even offered to give me her touch-screen phone for me to use instead of fixing the other one.

Losing internet is the next big topic. I have had no access to internet at my residence since Oct 18^th. This has created a problem of being in contact with people, especially with my parents on skype (though I do miss other conversations on skype too!). Ha, let me finally get around to the cause of it. There has been a lot of talk of a huge increase in bandwidth for the whole of Kenya in the form of some huge cable from I have no idea where. Anyway, all the internet companies basically are scrambling for their share of the market and have even resorted to sabotaging the other companies. Case in point: our building was supposed to receive a fiber-optic cable direct by the beginning of October. They couldn’t do it because the cable that was supposed to come was stolen. We still had internet, but just at a different capacity. Now, the internet in this area has been sabotaged, so we have zero internet now. Of course the schools and a couple cyber cafes were able to quickly repair theirs. That is where I go now.

Papers and research have been an interesting task since the loss of internet. So it’s back to the stone-age of card catalogues and talking to a person in order to find these funny things with paper and ink. I don’t know how much longer I can take the human contact or the tangible readings. In all seriousness, I was able to use my own, personal field research and a few books to complete my papers well. I spent the majority of last week on writing two papers for my masters-level classes. First, I completed a 16-page rough draft on Male Socialization in the Maasai Culture for my African Culture class. Second, I finished a 13-page final draft of a paper discussing the enculturation of African culture and Christianity in Africa for my class in CUEA, Living and Promoting Justice and Peace.

Have you ever given birth? I haven’t. Do you know someone who’s given birth? Why, yes I do, Chris. Have you been with them in the hospital, before and after? Hmm, well… From noon on Friday the 23^rd to the evening of Saturday the 24^th, Martha and I joined our great friend Mary Anne in Avenue Hospital. She was two weeks too early and had to have a C-Section on Saturday because, after inducing her twice, she hadn’t dilated enough. I’ll tell you more about that if you choose to ask, but anyway, it was good to be with her. I have never been with anyone who has given birth. I didn’t see the surgery or anyone else giving birth, but it was an unforgettable experience, knowing a piece of what the end of pregnancy looks like. I have a lot of respect for the whole process and that role that women have to physically bring children into the world. Incredible! Some things were surely imbedded in my mind for use at a future date.

We have been experiencing a little more of the dangers of Nairobi lately. Don’t be scarred! That’s not to say that it’s not serious, but things like pick-pocketing happens everywhere. Once a guy tried to unzip Martha’s backpack, I picked him up and set him aside. He left with nothing. What I really wanted to say is a story from one day this last week. I boarded a suspect matatu and didn’t realize that it was a pick-pocketing operation until a bit into it, at which point I simply tried to defend from all the most obvious tactics. Again I was spared because of my vigilance. Yes, both guys sitting on either side of me tried to reach in my pockets and bag, but I had the grace of a nice lady, Lisa, in the front seat who helped make them nervous. Other people in the back were certainly stolen from. I saw the cell phone being transferred out of the matatu. Lisa and I walked for another 15 minutes to our destinations, which was a really important time to talk about what happened. She helped me to realize the gravity of what could have happened and what to do next time: alight (an English word for getting out of the matatu. I forget if I knew that word before arriving here). Now, Martha and I are suspicious of town and matatus, mainly people taking advantage of us. I hope this doesn’t sour or consume my experience here, and I see good hope of that happening.

So, I went to the dentist the other day. I haven’t been in a number of years and was worried that I had an infection under my tooth implant and maybe some cavities. The doc took a look and a quick x-ray of my implant and pronounced my mouth to be in tip-top condition. Sweet, I guess I just have to brush more around the implant because of the extra gaps I have there where food can enjoy good cover. I paid a total of $29.22 for everything including the digital x-rays. Thanks Kenya!

I just returned on Sunday from Nanyuki. This is the end of the rail line, which the British installed in the colonial days. It’s not the end of the whole thing, just the one going north from Nairobi. It sits in the morning shadow of Mount Kenya, and the British keep their military base there. My reason for going was part of my coursework in my African Culture class (Tangaza College’s Maryknoll Institute for African Studies-MIAS). My field assistant, Joseph, lives close to the town with his mother, youngest sister, wife, two daughters, and brother’s family. He is the eldest and his father died in 1989, so he assumes the role of his father. Don’t be mistaken, all of these people do not live under one roof, for once a man is married, he cannot go under his mother’s roof or eat her cooking again. She has a house of her own in the original compound, in the middle of their land (maybe 10 acres of farm and pasture). He has a house there too but plans to move it over the Christmas holidays (“days” being plural because there is more than one “day” to the time off from work, school, etc.). His brother already has his own homestead outside of the original compound with his wife and three children. They grow mostly all of their own food. This made me want to live with them. Anyway, I can do that wherever, so I will. Martha, her field assistant Idah, Joseph, and I enjoyed about 24 hours in his rural home there in the shadow of Mt. Kenya, which we couldn’t see because of the clouds. We had great food, enjoyed fun and laughter with his beautiful family, and talked a lot about culture.

On another point, If you want to hear anything more about any of these topics, feel free to be inquisitive! I purposely leave out some things to tell people who will write me. Though, for the casual reader, I can assure you that you’re getting the real stories. Don’t worry too much!

Details on my first trip!

Apologies for the lack of posts

...I hope this one will make up for it. Maybe.

Last Friday, I went on a small trip with Martha and Omollo, our friend from CUEA. The plan was to take public means to Naivasha to buy food for camping, make it to Hell's Gate National Park, bicycle in, and camp one night. Then, we would go to the gorge, take a tour there, and bicycle out. After that on Saturday, we planned to travel to Nakuru by matatu, find suitable accommodation, and rest up for a Sunday of the Menengai Crater and traveling all the way back home to Langata.

Well, Chris, did it happen like that?

WELL, everybody, technically, the answer is yes, but in reality,I've got some explainin' to do.

(oh p.s. Do things ever go according to the plan?)

We tried to start out early, but we got caught in the traffic for the graduation of CUEA (I've heard that some 11,000 people came... the school is on a dirt road. you put 2 and 2 together.). Anyway, we finally found our way out to Naivasha, which is just north of Nairobi, not far. The matatu (public transportation van) driver decided that it would be best to drop us on the side of the highway because there were a group of piki-piki(motorcycle) drivers conspiring there. OKay, well that would have been just fine if they didnt want 450 shillings(kshs) for a 25km ride. We learned later from Omollo that they tried to start a conspiracy with him from the moment he stepped out of the matatu. They told him, "Hey, you know these people have money. Just help us out a little bit, and tell them that it's a good price to pay." They appealed to him as a 'brother' Kenyan.

I'm pretty sure this begins his frustration with the position the locals always put him into throughout the trip as the person to try to make high prices sound better. This frustrated Martha and I, but we sure didn't want to get ripped off (although we still did).

So we continued after some strong negotiations (final price 250kshs). Now that I think about it, I think this is my first ride on a motorcycle (someone correct me if I'm wrong!). Cool, so it was a good time on the back there and we stopped at the supermarket. I really felt like a tourist there. Great. Got back on and took the long road out to Hell's Gate. On the way, I saw some of the biggest greenhouses I have ever seen. It made me wonder about all the things they grow in there. hmmm... So we arrived to the long driveway up to the gate and the piki-pikis said that that was all the further that they would go. There was a shop renting bikes for 500kshs per day. They were nice bikes, but I thought we could get them for cheaper. We decided to pay the piki-pikis an extra 50 bob (kshs) to take us to the actual gate.

Once we got there, we shelled out the large sums of shillings for entrance, camping, and hiring bikes. It was only then that we realized that they don't rent camping gear at the park. We had to call down to the guys where we stopped to bring a tent and two sleeping bags. They brought us firewood too. Tent (Coleman -Ooo...) and wood went on my back while the bags onto Omollo's. Martha had her own adventures with two jugs of water and bananas. We picked up the only 3 bikes that really worked (out of 20-some) and were on our way once lunch settled a bit (PB&J).

After about maybe 30 minutes of riding and passing Fischers Tower (some colonial guy who got masacred here by the locals defending their turf), we were stopped dead in our bike tread's tracks. A herd of water buffalo enjoyed both sides of the road, and we didn't feel safe passing through. Wild animals are wild. Respect that. Soon a tour van came by and offered a lift past the herd. We stuffed our bikes and packs into the van and went by them. We continued much further because there was a lone bull further up the road. In reality, the herd is safe in comparison to a lone bull. Those are always super aggressive. They don't have the herd to protect them. We rode up the hill with much effort to our campsite with a few mishaps in there too.

We relaxed at the camp site and decided on the location for the tent. The site boasted a perfect of the valley below and all the animals (buffalo, antelope, warthog, impala, eland, zebra, etc.). In no time, we had the tent up and some firewood gathered. We enjoyed the evening of PB&J and conversation by the fire. Oh yeah, and before the sun went down, we had to try to scare the lone buffalo off the cliff below our campsite by throwing rocks at it so that it wouldn't come around our camp that night. Little did we know...

In the first signs of morning, I wake up to news from Omollo that it's just in our campsite. Solution = start a fire. We found out that he has been sleeping just above the campsite to benefit from the protection of the next cliff. Great! I'm glad he left us alone. He was huge! He was just munchin on the grasses and moved along when he caught wind of the fire in the pit. We all got around and packed everything for our biking trek to Hell's Gate Gorge. It reminded me of certain special and inspirational friends who have ridden bicycles for ridiculously long distances for a better cause than tourism. (If you're reading this, I love you guys!)

So, a sweet 5K to the gorge and we set our things down to take the tour. We toured a skinny, but tall side canyon(i don't know which word to use...) first, and the main canyon second with all the hot springs and views . We saw some amazing formations including the Central Tower (a volcanic plug... look it up) and the young walls of the newest gorge (200 yrs old... See dad! You're not THAT old!). We finished with a hike to a lookout point where we could see almost the whole gorge and tower. It was a beautiful experience to absorb.

We made it back, ate our lunch in spite of the lurking baboon, and continued on our way back to the front gate and eventually Nakuru. Almost half-way back to the gate, the skies opened up and really took care of us with the massive amounts of rain.

This was the very moment I realized how happy I was to be there. It was a pleasure to ride through that storm with my companions. OKay, it was dangerous. Life is dangerous.

We got back, dried off, and took the piki-pikis once the rain stopped. Omollo's got a flat tire after about 10 minutes, so we waited for them to patch that. Tire refilled with a bike pump! Off we go, back to the matatu station in Naivasha. These are the worst places to be in any town for a white-skinned person. All these men screaming, grabbing at you and your bags, all just to get you into their matatu. Some people are only paid to convince people to enter a certain matatu. Sometimes it's a bit overwhelming, but other times, it's simply infuriating. I had to scold these guys when we were trying to decide as a group which one to go on. They didn't want us to talk about it. Anyway, we got on and were on our way to Nakuru. Oh by the way, by this time we had dried off because of the length of the ride on the piki-pikis.

We arrived in Nakuru and sat in the park to decide which hostel to pick. We found the ones that we wanted, but martha had to go to Tusky's (supermarket) to get some BBQ sauce for chips (french fries). We walked down some streets and didn't exactly find what the Lonely Planet guide book told us was there. (I found no true information in that book about Nakuru. Honestly). We gave up for a bit and stopped at a restaurant for some chips. Martha was tired and hungry.

Considering we failed to find like 5 other hostels in Nakuru, we decided there that we would go for one a bit more expensive (2500 kshs according to the book-- actually 6000 per night). We arrived and thought we had entered the hyatt or something. Good thing the room was a bit basic. That made us feel more comfortable. The place was huge. It's called the Waterbuck. As awkward as it was, we settled in and rested. Martha and I eventually took a late dinner. I enjoyed a great t-bone steak. Then we went to the bar lounge and I enjoyed my favorite malt beverage here. The wood under my mattress was broken in half, but I slept alright. I had breakfast in the morning with Omollo (Martha slept more). We packed and left quickly.

We thought we had left quickly enough, but we did not realize there would be such a comotion and argument about the piki-pikis that were to take us to the crater that Sunday. We must have waited for 30 or 45 minutes while almost every employee of the hotel argued with various drivers on the price for the trip. We finally just walked out to find our own somewhere away from the rich hotel.

We gathered some drivers and made our way up there after filling the water bottles. My driver took me on a short-cut, and the other two thought I had been taken off to be killed. A few minutes later, we crossed paths again, and all was well.

Next, we found one of our most-frustrating experiences of the trip. We were told initially that it costs nothing to access the crater. We arrived at a road block with an unarmed guy in military fatigues and a guy in an oxford shirt who demanded 300 kshs for each person visiting the crater (we weren't supposed to pay for the drivers). Conventional wisdom and gut feeling said these guys were scamming us, so we asked for an official recipt. This is the first deterrent for bribes. They produced one, but we weren't sure why they charged the Kenyan citizen too. He shouldn't have been charged. We paid before our drivers really expressed their true concern about it. There was a whole lot of conversation in Kiswahili or other languages, which sucked too. I decided we should get their names and ID numbers and the phone number for their commanding officer. They conveniently didn't have that phone number, but I got one name and his numbers. Though it scared him, he didn't fold. He already had the money.

With that sour taste in our mouth, we made our way up to the top of the lookout point on the crater. It measures 90 square kilometers. It's 480 m deep from the lookout to the bottom. The history is that it was a volcano before and one day, it simply fell into the earth and killed a bunch of Masai with it. It's a huge depression with a bunch of volcanic rock. We started walking around and trying not to let the drool drip down our chins. The view was just awesome! We stood there and took in the view only to be interrupted by a guy wanting to sell us a tour of the crater. This was way less official than the national park tour. We actually negotiated the price and were on our way.

We walked down around the crater a bit, and Martha rolled her ankle, in her Crocs. Oops! Me too later on in my boots, not too bad at all. We tried to take it all in, and I'm really proud of a few of the pictures that I took on the way down. I'm sure they'll come up on here someday soon. We spent only a few steps truly as low into the crater as possible and we imediately started on the ascent. The guide had the easiest time going through all the hills, sun and heat. We had to stop for breaks. About half way through, we enjoyed a break under the shade of some clouds. We didn't know that we wouldn't see sunlight for the rest of the day.

We arrived to the edge of the crater, and found our path to be a 'goat' path rather than the 'good' path I had heard about earlier in the trip. By this time in the day, we all had some fatigue. Martha went up on the trail first, and I took up the back. She slipped on the loose soil a few times, and broke her walking stick one of the times. This was when she injured her shoulder by landing on her elbow. The rest of the way up, we knew, was a race against the coming rains and to get martha some care for her shoulder. The guide was there to pull Martha up the mountain with her good arm. I made sure to keep up and be there if she were to fall again, which did happen. No rolling down the mtn though.

The rain really started as we reached the rocks at the top of the climb. I got my jacket out and helped Martha put hers on. We knew that the paths would only get worse with the rain, so we had to go on. Not only was it raining, hail began to beat down on us. we were rock-climbing and really scrambling up this last section of rock and mud as the rivers of rainwater came down the path. This was when Martha said, "It's like I'm Frodo on Mount Doom!" It was considerably intense with all the rain, mud, and injury. It took all my energy, power, and balance with the big pack on my back to make it up the side of that crater.

Once we made it, wet, muddy, hurting, and tired, I let out a yell and chucked my walking stick into the air. We had made it. The cliffside we never thought we'd scale was behind us. We had overcome injury, rain, and cold among other things to get up to safety, a dry place, a chance to warm-up. This climb is one of the most proud moments of my life. I have to say it was truly exhilarating and fulfilling to have conquered the side of that cliff in the pouring rain and hail. I can't speak for the other two, but the two experiences of being caught in the rain this past weekend have become two of the best experiences of my time here. They make me proud to be who I am where I am doing what I am. I thank God for those opportunities. They have been great tests for me.

Once we warmed up in one of the tents for the crafts, the adventure was not over. We still had to go back down the hill on the backs of the piki-pikis. The one with Omollo crashed and we had to take a break because the road was all mud. The rain slowed and we made it down to the matatu station. We got some comfortable seats and took our wet selves right in there will all the rest of these poor people who had to endure our smell. Lucky them.

We made it home intact and slept well that Sunday night. The next day was spent doing laundry and unpacking. What a crazy trip it was! I don't know what I would have done without it though. It truly brought Martha and I through a tough patch in our friendship (I almost refused to go on the trip). I know that I have so many good experiences from this trip that I can't imagine where I'd be if I hadn't gone. God has truly used the weekend away to draw me closer and to repair relationship, not because we wanted to, because we had to. There were situations where we just HAD to come through for the other. Past behind us, we were there for the other one. Thanks.

So I know this doesn't tell you anything about September. 'Yeah! Where did that go, Chris?' Well, we shall see what comes up in the coming days and weeks. I love blogging actually. I just wish I didn't have other obligations that I like less than blogging.

Classes are seriously going well. Field research has been eye-opening. I think students should do more of it on every level. I have a term paper due at the end of October and two at the end of November, and I have a newsletter to help complete by the end of November too. Being in Master's courses, I feel extra pressure to make sure my papers will live up to those kind of expectations. My internship is going well too. Working with the other intern, Debbie, is enjoyable, so that makes it easier.

Otherwise, I have been spending time with some friends here and trying not to spend all my money.

I'm desiring more of a relationship with God and to find ways to honor my other relationships. I'm constantly reflecting on where I should be.

I'm glad some of you have been getting my postcards. The box on this end is famished for letters to me. ;) I love you all! Take care and thanks for reading the blog!

Reality check :)

So as nice and strong that last philosophical statement of mine felt, I'm looking the practicality of living so consciously straight in the face these days. That's not easy. The easy part is spelling out how I try to live. The hard part is actually doing it. Adjusting, learning, and being okay with a change is something that isn't easy. My comfort zone is comfortable for a reason! I like being there. It's comfortable to see through the lens of my upbringing and culture. I'd love to learn culture and assimilate where possible, but the reality of that is so tiring. It takes quite the amount of energy to try to think the way other cultures do. I totally understand why people don't get Africa. or Asia. Mexico. or some other place for that matter. It's not easy. I have to rest from it sometimes.

So Martha and I make chocolate chip pancakes, watch a movie from the US, or try to stay in contact with friends back at CSBSJU or on other study abroad programs. Martha will make her favorite food from the US to share for dinner, and I'll tell the jokes. I'll pick up my book from the US, and I'll keep up with the news. This is rest for me. Afterward, I try to get to what I explained in my "philosophy" in that last blog.

I thought it might be a little easier to feel comfortable here since I already had some experience living in another culture. What became obvious to me was that my knowledge of the language in Guatemala was incredibly instrumental. I thought it might be easier here because I can relate in my mother tongue. Guate culture opened up because I knew how to communicate with the locals. Kiswahili is something I haven't learned enough of yet to really communicate. This is restrictive because most friendly conversations happen in Kiswahili. It's what is comfortable for people here.

In some ways, Guatemalan culture is much more similar to that of the US than Sub-Saharan African culture is, so that and knowing the language gave me a great insight into life there. Here, I'm learning so many new things. Luckily, I'm able to make it a part of my class work in my African cultural overview class.

OKay, so back to my original point. Culture is so deeply embedded. As much as I'd like to say I can adapt so well to all these different situations, it sure can take a lot of work. I'm happy to say that I think it's worth it. I'm thankful for the hard work. It's certainly been rewarding. It's hard to believe that I've only been here for 5 weeks, but I know that is is a priceless part of my undergrad career. I've got some 9 months to go! Do pray.

p.s. please keep in touch! send anything! by any means! I hope people enjoy the postcards I've been sending

Keep living the life!

Do read monday's posts from bottom to top. There are 4. It makes more sense that way.