One million points.

Have you ever met anyone you truly hated? Like actually truly? Well I have, and it makes me want to scream. Certain people in this world don't really deserve to be here.

That being said, I have finally officially decided that I cannot extend Peace Corps for a third year. I was thinking before that I would maybe add an extra year, because I love teaching my kids so much. But some things (read: people) are making it very difficult to be here. So I'll be home at the end of this year! Ack! Our COS (close-of-service) date is supposed to be in November sometime, and after I COS I want to come back to the coast for a few weeks to say bye to everyone, before probably flying out of Mombasa and making it home sometime mid-December.

So that leaves me about six months. Six more months with some of the best and worst people I've ever met in my entire life. It's not all bad though. First off, my power finally came back on a few weeks ago, after they finally brought a new transformer in from Mombasa. That was promptly followed by someone from KPLC (Kenya Power and Lighting Co.) coming to Sarah's house in particular and shutting off her power alone because she was two weeks late in paying her bill. (Side note: Mind you last year when I first moved in I was not told by anyone for six months that I actually had to pay my electricity bill at all, and in that time my power was never turned off, but I guess that's besides the point. Awesome job KPLC. Way to be consistent.) So I raced my butt into town to the KPLC office and yelled at them for a while before finally agreeing to pay my bill, which also had a 580/= reconnection fee. Ugh. Needles to say my stima is on now and will hopefully stay on (save for the minor on and offs throughout the day) for the next six months.

We also had about 4 days without water last week. Usually the water follows the stima and will only go off for a few hours or so, but when I got to school and read the paper I realized they were doing some sort of pipe replacement up north in Malindi and would not be able to turn the water back on for a few days. Thankfully at school (both primary and secondary) we have tanks - I think around 1000 liters a piece - that fill from the tap while the tap is on, and then are full when the tap goes off. A thousand liters is a lot, but for 4 days with about 95 thirsty, smelly teenagers 1000 liters can go pretty fast. Thankfully the water people weren't lying when they said 4 days and it was back on as expected.

Here's another thing to be happy about: Wednesday afternoon is always NYAMA DAY. Hooray! Nyama means 'meat' in Swahili and Wednesday afternoons have the best meal of the whole week: ugali, mchicha (sort of like kale or spinach), and nyama. It's the one time in the whole week the kids get meat. Granted I eat a lot of meat on the weekends with my uber busy social life (ha!) and all the bbq's and fun dinners I get to go to. My kids, however, are not so lucky. At least they get meat at some point, but they're growing/grown kids and need their protein and one small bite of beef once a week can hardly be enough. They're still alive and kicking though, and the scarcity of good food at school makes the Wednesday afternoon meal that much better :)

Some more random thoughts/stories:

- Most of my kids obviously cannot hear a thing, this being a deaf school (contrary to what certain hated people at my school think). This forces their other senses to become impeccable, namely sight and smell. But when I'm outside the classroom the kids can't see me. So what I have heard on NUMEROUS occasions upon walking into the classroom is "We thought we smelled you coming, Sarah!" I always check with them to make sure it's a good smell and not a bad smell and they respond with, "Yeah it's a good smell. It's the Sarah smell." These kids crack me up.

- We had to give tests this week, although since we've only been teaching for about two weeks there wasn't a whole lot of information we could test. So I just ended up giving a short quiz on the board. My kids know I like to joke around and play with them but I guess sometimes they have trouble figuring out when I'm trying to be serious and when I'm not. My Form 3 math quiz had about five questions, and just for the sake of some giggles I wrote a sixth question on the board. "(6). Be happy." This was followed by a line that said the question was worth 1 million points. Totally just having fun right? Here's some of the responses my Form 3's gave to me for question # 6 (copied exactly):

• 9,000,000 cm
• 100
• I am love yu friend students All happy very good.
• Be love tearing
• God bless you Sarah
• You is can

and a lot of really funny looking happy faces. It definitely gave me a good laugh at the end of day. 

So everything is still moving here in Kilifi, though always very slowly. Africa in general has a different way of telling time than the rest of the world, but the coast of Kenya sometimes seems to be the slowest. But it does move. I've gotten myself into a pretty wonderful group of friends here and I count my lucky stars every day that I ended up HERE in Kilifi rather than some other real village in the middle of nowhere Kenya. Kilifi has almost everything I could ever need, along with a fabulous group of ex-pats from all over the world, and a bunch of white Kenyans who have taken to calling themselves the colonialists. Whatever they are and wherever they came from they're great. Kilifi seems to just attract the coolest types of people. Last weekend was spent on boats and at bbq's, eating oysters and drinking beer, and this weekend is looking like it's going to turn out very similar to the last one. Things could definitely be worse :)

I'm sitting in bed typing this post with a big fat orange tabby asleep and mid-dream next to me, belly up, paws in the air, stomach flab rolling out, and a purr machine inside him that is very reminiscent of the motorbikes you see (and hear) all over this country. It's going to be hard enough saying goodbye to my kids forever (still not sure I'll even manage it), but having to also leave my pakas behind? Too much. So I've also decided I need to bring them back with me. It's not going to be easy. Or cheap. But I can't leave them. Tummy flab and all. 

Sorry for the lack of pictures this post. My camera got stolen a few weekends back when I was being just the slightest bit complacent about leaving my things somewhere. I'll get another one soon, from a friend or I'll buy one in Mombasa. So until then, just keep looking at my albums on facebook and you should be ok :)

Until then, hugs from Kenya and happy start of summer back home!

~ Shub :)

Sarah is good at supermarkets!

So my power has been off for a week now, and I'm NOT happy about it. So not happy that I've been sleeping all the way across the bridge at the plantation, where they have power and hot showers and a washing machine and other glorious western amenities. I do miss being in my house though. And lord knows I miss my kittens. I think they miss me too, cuz they get all mushy and weird when I come home. Thankfully I think they're out terrorizing the chickens and ducks right now, so maybe they've forgotten that I leave them at night.

Anywho, school is opening today, and all my wonderful little deaf rays of sunshine are slowly returning to where I believe they're supposed to be: with me. We technically open school today but that means that many of them won't show up until this weekend probably. Fingers crossed the power is back on by then. Without power we can't have movie night, and that will be a disappointment to everyone. Plus I spent a lot of time over break stealing awesome movies from other people's hard drives for my kids. They are going to DIE for Transformers. If we ever get to watch it, that is.

Last week was another very successful Camp GLOW (Girls Leading Our World) in which I, by pure happenstance, actually ended up being a counselor. I was not going to be a counselor before because I could not make the planning meeting in Nairobi (cuz I chose to be on a boathouse in Kilifi that weekend instead) but one of the counselors for the Deaf camp got kidney stones just before camp. I, being 10 minutes from where camp was held anyways, and having already done one last year in Kisumu, was the default volunteer to ask for help. Though it was SO much work last year, I still got my butt over to camp every morning and tried my best to teach lessons that I wasn't really prepared for (can't say I do a lot of serious lesson planning at regular school either, so no big deal).

I had signed up four of my girls, and one of my teachers, all of which came except for one girl, Lilian, who lives super far away and had some issue with her bus ticket and couldn't make it. Hopefully we can make it up to her by sending her to Kisumu in August. We'll see. My other girls that came were Nazi (pronounced with a long Z) and Lucy (both Form 3), Shukurani (Form 4), and Emily Adongo, our new wonderful English teacher who signs fabulously and is the niece of a very influential Deaf lady out west.

The week was a success, as we all figured it would be. Monday we started with communication and myself and Kidanga, a deaf teacher from south coast, lead the very first session where everyone was together and we taught the hearing girls a little bit about Deaf culture. Since it was the beginning of the week, and we had not separated the hearing and the deaf yet, I wasn't sure who could hear and who could not, other than my own girls. Deafness is not something you can tell by looking at a person right? So towards the end of my talk, I was asking the girls for questions, many of which were very good, and some of which were a little strange. A girl in the front walked up and handed me a piece of paper with a question on it. I read it to myself, and automatically assuming she was deaf, signed back to her "Do you want me to announce this to the whole group?" She looked at me like I was crazy, so I asked her again. Then she motioned for me to come over, pulled me down, and whispered in my ear, "I'm not deaf." Great job, Shub. Way to start off camp by trying to sign to a hearing girl. So I attempted to recover my dignity a little bit and turn it into a lesson about how deafness is not easily seen on a person, and how the only thing deaf people cannot do is hear. The rest of the volunteer counselors and I had a good laugh about it later, at least.

We also had a quick lesson on Monday about self-esteem. We took turns going around the room and saying things that we are each good at. Some girls were good at dancing, or math, or cooking ugali, or signing. When it came around to me, I barely had a chance to raise my hands to start answering before all my girls chimed in at the same time "Supermarkets! Sarah is good at supermarkets!" This got a huge laugh out of the rest of the PCV counselors and it made me realize how much I actually do go to Tusky's. If it's there, why not use it, right? So we even wrote on the board "Sarah is good at supermarkets." Awesome. That was another running joke for the rest of the week. I just can't catch a break.

Tuesday was a day all about women's reproductive health, Wednesday was all about HIV/AIDS, and Thursday was talks about the future followed by an afternoon at the beach. I live 3km from the beach and frequent it as much as possible with my schedule, and had obviously seen beaches before, stateside and elsewhere. But the look on some of these girls faces when they saw the beach for the first time was incomparable. Having spent their whole lives in the village, I don't blame them one bit. I think when I was little the first time I saw the beach I called it a 'big sandbox.' Pretty accurate I think. So the girls spent the afternoon playing in the waves, throwing seaweed at each other, drinking soda, and enjoying themselves like never before. It was spectacular to see such unbridled joy. I got a lot of questions too about where the water ends, does it just stop at the horizon, how far does it go. "India" I kept saying, and hopefully that was right.

We also spent an entire afternoon doing our usual Peace Corps condom games: condom demos, condom relay races, condom water balloon toss, and so on. So to say the least I think the girls had fun, and therefore the week seemed very successful. I said goodbye to everyone on Saturday morning, most of whom were going all the way back to Nairobi, or thereabouts, and tried to get back into my routine at home and at school. Like I said, there's no power though. So I'm writing this post as fast as I can before my dinky little Acer battery runs out since I won't be back to the plantation until tonight.

This term is going to be extremely busy, I can feel it. And next term is somewhat of a joke, since we have conferences and medical appointments galore to get us ready to come back stateside, all of which will be happening during school, and all of which will likely be in Nairobi or farther. So again, I need to be soaking up my kids as much as possible, enjoying every second with them, and taking far too many pictures. Speaking of which, here's a bunch from Camp GLOW and some from my previous picture-less post last month. 

My boys after they won their match at provincials in Mtwapa

Getting ready for their volleyball match next.

Getting prepped for the match at nationals in Nairobi!

Fajita night in Nairobi with the girls :)

Same tiny little kitchen in Loitokitok, and same wonderful food and family :)

Begin Camp GLOW photos:

Team-building with the human knot.

Teaching something...

Shukurani - Camp GLOW superstar

PCV counselors all get together for the Cha Cha Slide. Charlie Brown!

Almost time for condom water balloon toss.

Beach day!

My girls and Emily and I! :)

And then back home to my wimpy little front yard and my adorable pakas :)

So I'm at school now and praying for my power to be back on within the week (please help!). The kids are arriving though, so that makes the day better for sure. I do still miss America sometimes and I definitely miss all the people there. That means you!

No but seriously, thanks for reading and stay classy everybody.

Love and hugs from Kenya!

~ Shub :)

Break month travels.

I think in my last post I was lamenting the fact that it would be a whole month before I see my kids again. Thankfully the break months here always go rather fast, because I end up being so darn busy.

School ended earlier than expected (I shouldn't have really expected anything though) and I had to say goodbye to a lot of the kids, while about 40 of them stayed behind to go to games. They practiced by themselves at school for a while, then on the 9th they were bused down to Mtwapa, where the special school is where they were hosting deaf game provincials for Coast this year. Mom got here on the 7th, and though she wasn't prepared for the heat of the coast, she still followed me all the way to games one day while my kids were at provincials. They all played fabulously (as they always do, I think) and actually won a lot of their games. They were told before provincials that 30 of them would be going to Nairobi for nationals, but unfortunately when the it came time to pick the kids for the Coast national team, it was Kwale (a primary deaf school in south coast) who was in charge of the picking, so it was the Kwale kids who got picked. So some of my kids got to go to Nairobi, but definitely not as many as we had first thought, and a lot of my best players weren't chosen. Ah, the beauty of helping out only yourself and your people.

Anyways, so Mom and I hung around Kilifi for a week, even though it was way too hot for her, and I tried to take her to all the breeziest, coolest places in town. I also took her to Kate's village, Takaungu, and she bought lots of bags from the sewing ladies that Kate's NGO supports. We went snorkeling one day which ended up being very nice and refreshing and the next day jumped on a bus to Nairobi (the timing worked out because I had to be there for Peace Corps work, and Mom had just about had enough of the heat of the coast). Though I wasn't technically in Nairobi for it, it was the new Education group's IST, where they all come back after their first term teaching and talk about what went wrong and how to improve. It's crazy to think it's been a year since my IST, and even crazier to think I might actually be termed a seasoned veteran at this whole 'Peace Corps' thing.

Nairobi was cold as always, but we did manage to get some work done. Amanda and I and the other secondary deaf ed-ers are trying to work on a project to streamline signs for Math, Bio, Chem, and Physics, because true KSL doesn't really have signs for most words in those subjects anyways. We got done what we could and I will be working with my kids next term on signs for Math and Physics, taking videos and pictures of all the signs, and hopefully going back to NRB to continue the project at the office.

While in Nairobi I also got to go to nationals for deaf games, and see my kids who actually did get picked to play, even with all the favoritism that went on. Though we were only there for a morning before we had to get back to the office to supposedly continue work, it was fabulous to see my kids again, and even tons of other kids from other deaf schools this side of Nairobi who I'd met before at Model School or Camp GLOW or something. I recognized way more than I could put a name and sign name too, but they all recognized me right away, so I spent a lot of time getting reintroduced to everyone. Even so, it was still wonderful just to be with deaf kids again, and feel totally at home again, right where I'm supposed to be.

Mom didn't want to throw herself back into the heat again, so she changed her ticket to fly out of Nairobi and left on Saturday and got back safe and sound yesterday morning. I had told my host family from Loitokitok that I would bring Mom and come and see them this month, but since Mom left a little bit early, I resigned to go alone and see them. I've been away from Kilifi and my pakas for over a week now, and REALLY want to get back, but I made a promise to my host fam that I'd come back so I had to follow through. So I'm currently sitting on the little bed that I slept in all of training, while the wonderful kids I lived with are all still running around screaming like always. Everyone is a whole year and a half older now though personality-wise no one has changed. Mama is still the same, always laughing, Paul is still running Baba's old carpentry shop and just bought himself the oldest truck I have ever seen, Trizzah is married with a baby in Nairobi, Anne is still sweet and always doing house chores, Henry is still as cute as ever and still giving me a hard time about being mzungu, and Monicah and Margaret are still gorgeous and have thoroughly missed playing with my hair. Luckily for them it's grown out A LOT since training - even with a haircut at Christmas - so they have a lot more to work with now.

So today we're just relaxing and hanging out and much to Mama's dismay, I will leave tomorrow to head back to Kilifi. Assuming I get back ok (haven't traveled from Loitokitok to the coast in a LONG time) I'll have a few days to relax and hang out with my kittens until Camp GLOW starts on Sunday. Though I'm not technically a counselor this time (like I was last August in Kisumu) I've nominated four of my own girls and the camp itself is five minutes from my house in Kilifi. So whether they like it or not, Shub will be a regular presence for that week. Then the next week is when school is supposed to start and lo and behold my kids come back to me again :) Which also means I'm that much closer to saying goodbye to them :(

I have lots of pictures from this month off, and will definitely take more before the term begins again, but they are all on my camera and I unfortunately left the usb cable in Kilifi. So I'll post those a little bit later this week after I get home.

Hope everything is great stateside - missing everyone all the time.

Cheers and happy April!

~ Shub out :)