Hell's Gate

I had the best weekend! Grace and I met up with friends at Fisherman's Camp in Naivasha. Rachelle cooked a lovely dinner of goat and potatoes, and we had a great time laughing around the fire that Grace (not the boys) started. We rented bikes Saturday morning and biked to Hell's Gate. We spent the whole day biking through the park, hiking, and feeling the hot springs. This was definitely my favorite weekend since I've been here! Hell's Gate has the most beautiful landscape and we got super close to the animals (zebras, warthogs, dik diks, twiggas). I have lots of pictures to show off:

I fell in love with this tree

the main tower...those are geysers on the left

hot springs

 

view from the top...I made it all the way with these terrible shoes...
I'm never showing up unprepared again :)

 

Check out more pictures here: http://morningiswheniamawake.blogspot.com/p/hells-gate.html

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend too! But now I'm back to real life again and putting off my homework. I've decided to cut my hair off this week! It's too much work...time to do it like the Africans and get rid of it.

If you hadn't noticed, I put up more of my pictures and friends' pictures. Check out the links at the top of the page!

Home Is Whenever I'm With You

I realized I haven't shared much about my homestay family. It's hard to describe what it's like to stay with a different family in a different culture. Here are a few pictures I've taken of my house...

My mum likes to decorate (just like my mom!) so I feel fairly at home in our brightly colored house (orange, red, lime green...)

 

I helped my mum pick out a new vase at a hand-made glass blowing shop. They had glass mugs with glass-blown elephant heads as handles. I was really tempted to buy them but realized they probably wouldn't make it home in one piece. 

 

I share a bedroom with my 9 year old sister Tamara. She makes me laugh every morning as she rolls out of bed. I'm not used to little siblings so I'm thankful that my family is hosting me and allowing me to gain some much needed patience.

My family just moved into our house in July. Every weekend I'm away, I come home to something different, the walls painted a different color or a new tree planted in the yard.

 

I hope to share more about my family, but as I said before, it's hard to describe. I also don't want to violate their privacy and share too much. I'll be moving to a new homestay family when I move to Kisumu in two weeks. I think I've already said this, but time is going by so fast! 

Children constantly watch TV here. I've been trying to get creative to get Tamara away from the trashy Mexican soap operas that are always on.  I promised I'd get paper from the store so we could water-color paint today. Maybe if you're lucky, I'll paint a picture for you :)

Three more weeks!

Jambo! Jama (our head professor) took us on a field trip this week to see the differences between the formal and informal economy in Kenya. Because the formal economy cannot handle the flood of people into the city centers, many Kenyans have resorted to the informal economy for money. We traveled through areas surrounding Nairobi. The most interesting stop was a small town where men used recycled materials to make pots, kettles, and other household goods. Jama took us into the center to see men hammering away at metal scraps. It was so impressive and something I wish I could show all of you, but I felt rude taking a picture of intensive labor. Jama encouraged us not to feel guilty because we were not there to watch but to learn. We then drove by a market full of beaded jewelry, so of course, all us girls returned the next day!

check out these earrings....

I returned home from the market to discover a goat head roasting over an open flame on my front porch...teeth, eyes, the whole thing (two days earlier, Maxi, our house help, was butchering the body on our kitchen floor). I only ate vegetables for dinner...

This weekend is chill. I decided I needed to get a start on the 50 plus pages of essays I have due at the end of the semester. Tugi and Tamara looked sad when I left this morning for Java House. They told me it was boring when I'm not there and that I looked pretty today. I love them.

I think I'm starting to get used to this place. The trip through Nairobi with Jama certainly helped. It is hard for me to think just as I'm getting the hang of it, I'll leave. Only three more weeks left in Nairobi before I head to Kisumu for my internship. I guess that's the way things work.