My Site!

Mfangano Island is beautiful and the people are very welcoming. I love the children in my host organization; they bring me water from the lake every morning. Since we live on an island our drinking, bathing, washing water comes from the lake. I have started living in my own at this point. So if you have easy cooking tips hit me up!

My house is great as you can see on the below pictures. I have two rooms, a kitchen and dinning/living room. No electricity in my house so lantern is my new best friend. I also sleep early because there is not much to do her when its dark. Finally, I walk about 30 min to charge my electronics.

My house

 Kitchen

Transportation on the island is a challenge. No vehicles on the island what’s so ever, unless people are vising from main land. Therefore, the main form of transportation is Mottobike taxi (piki piki) and Peace Corps does not allow us to ride them. So, I ended up buying a bike and riding a bike here on these roads is quite a work out!        

SWEARING IN CEREMONY

Finally Pre-Service Training (PST) is over! We were sworn in as Peace Corps Kenya volunteers as of Wednesday August 14^th! Swearing in ceremony was very exciting; most of us wore Kenya traditional out fits. Our country Director, representative from USAID, and two Kenyan officials were present. From the swearing in ceremony, we all said bye to our host families and departed to our specific sites. Took me three days to get to my island but I finally arrived safely.

Offically Peace Corps Volunteer

Ceremony

Meet the 37 Peace Corps Kenya Volunteers

WEEK 9: Finishing up training!

So, we finally made it to the end of training! Since everyone passed the LPI, we started learning local languages this week. This was a relaxing week since we were done stressing over the exam. We meet our site partners/supervisors this Tuesday. Our swearing in ceremony is this Wednesday the 14^th. The ceremony is in the morning and we go to site straight from there. Now we are just packing and doing our good byes with our host families!   

Laundry Time!

In America we take laundry machines for granted, but in Kenay we wash by hand. It’s actually not too bad. Saturday mornings are my laundry days, so I blast my Eritrean music and wash! It is surprisingly relaxing!  

LAUNDRY

TIME

BREAKING NEWS

The Nairobi international airport was set on fire yesterday, Wednesday August 7, 2013. They don't know why or how the airport was set on fire. The good thing is that no one was hurt but the main Kenyan airport has shut down. Flights are be routed to the other airports in the country and some flights are routed to neighboring countries.

Nairobi International Airport

                                  

Week 8: Teaching at local schools

This week we got the chance to teach life skills in Machakos local schools. Two of my peers and I presented on the topic of “how to care for a sick person” to form 7 which is middle school students and to form 4 which are high schools seniors. It was great experience, the students were very excited to meet and we were excited to be there. They sang us a song and they asked us to sing so my peers sang the American anthem, it was actually pretty good.

We also had our final LPI exams this week so it was a very stressful week for most of us. We all passed and we will all swear in next Wednesday!!!! 

Another mob justice story for you guys. This time it took place in my host family neighborhood. Some guys followed a woman who owns a shop to her house because he wanted to rob her. So, after she got into the house, he pointed a toy gun at her and demanded for money. The woman shouted in specific way (Kenyan have specific screaming sound that indicates danger) and then men from the neighborhood came and rescued the woman. Once again they stoned this man to death and also burnt him just incase! After talking with my host family they said Kenyans believe that mob justice send strong message to all the people that ever try to steal. Once again, according to Kenyan justice was served.