A little awesomeness

I enjoy participating in “blog-action campaigns”. They are for causes I believe in (like good science and good aid) and they give me motivation to tell a quick story. 

* * * 

This year some of my favourite aid bloggers are organising the second annual “Day without Dignity” campaign aimed at highlighting the dignity of people aid is trying to help. The theme this year is Local Champions and you should check out the call to arms and the other contributions, which are generally more awesome than my own. 

* * * 

Sometimes I joke that I measure the awesomeness of a project by the number of sacks of cement that were used, but in all seriousness the awesomeness of most water and sanitation projects is derived from the local masons. Masons are the dudes who mix up the cement, who slap it around on broken trowels to build up foundations and to build down wells. But they do a lot more than play with cement.

* * *

Meet Joseph. He’s a mason. He’s organized. He’s short and he smiles a lot. He likes meeting new people. He’s also a beneficiary of aid: he’s been labelled an “internally displaced person” and lives in a crowded camp in a crappy tent. When I met him I worked for an NGO building toilets, showers, and such things in his camp in Kenya. 

He is what made our project awesome. 

He helped us with our toilets: made sure we built enough, made sure they were easy to build, and made sure people would use them.  He helped us with the shower grease traps. He helped us find more good masons. 

But he did more than just build stuff and play with cement.

He initiated a successful system whereby any of the IDPs could borrow the NGO tools if they needed them for work they wanted to do on their own plot.

He got involved in health promotion activities and trained others.

He started his own NGO or masons cooperative to help with building up the resettlement areas, especially championing the importance of sanitation.

For months after our project was finished he called me to tell me about what he was doing and it was always awesome. 

* * * 

Meet Nur. He’s a mason. He’s also short, and more rotund than Joseph. He has a round face and wares a beanie. He doesn’t speak much English and I don’t speak any Somali, but we liked each other. I met him in Mandera in Northeastern Kenya and I got to know him over several years.
 

Telling you about Nur and how he made the projects awesome is harder than for Joseph because he was subtle. I had great affection for Nur because he treated me as technically competent in a world where the engineering advice of a young white woman was not always welcomed by teams of old black men (understandably). When he needed to talk to me he would sit with someone who could write in English and write me a letter, then he would come to my office and deliver the letter to me by his own hand. He continued to write me letters even when I was based in Nairobi.

He started as a daily worker mason, but soon it was clear that he was a quiet leader, that he was technically competent and smart, and that he was honest. He was soon running several sites, keeping track of materials consumption, and basically doing more than his share of work and sometimes doing it better than his superiors. Needless to say, as our team grew over the years he was hired as the only full time mason position.

He was what made our projects awesome. 

He improved the well and tank designs. He taught other masons how to improve their works. 

He trained lay community members on hygiene, maintenance, and use of their water supply. 

He helped ensure that the community feedback was incorporated into the project properly by interpreting it (not the language, but the ideas, which is harder than it sounds).

He was a community leader himself. 

He was awesome and he made our programs awesome. 

* * * 

Water and sanitation projects generally build things, which is part of why I love my job. I get dirty. I stick together piles of rock and sand with water and cement powder – but really I don’t. 

I don’t build anything. 

The masons do. 

They build everything. 

They also build the community and are often the key to how sustainable a project is. 

And they’re awesome.

Tourist tales

It's been a while, I know. I've been on vacation and have now emptied my brain of all things.
Time to fill it back up.

* * *

I started this "10 writing contest adventure" back in April last year. I have entered 6 so far, again - no wins and waiting on 1 result. I will try to at least enter the last 4 before this April. Look for that coming up.

* * *

Two perspectives of malaria.

I have had malaria twice while working: first time in DR Congo, second time in Kenya. The routine when you are in the bush is to find someone to look at a blood slide, get some meds and rest (no big deal). Malaria fevers come in cycles. Mornings are clear, afternoons wreck you- so in Congo I would go to work in the morning, then go home in the afternoon and cry about my crazy sick malaria induced nightmares and headaches. Total cost: 10$ maximum.

The third time I had malaria, I was on vacation: I was 4 days back to "the homeland" from Haiti this past November. In the great United States, malaria was deemed "a life threatening condition". Emergency room, ICU, specialist infectious disease doctors, CDC reports, more doctors and visits from students. Monitors of all sorts of vital signs, IVs, worries about my low blood pressure, but never enough pain meds to eliminate the incredible headaches. Total cost: 36,000$ minimum.

* * *

Next leg of the vacation was Syria for Christmas time (and a weekend in Beirut, Lebanon). I was somehow surprised, and somehow not surprised, to find that Christmas in the Middle East is just as commercialized and tacky as it is in the states. Almost identical. Neighborhoods where neighbors compete with extreme lights displays. Sales. Carols in the malls.

Mario and his family were superb hosts to this intrepid in-law-come-tourist. We visited many stark, dusty, open, sunny, quiet, old sites... St. Simion church where a man stood on the pillar for 40 years and today rests an obilisk, the Citadel in Aleppo, Ain Dara site, Rasafa and Jabbar castle on a pristine lake. I guess because of the season, there was no one around.

It was as if all these ancient walls, rooms, stables, churches, mosques existed only for me to crawl around in. Mario was a good sport and waited patiently while his wife turned into a kid crawling down, down into water cisterns and up, up onto falling down walls where I thought the slight wind might blow me over.

Driving to and from such sites gave another view of Syria. Not the upper middle class apartments and Christmas lights. Not the ancient antiquities and tourists sites. Mud houses, nomadic tents of farm workers, bright clothes on the lines, black dirty workshops tucked into a tiny unfinished room, bus stops with tiny shade. Men working, drinking tea. Stooped women in heavy clothes. Boys collecting sticks. Girls collecting water on their backs, with donkeys. Agriculture. Rain fed. Irrigation- unlined canals, lined canals built parabolas leveled just so, weirs, gates, control valves, drip systems, boreholes, rotating sprays like Nebraska.


Syria is under drought.
Like Kenya. Like Afghanistan.
While others are under water.

To the right is me in a huge water cistern. Long ago it was filled with rain water, collected runoff in a desert in northern Syria. While differing in construction and style from those in northern Kenya, it is basically the same thing as what is called a birkad in Somali.

* * *

Then the great return to Kenya for 2 weeks. A week at the beach. Few days in the mountains. Our old haunts. Saw lots of wonderful friends.

Driving in from the airport to town, some things seemed to have changed. Some roads were repaired. A new overpass and bridge was under construction. Many new apartment buildings going up too quickly to be built to code. The slums are so big, you don't notice they grow.

Reading the paper, nothing seemed to have changed. The International Criminal Court has publicly named 6 politicians for inciting the last bout of ethnic violence associated with the 2007 elections (see post from 2008). The unity government promptly dedicated millions to defending them and is on a major campaign to keep the 6 in Kenya for trial. Meanwhile, the northern areas of the country is being thrashed by more (repeated without recovery) drought, animals and livelihoods dying, people are threatened by lack of food and water, while the farmers in the bread basket area of the country have ruined crops.

It isn't as simple as one paragraph. Or even two.
It never is.

Unemployed men still seek out small shadows under trees, bushes, skinny lamp posts on every median, every corner, every small park in which to curl and hide from sun and sons and wives during hot afternoons spent waiting.

* * *

Next up, first impressions of my new home, Cairo.

An Optimistic Pre-quel

Back in 2006, I arrived in Kenya and was on my way to the wild northeastern bush- Mandera. I didn't know much about Kenya or Nairobi and, more importantly, I didn't know much about Mandera... just that it was dry, there was a strict curfew and nothing to do anyway but sit on the roof and gaze over the hills at Ethiopia or Somalia. I'd need some entertainment.

In preparation, I dutifully went to the bookstore downstairs from the movie theater and started picking stuff up.

It was here that I discovered "Kwani?" - the Kenyan literary magazine.

It is full of fantastic writing in English, Kiswahili and Sheng (an evolving slang language of the youth). Okay, let's be honest, I can really only say the English is entertaining, I can't read Kiswahili or Sheng.
It has poetry, stories, cartoons and other sort of creative stuff.

It has a pulse.
It is political.
It is gives an insightful perspective into the thoughts of Kenya and - to me personally - a bit of optimism for this country.

Since the post election violence at the end of 2007 (see Kenya Quickie)- Kwani? has sponsored and lead some of the most moving efforts at showing and questioning what really happened to people, as well as peace building and reconciliation through art. Take a look around thier site.

So there I sat on my way to Mandera with the 2005 edition of Kwani? in hand, in a yellow, 7-seat, twin-prop plane. There were plasic jerrycans of fuel stored in the nose and wings of the plane. The fumes wafted back. The big people were spaced in the plane to balance it out. Someone's daughter was on the lap of the Head of Mission. It flew low but finally did make it. The flight was 5 hours long (or more?) and I didn't read a page. An interesting beginning to my relationship with Kenya...

Since then, there has been at least 3 more Kwani? published, as well as some feature length books, some of which I bought - and then at some point I seemed to have lost or given away somewhere.

(And a historical note, it was on my way out of Mandera when I started this blog.)

El Nino

And what of this... absence? I take no responsibilty, whatsoever. Though I have no excuses.
Past months in suspended animation, I should have made that time somehow.

Remember a comment on kidnapping? (On kidnapping) eh well. Phrophetic of course... An entry I started back in July: "I love my job. But there are days it makes me speachless and this weekend has been one. 3 collegues were kidnapped, to join others somewhere in Somalia. You get in the habit of sarcastic emails, farts and animal noises. You get used to disagreements with warmth."

I never finished the entry. A little scared of being sentimental, which is fine over a beer when the guys got out in October, but not so entertaining here. Frustrating this time has been. Stiffled, yet somehow free eventually.

***

Passing time is inevitably seen
blowing past a window screen
ostrich plumes and elephant tracks
crocodile teeth and camel backs
flat red roads run to rocky hills
drying rivers tests a mother's will
Got out to walk on black craggy stone
sometimes salt white, dust alone
water from rock where donkeys drink
blinding desert, pupils shrink
skinny man, his wives wash grime
parched and poor, not pressed for time

***

Drying Ewaso Nyrio River in January.
Today it flooded it's banks.
Precocious little bastard.

Spring in the middle of nowhere.
This photo does not justice.

Thirsty cows.
'Nough said.

Typical scene at a drying earth pan.
Little bit of everything.

animals

****

take a deep breath and clear your mind
but i'm in a smokey room here
i'm afraid of respiration
i can't make it to the door

not long to see the moon
through dust storms without lightning
i have lived through one or two
and i think ill see another

at the river bend
the water keeps its way down
keeps the wind clear from the smoke
keeps the mind from knots

***
Camels share a single cup.
***
Giraffes glide through trees with grace.

***
I walk the line.

Kenya Kataclysm

Back in November, I took a little trip to Takaba. That is up in Northeastern Kenya where we have some cool programs running. It was in the rainy season and it was lovely... except the flat tires (that's the hook there, can't beat a little suspense).

***

On the road between Malkamari and Takaba:

There wasn’t much to see the second time round

Lightning still broke the wide skies, silent as the sun sank
We past this turn before, she thought
As roads became rivers, melting sand to glass pathways
without wind before but waves behind shifting beneath tires
Red to green muddled eyes climbed muddy trees
A wild grey cat in the shadows motionless watching waves
Rain and thunder joined the lighting and still no wind
Perhaps there is indeed some magic here to see
she thought the second time around


***

On Takaba by night:

Seems these days I don’t hear anything
Only silence and bullfrogs singing off the hills
Filled their ponds, their houseboats
Where are they in drought?

***

Takaba was cool (work wise) - except then it got hot (security wise) and we had to bolt out the back door to get back to Nairobi: via Moyale. Driving from Takaba to Moyale is only 5 hours usually, but it took us about 10. We braved the mud pits! Then we smartened up and just drove through the brush to avoid the mud pits, the drivers keeping top speed as not to sink... Then the epic of the flats began.

Two at a time - with only one spare (which is half flat, so really only a quarter of what we need)!

What to do? What to do?
(.... interlude under the only shade tree for several hours, talking human resources....)

Ah - Ha! What is coming over the horizon? That's a Matatu (local public transport, see photo below)! And oh what luck, the driver of this truck is a friend of our driver and he lends us his spare tire. And we are off again, with the matatu spare that is too big for our car and rubs at every turn. And our original spare is low on air, but it'll have to do... Ah - Ha! What is that bumping down the road? It is a BIG truck, and a nice one! They have an air compressor and are very nice and fill up our half flat spare... And we are off again...

As we roll into Moyale (a boarder town with Ethiopia that hasn't much to offer) the spare from the matatu gets a leak! But we tax the tires and keep driving, leaking and all, to the hotel and park the car at the police station just as the tire becomes too flat to move.
We have dinner at the Prison Canteen "under da shades" and da stars.

(Just a note, the next day I fly back to Nairobi and having been in the bush eating goat meat for a week, Mario takes me out for Sushi. On the way to the restaurant ... you guessed it! We got a flat tire! 4 and a half flats in 36 hours. That's a pretty good record.)

Back to Moyale, the boarder town with not much to offer, as I mentioned. Moyale by night is not an exciting thing. But we let sleeping goats lie...

This is our hotel in the day time. The hills in the background might be Ethiopia. They might not be. Who knows.

Moyale Intenational Airport, Gate 3, Boarding for Nairobi
The pilot inspects the plane before takeoff and seems to spy a problem.
"Is it gonna fly?"

Not until we get the cows out of the landing gear!

Just kidding! That's not really our plane (and that's not the pilot, it's our watsan engineer). That's a dead plane on the airstrip (no African air strip, dare I say airport, is complete without a dead plane or two, see blog of "Welcome back Congo").
We made it back to Nairobi safe and sound.

***

On Kidnapping:

Each time it seems to get closer; hoping it's an illusion
like when the moon is on the horizon and it seems bigger.

*** *** ***

A few months ago I had a blog about “Kenyan Quickie” where I described my rapid adventure in toilet building in the camps that developed when people were displaced due to fighting and violence after the 2007 Kenyan elections.

So… 1 year later. Those political folks in the elections found a “power sharing deal.” There is a report into the violence on the table, with ultimatums of a Kenyan tribunal or the Hague. Personally, I can’t help but be skeptical. Is there real accountability, real responsibility, real closure? I can’t help but feel sad; those who were harmed, stay harmed and they are the ones who want this peace, who want reconciliation, who just want to live the life they have or had, who want their sons and cows and sheep and houses back. There’s a lot of fear and a lot of hope and my biased, skewed and skeptical view won’t really help fix the hurt either way. And neither will all the 378 latrines we built.

And yes, so 1 year later and we are closing our programs in that area (Nakuru) because it is time - the emergency is over, things are getting back to "normal" and the situation is outside our meager mandate. You can only save the world if you're focused, you know. But we built a lot of latrines and showers and water supply systems, some trash bins and distributed a lot of tools, jerry cans, soap, water filters, and other hygiene products and to top it off a lot of hygiene promotion (awareness raising). So what was the impact? Why do we do what we do? Well, we just did a survey to find out – and here is what we found. In areas where we worked people are twice as healthy (or half as many general illnesses); there is 3 times less diarrhea for children! People are 4 times more likely to drink potable water. So that’s nice.

Like I said, you can only save the world if you're focused.

Nairobi - not so bad

Well life isn't so bad in Nairobi. Nai-robbery. We live in a nice neighborhood, in a nice house that comes with a dog (nice german shepard who's called Leo). We have a normal life. We go to work and come home to be together and say "how was your day, honey?" I cook, I do the dishes, he does the rest of the cleaning and the finances. Sadly typical, yet comforting.

Don't worry anyone, this is our house, inside a walled and guarded compound. You can't see this from the road.



Welcome, as you come in the door (which is on the side of the house)- here is what you see.

Walk across the room and look back, you can see we have a sweeet loft upstairs area....

And looking down from the loft on the living room.
But just when you get tired of the normal life- jonsing for some camel meat, scarred donkeys, diarrhea, cold showers, and the wind in your hair - a field visit to bases saves the day... Mandera, Garissa or Nakuru (and Mario heads to Somalia), just enough to spice it up enough to remind us why we love our jobs: the dusty, bumpy roads, big camels (cute and tastey), dirty kids (cute and funny), land cruisers, cement mixes and sunburns.

Kenya Quickie

I was back in Kenya for the past 2 months (February and March) for a short mission being the WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) program manager of the emergency response programme for Kenyans displaced by the violence after the elections. (Mission in my job means "assignment" - I assure you it has nothing to do with "missionaries" nor "top secret" missions.)

What a great time. I have learned a lot and working in camps, which has been a new challenge. Here are some photos. I am a bit cautious to comment on generalities, as the situation is quite political. I guess what was important for my life was the pace of work, the lessons learned from colleagues, analysis, protection discussions. Most memorable were the smiles of those who'd lost everything or who brought it all with them, stories and laughs and wondering where the truth is...

........

One man hid in a well for 2 days to escape people who were trying to hack him up. Then one day I saw a crow on phone line and it was wobbling, on the wire, all ruffed up with feathers sticking out all which ways, back and forth, about to fall off, back and forth.... And I thought of this guy in the well.

So with their houses burned they ran with nothing, or from just a fear of burning, rumors of burning they packed up their things. Some with nothing. Some with everything.

It is easier to show you those that packed it all up ... their chairs beds tv antenna , literately the kitchen sink.

Still smiling.

Not exactly welcomed to the stadium in Nakuru, but also not refused.
The showground had more people, although this picture was taken before they moved into this section of the camp. A bit strange like a ghost town for ghosts that have never been.
Some didn't feel safe in places like the showground or the stadium.
Some settled at polices stations all around the country, like this tiny group of ramshakle shelters made as just a roof from plastic sheeting with dirt floors. They felt safer there, the police to protect them, but they had no tents and rarely food.
In this camp (shown above) a baby had been born with no medical care available, the photo below was taken inside one of these tents with the mother (behind) and her sister holding the baby.
...............................................................................
My work entailed building a lot of toilets. I have never built so many toilets and showers and clothes lines in so little time. Here is a view from a top the water tanks looking out over the showground upper site - as you can see the folks had moved in by this time.
These are the water tanks from which the previous photo was taken. We, with the Kenyan Red Cross built the tanks and water supply. Good collaboration thanks to some speical people.