today was my first day on the job. i got skanked up in american business casual, hailed a matatu, and wandered up Gitanga Road with my roomate Brooke. however, we got quite lost and on our brief morning commute turned into 45 minutes of wandering.
Being it the city for two days now, it has become clear to me the ncessity of viewing Kenya with "new eyes." despite my best intentinos, i find myself comparing Nairobi to the world i konw back home, and of course there are differences. however, the western snobbert that such comparison generates is quite harmful. at times, when i am not being critical of my own thought processes, i find myself acting like i imagine a white european would: the people are novelities, the ways of ife are novelties. more that noce, the industrializatin and entrepreneurship ventures (candy carts, soda shops, roadside shoe repair) have struck me as 'cute'. fluent english speakers also surprise me in a way that i can only classify as western egoism. i hate how i have internalized so many american notions of living dispite my distate for the US. blah.
so, my mission for the next couple of days is to stop living inside my head here. to me, that means blending in comfortably enough to stop being a perpetual outsider. i also want to stop carrying valuables around, so i can relax a bit. finally, i want to reserve all judgement about kenyan ways of life and (addendum)make actual provisions for helping street children because mutal aid ROCKS.
Sunday, May 30, 2004
Today has been my first full day in Nairobi. I went to bed around what was perhaps midnight, and awoke around 8am to the phonecall of my parents. Actually, the sky was so ambiguosly colored I woke up minutes before on my own accord, fearing that I had slept through a noon meetup.
I've seen very little of Nairobi. However, I marched down to a shopping mall called the YaYa Centre today, and spent an ungodgly $40 on food. What is far worse, however, is the fact that there remains nothing for me to eat. -- no spices, certainly. I forgot my beloved 'liquid aminos' at home, which almost made me cry this afternoon. I've certainly been fantisizing about having my bottle of Braggs express-mailed to Kenya. To be honest, at this point I can't think of anything that would turn me on more.
I'm feeling a it frustrated and a bit antsy, but I am trying to combat these emotions by reading. Im about one hundred pages into Ursual Le Guin's The Dispossed. I don't think my trip to Utopialand will be rounded out until I sample Thomas More's classic, however.
I was able to come up with a list of reading questions. Namely, under the anarchist frame, (1) what are the advantages of rule without government? and , (2) is it possible to have 'freedom' in a soceity with government?
there are such lovely trees in kenya.
I've seen very little of Nairobi. However, I marched down to a shopping mall called the YaYa Centre today, and spent an ungodgly $40 on food. What is far worse, however, is the fact that there remains nothing for me to eat. -- no spices, certainly. I forgot my beloved 'liquid aminos' at home, which almost made me cry this afternoon. I've certainly been fantisizing about having my bottle of Braggs express-mailed to Kenya. To be honest, at this point I can't think of anything that would turn me on more.
I'm feeling a it frustrated and a bit antsy, but I am trying to combat these emotions by reading. Im about one hundred pages into Ursual Le Guin's The Dispossed. I don't think my trip to Utopialand will be rounded out until I sample Thomas More's classic, however.
I was able to come up with a list of reading questions. Namely, under the anarchist frame, (1) what are the advantages of rule without government? and , (2) is it possible to have 'freedom' in a soceity with government?
there are such lovely trees in kenya.
