Just returned from a week-long homestay in Kericho, Kenya. It was an incredible, and also quite difficult, experience. I stayed with a family who belong to the Kipsigis ethnic group, a sub group of the Kalenjin people who inhabit the Rift Valley. My mom was a primary school teacher, my dad a tea farmer, and my sister a maternity doctor. I went to school with my mom, plucked tea on the farm, attended church with my family, roasted maize over a bonfire, and went to the market. Many people in the community rarely, if ever, saw white people. Walking through the market and having every person's eyes immediately fixed on me was a feeling I'll never forget.
We met our parents at a ceremony involving lots of dancing and chai. I was given the name of Chebet, meaning "one who was born during the daytime" upon joining their family.
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| All the host families were gifted avocado trees. We planted ours together the first evening. |
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| My sister, Lorraine, and I before she had to leave for the week to go back to work at the hospital. |
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| My parents, Leah and Josiah, loved taking selfies. Of course I had to take a few too. |
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| My family's house and one of their guard dogs. |
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| We cooked meals over an open fire in the kitchen (though this pot just contains water I was heating for a shower). Lunch and dinner every day consisted of ugali, rice, cabbage, a little bit of beef, and lots of fresh fruit. I would estimate 80% of the food we ate was grown in their garden. I did a lot of cooking with my mom and a LOT of dishes. |
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| Every day at 4pm was tea time, but being on "Kenyan time" meant we usually had tea around 6pm, and dinner at 9:30 immediately before bed. Here we made mandazi (similar to a donut) to go with the chai. |
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| An outside hand washing station, called a tippy tap, that was placed next to the outhouse/washroom. |
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| My family owned several fields of tea, and I helped pick tea, called "tipping," a few times. To produce the best quality tea, only two leaves and a bud are harvested from the bush; most of the older leaves on the plant are ignored. Immediately after harvesting, we carried the tea down the road to the buying center where it was quality checked, weighed, and lifted onto a truck to be taken to the factory and processed. My family sold their tea to a brand called Finaly's, which exports tea to the U.K. and U.S. |
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| Drawing water from the well. My family used a combination of well water and carried water from a river source located about 3/4 of a mile from the home. |
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| I milked the cow every morning and evening. The milk was then used to make chai or a Kipsigis favorite called mursik. Mursik is made by heating milk and pouring it into a gourd, mixing it with charcoal from the fire, and letting it sit and essentially go sour for two days. I drank some mursik, but much preferred the chai. |
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On the drive back to Nairobi we stopped at Lake Elementeita, which was teaming with flamingoes! One of the most beautiful lakes I've seen, and a welcome break from the 6 hour drive. Kenyan roads, while well maintained, have an extreme number of speed bumps. Back of the van can get a little jostling.
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Happy to be back on the compound now and starting classes tomorrow!
