While I'm feeling all retrospective, I thought I might as well go ahead and blog about my work trip to Kisumu and Suba in June, even though it feels like a million years ago. That said, it was a really interesting trip and worth a blog entry. Also, Kisumu is a sister city of Boulder, Colorado (according to Wikipedia) and I thought it was important for Jess to know what her new town's sister city is up to these days.
My organization has programs all over Kenya, several of which I had visited when I was here in March. I hadn't yet been to the ones in the west, on Lake Victoria. These programs are all HIV/AIDS related, focusing on prevention programs, especially among the fishing families that live in small villages scattered along the beaches of Lake Victoria. They are on the whole great programs and there were just a few minor things for me to address, but to do that I needed to go out and see some of the program sites--my absolute favorite part of this job, I think.
I flew into Kisumu on a Sunday evening, coming in to the air strip low over a darkening Lake Victoria and headed out first thing Monday morning to catch the ferry from Luanda K'Otiento outside of Kisumu across the lake to Mbiti Point in Suba District.
The ferry got into Mbiti Point a few hours later and we headed straight off through the countryside...
...to visit the first program, which teaches caregivers (parents, grandparents, older siblings) of teenagers how to communicate with the teenager better. The groups meet several times a week and have an extensive curriculum with a lot of topics, some of which relate specifically to HIV prevention, but many of which only discuss ways of communicate, better understanding teenagers needs and wants and so on. The caregivers apparently really like it and were certainly active participants in the sessions I visited. The first was in a church, set inland a bit.
We stopped for lunch after that. It was as fresh and local as fresh and local gets, pulled straight from Lake Victoria that morning. The waiter was named Obama--Obama's family is from this part of Kenya, a huge point of pride and something everyone wanted to talk to me about.
This is my colleague Karari, who I was traveling with and who along with several others of our Suba District team mocked me for the mess I made of it and how much I left behind. I have to say, it was pretty good, but I have never quite required my taste for seafood after the Senegalese fermented mudfish stew incident in Paris several years ago. The waitress looked skeptical when I ordered it (having picked it randomly from the menu with no idea what it was) and said tactfully that it was a "very African dish" and was I sure? At this point I had spent an entire slightly less than two years in Africa and wasn't to be deterred by that assessment. It was horrific, my delicate American tastebuds devastated. Lesson learned.
After I'd picked my fish as clean as my clumsy American fingers could manage, we headed off to another caregivers group, this one on a fishing beach right on the lake.
While my colleagues were taking care of some financial business with the team leader which I was irrelevant to, I made some new friends.
The next morning we drove out to visit a few of the mobile voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) for HIV sites we run in the area. The first was in a little strip of businesses along the road, where I made a few more (slightly skeptical) friends.
The second site, though, was tucked down on a remote fishing beach in a little town right on the lake.
There were huge swarms of bugs around town and out across the lake looking almost like smoke. These little bugs attract the small sardine-like fish that the fishermen catch and leave to dry on nets around town. The bigger fish are more prized, though, because they bring in a bit more money.
Then we bumped back to town to catch the ferry back to Kisumu. It took awhile to load the cows (the owners can get a higher price if they sell them in Kisumu, so many who can afford to will load cattle up and ferry them across the lake when they are ready to sell) but eventually we were off.
As we were arriving back in Kisumu, we saw another ferry pulling out of dock, way overloaded with more people still fighting to get on. It is cheaper by a few shillings than the ferry I was on, but overloaded and with not nearly enough life jackets, making it much more dangerous.
My time in Kisumu was quick, just enough time to see a glance of our programs there, including another VCT, a voluntary medical male circumcision program and a prison where we have a TB program for the inmates.
I also really enjoyed driving around and seeing Kisumu as we visited the programs. It's the third largest city in Kenya and has an interesting feel. Some of this comes from the very large Indian community there.
And, of course, another fish, this time with my Kisumu colleagues at the Tilapia Beach Resort on the shores of Lake Victoria.
Before:
After:
Including the gills. Yuck.
And then, with my stomach full of fish, I flew back to Nairobi.
My organization has programs all over Kenya, several of which I had visited when I was here in March. I hadn't yet been to the ones in the west, on Lake Victoria. These programs are all HIV/AIDS related, focusing on prevention programs, especially among the fishing families that live in small villages scattered along the beaches of Lake Victoria. They are on the whole great programs and there were just a few minor things for me to address, but to do that I needed to go out and see some of the program sites--my absolute favorite part of this job, I think.
I flew into Kisumu on a Sunday evening, coming in to the air strip low over a darkening Lake Victoria and headed out first thing Monday morning to catch the ferry from Luanda K'Otiento outside of Kisumu across the lake to Mbiti Point in Suba District.
The ferry got into Mbiti Point a few hours later and we headed straight off through the countryside...
...to visit the first program, which teaches caregivers (parents, grandparents, older siblings) of teenagers how to communicate with the teenager better. The groups meet several times a week and have an extensive curriculum with a lot of topics, some of which relate specifically to HIV prevention, but many of which only discuss ways of communicate, better understanding teenagers needs and wants and so on. The caregivers apparently really like it and were certainly active participants in the sessions I visited. The first was in a church, set inland a bit.
We stopped for lunch after that. It was as fresh and local as fresh and local gets, pulled straight from Lake Victoria that morning. The waiter was named Obama--Obama's family is from this part of Kenya, a huge point of pride and something everyone wanted to talk to me about.
This is my colleague Karari, who I was traveling with and who along with several others of our Suba District team mocked me for the mess I made of it and how much I left behind. I have to say, it was pretty good, but I have never quite required my taste for seafood after the Senegalese fermented mudfish stew incident in Paris several years ago. The waitress looked skeptical when I ordered it (having picked it randomly from the menu with no idea what it was) and said tactfully that it was a "very African dish" and was I sure? At this point I had spent an entire slightly less than two years in Africa and wasn't to be deterred by that assessment. It was horrific, my delicate American tastebuds devastated. Lesson learned.
After I'd picked my fish as clean as my clumsy American fingers could manage, we headed off to another caregivers group, this one on a fishing beach right on the lake.
While my colleagues were taking care of some financial business with the team leader which I was irrelevant to, I made some new friends.
The next morning we drove out to visit a few of the mobile voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) for HIV sites we run in the area. The first was in a little strip of businesses along the road, where I made a few more (slightly skeptical) friends.
The second site, though, was tucked down on a remote fishing beach in a little town right on the lake.
There were huge swarms of bugs around town and out across the lake looking almost like smoke. These little bugs attract the small sardine-like fish that the fishermen catch and leave to dry on nets around town. The bigger fish are more prized, though, because they bring in a bit more money.
Then we bumped back to town to catch the ferry back to Kisumu. It took awhile to load the cows (the owners can get a higher price if they sell them in Kisumu, so many who can afford to will load cattle up and ferry them across the lake when they are ready to sell) but eventually we were off.
As we were arriving back in Kisumu, we saw another ferry pulling out of dock, way overloaded with more people still fighting to get on. It is cheaper by a few shillings than the ferry I was on, but overloaded and with not nearly enough life jackets, making it much more dangerous.
My time in Kisumu was quick, just enough time to see a glance of our programs there, including another VCT, a voluntary medical male circumcision program and a prison where we have a TB program for the inmates.
I also really enjoyed driving around and seeing Kisumu as we visited the programs. It's the third largest city in Kenya and has an interesting feel. Some of this comes from the very large Indian community there.
And, of course, another fish, this time with my Kisumu colleagues at the Tilapia Beach Resort on the shores of Lake Victoria.
Before:
After:
Including the gills. Yuck.
And then, with my stomach full of fish, I flew back to Nairobi.
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