Birthday Blog

It’s my birthday and I’m feeling a bit nostalgic and a tad homesick, so I figured I’d go reach out into cyberspace with a little update about life lately.

Going in to this project, I figured it would take a month before I really got adjusted and started being useful at work. Maybe I can read the future, or maybe it was a self-fulfilling prophecy, but pretty much a month to the day after I started at IFP, things got hectic. Instead of just working on grant applications, I’ve somehow taken on a great deal of the World Fisheries Day planning. Though I have about 0.2% authority and virtually no means to get important things done, I’ve become somewhat of a taskmaster for the rest of the planning committee in hopes that this day will actually happen successfully. Most the deadlines I impose are completely ignored, but I am getting more persistent in my pestering. Additionally, I am writing, editing, marketing, and designing a magazine to go along with the celebrations of WFD.

The inefficient, short-sighted, and occasionally irrational way that planning happens has become quite hilarious to me. My boss is under some delusional assumption that this unorganized event at a remote location will draw in thousands of people, and therefore has unreasonable expectations. He wanted to charge $500 for exhibition stalls and is insisting that we charge upwards of $400 for advertisements in the magazine. Today he asked me to draft a letter to the Prime Minister of Kenya inviting him to be the Chief Guest with less than one month’s notice. Sometimes all you can do is chuckle to yourself and go along with it because it is good to actually be doing something. At least by the end of the internship I’ll be able to add graphic design, journalism, marketing, and event planning to my resume!

On other fronts, home life is going great. The kids are great and quite sibling-like now. Apparently the other night when I was late in coming home, Ray (my 5 year old brother) was quite concerned and kept asking why I hadn’t come back yet. Becky (my 2.5 year old sister) loves to hit me and bite me just like a real sister, but within the same minute, she’ll be cuddling with me and falling asleep in my lap. Storm Over Paradise now plays for a full hour on weeknights, and it is getting so dramatic. You’ll be glad to know Aymar is out of jail, but her love for Nicolas is still being thwarted by the evil plotting of the fake Corina Rosenberg. And I just figured out that I can download free yoga podcasts on iTunes so I can work out all the kinks from the daily jostling of the 30min matatu ride to and from town.

The biggest drawback to living in Kenya is that I’m having a pretty difficult time meeting friends. Though I wouldn’t have to look very far to find a Kenyan man more than willing to be my boyfriend or a woman whose children I could sponsor, finding genuine friends is not an easy task. Other than Samantha, I don’t really hang out with anyone outside of my family. Incidentally, I finish about one whole season per week of the TV show Alias (a whole $2 on the side of the street). It is very difficult to be seen so differently. The color of my skin (and, synonymously, my economic status) enters into every interaction I have. I am getting quite sick of strangers asking for money or phone number and people assuming I am rich. I especially hate that my interactions with strangers has become extremely guarded and that I assume everyone who introduces themselves to me has a hidden (or not so hidden) agenda. I don’t want to be a racist, classist expat that only socializes with other white people, but the truth is, other Westerners are so much easier to relate to.

Now that I’m another year older and my time here is passing very quickly, the dreaded question of what my life will hold next keeps creeping into my thoughts. I’m trying to be content to enjoy the magnificent sunsets, take in as much as I can at IFP, and know that another opportunity will come my way in due time (hopefully one that pays).