Hatujambo to all,
I am finally back in contact with the outside world after the first week in our little village of shichingi. Everything is going extremely well, but there will be a lot of challenges over the next two months. None of them will be winter time (how did the groundhog report), but that doesn't stop my host family from asking me i am cold when the temperature drops below 70. Kenyan hosts are very gracious, but also perhaps gratuitous. They always play the little battery radio at dinner with the mix of kenyan and american music, or sometimes the BBC, when I would much rather talk. However, dining is a personal event apparently. We'll see, I quickly got a lot more out of my sisters by night 3 and 4. In fact we've had good discussions. Everything you talk to anyone about is bringing entirely different ways of seeing the world into collission, so you can imagine the reaction when my sister asked me why there were so many africans living in my country. For one thing the concept that America is sort of a newly settled entity is a tough one for many. My father was curious if i was from the chicago clan, or maybe boston. But she didn't believe me about slavery! I felt terrible trying to explain this tragedy to her and having her doubt me entirely. Eventually I think she realized that I wouldn't lie to her about something that people are ashamed of. It was the same way when the business teacher suggested that Koreans had invented the atomic bomb and americans are trying to steal it from them. He and Jordan and I have had some very colorful discussions.
Which brings me to teaching, because I can't really talk about everything, but thats the major focus I suppose. Classes have been great so far. After two days of observing on wednesday jordan and I split the 11th grade(not the name but I translate these things both ways. They are called forms here) into two classes of 15 instead of 30. It was really easy to talk to the kids and they had plenty of questions at first, though they need to be asked once or twice to talk loudly. Then they had a break between the first and second class and I asked them to write down a dream they had, which is pretty cheesy because we were going to read Harlem (What happens to a dream deferred, does it dry up like a raisin in the sun ect.) I am sure that has been done a million times in underprivleged black classes. I was impressed at what they wrote down, but everyone thought I was talking about sleep dreams, though their english was good. I explained to them the real meaning I was looking for and then I think really successfully explained to them the metaphors in the poem. The second homework round 75% gave me a real aspiration as oppossed to a sleep dream. Progress. Now we are reading an assigned novel that the exit exams for college will be on. They also have to read Merchant of Venice (Oy vey) in 12th grade, but luckily someone else is teaching that. This book is about Kenyan independence and is called "Coming To Birth" Its written by an english expat and is fairly good. There is a lot of Vocab to explain and the students don't learn the history of independence till later this year, so I am explaining to them all of the events, which is really silly and useless. I also have a business Class, which has only met once because of a church event (the Jubilee year, my torah portion! I explained to a few people that they were pronouncing shofar wrong). But I started off with questions and then doing the best lesson I could think of: Marxist representation of Value! Their assignment for the weekend is to explain why money is valuable. That will be a lot better than their text book, which is full of simple descriptions of markets and trade areas and simple business descriptions. We're going to work on understanding how business works first, then how to run a business because they come from an agrarian society where 60 percent of the population is unemployed by a traditional business and the same number farms some or all of their sustinence. They couldn't believe I had so many cows or that we didn't drink any of their milk, or that there are only 4 workers on the farm or that anything about how capital has replaced parts of their society work. So that has to be explained. Most of those kids will never run a business, let alone work for one. Division of labor and value theory are essential. Then we'll get into the boring stuff.
I could probably write for a really long time. I'm still exploring opening a micro finance bank in my village. For example there was a farmer who saved money, planted his field with cane, and then ran out of money before the harvest, and has let the field go untamed and might not get to harvest it. These sorts of things require the availability of accessible, relatively cheap cash flow. I have to be careful though, this is a nation where the children read the merchant of venice! Anyway, I hope everyone is doing well, mom and dad to let you know, Letters take about 2 weeks. There may be some in the pipeline or not. I won't say. Please write me and let me know of the daily events in your life. There is a lot more I didn't correspond, but I am taking a diary so these things will not be forgotten.
Love,
Jesse
On 1/26/07, Jesse Hoff
Habari gani to everyone. I am having a really amazing time thus far. My group mates are exciting kids, Alex is a wonderful leader, Safari has been amazing, we're settling down in kakamega for the weekend then sunday we go to our villages finally. Wednesday we start teaching! It turns out that without a serious amount of work I won't be learning kiswahili on my own, the English is too good and widespread here. We spent the first few days traveling to parks and working on swahili (not so much though) and teacher training. I can't believe how excited I am for teaching. We saw some enormous mountains and craters, went on some driving and walking safaris, camped out at a kind of muzungo (westerner) campground. I have now seen most of the cool wildlife in their native areas. It was good to get out of touristy areas though; it was an uncomfortable relationship with the drivers and guides and everyone responsible for the tourist industry and the tourists. They are extremely forceful about certain things and won't accept help or our desire to operate independently , but now that we are in the western province that has changed. People actually desire befriending you and are curious as opposed to opportunistic. The caretaker and cook for alex's farmhouse is also our swahili teacher in kakamega, and is a really great guy. We've been playing soccer and talking with him, and he's allows the girls to help him cook and doesn't keep us from taking care of things like bags and tents ourselves. We've talked to embassy officials (sort of out of touch frankly), aid workers, ngo employees, kenyans, everyone. I really want to be an economist now (and by the way sash, congrats on LSE, i'm really jealous), and study the way these things work. 60-70 percent of all employment is unofficial and most people really survive off of backyard plots. The population has increased five fold since 1968's independence, when it was about 3-4 million and is now 30-40 million, so the success of these backyard plots is running its course. I had a vigorous debate with alex's girlfriend (an ngo worker for womens rights) as to whether consolidation and modern farming techniques would make a more sustainable, productive agricultural environment. These are all questions I will be trying to answer. It looks like in addition to english I will teach either physics or Bio. Sorry about the phone call by the way dad, Skype is too slow here to work. I will use a landline soon. More updates later, probably next weekend, but maybe sunday before I go to the village, Take care everyone and good luck (I read your emails, you sound well)
Love,
Jesse
1 comment:
Very interesting!
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