The Kenya Drama Festival

On April 15 and 16 we returned to Kakamega for the Kenya National Drama Festival.  This is a long event, that pits primary, secondary, and university students into a competition for original works of art, including dance, theater, monologues, and even film (though the film didn't seem to work out very well).  The event lasts for over a week, though we were only there for two days.  We went with Faith, who had brought her school group here years before, when she was a teacher in Kenya, and wanted to relive the moment, I think.  We saw some interesting things, and I wanted to share a few of them with you.

This is a picture of the auditorium where the secondary schools were having their performances.  We only saw a couple of things, because we were late.  It is a looong matatu ride from Eldoret.  This was held at a boys secondary school in Kakamega.

The first thing we saw was a drama in French about a girl who gets in trouble at school.  This was a secondary school production, and was well done.  This is the girls mother.

This was the school.  The students make all the sets and bring them from schools all across the country to the festival.  The productions were pretty elaborate, as you shall see.

The next thing we saw was an incredibly elaborate dance.  The theme of the festival was national unity and reconciliation.  You may not know this (I did but didn't, if you know what I mean), but after the 2007 elections in Kenya there was incredible violence in the country, and many people were killed, and the killings were ethnically based.  So, reconciliation is a big thing in the country.  In this dance, there is a couple getting married, but if I read it right a parent is objecting because the girl is marrying someone from a different group or tribe (don't really like that word).  In the end the parents are reconciled to their daughter marrying someone of a different group.

Here is the wedding in progress, a the beginning of the dance.  Its complicated, but the next bit is a video to give you flavor (if it work) of the dances.

This dance actually got second place at the festival, it was really incredible to watch.

We stayed at the Kakamega Golf Hotel, and it was very nice.  This was another one of the places that the British used to come to get away from the hotter areas of Kenya and play golf.  I don't believe that this is the original hotel, it looks a bit more 1960s or 1970s, and the British left in 1963.  But it was a very nice place.

Another shot of the hotel.

These are little bandas where we had lunch at the hotel.  They are nice.

The hotel pool.  It started to rain before we could get in.  Disappointing.

Evan at the hotel.  We were actually not excited about going to the festival, but it turned out to be a great experience.

On Monday we went to the competition for the colleges and universities, at a girl's school outside of town.  We were lucky enough to see our second award winning production, about a woman police officer who is neglecting and maybe abusing her husband.  This was in English, and easy to follow.  Spousal abuse is a huge problem here, with men beating on wives, wives beating on (drunken) husbands.  So that was kind of the central theme of this play.

Here is the husband, Mr. Jefferson (pronounced Meeeeeester Jefferson by the villagers in the play), and he has climbed a tree and is threatening to commit suicide because his wife is being so mean to him.

They call in the priest to help Mr. Jefferson and Mrs. Jefferson reconcile.

They do a flashback, recalling how the couple met....

How they courted... The two leads were very good and this was all quite fun and funny.

And how they got married.  Note the hair.  You do NOT see that kind of hair in Kenya now.

They talked Mr. Jefferson down from the tree, and the family (they had two kids, who were also hilarious) walked off happy.  At one point they had angels appear to speed the healing process (the figure in white), but to be blunt, Evan and I almost lost it because it looked like someone from the Ku Klux Klan had invaded the stage.  Only someone from the American South would probably think that.  This was a very good production.

 Another art form that shows up is the monologue, usually running about 15 or 20 minutes.  This is drawn from the African story telling tradition.  Some we saw were humorous, but this one, of a woman who has been abused, and is sheltered in a hospital, was serious and I thought was very good.

She was very passionate, and of course they write these themselves.

Very passionate performance.

Evan in front of a sculpture at the girl's school.  He did not want to do this trip, but by the end we were both saying it was a lot of fun.  We were laughing, since we were the only mzungus there, that we could tell people we were talent scouts for Jay Z or P Diddy or something like that.

This is me, getting ready for the long ride back to Eldoret.  I think what I liked, besides the great performances, was the fact that this is something tourists don't see.  This is why you come to live somewhere like Kenya for months at a time, so that you can begin to understand the culture.  I think this helped me understand it better.

A Visit to Kisumu and Lake Victoria

One of the main places I wanted to go on this visit to Africa was Lake Victoria.  Sought by European explorers for years as the source of the Nile, which it is, Lake Victoria holds tremendous fascination.  It is the third largest freshwater lake in the world, behind only Lake Superior and Lake Michigan in terms of surface area, and is the largest lake in Africa.  It is not deep, because it in a depression associated with the rift valley, but it is big.  We visited Kisumu, the major Kenyan city on the lake on April 7 and 8, and my goal was to take a boat out on the lake and eat fish from the lake.  Evan and I went with our friend Faith Maina, the other Fulbrighter, who is from Kenya.  She was a good guide.  We took a matatu to Kisumu, and then proceeded to all the things that I had planned, which hardly ever happens!  It was a fun though short trip.

This is a big lake.  Actually, Kisumu is in a bay, so this is the lake at one of its narrower places.  The lake is much lower than where we are on the plateau, and it was much, much warmer than Eldoret.

Another view, this and the above are looking towards the west, towards Uganda.

Evan and Faith getting ready to get into the little boat behind us.  The wind really was picking up as we got out on the lake.

These are some of the fishing boats that ply the lake.

Lots of birds live around the edge of the lake, eating fish.

I'm not an ornithologist, but birds are pretty!

This is an African eagle, they nest along the shore of the lake as well.

One of the main problems facing Africa is deforestation, and one of the main causes is the making of charcoal.  This is charcoal from the forests of Uganda, brought across the lake into Kenya.  The people here use charcoal to cook everything, and use it in the house, which creates a tremendous amount of indoor pollution.  Alternatives are expensive and hard to come by.

One thing the lake is also famous for: its hippos!  Here is one near the boat.

They are strangely fascinating creatures, who spend all day in the water, and come on land during the day to feed.  They also kill a lot of people every year.

They stay in groups, and there were three together, and think two are visible in this picture.  The boat was rocking like crazy because of the wind.

They are definitely fascinating animals, particularly when they fix you with their glare.

 This is the hotel that we stayed in.  It is an older colonial hotel, the Kisumu Hotel, now managed by Maseno University.  There is nothing quite like this in Eldoret.

This is the dining room.  It was very nice, and it had a nice pool, but I didn't get a picture of that.

This is the bar area in the hotel.  Again, very nice!

One of the main streets in Kisumu.  So much cleaner than Eldoret, it was laid out by the British when the railroad arrived from Mombasa, connecting by ferry with Uganda.  We don't think of Uganda as being anything other than screwed up today, but 100 years ago it was the big prize, with a large functioning economy and well organized political systems.  My, how times change....

Another view of a street in Kisumu.  Very green and uncrowded.

Don't get me wrong, it's still Africa, but it is much calmer than Eldoret, though much larger.  Go figure!

Another street scene in Kisumu.

This is a tuk-tuk, basically a golf cart sized thing that is used to transport around three or four people.  It has  handlebars like on a motorcycle to steer,, and it has a small engine, almost like lawn mower engine.  They don't do well in hilly areas, so there are only a few in Eldoret.  There are apparently a lot in Mombasa and elsewhere on the coast, where its flat, as is Kisumu.

This was our destination, the lake as evening came on, going to what is called Railroad Beach (because you have to cross the tracks) for fish grilled right in front of you.

These are the fish houses.  Okay, its not Isle of Palms or Destin, but it was great fish!

Another view of Railroad Beach.

The lake has many environmental problems, one of which is water hyacynchs which are choking parts of the lake.  You can see this boat poling through the hyacynths to get out to open water.

We finally started to eat as the sun began to set.

Evan and Faith at the restaurant.  We each  picked out our tilapia, and they were huge.  Nothing like the little scraps you get in the US.  They cook it right there and serve it with ugali and sukuma wiki (greens).  Delicious.  The problem is, we really weren't supposed to be down there after sundown, not because of robbers (though that is a concern; on the way back to town--we took a tuk-tuk) but because of the mosquitoes.  Malaria is endemic in Kisumu, worse than Eldoret because it is so wet and warm.  I fear that this is where Evan caught malaria.  Still, the fish was good!

Evan and I at dinner.  I think I got some sun on the boat ride....

The beautiful sunset over Lake Victoria.  This was one of the things I really wanted to see, and it didn't disappoint.  We left early the next morning for the matatu ride back to Eldoret.  It was a nice little trip, I wish we had stayed longer, but I am definitely glad that we went.

A Farewell Dinner for the Canadians

On April 5 there was a farewell dinner for the three Canadians who had been in Kenya for a few months.  Paige, Andrea, and Julie were great traveling companions, along with the Swedes and the Danes.  Pretty much all of these folks are now gone or are on their way out of the country.  Evan and I will be the last of the group still here.  Of course, Evan is leaving early when Leslie and Joel come, and then it will just be me.  But I wanted to give you a picture of some of the people we have met here.  We were at the one Chinese restaurant in Eldoret.  I wouldn't say it was great, but it was pretty good.  And the people are nice!

This is a picture of the whole group that was there that evening.

This is Eunice and Paige.  Eunice works in the international office, and Paige is one of the Canadians.

This is David and Grace, also Canadian, and Eric, who is from Sweden.  David and Grace leave Eldoret on Friday, May 4, to go to Mombasa and a few other places.  Eric leaves the following week.  He is the last of the Swedes (sounds like a book title...).

The two in the middle are Andrea and Julie.  They are twins, and I never quite figured out which was which, but they are very nice people.  On the left is Faith, the other Fulbrighter here at Moi, and to her right is Joey, who basically took care of the Canadian girls while they were here.  The woman whose back is to the camera is the daughter of one of the nursing instructors at the university.  Paige, who got engaged in Mombasa, by the way, worked as a nurse in the hospital.

What can I say about the three Swedish girls that were here in Eldoret!  They were great to be around.  Elin is on the left, Marie in the middle, and Petra on the right.  They worked in the hospital, and had some really horrible horror stories to share.  They had tough duty, as did Eric and Adrian.

That's Evan in the center, and to his right is Adrian, the last Swede.  He and Eric were both here as doctors in training, basically, at the hospital.  Petra was also a doctor, while Elin and Marie were both nurses.  The woman in the foreground is the nursing instructor.  All in all the mzungus we traveled with were very great people, and Evan and I are missing them.  Faith is almost done here, and once she is gone, it will just be Evan and me.