First Glimpse into Kibera

1/28/11

“Daaaaang that woman’s got a mouth like Nikki Minaj!” –Wangari, after hearing one of the Kenyan soap opera stars cursing

Sometimes misfortune leads us to the most wonderful blessings. I got some disappointing news from home and came home crying yesterday. My host grandma, who I’d only heard speak in Kikuyu and Kiswahili, was the only person home, so I was struggling to explain my worries to her in Kiswahili. After a few minutes, she gently brushed my hair off of my face and said, “My child, why don’t we use English now?” Ha ha, oooops! She had a great talk with me about faith and trusting that things will work out the way they should in the end. My host mom also had the most wonderful chat with me when she got home from work; we really bonded deeply and I could feel her love radiating.

I got to go into Kibera today for the first time! It’s the largest slum in Africa, and it was so powerful to see. In addition to my classes I’m going to be doing an internship for the 6 weeks I have left in Nairobi with an organization called SHOFCO—Shining Hope For Communities. [The website is http://www.hopetoshine.org/projects/clinic/ --check it out!] After the Kenyan government instituted free public education in Kenya, the schools of Kibera became overcrowded, sometimes with over 100 students per teacher. SHOFCO started a school for girls at that time to reduce class sizes and give girls equal opportunities, and it has had great results. They’ve now expanded and a couple of months ago opened up a community clinic as well, which is where I’ll be working. They deal with pre- and antenatal care, childhood vaccinations, HIV care, women’s health, lots and lots of malaria and typhoid, and any other health problems that make it to their doors. I can’t wait to get started!

“The best reason I have come up with for looking closely into Rwanda’s stories is that ignoring them makes me even more uncomfortable about existence and my place in it.”

-Phillip Gourevitch, We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families

I think this is one of the reasons I want to volunteer in Kibera. It made me so upset in a way to see the separateness of poverty and normalcy in Nairobi. It seems all too easy to forget about the slums, to look past the pain.

Entering Kibera, the vastness of the poverty is overwhelming

The path to the clinic

The clinic where I'll be working