Family Deluuuuxxeee

Ama - Mama feat. Baby Kalila
#Swaaaag!

Family is the most precious thing in life.

Once again I had the opportunity to realize that (some people never do).

My parents are the most important persons in my life and I appreciate the way they raised me every single day. The older I grow the more I can see where my character, humour, looks etc. come from. 

And I'm proud. 

It's not like we always had/have a peaceful family life. In fact we have many disputes and discussions but if I had to choose role models I would definetly pick my parents.

It's such a privilege to have a mother and father. Since I'm living with orphans I know this even better.

It makes it hard talking about (great) family life knowing they never had the chance to live the same way.

At least the good thing is that my parents and my surounding always gave/give me enough love, so I have a looooooot of loove I can pass to them. 

I really hope these orphans will have their own gorgeous and healthy family life one day.

Even though they're sometimes smart-alecky, chaotic and too busy to care about my problems -

I would NEVER trade the world for my parents.

"...Sie hat alles im Griff, meine Mutter ist ein Wunder. Ich denk kurz ich bin der King doch dann holt sie mich wieder runter." (Sido ;) )  

In the end family is more than parents... Especially in countries like Kenya.

Family constellations are easy to explain:

Your grandma (shosho) is not just the mother of your mother.

All brothers and sisters of this shosho are also your grandma's and grandpa's.

And it goes on... My cousins are not just my aunties/uncles kids, but also the grandchildren of the other shosho's & guka's (grandfather). 

cousins, guka and shosho's. From the left:
Waithira, me, guka, shosho's sis, shosho, shosho's sis, Wanyamu, Muthoni, Kinyanjui

Sooo last weekend I was invited to a family-get-together at my shosho's sisters' place.

What happened: I hardly knew anyone. 

It was a lot of fun meeting my cousins and aunties from another shosh!

There was a lot of food and drinks and introductions so that everyone got to get an orientation of the family.

I even met my auntie (my mom's cousin) from London with her newborn. When her first daughter was born four years ago I went many times to England to babysit, for the first birthday, the christening...  Now after we haven't seen each other for long we met at the family-get-together. It was so nice! And she's like the coolest auntie ever!

Cousins from three (of six) different parts of the family... Not sure if we look alike... But we're all pretty ;)

Except of the big family-thing in the last week didn't happen that much... Or hold on!

My cousins' baby was finally born! We spent the whole weekend waiting... Nothing happened...

When we went to the hospital for the check-up on monday they told us the baby is too big to get pushed.

It's a babygirl! Called Kalila and or Salima :)
Bless this baby...! 

Means: They booked her a scisserian for the next day. No one was (mentally) prepared for this step.
My cousin didn't even had time to think about it. We brought her back to the hospital two hours later in expectation to come back the next day in the morning for (baby) visiting hour after everything's done.
The baby however decided to want to come out at night. We got the message that my cousin's gone into labout at 1.10 am. When we reached the hospital 1.35 the baby was already born. We heard the baby crying somewhere down the hall and couldn't believe it.
It was a moment full of joy and happiness. My auntie, cousin, Salim (the boyfriend) and me where so relieved that we all started crying..
Of course we weren't allowed to go into the maternity to see the baby or my cousin.
Luckily she called us right after to tell everything went well.
The rest of the night was so random... We people couldn't stop celebrating till 6... Dancing to bredda Bob Marley :D

My cousin (Ama Waithira) was allowed to go home today with the baby. Everything's fine and mother + baby are healthy. I'm so proud of her! Imagine she's also only 18!

Rongaii... The place I've been staying quite often the last weeks. It looks so typical kenyan :) Crowded, dusty and chaotic. And SO LOVELY!

For the moment my family is here in the childrens' home. Such as the other german volunteers and of course the children.
Sometimes I think they couldn't be luckier than in this home. They support and console each other, share their knowledge and love. Many of them have some/all of their siblings there so they're not all alone. And even if they have any they have like a 130 brothers and sisters around.
This kids are one unity. More than many family with parents are.

Lena, Lisa and mee... on the right with the watchman (soldier aka soldjaah) and Felice. 

Being with this kids gives us so much... impossible to describe...

I don't wanna leave them. Not now, not next month, not in half a year.

I already miss them when I leave for the weekend and it's beyond words how it feels coming back home getting run over by a bunch of children yelling my name and hugging me. <3

Giving And Taking

Days go by... In the blink of an eye..

Really, I mostly don't know which day or date it is and it's okay. I like floating in the time.

This is gracious living, isn't it? Nowadays time is a luxury good, like food and money.

 Even if it's intangible it's a limited ressource. 

Someone tell me: Why should I question myself about death if I haven't even answered all the questions about life (,the universe and everything). 

(-> Btw the answer should be 42 #the hitchhikers guide to galaxy) 

The minute I'll die all questions about death will be answered (hopefully), so why waste precious lifetime? 

oh baby Joy... She was brought to the Childrens' home when she was only one month old.
Her mother casted her out and wanted to let her drown in a river.
A woman heard the baby cry and scream and rescued her in the last second.

Today Joy is like the most beloved child in the whole home and the little sister to everyone.

Cecilia and me. She's the one, who manages so much in the home.
If you have any problem, question or wish you go to Cecii to ask for her help.
We love her so much!

Lisa was the one, who had the idea of sponsering and making Mandazis for the entire children.

We made about 400 pieces! 

The Mandazis were fresh and delicious and the kids so excited and happy.

There were even enough left for all the workers!

The other day when I wasn't there the other volunteering girls made about 200 Chapatis for the community. 

We're diligent people...

spontanious party time before giving out the Mandazis :D

When the jeep of the mum and dad of the childrens' home arrives it mostly has either bread loaded or vegetables. The bread rejections get donated by the local toast factory and get delivered almost every day. The whole morning people are busy sorting out the spoiled bread. 

The director of the airport is the one, who donates veggies quite often.

Without all this sponsorings there wouldn't be enough food for all the children I guess.
Especially the bread is the best and biggest benefit to the home!

A doctor came last week to enlighten and vaccinate the children.

They were all very brave!

Except of Kamande, who was so frightened that it was almost impossible stopping his crying and defensing.

Pole sana...

If he wasn't 15 years younger I would marry him right away. :D

He's so cute!

On the boys' side. This guys are at the very end of the day still so energetic!

 Ohh by the way... I thought the rainy season was over. It's not.
I woke up in the middle of the night yesterday because HEAVY rain was falling into my face through the open window -.-
The next morning Sarah was supposed to leave the house at 6 for the airport (unfortunately she has gone back to Germany..). Impossible. The driver couldn't reach our place. CHAOS.
In the end we tried walking with her towards the road. Impossible. The mud was so beastly and sticky that some of us had to give up.
How Sarah, a worker who was carrying her suitcase and Lena finally reached the drivers car is a miracle to me. Now she's back home in Germany, where it snows. Yuck...

 To do list Kenya.... There's one point on the agenda which is called: "Learn how to... ...slaughter chicken".
Check.
Sounding rude, I know. It's nothing I am proud of. I can imagine people (mostly in my far homecountry) judging me 'cause of killing an innocent animal out of my own will.
Here's the explanation why it is/was so important to me to slaughter.

 As I am not a vegetarian I enjoy eating meat.
I definetly know that there is NOT A SINGLE feasible reason to eat meat, except you have any other choice. It's easy going to a butchery or supermarket and buy meat, because you don't have to care about how this former life - created by mother nature - has been treated.
In case of morality I therefore decided for myself that at least I should be able to kill the animals I eat. I believe that if you confront yourself with the actions you unconsciously take it'll widen your awareness towards the attitude and the consum of animals life's.

Why does it sound so wrong? :D

"WARNING!!! Don't smoke weed here"
Why not just tell the truth so everyone understands?
This is some serious direct communication.
(Backstreet, Rongai)

Look at my cousin! She's so HUGE! The date of birth was supposed to be on Saturday. 

I went to her house to be there when the baby comes. I tried to be as supportive as possible; cooking, washing, caring. 

Is it a pie or is it a pie? I'm gonna be the best wife EVER.

So I stayed there till Tuesday. Guess what happened?

NOTHING!

At least we know now that it's a girl, which is gonna named Kalila (so pretty!).

Kalila seems not to be in a hurry. She's already so kenyan.

If they say the babie's gonna come on Saturday it'll probably come 9 days later as  people here never arrive in time for meetings.

No hurry in this world.

that's my cousin's sister Njeri in the new babybed :D
She just finished class 8 by doing the KCPE's.
I'm so proud of her! My little, grown-up cousin <3

Waithira and Salim
this has to be REAL love.
#things I'd never do :D

Masai school close to our children's home.
Located in.... the middle of nowhere.
Also called as Masai land

Big honour! The girls were the FIRST MZUNGUs visiting their place.
They were so exhilarated, touching their white skin proving if it's real.
We had a lot of fun talking and dancing with them!

On the 14th of December there's gonna be a "Funday" in the childrens' home. 

There'll be a lot of games, drama plays, food etc. So we volunteers go around the whole area, knocking on people's gates to invite them personally to have fun with the children on that special day. 

But it's not all about fun: 32 children need to go to Highschool next year to complete their basical education. That's why there's also going to be a minimal fundraising. 

Also you, that you are reading my text right now could help financing the further education of these kids.

Even less is more than enough!

Lisa: "Ey Imani, Minnie called and said she needs her blazer back!"
-.-

3 1/2 Mzungus

3 1/2 Mzungus on tour... in the middle of the bush

Sugarcane Warriors

 Lisa is 28. I am 18. We're always mobbing each other because of our age. In the end we have the same drivel on our minds and a lot of fun together :D

From Bounty to Botswana

Planting the "BILLS Wazungu" -volunteer-tree

The last week was so weird.... So many events happening and too many experiences to cope with.
I guess my blog shows my life in a very bright light without many troubles or problems.
Actually I have a brilliant time.. Elsewise the time of my life!
However like everyone else I'm having ups and downs.

Last weekend was one of the downer examples. But I'll tell about that later.

Let's start from the beginning of the past week.
First I wanted to mention that we now also have a male volunteer, called Brian.
He's a friend of mine, who wants to stay in the home for a couple of weeks. Not only the boys are glad to have a male caretaker but the directors of the home are more than happy about the benefit he gives to Heritage. Today he made a small miracle happen: With the help of  others he fixed the whole water system in between two hours so there's finally running water in the childrens' home!
There's now water coming through the tabs and showers - unbelievable. One of the girls told Lena full of excitement: "Imagine you just take your soap and then you stand under the water! It's so easy!"
It's hard to imagine how it must be first using a proper (cold) shower in your entire life..
We all hope the construction will work for the long-run. It makes things so much easier.
Kids don't have to carry like a hundred liters of water to the first floor every morning to fill the tank for the day.

Apropos water... It reminds of another awesome event of last week: One of the volunteers birthday!
Lena turned 24 last Thursday and we tried to make her birthday as celebrative as we could.
All our efforts seemed to be displaced, almost everything went wrong. It was so sad that it was hilarious again :D.
It started with our birthday present: A voucher for the hair salon next door.

Unfortunately the mama of the salon was so excited about all her (white) customers that she put (TO MUCH) hairoil into the girls' hair. The hair looked so slobbery afterwards as if it hasn't been washed for months. Not the best  :D

Thank god there's the traditional kenyan way of celebrating a birthday: Without warning water gets poured all over the birthday girl/boy! It is called "Shower of blessings"! After someone pinches you x-times (x = years of age) into your arm.
- A very nice gesture as long as the weather is fine and the people stop pouring after a certain time. Both of this options weren't preexisting...

...At least all the hairoil got washed out of the hair :D
I can't even remember what else went wrong but I remember that the mood on this day wasn't the best.
In the end we had a nice evening in our dorm with some imported, overpriced sparkling wine.

We felt so sorry. Lena will never forget her 24th birthday she almost froze 'cause of the cold water. 

She was happy when everything was over...

...So we decided to try celebrating it again the next day with the kids & cake.

Uhh now I'm afraid of my birthday. Especially because it's gonna be cold in March. :(

The day after Lena's birthday the celebration didn't stop. In Kenya school closes around November for the big break. When the break ends in January pupils - normally - move up to the next higher class. In Germany we have that holiday around July and only for six weeks.

The graduating ceremony is so magnificent. The pupils sing, dance, play drama, there's a lot of food and drinks, speeches and presents etc. AND they get robes... It made me so jealous! 

Mathe and Fathe - the leaders/directors of the childrens' home
performing a song. So cool!

There's a Dementor in my room..
You remember Harry Potter? :D

When we're not celebrating, relaxing or eating we have various assignments now.

 A job for the long-term is sorting charity clothes. We sort the very spoiled and dirty ones out and the rest is sorted by gender, size and category. After we pack them back into labeled cartons for giving them out to children or selling them. They are too many!!!

In these days the markets and indigent places in third world countries get floated with charity clothes.
That's why you get clothes, shoes etc on markets so cheap.
Mostly they're still very good quality!
How should the domestic clothing industries in those countries survive? There's more consumption on one side of the world than need is on the other side..
The bad thing is that the clothes you get here just a fraction of the consumption worldwide are.
It's too much... Too much... And still no one cares.. :(

It's not a very nice assignment... But we still have fun!
Bad taste for less and taking pics, and "good taste" for keeping for ourselves. There's no need of cloth shopping anymore ;D

oh happy daaay

aka nur Bullshit im Kopf..

Another assignment when Cecilia our "employer" doesn't know what we can do... Sorting cereals. It's a pretty stultifying work..

And still our main task, why we're here: Spend time with the kids!

...he was a (sk8er)boy, she was a girl can I make it anymore obvious?
-They are made for each other *___*

Now that the kids are on break they have enough time to attend flute classes.
Being a teacher is hard work...

Masaai-Ninjaaaa

how can people still call me mzungu? There's any difference?

Ohh Wanjiko, I think she's the jolliest kid I ever met..
She always makes me smile :)

...and we danced and we cried and laughed and we had a really, really, really good time...!

nataka colgate.
- I need Colgate/toothpaste 

baby fell.... we're there.
kid is sick... we cure.
boy gets hit by a stone Oo... we cool.

the black-baby-beatles <3

Ayy Kamau! I really fell in love with him...
He's so tiny and crazy... Look at his banana shoes!
Normally he takes one of his shoes off and rans away squeaking in his red socks and you can't catch him.

Business Nairobi

Weekend time. It was supposed to be such a cool weekend with the girls in and around Nairobi.

We had planned to meet up with Leslie on Saturday for going shopping to Ngara and Masai Market. We did and it was fabulous! This places are like heaven to girls!

Now I'm really good at burgaining and also the girls are doing well. I got another pair of heels (I couldn't resist - they were screaming my name) for 500Ksh and trousers for 1800Ksh in the end for 800 bob! Haha next time I'll start crying for lowering the prices even more. I've heard there are many strategies :D

In between we went for a kenyan beer ;) 

The plan I had made up for the evening seemed to be so nice and relaxing! We got invited to a bash at a house at a friends' cousins house in Ngong. The plan was to relax there, order/cook some food, relax, watch films etc. 

Btw Ngong is very, very, very far from the place we are staying.

When we got there the chaos started. Tony the (not anymore)-friend of mine wasn't there to pick us up and the his cousin couldn't be reached on his phone. After we've waited like ~1 hour in the dark he finally came to pick us up in a small car, where we had to squeeze to get the 7 of us fitted in (<- normal to me, big shock to the girls). Then this Tony messed up all the plans we had made up the WHOLE week before the weekend. 

We drove to a friends' house of his, changed the car... Drove to the cousins' place, where the bash was supposed to take part. NO ONE was there. We got so grumpy after we walked the whole day through entiring Nairobi and had expected to settle down at a place where we could stay over for the night.

NOTHING!

From the "host's" house we got driven to Dario's place, who I only met once. Dario was kinda wasted and didn't even realize what was happening around him and who the four girls were which got "delivered" to his house. Tony - he's such an a**hole - disappeared somehow leaving us alone there. 

We didn't knew what to do... We had no place to stay over, were almost starving and pissed.

In the end Dario helped me to get food and a taxi for the girls to my aunties' house in Ngong. 

(Thank god I have a wide spread family!)

My plan was to meet up my aunties' son (my cousin Wanyamu) in the next town, who was out partying. 

For me the evening wasn't over. Mostly I see the good sides of the things, which happen and try to make the best out of the situation.

Then, I couldn't go unfortunately because it started raining. And when I say raining, I mean it was raining cats and dogs! It took us around two hours to organise a taxi which had the requirements to manage the route to my auntie's house through the rough and muddy road. 

The taxi drive was the most frightening one I ever had. It was like a scene from a thriller or horrormovie.

We were rushing/bumping  through the darkness into the bushes on a dirt track. We could barely see where we were heading to. Heavy rain - no light. The only description we had was from Bounty to Botswana Road.

The taxi driver was answering so suspicious and weird questions which really made me feel unsecure.. Such as "do you know where we're driving to?", "do you still know where we are now?", "you're not attentive? Are you tired?", "What are your names?".

It was like he's checking out if he could take us anywhere without us noticing anything.

I was expecting to get kidnapped or killed or I don't know what... Really it was so creepy! I'll never do this shit again.

In the end we got soaking wet to my auntie's safely, where hot tea and warm beds were prepared for us..

That was the most fucked up night ever! 

I felt so sorry everything went wrong and the girls couldn't enjoy. Now they think every weekend would be so chaotic and they're afraid to go out again...

But they realized how friendly people can be.

Here's a big THANK YOU to Dario, who took as much care of us as he could. Even if he didn't know us.

A big THANK YOU to my tata Nancy because I know she'd always take care of me and anyone who needs and asks for her help.

And a big SCREW YOU Tony & Steven! I don't want to see your faces ever again! You guys should be aware not to get into my way/life again.

The next morning the world looked way better. Good weather and a proper breakfast! As if anything had happened..

Another german volunteer, called Paula came over for breakfast. She's staying in a childrens' home close to my aunties house in Ngong. We went to her place to see the differncies between our children's home and hers. Since I've been there before it wasn't a big shock to me... though for Lena, Lisa and Sarah.

The Tunza childrens' home is more the way childrens' home usually here are than ours is. 

As I said: Heritage of Faith and Hope is more paradise or at least a 4**** hotel.

The Tunza Childrens' Home heritages also about 130 orphans but they don't have as much space as we have in our home. They have one dorm for boys and one for girls. About 50 beds are in one dorm. No privacy and an incredible smell is in the air...

The whole atmosphere there is so different. It's a depressing mood there. The kids don't jump around and are jolly... We're so used to the kids in Heritage which ran towards you when they see us volunteers or visitors to greet and hug, talk and play. We felt so down..

At least they have (Google) baby beds... We don't have. Babies just share normal beds.

 This visit was one of the best experiences of the last week, because now no one of us is able to complain about life in Heritage anymore. I'm thinking of spending a month or so at the Tunza sometimes because it's more likely the kind of life you expect when you apply for voluntary work in developing countries.

After we left Ngong and went back to our home, which each of us volunteers (now) fully accepts as their home.

I love the route from the Ngong hills to Nairobi because the landscape is so lovely and there's so much to see on the way. Especially all the tree nurseries on the way. 

Back home there was a surprise waiting for us: Our own tree.

In front of the childrens' home they're many bushes, flowers and trees, which are devoted to different donators and voluntaries.

Now there's another one, called BILLS Wazungu Tree. (B = Brian, I = Imani, L = Lisa, L = Lena, S = Sarah) Wazungu = Whites. 

 Now I need some rest....