Bless the rains down in Africa

The woman seated in front of me leans casually on the satchel stuffed with a banana tree, which occupies two seats in the mutatu traveling from Karatina to Nyeri. The leaves overflow into my lap, as do the passengers next to me. No one finds this odd, and I am thankful it is blocking my view of the windshield in this journey. Mutatu drivers make NYC taxi drivers look like they could teach driver's ed.

I have been in Karatina for four days, and since there are only six children at the Orphanage during the day, next Friday I will be moving to Nyeri to teach classes at St. Mary's all-boys school. Unfortunately, this means I must tell my host mother I will not be staying with her much longer.
She looks at me through glassy eyes with an expression that tells me she's been through this type of disappointment before. "Is it me? Is it my house, you do not like it here?"
"No! No!" I say, without skipping a beat. "I love it here, but the work, the work is too little."
"You see Jennifer," she says slowly, deliberately. "We did not use to have a house nice like this. I use to fear the volunteers, that they would not like me or my house, because they are upper class. But when you stay here, I benefit. They give me money to buy food for you, and then I am able to eat what you eat. So if you leave here, I no longer benefit."
A hollow ache creeps into my stomach as I realize why her eyes are welled with tears and the guilt is overwhelming. The struggles of this country stretch beyond blurred lines.

There are times in this magical country that I experience moments of complete and absolute euphoria. I try to hold on to these moments for as long as possible, and hope I'll be able to do so in the future when I need to remember who I truly am, where I came from , and where I want to go.

By some divine act of fate, I have been placed with a family so religious, we pray for ten full minutes before every meal, and I've just spent this entire morning listing to Baba preach about why there is a god. My feet are incredibly dirty, and we have refugees from Sudan living next door. Now that's something you don't hear every day. The house is cozy and spacious, and the couple have 3 children over 23 yrs old that live in Nairobi. My days here feel like weeks, and I've truly learned the meaning of "living for the moment." We buy for what we need in present, we eat as much as we can because we know that for now, at least, we have it. It is so refreshing to see the people here thankful for anything and everything.

There are also moments I find myself in unexpected situations, that are surprising yet fitting, all at the same time. Today I find myself in a teal-walled living room playing Scrabble with Nancy and Carol. They are 14 and 19 yrs old respectively, and are Kenyans living down the street from the Orphanage. I am not quite sure how this happened. We met while watching after the children, and they invited us into their home for lunch and "American Pie" on VHS. But now I am playing Scrabble with my new friends. The rains have begun, and we realize we will be staying awhile.

I am becoming acquainted with having no particular place to be, nor anything urgent to do. And when strangers invite you into their home to share a prepared meal, you politely oblige. This is Kenya, that is just the way it's done...