We have been back in Kenya for a few weeks now and are finding it more of a culture shock than expected. Little things like having cold water. This was desired more than anything else in Togo but was unattainable. The thought of cold showers took up an unhealthy amount of conversation, becoming a dangerous obsession. Nairobi, where we find ourselves now, is so cold that a cold shower is the last thing on our minds. Indeed we only keep going by having frequent saunas.
Of course, the real difference between Dapaong and Nairobi is the lack of white people in Dapaong. As everyone knows, white people are stinking rich and so have to have things more posh and hoity toity than black people. An example would be carrying bags. It is difficult as a white to carry a bag as friends/strangers/crippled old ladies try to carry it for you. Or lunch time
Shopping in Nairobiwith the staff, who get ugali and beans in a big pot, whilst we get separate ugali and beans in a dapper, white persons pot (and the rhyme ‘beans beans, good for the heart…’ is not talking about baked beans, it’s talking about Kenyan beans). Or booking into a hotel with a black guy, who will then sneak out and go somewhere cheaper the moment ones back is turned. It was therefore with relief that we found ourselves going back to Kibwezi, which is hot and has few whites as it is mostly ignored by the aid circuit and there is an old staying that any white person who comes to Kibwezi is cursed and will die. (Then again we all have to die at some point.)
I can’t remember what we said about Kibwezi last time so I shall probably repeat myself. No apologies I am afraid, I don’t really care and you will no doubt skip over the boring bits. The people here are from the Kamba tribe – distinctive idiosyncrasy being that they great people with ‘wotcha’. They were moved from their homes, a hilly and mountainous domain, when the Tsavo parks were created and relocated to the plains where many of them promptly died (didn’t manage to get the moving house vaccine). To rub salt in the wound they can see their old homes (the hills at any rate) from where they live now.
They are quite happy with the land they now have because it is amazingly fertile. This is because of all the ash from the bush that they burned to clear it. Sadly, although we have little knowledge of slash and burn farming (or, lets be honest, farming) we still have a shrewd idea of what is going to happen.
Kibwezi is one of the poorest (thank you Kenya poverty survey 2004) areas of Kenya and many of the people are subsistence farmers. Brilliantly, it rained last December after a three year drought. Not so brilliantly the crop pretty much failed when it didn’t rain again until March. Fingers crossed. When asked what we could give them to make their lives easier they replied ‘rain’. There was then a long silence.
So it was with great relief that we arrived in Kibwezi, back to our new normality of being a curiously disgustingly coloured person as opposed to such a rich person that we behave badly if we object to people blatantly short changing us. I even managed to make a small girl cry by looking at her, the satisfaction of this being compounded when the wood she was standing on broke and trapped her foot. She was almost gibbering with terror as I freed her and wailed as she fled to her mother who found it as hilarious as we did. Ahhhh sweet.
So what did we achieve beyond mentally scarring small girls for years to come? Well, as the people there are subsistence farmers they can’t afford school fees (at £15 to £30 per term for secondary school). So we paid for some of the kids to go to school, an outrageously cheap way of making people think one is astonishingly generous whilst contributing at the same time to the image of white people having so much money that they do not even notice when ‘astronomical’ amounts are spent. If anyone wants to feel good for £1 a week let us know.
Which kind of but not really brings us full circle to our starting point, the question: ‘Are whites fair game?’ Apart from feeling grumpy when we are ripped off but appreciating that we ourselves contribute to this ripping off through our generosity (casually doubling incomes) whilst understanding that in Dapaong anyone who wasn’t from Dapaong was ripe for scamming so it isn't just whites, one can only come to the conclusion that ‘we don’t really care, as long as it is other whites’.
And is Kibwezi really any better? Well, we were told by the hotel manager the rooms would be 1,300 but were presented with a huge, massive beast of a bill. When we asked to see the manager (who we had just seen in passing) we were told (with glances to the drive) that she had just left… So we paid and went somewhere cheaper (but don’t worry, it was still a step up from our African friend).
Now let me leave you with a final thought. So many people have commented that we have changed since coming to Africa that I feel the need to relate an example conversation:
Prof Igendia: You two have changed since you came to Kenya.
Edd: How is that?
Prof I: Your wife is a lot fatter.
Joanna has just got her revenge by telling me the shower head has fallen into the toilet!
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