Memorial Day Bashing Around Town

On Memorial Day, Shasta and I went all over town. We started out heading from our Apartment towards Central Park. We headed to the Disney Store then American Girl Place. Lunch for me was a pretzel and ice cream from a vendor near Central Park. Then we took a subway back to the apartment, picked up our maps. Then we headed out on the subway to Coney Island. Coney Island was insane...so busy. The weather was beautiful too. Shasta and I went on the Cyclone...a 80 year old wooden rollercoaster. It was my first time on a rollercoaster...and hopefully my last. (My neck is killing me today). After a nice walk on the boardwalk, down to the beach, and into the water, we got Corn Dogs and Cotten Candy. Then we jumped back on the subway up to 8th street. Checked out the Washington Arch then wandered around Greenwich Village and Soho for a while. We had fries in Soho...how random. Then back to the apartment and a trip to Time Square to check out the Toys R Us store (I was looking for something for JED :). After that I went out with a couple of the guys to comedy club. Lots of fun but now its back to the classroom for four days.


Mom: Check it out...its the American Girl Place. Very fun.

American Girl Place, Disney Store, Coney Island Beach, Greenwich.

Toys R Us Times Square.

NYC

I'm finally in New York City. Living in an apartment with three roommates, in the Herald Tower Apartments on 34^th St and 6^th Avenue. Tomorrow I'll go for my first day of classes at the Empire State Building.

Today I hung out with my new roommate Shasta a lot today. We walked to Central Park…BEAUTIFUL! Then this evening after orientation we walked to Times Square and had supper at the McDonalds there. Then to Walgreens for some food for the next few days. Lots of fun but now I'm tired and need to sleep.

Pictures soon!

Some Clarification

My dad asked me what message I want to convey with my picture. Umm...good question. When I started taking the pictures I wanted something that looked really nice, showed off my new camera, all the books and work I have to do and my computer. Sadly my computer didn't make it in any of these pictures. I want the pic to show a bit of my personality, what I do, what I'm capable of with the camera (and Picasa). Of course on Facebook its also important that someone be able to figure out who I am...its always annoying to get a friend request from someone and the name is familiar but the picture is poor and you just can't quite remember where you know them from. So yeah...

Profile Pic Options

I'm trying to pick out a new picture for my Facebook profile (and having some fun with the new camera). Oh and notice in some of them the obvious procrastination....see those stacks of books and the computer? Thats what I'm supposed to be doing instead of taking self-portraits and posting them on my blog

So I'm played with the profile pics a little bit (Picasa is a wonderful free program) and here is the results for four of them. Tell me which you like best.

I like this one because you can see my whole face, and I'm almost smiling, but the camera is not as obvious.

I like this because you can see my face, it has personality, the camera is prominent but I'm not smiling at all (and I've been told before the first impression people get of me...I'm a smiley girl...others have referred to me as...the girl who smiles all the time)

I love black and white photos, I love the little mystery, but my face isn't showing very well.

Full shot of my face, little smile, camera hidden, odd pose, (I like that my hair style - which I LOVE - is fully visable in this one :).

So tell me what you think...or don't ;)

By the way I would love to know who reads my blog so as well as telling me which picture you like, I would really appreciate it if you dropped me a comment and let me know whose reading my blog.

More essays coming your way...tomorrow...I REALLY hope! I'm almost (ummm well 30 pages in one book and 85 in the other left to go) done with my reading.

Passport…and other stuff

Well, I applied for an emergency passport yesterday. I'm supposed to go back to the embassy on Monday about 2 pm to pick it up. The tricky part is that after picking it up I'll have to race across town to make it to the Kenyan immigration by 4 pm. If I don't make it there and get my Dependents pass and re-entry permit redone then I will have to pay $50 to leave the country (basically buying a visitor's visa) and $50 to come back in to the country (another visitor's visa). This trip is continuing to get more and more expensive.

Yesterday I also replaced my Press Pass (the picture is much better this time…sadly don't have a camera so I can't post a picture of the new one).

I also got my freelance agreement, which means that the $500 course fee for WJI will be waived. The agreement is with the Nation Newspaper (one of the Kenya's national newspapers) and basically is that they will agree to consider published two articles I write while attending WJI.

On another note, I also bought some Moleskin notebooks (David isn't that what you use). They are very nice little notebooks with sturdy black cardboard covers that fit nicely in the back pocket of a pair of jeans. I lost my notebook I had been using for everything when I was robbed so I decided to replace it with some a little nicer.

Last night I watched three movies. I just needed to upwind. I'm so tense and stressed…probably more so because I now feel I wasted a bunch of time but I needed it. I've done very little to relax and unwind since the robbery and I really needed it.

Now I'm feeling overly stressed because I have so much to do and VERY little time. A sample of my to do list which changed dramatically because of the robbery:

• transcribe interviews that I did in Nakuru
  
• Write article about IDPs for Nation newspaper
  
• Write article about Kenya, five months on for World
  
• Write article about hijacking/robbery possibly for World on the Web
  
• READ, READ, READ
  
• Do research on speakers at WJI
  
• Do writing assignments for WJI (when I do them I'll be posting them here on my blog so be on the lookout…especially since you don't usually get to read my "article" style writing.
  
• PACK, PACK, PACK (right now I don't actually know what I'm going to back my stuff in!)
  
• Oh that's about all...maybe…probably not though
  

Please continue to pray…the struggle is not over and adding lots of stress on top of trauma only serves to bury the trauma not deal with it. Not the best thing but I don't know what to do right now….I've talked it out until I'm so sick of talking about it. I've thought about it, I've prayed about it, I've pushed it down, away wherever, I've given Viyerrah good advice…poor guy he had to ride home last night on the same kind of bus at almost the same time. I kinda feel numb right now and I don't like that. Like I said I'm sick of talking about it, it's gotten to the point I know all the points that make people go, "Oh my," so I find myself dwelling on them, I guess to make people feel sorry for me and yeah it's just annoying.

Ok well I must get back to work and at least TRY to get a few things finished today.

My Walk

So I did what I said I was going to do to relieve my boredom. I walked down our road – took pics. Then I got a mat but there I was not brave enough to take pictures, I don't enjoy being stared at or asked for money. But I'm going to do it one of these days before I leave for America, even if it means telling people I'm writing a article about public transport (and no that's not a lie cause I'm writing one for an assignment for my correspondence course). Then I hung out at Nakumatt Karen (Nakumatt is like Walmart but more expensive and less extensive). I bought a newspaper and a coffee at a little coffee shop (David it was the closest to one of your mochas I've had in Kenya but still not so good). Then to my horror it started to rain. Sadly in my pictures you can't see what I'm wear but I was wear a sundress (as in spaghetti straps) with a tank top underneath and jean capris with Teva sandals. In Kenya when it rains its not like in America. In America if its warm out and it rains its still warm out, in Kenya if it rains, it doesn't matter what the weather was like 1 minute before the rain starts, when it rains it always gets cold. I was freezing, sitting outside at a table (with one of those little umbrella things over it) and the rain was blowing on me. My mocha helped a little bit but not much. Then my dad came but so did one of my friends – Viyerrah (the only pictures I have of him are from Msafara, I'll take some next time we hang out and post them). He's an intern at my church but is on loan to a sister church. He lives about 10 minutes from my house and we have been hanging out a couple of times a week. So after paying Dad 50 shilllings (75 cents) I convinced him to pick me up at the end of our road in about an hour. Viyerrah and I wandered around Nakumatt and talked before I got a Mat back home. Oh and Viyerrah loaned me his sweater so I was no longer freezing! It was a fun evening. Here are some pictures:

Going out our gate (Jed - my little brother is opening it for me

Our road/driveway

More of the boring dirt road (now since the rain its mud), pretty trees overhead though

Some kids chilling at the end of the driveway - "Mzungu tupige picha = Hey white girl, take our picture" Halafa "Anapiga picha ya kila kitu = later "She taking pictures of everything." I don't think they realized I understood as much swahili as I do.

I love that fact and I love smiling Kenyan children even when they make fun of me.

The signboard for our road. If you want to read a funny story by one of my friends about not being able to find my road check out http://joyinkenya.blogspot.com

Random picture of my foot walking down the dirt road

Waiting for a Mat - across the main road looking back up our road.

The main road, which you can't see but it full of potholes and patches (and this is in one of the upscale parts of Nairobi!)

Hope you've enjoyed my random pictures. More to come soon. I hope to document the next two weeks so that I have lots of pictures to take with me to the states. I've got to show off my new home right (I've got a couple thousand pictures from Londiani but only a few from Nairobi).

A Simple Jar of Peanut Butter

The jar of peanut butter was sitting on the counter, unopened. I watched as my brother placed the bread on the counter beside it and went to bring the homemade strawberry jam from the fridge. And I thought to myself, "That peanut butter hasn't been opened."

At that moment David must have realized my thoughts as he looked at me with a grin, "Don't even think about it. It my turn." Not ready to admit defeat, I protested, "No, you opened the last jar, this time I should get to."

Yes, we were actually arguing over who would get to open the jar of peanut butter. For both of us there had always been something special about opening a jar of peanut butter, looking down at the unmarred smooth surface with the three precise ripples and one little peak made by the machine that had filled the jar. Then after admiring this odd form of beauty would come the ultimate moment, the prize we were fighting over. To take a knife or a spoon and gently dip it into the glossy brown surface, taking the first glob of peanut butter and destroying the newness of that particular jar of peanut butter. Of course the rest of the prize was that you didn't use the first knifeful for your sandwich, oh no that was sanctified – set apart – just for the mouth of the prize winner.

Its been years since I have engaged in the ritual ceremony of opening the peanut butter jar. Partly because my brother has been married for the past eight years and half of the fun was in the race to see who could win this particular prize. The other reason…because in Kenya we buy natural peanut butter, the kind with a layer of goopy oil on top which must be mixed into the rest of the butter before it can be used.

However, I have not written the story of the peanut butter jar for no reason. Actually I believe it has a spiritual significance in my life, I just haven't figured it out yet. So while I'm trying to discover what deep spiritual meaning this insignificant little story could possibly have, I hope you have enjoyed the story and please by all means find a friend or a sibling and discover the competition and fun of being the first to open the peanut butter jar.

Please note: I have no idea why I just wrote this little story but I felt like writing something and this was what I felt like writing about. So since I wrote it I figure others might as well read it – that's why I'm posting it to my blog. David, I hope you read this and laugh as you remember. I don't know what made me remember how we used to do this but when I did I just felt like writing about it. Maybe some day I'll have your way with words and telling stories from our childhood to make a point.

Having a Blast

Today was very fun. I had a small party at mom and dad's house. Basically it was to say thank you to the guys who became my friends during Msafara. 8 people came (out of the 9 I had invited) and we had lots of fun, eating, talking, looking at pictures, taking pictures, watching video clips, and generally hanging out. If any of you happen to read my blog – thanks so much for coming and making my day great. It meant a lot to me. Here are some pics from the day. I think you will agree that we had fun.

Gedion behaving like a five year old with Jed's bike and I joined right in as he "carried" me on the bike.

From left: Gedion, Njeri, Myself, and Ken

In the "tree house"

From left: Roselynn, Cornelia, Njeri, Myself, and Nancy

The Gang posing

Having fun with the camera

Clockwise from me: Roselynn, Nancy, Daniel, John, Njeri, Gedion, Cornelia and Ken

Such fun and such great friends!!