Weekend news

Spent six hours at a swimming gala in town waiting for my eldest daughter (8) to swim two lengths of breaststroke. The sun was scortching, the place was packed and there wasn't any shade to speak of but being a sunday we all went along, siblings and all and waited and waited. Gradually, during the day small gems of information about the gala itself were released.

1. Many of the races scheduled for the previous day had had to be carried over to sunday because there was a double booking at the aga khan school. The venue had been promised for a wedding and wedding guests were unhappy about tail end swimming gala attendees hanging about so on Saturday the second half of the event was postponed. This meant that races were carried over to the next day.

2. Swimming races scheduled to start at 9am on Sunday did not begin until 12.30pm because no one knew or had been informed that saturday's races had to be finished first.

3. 3,000 children were listed to swim over the weekend. Some races had more than x40 heats.

4. The loos had no water. Imagine!

Things improved a little when we left the area immediately around the pool and lounged under trees on the playing field outside. The welcome shade and breeze made up for the occasional wafts coming from the cess pit. At 3.45pm we found out that our daughter would not be swimming because they had run out of time. What's more we will have to come back on Wednesday morning if we want our kids to swim their heat, then be awarded a 'time' which may or may not qualify them for the league (which in turn translates to more hanging around at swimming galas).

Our middle daughter was sick in the car on the way home - we blamed heatstroke. My friend got stabbed by a poisonous kai apple thorn while kindly taking my 3 year old daughter for a wee in the bushes. But having said all this, I must admit that overall we had quite an enjoyable day. Eeking out meagre supplies of snacks and chatting all day with mates was not too bad and after a few tears we managed to rescue what was left of the day with a quick swim at the club and a plate of chips. Heck, we even made some new friends! The fact that we are happy to wait around for a whole day for something that never happens must mean that we are truely initiated into Africa now. There's no going back.

(My husband remembers Aga Khan galas from when he was a child. He said they were deathly boring even then and he and his mates used to spend the day running about stealing other people's empty glass soda bottles. When they had enough they could cash them in for an ice-cream.)

Depressing Kenya news headlines..

'Transparency International' have compiled a list of 180 of the most corrupt countries in the world. Sadly Kenya ranks 147 having been given a measly rating of 2.1 out of 10 in a sliding scale and shares a position with Syria and Bangladesh.

This is particularly disappointing as, since Moi's era Kenya is supposed to have been making a concerted effort to stamp out corruption setting up committees etc. but in fact the problem continues to get worse. Corruption is so ingrained in this society that everybody is guilty. 'Graft' or gaining money through corruption seems to be easy pickings and many are obviously tempted to abuse their positions of power, especially as there is no welfare system to help with unemployment, schooling and medical care.

Another depressing investigation into police killings of Mungiki suspects has revealed that over three hundred have been murdered or are missing. Initially the police shot Mungiki but later changed tactic using strangulation, drowning and torture to make it look like rival gangs were responsible. I know that the Mungiki gangs threaten Kenyan society, I guess they can be likened to the Mafia as they too murder, racketeer and terrorise, but police murdering members without apparent recourse is not the answer (many of them are male youths) as in spite of all these killings Mungiki still exist.

The good news is that our middle daughter has learned to ride her bike and is thrilled to bits with herself! Our laid back parenting tactic was to wait until she is practically a teenager and then wait until she teaches herself, which has worked a treat and cut down a lot of the stress, coaxing, bribing and back breaking bending down, holding the bicycle handlebars while trotting along beside that is normally involved.

The funny news is that I rented a dvd from our friendly pirate dvd hire shop (only £1 to take out a movie), but this time chose a TV series rather than a film, that way you can break it down into manageable bites and it lasts longer. On sunday night, feeling a little jaded, my husband and I sat down to try out the first three episodes of the first season of 'The Wire' an American cop show with lots of swearing and a fairly complex plot line. After an hour of concentrating hard we turned in that night very confused - characters were being thrown in all over the place and dead bodies turning up here and there, but we put it down to being tired. The next night we discovered we had sat through the whole of episode no. 2, not number 1, so had an evening of starting again, this time at the beginning, and saying 'OH right, now I see what's happening?!?' Duh.

Expat Tales

The Sunday Times, Home section were asking for expat tales;
'we want to hear your stories of the ups and downs of expat life and any useful tips for readers who want to follow in your footsteps.'
(thanks to my mum in law for forwarding all these UK newspaper suppliments - we love them!)

I wrote in, doubtless along with many thousands of other expats so, as it is unlikely to get published in the paper I thought it might be fun to paste it in here:

Africa Expat Wife

It’s coming up to my ‘ten years in Africa’ anniversary as an expat housewife and to be honest it has been a rollercoaster ride. We bid tearful adieus to all our family and friends at our wedding and then hopped on a plane two days later for a honeymoon in Zanzibar. Marrying in February in England on a grey drizzly day, followed by choosing an eco hotel at the hottest time of year in Zanzibar (no air conditioning or ensuite facilities), was perhaps ill advised but we were planning our move around the inception date of my husband’s new job and within the constraints of a tight budget so were left with little choice. Our honeymoon was memorable because of the heat, the diarrhoea and vomiting and the fact that having never been to Africa before, I felt I had just landed on another rather exotic and colourful planet.

One of the first and best things I did on arrival in my new home, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania was sign up for Swahili lessons and knowledge of the language has stood me in good stead over four years in Tanzania and six in Nairobi, Kenya. At the time I did it because frankly there was absolutely nothing else to do between sitting in internet cafes where the power kept cutting out and killing time at the British Council reading two week old copies of the Times or Penguin Classics,. Initially my husband came home to our ‘studio apartment’ for a hot meal every lunch time in the sweltering heat because I was working through my Delia Smith complete Cookery book (a wedding present), until he announced that he could bear it no longer. Trying to find smoked haddock or summer fruits was a challenge. I had to learn new names for fish; red snapper, dorado, parrot fish and feast instead on mango, pawpaw and passion fruit. We couldn’t get fresh milk or decent cheeses and imported food from the supermarket was prohibitively expensive. Filling hours in the day was tricky as requesting two expat work permits per family in Africa is considered greedy. We joined the Hash House Harriers in an attempt at meeting people but I spoiled it a bit because after becoming properly initiated members I managed to poison the entire group by feeding them dodgy paella. After a brief stint working as local hire for the British High Commission, therefore on British soil so no work permit required, we moved into a proper house and I had my first baby. Her arrival opened up a new world of coffee mornings, baby groups and pedicures. I have not looked back since.

Living as an expat in Africa, there are issues of safety and security. It cannot be denied that employing night guards and locking car doors before setting out for the shops are a part of our life. Stories circulate around our small community of break-ins and carjacking, but somehow these horrors are outweighed by the quality of our family life together a long way from the rat race back home. In some ways the lifestyle in East Africa resembles what I imagine 1950s Britain to have been, where we ‘make do and mend’, there are shortages in the shops, power cuts, intermittent water supplies and we make our food from scratch. Supermarket ready meals might be a way off being available but we are spoiled by the locally grown fresh fruit, vegetables and flowers available in abundance. There is time to stop and chat in the shops and everyone is unfailingly friendly and open. That said twenty first century apartment buildings and shopping centres are sprouting up at a rapid rate so we are by no means stuck in a time warp. There is also political uncertainty and a huge disparity of wealth to come to terms with, though the gap in Kenya is closing with the emergence of a growing middle class.

I was slightly perturbed on our arrival in Kenya, to find that Swahili is far from the first language spoken here. In fact tribal languages and English come first but I obstinately continue to use my Swahili so as not to forget. A low point was finalising the purchase of our beautiful house in Kenya at exactly the point that the country descended into election chaos in early January. The highs however, have been innumerable. We now have three children aged eight, five and three and their ‘African’ childhood has been idyllic with all year round sunshine punctuated by far flung safaris, quality time with visiting family and frolicking on palm fringed sandy beaches. I have thus far eluded stress, grey hair and wrinkles thanks to the support of heroic ayahs who have been patient, kind and loyal both with me and the children! Now that we have been away from England for so long, it is hard to contemplate a return but when the children hit their teenage years and want to branch out we may be forced to decide. For now life as expats in Africa suits us very well and we wouldn’t change it for the world.

A bit frustrating...

Like many other housewives, my day is defined by cups of coffee, school runs and cooking the odd meal. Yesterday was a frustrating but typical one.

First, the new hot water system in our kitchen failed for the second time in a week. Gladys is once again carrying buckets of water from the upstairs bathroom so that it is possible to wash up in warm water. I called up the contractor who fitted our new electric heater under the kitchen sink and he had the gall to say,
‘You know those small electric units are actually rubbish, they never last long, I did tell your husband at the time. Once they start going wrong they’re finished.’
‘But you only fixed it last week and first installed it only a two months ago,’ I said in disbelief. (My husband denies being told by the contractor that the electric heater would be rubbish).
‘Ah yes Madam, but remember our first plan was to link the hot water from the roof down to the kitchen. For some reason you stopped us doing this.’
‘YES, because you were going to knock a two foot hole in the house so that you could fit a human head in underneath the bath and look around for where to connect the pipe! Then you were going to knock another hole in the wall outside the kitchen.’
The conversation went on a bit like this the upshot being that we have wasted time and money and we have no hot water for washing up.

I have two daughters at a kindergarten twenty minutes drive away; they both finish at different times, one at lunch and one at three pm. Our third daughter is at another ‘big’ school that is twenty minutes from our house in the opposite direction. She finishes at 3.30pm - the distance between the kindergarten and big school takes at least forty minutes. At the moment there are road works in both directions which in Nairobi means that men come along and draw around the potholes with yellow paint, then later a team of men with pick axes come along to make the potholes into large craters. Eventually the road in patched with stones and tarmac. Directing traffic is always a haphazard affair and is often done by way of waving branches of red bougainvillea willy-nilly at either end of the road being repaired. This leads to incidents of road rage and sends drivers blood pressure soaring. Add to this the fact that my car radio is stuck on one channel that plays the same songs on a loop and with traffic jams and disruptions you have a nervous breakdown in the offing.

In an attempt to reduce my three return journeys to the kindergarten I asked my middle daughter if she would mind going home with a friend yesterday. Initially she seemed keen but at around two O’clock I received a call from her teacher saying she was in floods of tears and wanted me to pick her up in the afternoon. Grrr.

Between school runs I finally got around to trying out the chalet girl’s high altitude yoghurt cake recipe that my Mum had found for me (Nairobi is 1700m) because I am sick of American cake mix kits full of preservatives that are the only ones that ‘work’ since I switched from an electric oven to gas. (Electricity prices have gone up more than 100% since Xmas). I wanted to make it with Florence who works in our house and is learning to cook so that next time I could ask her to make one without my involvement. It was a bit fiddly as our pots of yoghurt are either bigger or smaller than those sold in the alps. We would have ended up with a tiny cake or a huge one so compromised by recalculating with ‘cups’. The cake looked like it was going to be a roaring success but would take a lot longer to cook than the recipe stated in my slow gas oven. My parting words to Florence when setting out on my third school run of the day was,
‘Ooo, I reckon that needs at least another ten minutes,’
Sadly she took the cake out exactly ten minutes later while I was out and it was not at all cooked in the middle. The cake fell flat. Now I don’t want to be one of those expat women who whinge ‘Beatrice burnt the biscuits’ or ‘this is supposed to be fish pie but Matthew got it a bit wrong’ but I must say, I was gutted. So was Florence. We will have to try again when in a more positive frame of mind.

Kriegler Commission findings re: Kenya's 2007 flawed election

After six months of investigation, the Kreigler Commission's report has been handed over to Kenya's leaders. Their findings have been surprising in some ways and fortunate, for they do not lay the blame at any high profile individual's door, or add fuel to consipiracy theories over high level involvement in post election violence. It was diplomatic because Kenya does not need to get involved in further mud slinging but a instead needs a way forward. The Commission stated that the whole election was flawed from grass roots level and the lack of transparency in the process caused widespread misconceptions, suspicion, uncertainty and anger.

'The experts ruled that widespread bribery, vote-buying, intimidation and ballot stuffing - compounded by defective data tabulation, transmission and tallying - impared the integrity of the electoral porcess and irretrievably polluted the results' (the Standard - 18/09/08)

South African judge Johann Kriegler said, 'Even if you wanted a re-tallying of the results, still you won't have sorted out the mess. It would have been impossible to tell you who won or who lost.'

The main focus of the report comprises detailed advice regarding how to restructure and overhaul the Electorial Commission of Kenya to avert such a disaster from ever happening again, where in January this year more than 1,000 Kenyans were killed during infighting and over 350,000 displaced from their homes.

Further observations were that FM radio stations broadcasting 'hate' speeches in the run up and after the election 'helped to fan the animosity between communities' and some of the Media houses did not observe media ethics and standards in order to win a larger audience, adding fuel to the flames.

One fundamental point made in the report was was that many holding responsible positions within the electoral process scarily felt that they could tamper with votes and manipulate the electorate with impunity. This unlawful behaviour has to stop or be stamped out otherwise defective elections and the violence that ensues will never go away.

Kiswahili

Over the past couple of years my eight year old daughter’s school reports for Kiswahili have been disappointing:

‘I would encourage her to use the vacation to practise speaking Swahili to become more confident and fluent.’
‘It would be helpful if your daughter was encouraged to speak Kiswahili outside school hours.’ Etc..

In fact, my husband and I do speak Swahili (or Kiswahili to use its correct name). The reason I learned the language when we moved to East Africa was because:
1) I had absolutely nothing else to do at the time – literally!
2) It irritated me that my husband knew some words and phrases and I didn’t. It meant that he was having conversations that I couldn’t understand, so I quickly had to do something about that.
3) I spent one year working in an office in Dar es Salaam surrounded by Swahili speakers and enjoyed eavesdropping their telephone conversations and general banter.

Purists, or rather Zanzibaris would say that the Kiswahili language was born in Zanzibar and it is only the Zanzibaris who can speak it properly. That said, in Dar es Salaam (only an hour and a half ferry ride from Zanzibar) the language is spoken equally beautifully with adjectives and verbs agreeing etc. Julius Nyerere, former President Post Independence (ruling from 1963-1985), insisted that Tanzanians abandon tribal languages and adopt Swahili as their first and only language, this way tribal divisions would be broken down and the people united. He also did other things like banned the existence of tribal leaders and made sure Government officials worked away from the area where they grew up. Many criticised his methods, largely because learning to speak English was left out of the schools curriculum, leaving Tanzanians behind developmentally. However, After Kenya descended into chaos following the recent December 2007 election, where its people were fighting brutally along tribal lines, one can see the wisdom of Nyerere’s actions. Tribalism is indeed a dangerous beast.

In Kenya, Swahili is often considered a third language after tribal languages and English. We are a long way from Zanzibar here in Nairobi so the Swahili spoken here is described as ‘slang’ but even so, the fact that almost everyone here speaks three languages is highly impressive! When we moved to Kenya I was determined to keep my Swahili up so use it often, around the shops and at home. When I open my mouth I have often been greeted by a blank expression or have had my Swahili questions answered very deliberately in English, undeterred and perhaps a little tactless, I am still pressing on. When people finally tumble to the fact that I am speaking Swahili I think they say to themselves,
‘Oh, I see, she’s speaking Swahili.’ Followed by, ‘Well that’s nice; at least she is making an effort.’

One of the many things we liked about my eldest daughter’s school was that they teach all students Kiswahili. Therefore, in the summer holidays when my husband and I suggested allocating one day a week where we speak only Swahili at home my daughter responded with a groan:

‘The thing is Mummy, I’m just not really interested in learning Swahili.’
I found it hard to bite my tongue.
‘But Darling!’ I said, ‘you spoke Swahili pretty fluently at two years old, what happened? It’s so important to learn the language spoken around you, then you can practise! Plus, it will stand you in good stead for learning other languages in the future…etc etc…and…don’t you know.. and.. and.’

We did have one breakthrough recently. When doing Kiswahili homework last week we found that she knew her numbers already because she was knows a song: ‘moja, mbili, tatu’ that Gladys, who works in our house, had taught her. (well done Gladys!).

This term my daughter begins French lessons in parallel with the Kiswahili and heavens alive, at just the perfect time my daughter has miraculously found a French friend! What a coup! (my French is terrible). I heard them together on Saturday on the trampoline chanting,
‘un, deux, trios, quatre, cinq’
And I must admit it warmed the cockles of my heart, but no doubt this enthusiasm will be short-lived. We may never get further than numbers.

Madam, Mze, Bwana, Mma, Rra...

I received a comment asking what the titles Mma and Rra in Alexander Macall Smith's the No 1 Ladies Detective Agency meant. I must admit that I googled the answer that revealed Mma short for Madam and Rra for Sir.

It got me thinking, I have been called 'Madam' for the past ten years in Africa which is very old fashioned and strange (especially as when I arrived I was in my mid twenties) but you get used to it and after a while stop noticing. Maybe it strikes our overseas visitors as odd, but no one has mentioned it. Perhaps I should have been more insistent that people use my name, especially people that I see every day but I never thought of doing this which is rather shameful I guess. In fact being called 'madam' is just how it is and how it has been for a very long time. There is the added complication that my name is in fact a boys name here, so whenever I do give my christian name the reaction is disbelief.

In Kenya it is customary and polite to call ladies 'madam' or 'mama' (mother), for younger women it is sometimes 'dada' meaning sister and men 'bwana' or even 'boss'. There is also the title 'mzee', which literally means 'old' but because being old means that you deserve much respect in this community then it is a flattering title (though my father in law does not agree and still says: 'less of the mzee thank you!').

In Tanzania it is very important to use the correct etiquette when greeting people. Endless exchanges of: how are you? how is your home? how are your children? how is your job? can be tiresome, especially when taking place in a lift with a stranger or on the telephone when you only want to be transferred to speak to someone else. In Kenya people cut to the chase a little quicker but there is always some kind of greeting first. Even in business, to pick up the phone, omit to say hello and open with 'can I speak to...' would be considered very rude.

Politicians are given the title 'honorable' for some reason and while the newspapers delight in revealing corruption stories linked to government MPs they will still give them their correct title. At the time of the election chaos there was some debate on the radio as to whether some political figures actually deserved to be called 'leaders' in light of the fact that they seemed consumed by only pursuing power for the sake of their own gain and not the greater good of the country.

The custom of calling everyone by their first name in England has not yet reached here though things are gradually becoming less formal. I know that there are many people in the UK, particularly of the older generations, who might regret that more respectful titles have been dispensed with. At my eldest daughter's school, they still call their teachers 'Mrs' or 'Mr' and are forbidden to do otherwise.

Rain, rain everywhere but not a drop in the tank!

I have to admit that after all that whining about drought, it’s now raining, absolutely pouring, bucketing down. We have had no power all afternoon and evening (‘til now). Over the past week we’ve had a couple of showers but today the heavens opened as only they can in Africa. People were drenched in Nairobi this afternoon, rolling up trouser legs and wading along roadside verges that in minutes turned to fast flowing rivers. They sheltered, huddled in petrol stations or where ever it was possible to shelter. The road traffic almost ground to a halt. I saw a smartly dressed lady in a business suit scramble out of the boot of a saloon car with her two children, evidently having accepted an emergency lift to the nearest bus stop. Flimsy parasols that in the sunshine once looked jaunty shading roadside fruit stalls in a row along Ngong Road, today looked tattered and torn in the downpour. School children got soaked walking home today because this morning no one had thought to bring wellies and coats 'just in case'. At my daughter’s school in town there were actually hail stones falling, however, once out in the weather and on close inspection through busy windscreen wipers, no one seemed to look in the least bit miserable about the situation. Quite the reverse in fact. By way of explanation I heard Gladys, who works in our house scolding my eldest this evening for saying, ‘I hate the rain.’ ‘Never say that!’ She said. ‘Rain is a blessing!’

Still no sign of any water trickling in from City Council though, and all I could think of as I gazed at the sheeting torrents was, ‘we really should be catching this for our water tank but after five and a half years we are still too badly organised.’ The good news is that the water table in the area should be rising so the boreholes will be replenished a little. Let’s hope that the dams for Nairobi’s water supply are also filling and this will be the end of our mini water crisis. Let's hope for lots more rain (but it would be nice if it fell only and night and not during rush hour or while out doing school runs if possible...).

The debate of Aid Dependence in Africa

Last week in The Nation newspaper in an opinion column was an article entitled ‘It’s time to wean ourselves from donor aid’ by Rasna Warah, an editor with the UN. It was written in the context of the ‘Aid Effectiveness’ conference that was staged in Accra, Ghana last week and the recent publication of a book by Yash Tandon entitled ‘Ending Aid Dependence’. Benjamin Mkapa (former Tanzanian President) had written the forward to this book, urging developing countries, ‘to formulate strategies to exit from the aid dependence bandwagon’. This interested me as we were living in Tanzania when Mkapa was President and for a year I worked in Dar es Salaam as a ‘local hire’ employee in DFID (the British Department for International Development). I think I am right in saying that since Independence, Tanzania has been the most aid dependant country in the region. Nyerere looked for help from the communists and when he stepped down and his socialist principles were switched to democratic, aid money from the West flooded in.

I also write this in light of receiving my monthly text message today, from the night watchman we employed (through a guard company) two years ago who after a short while gave up working as an askari altogether and for the last year or two has been unemployed and asking us for enough money to get by every month. To be fair, he lives in Kibera slum and is trying to set up a business making wool rugs (first it was going to be school uniforms) that he hopes will be supported by an HIV related NGO but for the last eight months progress has been frustratingly slow. The disruption of the election didn’t help. In the past his messages have been heart wrenching,
‘I have been very sick. No money, food finished, now drinking unga’ but of late they have become more pedestrian,
‘Good morning Madam, we r well.pls help us tis month. Sms me convenient time to meet.regards from wife.’
I wonder, after months of this, if we are in fact actually helping him?

I don’t want to get tied up in knots on a subject that I don’t have sufficient expertise to comment on, but my experience showed me that the aid system as it stands (in East Africa) does not work efficiently because a phenomenal amount of cash is squandered through corruption both on the recipient and the donor side. I saw this for myself. The author of the above article quoted Susan George and Arturo Escobar who argue that aid is just another form of colonialism. Ms Warah also quoted from African writers who have published works giving an African perspective on the aid industry and why it has failed to lift millions out of poverty. She writes ‘Bindra argues that “far from being productive or necessary, the donor dependent relationship most often ends in mutual hatred” and that by and large, countries that have ignored donor prescriptions have prospered’.

I also recently visited a small orphanage whose Kenyan boss (a Pastor) receives a steady income from overseas donors and volunteers but refuses to buy in clean water for the children, pay for medication when they are sick or pay school fees for them or even proper food. He, however, is enjoying the gravy train and has recently bought four computers and a second hand car. After some weeks my volunteer friend left the place in heartbroken disgust.

To become independent from aid as Malaysia, Singapore and Brazil have done would be a triumph in Africa but no one seems to be able to agree on exactly how to do it. Without wanting to sound patronising, I would imagine that withdrawing aid money in Africa would be a little like withholding hard drugs from an addict. So entrenched is the aid dependence here that a dreadful period of cold turkey would surely take place as the money is withdrawn and people all over the country would suffer as a consequence. Thereafter would follow a period of relearning of how to run the country independently culminating in the triumph of prospering unaided. Of course there is also the possibility of utter failure to survive. I won’t deny that aid money helps millions directly and improves lives but in the long run is it also holding developing nations back from being able to help itself and stand on its own two feet?

I wonder if our ex-nightwatchman might get his business plan off the ground quicker if we weren’t paying him a monthly ‘salary’ gratis, in order to keep the wolves from his door. Either way, I am not brave enough to stop giving, though the ‘mutual hatred’ phase could possibly rear its ugly head if progress is not made soon.

Back to the gym

In the spirit of September being housewives New Year (i.e. children finally back to school after the long holidays), the aerobics lesson I try to go to was suddenly packed. In September we housewives scurry about clearing out cupboards, at long last putting photographs in albums and try to lose weight and/or get fit after two months of long lie-ins, holidays and late nights. Generally expats gravitate toward the gym to get fit as our daily lives in Nairobi are devoid of exercise. We don’t walk, don’t climb many stairs, don’t do gardening etc. we have big cars to bounce over potholes and use them because practically everywhere you go you can park right outside. Shops and kids schools are too far to walk to. Nairobi is a city of shopping centres or malls that you drive into, shop then drive out. The City Council seems to have overlooked the provision of pavements for pedestrians or cycle paths so walking means getting covered in dust, negotiating past hawkers and twisting your ankle in deep gullies. I noticed in the summer that in England shoes are important because you really do have to walk in them. Flat leather flip flops and flimsy ballet pumps just don’t cut it. In London you always end up walking for miles and in my parent’s home town it is pleasant to walk peacefully to the supermarket or into the town centre on proper wide pavements amongst pretty buildings.

Anyway, back to the gym and imagine my surprise when in the midst of our very female mixed Kenyan and expat 9am aerobic class there was a man! He danced around the centre of the studio keeping up with the routine fantastically which was just as well because as a broad shouldered, over six footer with shaved head, he dwarfed us all and the prospect of him stumbling then treading on someone’s toe was to be dreaded. This man’s presence reminded me of when I used to drag my husband to Taebo and Step in the evenings. There were a couple of men around at that time of day, but I think it is safe to say that he hated every minute of it. It’s the routines that get everyone and there is nothing worse that careering off in the wrong direction as you get lost mid dance – I should know!

The giant in our midst was actually an old hand at aerobics classes which would explain his skill at keeping up with the grapevines in a packed studio. He told us he usually went to the 7am classes before work but liked to do a 9am one every now and then as they tended to be more ‘high impact’. I was a little worried by his very short, loose fit running shorts and I could tell (without looking) that he was struggling to keep his dignity during the ‘floor work’ leg raises etc. While flattered that the 9am class might be tougher in spite of following the same formula with the same teacher as the earlier classes, I also felt a little depressed. It told me that the 9am housewife gym bunnies with no job to go (as they do not have local work permits) do not have enough of a life and spend to much time working out.

Water Shortage in Nairobi

We are hoping for rain, rain, rain and lots of it – but unfortunately it’s not rainy season. Our grass is reduced to yellow tinder and crunches when you walk on it. The Nairobi dam is now dry so the city council has stopped sending us and many others a supply. On enquiry at their offices, they say that they are eking out what water remains and waiting for rain.
‘Mungu atasaidia’ (God will help)
It is not the first time that the water supply has dried up and it will not be the last. When there was talk in January of a coming drought later in the year, it felt unreal because the whole country was experiencing post election turmoil, an episode that proved to be one of the worst disasters in the country’s history.
‘Drought?’ I thought at the time; ‘Please, not more bad news.’

Water, or lack of it, is always a critical topic of conversation when living here in Africa, but something I never considered when living in rain soaked England. Managing at home with no water is uncomfortable, unhygienic and makes you miserable. The water supply to our home from the city council is intermittent. The way it works is that we have a large, concrete water storage tank in the ground – most of the time it is just off empty with an inch lying at the bottom. At the top of the tank and just beneath the manhole cover is a pipe the width of a hose that leads from the road outside, across the garden underground and through a water meter. The water is unleashed from some central place once or twice a week and is supposed to gush through the narrow pipe into our tank and fill it, but generally it is a miserable trickle. The water might flow into our tank for a whole day and a night or perhaps for just half an hour, depending on the City Council Water’s discretion. The idea is that the City Council water is clean and has been treated and on balance the quality is not bad (though we don’t drink it before boiling it and putting it through a filter first). My ear is now trained to detect the sound of water trickling into our ground tank as I stand at the kitchen door and when I hear it I rush over, lift the manhole cover and peer into the darkness within, surveying the flow of water from the mains.

Others have a bore hole in their garden which is an expensive thing to construct. The borehole draws its supply from the water table beneath and then pumped straight from the ground into your home. Of course this water is not treated and in many cases is too rich in fluoride, which is a major cause of brown staining on teeth if you drink it for long periods. There are issues over excess fluoride in City Council water too. Many boreholes that service more than one or two houses in our area have now run completely dry.

When the City Council fails us completely and we have no water, we order in a truck or ‘bowser’ to fill our tank and we pay them directly per delivery. As in many cases in Nairobi, solving a problem boils down to hard cash while those without money have to suffer. The same system applied when we lived in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Today I called our friendly water supplier who helps us out in times of shortage. Her deliveries are prompt and she is reliable but this time she said that they would not be able to come today as the water level in their borehole is very low so it takes a long time to extract the water out of the ground and into the truck. They hope to be able to pass by tomorrow.

Many people do their best to harvest rain water but so far our attempts have been pitifully poor. Our house was built in 1930s and to effectively harvest rain water you really need to design the house to do the job. We have lots of little roves that do not funnel to a central point. Plus, water running off the roof can be dirty and infected with monkey poo etc. My friend and neighbour wondered why her whole family were getting repeated upset stomachs for months, until she finally analysed the water that had been collected from the roof and realised it was toxic.

Having perennial problems with water means that you can never truly enjoy a deep bath or a long shower without a nagging feeling of guilt. At the moment, I notice many people on the street carrying yellow plastic containers and filling them where possible from dirty streams or outlets at the side of the road. Yesterday afternoon we had a short lived downpour – the first in six weeks.
‘Sorry for the rain’ I said to a soaked passer by.
‘Mvua ni baraka’ (rain is a blessing) he replied.