Things I know so far...

Every Monday for the past couple of weeks our Kenya group has been meeting to do team-building activities and have general discussions about issues in Kenya. I think it might be helpful to compile my knowledge up to this point so that everyone can be on the same page.

General trip stuff:
I will be gone from Dec.29th to Jan.13th, with most of that time spent with the Samburu people in Umoja and the Kalama Community Wildlife Conservancy. Our first 3 days in will be spent in the capital, which is a large city called Nairobi. Interstingly enough, we will be celebrating New Years Eve there - which should be pretty amazing. After that we will travel to the Samburu National Reserve (who works with Kalama and the village of Umoja). During our time there we will be working the the reserve and the Save the Elephants campaign doing mammal counts during the mornings and evenings, and working in the Umoja village in the afternoons. You can learn more about Save the Elephants at http://www.savetheelephants.com/. I also found some good information about Kalama at http://www.nrt-kenya.org/kalama.html.

About Umoja:
Umoja is the Swahili word for "Unity," and is a fitting name for a village that was founded 10 years ago by a "troublemaker," an indigenous Kenyan named Rebecca Lolosoli. Rebecca has started a women's rights movement that has never before been seen in Africa. She is working hard to change gender roles, and has created a women's only village where battered, solitary, or widowed women and girls can find a safe haven. Much of our time will be spent in Umoja, where we will be helping teach their children English, and doing basic labor in an effort to increase their quality of life.

I found a good article about Rebecca at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/08/AR2005070801775.html, or you can just google her name.

There is also a good website about Umoja with some pictures and videos that were taken for a documentary that was made. You can see those at http://www.mantrapod.com/ (be sure to click on the English vesion of the site).

I found this video on YouTube about Umoja and Rebecca. It was filmed by the Mantrapod crew, so the subtitles are unfortunately in French.

Gender Roles:

During one of our Monday meetings we had a woman come in a speak about the cultural differences and gender roles in Kenya that we need to be aware of. I managed to take some notes, and I want you guys to learn about these things too.

Kenya is a collectivist culture, meaning that everyone works together, everyone benefits, and no one is ever alone. Brett (one of the supervisors) was telling us that Rebecca has a story about how when she first came to the US to speak, people put her up in a very nice hotel with a room to herself. She said that she just sat there and cried, wondering why they didn't like her and wanted her to be alone. This just shows the huge difference between Americans and Kenyans, us always wanting to be alone - and them never being alone.

For the most part, everyone in Kenya is an open book with their emotions because one person's issues are viewed as the entire tribe's issue, and no secrets are kept from anyone.

Women have had virtually no status whatsoever until relatively recently. It is a general belief that there is no such thing as a non-sexual relationship between a male and a female. Female foreigners, especially those who are white/or American are generally not viewed by men in a positive light because of the widespread viewing of TV programs that portray women as purely sexual objects. We were given wise advice to never be alone with a man and always be with other female friends. I know that this may worry some of you out there who are reading this, but please keep in mind that we won't be around many men - seen as how we are working in an all women's village, and most of the men that we do encounter will be well educated and have generally more western views.

We also got a little history lesson about traditional marriages and the woman's role in a family. Initially, the groom will give a "lobola" to the bride's parents as a labor payment and a way to help cover childcare costs (this is not to be confused with a dowry). The lobola means that she legally (this word is used loosely by our standards since they are largely an oral society) becomes a part of his family and so will their children. Children are always considered to be a part of their father's family even if a legal divorce occurs.

Polygamy is still widely practiced in Kenya and is veiwed as a status symbol, as well as a way to "distribute the work." Women like Rebecca are fighting agains the concept of polygamy, and increasingly couples are marrying into monogamous relationships that were not organized by their families.