Farewell Chogoria

After a month in Chogoria, which seemingly flew by, we are now on the road and travelling for the next week.  I (Marjie) am eager to see more of this country, and travel as a family of five, but I feel melancholy about leaving.  We quickly created a home for ourselves in Chogoria, trying to integrate with the community and get to know the people and their lives.  With six of us (including our resident Nate), we each contributed our part in getting to know a different aspect of the village life: Nate and Roger through their work at the hospital, Zoe attending the boarding school, Lena having the chance to experience two different schools, and Talia and I exploring a variety of different opportunities (school, hospital, Village HopeCore, learning about the education system, and Talia having quite the social life with the hospital interns).

Not only did we learn about these different institutions, but more importantly, we developed what I hope will be lasting friendships.  One of the doctors, Franklin, will be visiting for a month next Spring. As we were leaving, Franklin, his wife and son, came to bid us farewell with a basket of fruit that must have weighed 30 pounds! In our hope and enthusiasm of having one of Zoe’s classmates, Sharon, come visit, we travelled to her family about 45 minutes away to a town called Chuka.  They spent last Saturday graciously hosting us for the day, with tea, a huge lunch, introducing us to family and friends, (we were the first white people in the village and quite the spectacle) and then taking us on a tour of the school where Sharon’s dad works.  It was wonderful to meet them, and get a glimpse into Sharon’s background and family.  In our last week, we became much closer to Valentine, a dynamic, intelligent, worldly, and warm intern.  Valentine guided us to the locally-famous Chogoria waterfall, took Talia to an intern dance party, and on our last night in town, she and her mother and “auntie” had us for tea and local delicacies.  We became very close with David Mbae, principal of an elementary school.  He was our go-to person for all things from the moment we arrived in Nairobi, having driven 4 hours to meet our plane! And lastly, the 3^rd grade class, under the teacher Janice, held a special place in all our hearts.  On our final morning we went to say goodbye to them, and after hugs and photos, they broke out into a chorus of cries.  It was only by singing one last round of the “Hokie-Pokie” with them, that we were able to leave.

So, what’s the take-away?  After our first week here, I wasn’t so sure about our stay.  I hadn’t yet found what I felt was a “meaningful” place for me, and questioned what I would do for the next three weeks.  But as I look back on our month in Chogoria, I would describe our time as living life in technicolor. It was true sensory overload. Each day we returned home to dinner together (and sometimes lunch) to share our tales of interest and amusement.  We were living life in the details that provided all of us such an enriching experience-  the funny sayings “isn’t it?” or “fine time”, learning about “shang” an entire new language spoken only by Kenyan teenagers, having one of the village market women teach me how to make porridge (which I never really did master), greeting child after child with a handshake or wave, or having them yell out to us “mzungu” (white person). 

How do we bottle up these daily occurrences so we can remember the smells, encounters, and small moments of our trip to Kenya?  It isn’t the safari we will forget, or the hike to Mount Kenya.  It is the details: Joy’s charming little store where we could get just about anything, including water, Lena’s school uniform, or a coffee cake for breakfast.  It is the unpleasant smell of burning garbage.  It is the unpredictable shower- sometimes scalding, often freezing.  It is Allison (our housekeeper’s) tales of her family and daily life.  It is our neighbor girls, Joy and Mary, and Shalom and Patience, coming over to play whatever on our front lawn.  A photo album will hardly do. As we brace ourselves for the hectic lives we lead in Michigan, I so much want to create the spaces we have given ourselves this summer to reflect, pause, and enjoy our lives.