Woke up early as we were going to pick up the class at the airport which is about 45 minutes away due to the roads. Stuff around Eldoret isn't that far, however due to the random speed bumps and poor quality of roads, it's fairly slow going. We meet downstairs for breakfast, which is a buffet with cereal, bread, tea, instant coffee, omelets, and porridge. Being cautious of my food, I opted to not try the milk in case it came straight from a cow and was unpasteurized. I decided to try the porridge and ate maybe two bites. It had a thin jelly consistency, a complete lack of flavor and was just overall awful. The omelet guy showed up, so I polished off breakfast with one of those and another glass of juice.
Off to the airport we went, with the class supposedly booked on a flight to land at 8:30 am. We meet the Moi representatives, Susan Chebet and Emmanuel Kipkorir, and await the arrival of the rest of the class. One plane arrives and no one from the class is on board. Scott and Claire needed to head back to town to talk to the police some more, so they took off and we await the next flight. Another plane came in, but still no class. However, the representatives from IU and IUPUI were on board. They were in town for a peace conference and I met Ian, one of Jen's co-workers, who is an incredibly nice guy. Shortly after they arrived, we got a call from Scott to tell us where the class was. The flights out of Nairobi could only get 7 of them, so they rented a couple vans and drove from Nairobi to Eldoret and were expected to arrive between 12 and 1 pm. So I joined the Moi folks on the bus to go back to the University.
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| From Kenya 2010 |
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| From Kenya 2010 |
The ride was pretty miserable and it was coupled with my body getting used to the climate and extra water I was drinking to ensure hydration. It took in total about 90 minutes to get back to campus, with us stopping in the rich people area to wait for Susan and Diane Henshel from IU SPEA. The IU Guest House is in the rich people area and they had dropped off the other IUPUI folks there.
Mama Mia's, expensive restaurant:
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| From Kenya 2010 |
We finally arrived at Moi around 11:30 am. We dropped Susan and Diane off at the administration building whose appearance surprised me quite a bit. From a distance, it looks relatively modern and nicely kept. Up close, you can see very old windows, the cracks in the building's facade and the general worse for wear condition of the outside. Comparing to Purdue, the closest buildings to give an adequate comparison would be married student housing. It just had the appearance of not being well-maintained when you were up close.
The rest of the class finally arrived at about 12:15 and we checked into our rooms. Bruce, Steven, Mark, Tiago, and I were bunking in a house down the road from everyone else that gave us a taste of what life in the projects/ghetto or as squatters may be. The house was being used mainly as storage, it appeared, and had a mildewy smell to it. As keeping with Kenyan tradition, the beds were hard as a rock yet somewhat form fitting. I'm curious to know what MOC the mattresses there are. We go back to the main guest house and eat lunch before setting out to the job site.
That's the tank being rolled to the site, it's tough to see:
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| From Kenya 2010 |
Cutting the screen for the sieves:
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| From Kenya 2010 |
We got to St. Catherine's and immediately started to unpack and get to work. We spread out the sand a bit to facilitate drying and then groups formed to complete the various work. We needed to construct sieves, continue spreading out sand, get the plumbing squared away in the tank, get the tank itself and sieve sand once the sieves were completed. I paired up with Mark, Jeff, and Phil to get the sieves put together using my and Dr. Blatchley's drills. We drained both of his batteries, but my drill ended up lasting the entire week somehow with only one battery. Mark, Jeff, and Phil were fantastic to work with and we had a great time catching up about our different modes of getting to Kenya and busting on each other.
As we got the sieves together, they were put to use washing the gravel and really help got that done quickly. We got the first layer of gravel in and Steven and Adin started getting the plumbing in place. I also helped out with plumbing and whatever else, just as everyone did. We really did work well as a large team and I was pretty impressed with there being next to no conflict despite everyone being so tired. We definitely each had moments of wanting to yell out, but we were never really pushed over the edge.
Some pics of the site and working:
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| From Kenya 2010 |
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| From Kenya 2010 |
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| From Kenya 2010 |
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| From Kenya 2010 |
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| From Kenya 2010 |
We wrapped up sometime around 6-6:30 pm and due to the rain had to walk up to Cheptiret on a very muddy road. That walk was probably the most exhausting thing I did on the entire trip, and it didn't help that as we were walking it got darker and therefore much more difficult to tell where we were putting our feet. My steps got smaller and smaller so I wouldn't fall down; I was also carrying my drill and was slightly worried it might look like a gun as the light got less and less. We drove back to Moi and went straight to dinner. After dinner we went back to our respective houses/rooms to crash. At our house, we talked briefly but for the most part all went to bed immediately. The plan for Wednesday was to get there with the sunrise.
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