#cfc1314

The CFC Stop Poverty tour is over for now, and the CFC participants posted in Kenya have left Ilula. The tour lasted 4 weeks, and we spent a week in each of the following places: Nairobi, Mombasa, Moshi Kilimanjaro region and Ilula. There we've been visiting schools and youth groups where we've performed the show me made and held workshops on various topics. Hopefully we've passed on our message and inspired people to start, or continue, working to stop poverty in their local communities! 

Here are a few photos from the tour. All credit goes to our photographer Betzy Hänninen :) 

We finally arrived in Nairobi on Friday after spending a total of 26 hours sitting in a bus spread out over 3 days of travelling. Ugh.

Now, why are we back in Kenya? The reason we’ve spent the past week in Nairobi is to work with a campaign that was initiated by Norway’s YWCA-YMCA, called “Stop Poverty”. We’re going to campaign for this cause and go on an information tour around Kenya and Tanzania the next three weeks.

By the way, “we” is not only us four in the Tanzania team. We’ve met up with the 8 CfCers in Kenya, as well as another group called YPP – Young Peace Performers. They’re also on an exchange program, and their group includes people from Kenya, Tanzania, South Sudan, Zambia and Sri Lanka. That makes us a total of 23 energetic and passionate young people, who are ready to visit many schools and youth groups on this “Stop Poverty tour”. (I can’t believe a week has already passed! We’re such a family!)

Keeping in mind how complex the problem of poverty is, the challenge has been: What is the most effective way to inform, engage, and invite young people to join? Entertain them, duh!

So what we’ve been working on is to make a show! It includes dancing, singing, role play, video clips and of course information about the campaign, how to join and what one can do to fight poverty in one’s local community. I must say that I’m so impressed with how well the show has come together in just a few days of planning and rehearsing. We had our first performance today, for representatives of FK Norway (The Norwegian Peace Corps) as well as board members of Nairobi YMCA and YWCA. The past few days have been intense, which is proved by the fact that by 10 PM most of us are in bed, but it has been worth it. The performance went great!

This is how warmly we were welcomed when we entered Ilula Orphan Program Friday afternoon. This felt particularly good, seeing as we’d just spent 8 long hours in a hot, crowded bus from Dar-es-Salaam. Let’s just say that I will never, ever complain about sitting in a bus back home in Norway. Ilula Orphan Program (IOP), is where I’m going to spend the most of my time the next three months.

All four of us, Emilie, Leah, Penina, and I, share a room. It has two bunk beds, two closets and two desks. The room does feel crowded since we’re four, but we’re making it work. It felt good to unpack after being a little bit of everywhere the last few weeks.

We got to meet the children the first day, and they’re very, very sweet. It’s an all girls orphanage, and their ages range from 5 to 22 years. Some are of course more talkative than others, but they’re getting used to our presence very fast. Emilie and I had little kids hanging from our shoulders the minute we entered the room. They are so funny and absolutely adorable! They also think it's so funny every time we say something in Swahili..

I think it’s time for me to answer the questions people have been asking me since I arrived in Africa. I’ve been mainly asked about how whether I’m living comfortably and how the standards are. So far I’ve been a little bit of everywhere, so the standards have varied vastly. For instance, at Brackenhurst, which is just as much a hotel as a conference center, we had hot water and could choose between lamb and beef at dinner. At the YWCA hostel in Dar-es-Salaam, however, we had to share dirty washrooms with many strangers and got two slices of white bread for breakfast. Hence, the living standard depends on where we are.

Now that I’m at Ilula, my base, I can share how it is like here. Ilula is on the countryside, and it takes an 8 hour bus drive from Dar-es-Salaam to get here. A single paved road cuts through the area, and houses and shacks are scattered along it, some near, and some far from the road.

We’re served good food here at IOP. The diet mainly consists of rice, pasta, and ugali (cornstarch mixed with water), vegetables and sometimes we get some meat. Sometimes Emilie and I treat ourselves with mango juice, peanut butter and bananas from the market. 

There is a dress code here in the village. Women can’t expose much skin, and we can’t wear clothes that are transparent or tight. We must wear clothes that cover our shoulders and wear pants or skirts that cut at the knee at the shortest. Not the coolest thing in the world because of the heat, but we’re getting used to it.

The showers and toilets are shared, and yes, the toilets here are holes in the ground. We shower in cold water and wash our clothes by hand. Showering in cold water is more than fine for me, because it’s extremely refreshing after one has walked around in the heat here.

Most of the time we don’t have running water, and sometimes we don’t have electricity. Therefore we take care of all the bottles water we get and use our flashlights when we have to. If we need water to wash our clothes when there’s no water, we fetch some from the well with a bucket that has a rope tied to it.

While writing this, I realize how different it is to live here compared to Norway. I’ve been aware of this the whole time, of course, but it becomes so much clearer once I write it. I must add that adapting hasn’t been a problem. Many things are uncomfortable, but it doesn’t take much time before one gets used to them. In other words, I don’t walk around dwelling on how deprived we are of the luxuries we have in Norway. Everything here just feels normal now. For instance, I’m so incredibly used to washing my clothes and towel by hand that I just do it automatically. It’s certainly not my favorite thing to do in the world, but it’s OK! Although many things are uncomfortable, we have everything we need, and we’re safe :)

Oh, and the only reason I'm able to post this is because we have taken a 1 hour bus drive from Ilula to Iringa, where they have internet cafes.