To Kisumu with friends

  I was so impressed by this park in Kisumu.  It could have been in any city in Canada, it was so clean, orderly, and well kept.  People have told me that the town of Kisumu is so beautiful (it reminds me of Victoria BC) because the main tribe there is Luo, a people who are known to be fairly prideful and really love the BEST things money can buy (so they can show them off...)  :)

Last weekend I went to Kisumu, Kenya's 2nd largest city, on the shores of Lake Victoria.  I went with two students from ICM.  Aggrey is a pastor in charge of overseeing several churches in his area ('bishop') and is a married father of three girls- two are his own and one is adopted from one of his wife's reletives who died.  Salome is in charge of the women's ministry in her province.  She is married and has six children, my age and younger, though none were at home while we were staying there.  I met several of her friends, and 100+ kids (literally) from her rural neighbourhood.  Out of 12 women I met, all but one had 4 or more kids- usually more like 6-9.  One had 9 of her own plus 6 adopted.  About 1/3 of the women said they had adopted kids- usually from extended family.  The area around Lake Victoria is the hardest hit with the AIDS/HIV pandemic. 

I learned a few things here.  First- it's not really all that normal for a husband and wife to live in the same place all year round.  The fact that Salome and her husband have always lived in the same house is a bit unusual- lucky I'd say.  It's more usual for the husband to be away working somewhere in some city or ??? and have his wife/ wives at home taking care of the kids and the shamba.

Second- I always wondered how parents could send their kids- as young as 10- away to boarding school.  It is totally the custom to do that here- I just couldn't see why it would be a good idea for everyone to send their kids away for a good part of their growing up years.  As we drove in the pre-dawn hours towards our bus early Monday morning I got my answer.  There were dozens of students in uniforms walking on the roads... at 5am... towards school.  School opens at 7:30 but these students are going there early to take advantage of the electricity to study by.  At home the rooms are small, dimly lit (by lanterns if paraffin can be afforded), and busy with the rest of the big family.  At least at boarding school students can get some studying/ learning done.  Also, they don't need to walk so far- spending up to 2 hours each direction in commuting time!