Saturday around town

Some pictures around town. Here is the shop where I picked up my Kenyan outfit I had ordered to have made. I'll put up pics of that later. The woman in the foreground is the shop owner. She quoted another Canadian girl close to $45 for material and to make a dress for her two weeks ago (at another shop that she owns), then the same woman quoted the same girl a price of $20 one week ago, when I also ordered my outfit. The difference?? My friend Sarah, who was Kenyan, and knew the lady well was with us when we went together last week. I guess she didn't feel like she could say such an inflated price in front of a person who knows the actual costs. We are used to getting charged 'mzungu prices' and needing to bargain hard if we want similar treatment to others on the street, but this difference in price was a little silly.

In any case, it was interesting to be in a tailor shop and watch the workers non-chalantly piecing fabric bits together with none of the precision I was taught in my sewing class in high school, then using foot-pedal powered sewing machines. They did have one electric serger too, but I guess if the power goes out, that means only one person is out of commission. When ordering my dress I just pointed to crumpled pictures they had from magazines, and described any differences I wanted.

The other option of buying clothes is second-hand, as you can see on this shot of a street in town. Choose your stall. One has all blazer/suit jackets, another has all polar fleece, the next is all men's brown or black shoes, and the next is ladies undergarments... I bought a pair of sturdy brown shoes today as well as a pair of brown trousers... both chosen for their ability to hide dust and mud well...

I stopped in at a drug store with my friend Sella this afternoon. She was sick from drinking milk that wasn't boiled properly. Anyway, when looking at the vast array of medicines I was amused to see half the shelf space dedicated to humans (including selling bottled water... I guess that is a medicine too...), and half dedicated to ridding your goats of ticks, increasing milk production in cows, and curing who knows what in chickens. You could also purchase fertliser for your tomatos or collard green seeds to plant in your kitchen garden.

Below are Sellah and I, after spending two hours in a hair salon. I just read entertaining Kenyan woman's magazines (with articles on polygamy and models who actually looked like people you see in town, rather than the typical skinny skinny North American ones), but she had her hair subjected to all sorts of torture. Well, that's how I see it, since I don't even like using hairspray in mine, and I constantly try to convince my husband to give up his gel habit...

All this is in the name of fashion and style and looking presentable... first vaseline was put on her scalp, then a relaxer chemical (the vaseline was to protect her scalp from burning), then it was washed out, then something else was put in, then it was put in curlers, then she got them dried (I smelled burning but didn't want to alarm anyone...), then it was combed out (as in the curls were combed out), all but a few on top and a swoosh at the nape of her neck. I have a whole new respect now for the effort involved in styling Kenyan women's hair. The lady next to her had some sort of plastic mesh thing put on her head, and then had bits of hair pulled gently through to form a mass of little bumps made of loops of hair (like how a carpet is made?). She also sat under a drier, then later the mesh was removed, the bumps were perfect, and bits were further flattened/ styled with more goop.

Boy am I thankful for my wash-and-go locks!

Here's a pic of a Sunday School class from a local church in the recording studio of the radio station on campus where I stay. Linus is recording them, as part of a kid's program that aired later in the day. They recited bible verses and said poems and sang songs. It was pretty sweet.