Things that trip me out about Kenya or that l just love in general....

1. They have Big Brother Africa, Deal or No Deal, and American Idol West Africa. I mean, aside from the fact that there's satellite stations broadcasting all SORTS of shows that are regularly aired in the States (including shows that flopped after the first pilot there, but managed to gain a real audience here, and therefore have continued), it blows my mind that these particular shows have their own whole cast and crew here. The benefits of Big Brother and Deal (shows I never had any interest in) is that the last one standing gets a great deal of money, and in Africa, it's more than enough to both put you AND your children through school, but often to help care for your family as well. Where it's still sizable in the States, it's monumental here. Idol West Africa is extremely important to the up and coming musician. In the States, where it's not only common but incredibly easy to get lost in the throes of new artists and wannabes - whether you won Idol or not - here, you WILL be famous, no doubts. Western music may be ultra popular here, but African musicians have a deeply loyal following that far surpasses the Clayken teenyboppers. The money and opportunity a show like this brings carries a much deeper significance than it does for any American kid, no matter what tax bracket they hail from. It's just how it is.

2. Kenyan Karaoke is a RIOT! It's totally different; first of all, 80% of all the singers, if not more, are really, REALLY fucking good. But on the screen where your lyrics prompt is, the images that come up have NOTHING whatsoever to do with the song - or an unintentional tongue in cheek and highly hilarious sideshow. You could be singing Push It by Salt-n-Pepa, and at the same time watching children frolicking with their dogs, or men at a park playing chess. You never know what you'll get with the karaoke here.

3. There's a deeply ingrained protection and care for children and elders here. If you are riding a crowded matatu, and a woman and her child get on, it's inevitable that someone will pick up the child and put them in their lap. It doesn't matter if they know the mother or not, that's just how it goes, and it creates a trustworthiness and lack of fear in children that's a beautiful thing to watch. If an elderly person gets on, it's common for someone to offer their seat. Sometimes they won't (and sometimes they can't due to how packed it is), but they'll take whatever the senior might happen to be carrying and hold it for them.
I just recently read of a campaign based on a six year old Children's Act in which parents who don't make their children go to elementary school are punishable by up to a year in prison. Even orphans and abandoned children are encouraged to register through churches and community organizations as a matter of law. Since so many unfortunate children end up on the streets due to neglect, ill or dead parents (HIV/AIDS, diphtheria, meningitis, bilharzia, malaria, the list is long) and often end up in petty crime, this is an effort to help them find some purpose and meaning. The classes may be overcrowded and the teachers too few, but it's far better than the alternative.

4. The typos or unintended implications of names or phrases are often hilarious. You see them everywhere - in the paper, on billboards, restarant names. Back when we used to live here, there was a burger place downtown called Waterburger. You KNEW it had to have been inspired by Whattaburger, but to avoid lawsuit and still keep it as close to the original as it would go (or possibly because if you say Whattaburger in Kenyan English, it would translate to most as 'waterburger'), that's what they went with. There's a Creamy Inn here, which is actually a restaurant (there are a lot of "Inns" that aren't actually Inns, but South African fast food chains), but if it were in the context of a hotel, and even outside of it, it's too funny. I'll be taking a photo of that one. There also used to be a large burger chain called Wimpy. I think it's been bought out, but if not, I'm takin photos of that too. A recent headline: "Drivers want share of rally sponsorship kitty". While "kitty" in this sense means a certain prize money fund, I don't think I need to elaborate on how amusing this one is in regards to general American"kitty" associations. A friend of mine here recently wore pigtails and all of her students and fellow residents kept calling them 'pussy tails'. She couldn't really explain to the kids why she found it so funny, but the adults immediately dropped the 'pussy' from their vernacular after hearing the translation.

5. There's a word in a report my mom edited once for our friend Joyce Nyakeya, "anyhowly". I don't remember what particular context it was used in, but let's say it was a sentence addressing the shoddiness of a program she was observing, and the feedback reports were 'written anyhowly'. Joyce is a college graduate, and so Mom was surprised when she ran across this word, but she shrugged it off and left it out. When Joyce read back over it, she asked what happened to 'anyhowly', to which Mom replied that it wasn't a word, to which Joyce indignantly replied that it was a perfectly functional one. I think this word should have been part of the English language; it certainly cuts "any which way" down to only one word, and I'm determined to use it from here on out.

6. Kenyans not only occasionally make up words, it's almost impossible to take them literally in regards to time or distance. We all went down to the coast of Mombasa one Christmas, and needed some supplies. We were told that the nearest shopping center was "not fah", and so decided to walk. After about an hour and approximately four miles later, we asked someone else. "Oh, not fah!", they replied. When we questioned just precisely *how* far, we were told, "Oh, it's just thea, just close", so we kept walking. We finally found the center, an hour and another four miles or so later, badly sunburned and dying of thirst. It's safe to assume that, in a country where a large number of the people travel by foot, 'not fah' means it's probably at least two miles away.
Time is much more lackadaisical here. If they say they'll be there at one, expect them at four. There's no timetable whatsoever for buses or matatus, so if you want to get somewhere at a particular time, you make sure you're there early enough to make room for heavy traffic and rush hour, as well as the fairly common breakdown on the side of the road. I took a taxi from a friend's house to mine today, and was told by the driver that he'd be there in "some minutes". He showed up 45 minutes later, but you couldn't deny that it was, quite actually, *some* minutes.

7. During the light(er) traffic hours, there are two or three lanes on each side of a major road. During high traffic, it turns into about five, and rarely are they actually parallel. They are diagonal and sideways, and gods forbid if you get stuck on the inside lane of a roundabout - you could be there forever. Even if you're in the "right" lane, and say, going straight from a roundabout, it's inevitable several cars will cut in front of you from your left and go straight across to your right. You are guaranteed to narrowly miss either hitting a car, or being hit by one, at least once a day. In other words, people drive any-fuckin-howly they want, and your main goal should always be avoiding collision.

I'm sure there's more...will post them when I come up with 'em.