Some video from Africa!

If you are queesy: stop the film at 3minutes30seconds.

EyeCampRoughRun from travispitcher on Vimeo.

This is some footage from Uganda, it is (of course) beautifully shot and beautifully edited and I can take very little credit for either thing.
Although most days in Africa I helped film or work on sound, the hospital was very crowded I was more in the way than helpful inside. I babysat Travis's equipment though, since he could hardly have his giant backpack on inside. (You turn suddenly while wearing it and people get hit in the face, and if those people are blind they have no chance of avoiding your bag.)

For my Komaza friends, I'm sorry we don't have any Kenya footage to show you, but if you can manage to load this video on your very slow internet then this will at least give you an idea of what our footage will look like.

When you're watching it remember that this is a rough cut, and there will be narration explaining the Eye Camp. Here is what the narrator may say (beginning after the lady in pink says "I'm not looking proper"): In rural Uganda people have gone their entire lives without ever having their eyes checked. They gather together for a free exam, first having basic checkups by professional doctors and nurses. The doctors write prescriptions for free medications and give away free eye glasses, all fund-raised by the Tipping Bucket.
*The screen goes black*
But the real miracle is when sight is restored completely.
Many people, living blind with cataracts for years begin being preped for surgery to have the cataracts removed. The clouded lens is carefully cut from the eye and replaced with a new clear lens.
Then the film ends, but in reality the film will not end yet. The next morning when the bandages were removed people cried out, excited that they could see. A man saw his wife and daughter come in and could not stop looking at their faces, so grateful was he to finally see them. It was a really neat day and Travis (of course) captured it all so well.

28 days in Africa

A picture for every day?

And maybe a story for each one.

Oh, blast. You know I've just realized that I have at least one CF Card at home with morepictures on it. Things like giant anthills, and Freddy the Boda-Boda driver, our cook Edith, and pregnant Aberforth, and Travis trying to eat sugar cane and feed Nutella to the goats (which they didn't like at all.)

So here are 25 pictures for now, and nope, they are no longer in order:

aaaand, I still can't crop. So if they look like they ought to be horizontal then click for the full picture.

It would seem wrong to start this photo flood with a picture of someone besides Osito. Unfortunately, you can't see him unless you click on the picture.

So Osito was one of our drivers. He told us he was 26, but he also said he thought he was born in 1987. So we don't know how old he is.

Osito has, as he mournfully told me the first time we met, "never even touched an aeroplane," yet his greatest ambition is to be a famous singer in America. If he becomes a famous singer in America then he will send his giant fortune to a Kilifi orphanage.

This is a picture he asked me to take to go on the cover of his Demo Cd.

If you are wondering, Osito's "band" is really a small gospel choir.

He is not the main singer, but intends to be the only one photographed for their cover.

Oh Osito, I love you. But you also drove me nearly crazy.
This is Squeegee, our favorite wiggly skinny little puppy. He did have fleas, but we still let him in our room and I carried him around quite a bit.

I couldn't help it. Have you ever seen such a cute little guy? He is also the puppy that I mentioned being harassed by monkeys in Kilifi. I'm glad to say that he is still alive and well.
This is my cute husband filming a burning pile of trash.

First, imagine the worst smell you have ever smelled.

Now set it on fire.

There isn't a garbage system in Kenya (or most of Africa, I think.) So people throw their garbage in the woods, or if that's too big of a pain, they burn it.
This is Kilifi! Doesn't it look just perfect?

Yes, the picture below is also Kilifi, combine them into a rural and gorgeous town and you got Kilifi.

This picture was taken from the BoatYard, a little tourist restaurant that served absurdly delicious crab samosas, while you sat with your feet in perfect white sand, shaded by palm trees, and looked out at the sun setting over the Indian Ocean.

Can we talk about ideal? This was our special treat for our last day in Kenya.

We went with our friends Leah and Rajiv, our personal Kenyan tour guides, they introduced us to our favorite parts of Kilifi, like the people, and the alleyway market, and --of course-- crab samosas.
This is Osito again, in front of his Tuk Tuk. It's basically a motorized rig-shaw. He would drive us around town in it for super cheap.

I said to him, "Osito, can I take your picture in the Tuk Tuk so my family can see what it looks like?"

"Of course, of course!" he said

So I took a picture of him sitting in the Tuk Tuk seat.

"One more," he said, and he got out and crouched down next to the front.

"Another?" he asked, posing in the above position.

"Would it trouble you to take just one more?" he asked.

A dozen photos later and I am confident that I have pictures of both Osito and the Tuk Tuk from nearly every angle.

We had a bonfire on the beach one night and it was a blast. Luckily Rajiv and Travis were both boy scouts or we never would have gotten the fire started it was so windy! We ended up all crouched and huddled around it, holding a blanket over our heads to block the wind. When the papers and sticks finally caught fire my eyebrows (and everyone else's) were nearly burned off.

Lots of teeny tiny crabs (think nickel-sized) would venture near to see the fire, but become frightened and try to scurry away.

But the boys kept herding the scuttling little guys into the fire where they would scream, start to bubble, and then die.

Then the boys would pull the crab out and eat it! they said it was pretty good, but I was too squeamish to have a bite.

I think this monkey is in the Nairobi airport, although I assure you they were everywhere.

The guards in the airport absolutely hated them, but they kept sneaking in somehow.

This is Osito's band. Can you see him back there?

We have his cd if you would like a copy, and if you are feeling generous I think Osito would love to get a few US dollars in the mail.

He might even donate it to a near-by orphanage.

This picture was taken in Uganda at one of HELP Internationals Eye Camps. HELP pays for doctors and nurses who come to very rural places and give out free eye glasses and perform dozens of cataract surgeries.

Travis made good friends with the man above and followed him through the whole procedure.

He spoke very good English for living somewhere so rural.

This is us at the NILE river. We were right near the head of it, visiting some pretty little falls.

I have never been anywhere that is mentioned in the Bible, and I know it was silly, and we were very far from Egypt, but it was a very neat experience to see the Nile.

I just kept thinking about Moses, and after I thought of that (of course) I felt the need to take off my shoes.

And then I finally understood (I think) how sweet it was for Christ to wash the apostles feet. Since every day we came home and our feet were dirty and sweaty and aching, but mostly dirty, and I would have to sit down in our disgusting cold shower and try to rub my feet semi-clean.

And sitting there at the Nile with water washing over my feet just felt so heavenly.
This man is at another Eye Camp.

Travis took this picture.

Isn't it gorgeous?

This is me.

This is our driver Peter, who, if you've read other posts in Africa you will know was a very good friend.

When we were in Uganda he actually called us and once I was on the phone said "Becky, please. I miss you so much. Please, please return to Kenya."

"I would like to," I said.

"Then please come back. Come back now if you can."

It's nice to have friends who want you to visit.
Remember when we broke down in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere in the middle of Kenya.

We took some pretty long-exposure shots.

You seriously wouldn't believe the stars you can see in Africa.
Remember when the Kenyan women couldn't stop laughing at me? They helped me tie my skirt and then babbled on in Swahili and then laughed until they cried?

These are a few from the group. The girl in the black and green is the one who finally helped me.
This is a photo from when Rajiv and Leah and Travis and I had dinner with Kadzo and Bahati and they gave me my Kenyan name and then showed us their farm --which we would have destroyed if they let us keep working on it.

These are the mud huts they live in and you can see their make-shift tables and communal plates.

It was perfect. I want to do it again.

Today.
This is Elvis, Bahati's baby. All of the babies (and I even saw children who were at least three r four) are carried around like this. The fabric used is the same fabric they use as skirts (Kangas) and often the woman will wear a skirt that matches her baby-carrier.

This is Kadzo and Bahati laughing at someone (I think Leah) trying to hoe.

Don't be fooled though, they laughed much harder when I tried to hoe.

Repeatedly they took the hoe away from me and tried to reshow me how it's done.

And repeatedly I failed.

This is just a little baby tree.

And little baby me.

Some Children

I have separated photos out into several categories the first category is African Children, aka the cutest human beings on the planet.

You know those ads of crying skinny little Africans with big dark watery eyes?

They've all got big eyes, and unlike American kids they often look solemnly at the camera rather than grinning.

And if you happen to catch one of them falling down, or stubbing their toes then BAM! a sad watery eyed face that you can use in your ad about donating money. (Other than shots and one time when Monica fell down, I never saw a single child cry [Monica is the last photo, isn't she sweet?])

Anyway, I love these little guys.

Here are some of my favorite children/pictures:

hmmm, I'm having a hard time cropping things, so some of these are very goofy. But you get the gist.

Uganda

We're leaving Uganda. In one half hour a man will be here to pick us and our luggage up and take us to the airport.
So I will be quick. I think you deserve at least one decent blog post while we're here, no?
This is what Uganda is like: No INTERNET.
But other than that... here are three stories to help you picture Uganda, treat them as individual blog posts and remember, in a mere three days I will have Internet good enough to post PICTURES online for you.

Story One; Chicken Eating Ants
Everywhere in Uganda there are tall (sometimes 10 feet tall!) red mounds of dirt as though some one dug a gigantic hole and piled up everything that came out. Having read the Posionwood Bible these mounds terrified me and I assumed that they were gigantic ant-hills.
After I finally asked about them I was told that not only was I correct, but that our cook said that when they all come out they could eat a live chicken.
The night after I was told this was a very scary night. Travis and I have been sleeping on a mat-thing on the garage floor of our house. As I prepared for bed I saw what could only be described as a CHICKEN-EATING ant. He was freaking gigantic, walking calming towards my side of the bed.
In a daring act of bravery I smashed the ant (which was as long as half my pinky) with our sunscreen bottle repeatedly. It proceeded to release the worst-smelling poison (I'm SURE it was poison) in to the air making it even more impossible to sleep.
Why was it already impossible? you ask.
Here are three good reasons:
1. We live next-door to a piggery and can hear pigs screaming all night long as they are slowly killed with a blunt knife.
2. We were given a chicken as a "gift" and he does not only crow at sunrise. I would describe his crowing as insanely loud and occurring every 15 minutes.
3. There are two goats on our land too. One of whom (Aberforth) is very pregnant. If I had not seen her sans-baby the next morning I would assume that all of her human-like screaming was due to the pain of giving birth. Guess what? That treat is still to come.

Oh, and our cook finally told us today that the ant-hills are filled with delicious crickets... not ants.

Story Two; The Orphan Choir
On Monday we were asked to join a few HELP Intern. volunteers as they went to listen to the Orphan Choir in Kyini. We were to record music for them that they could hopefully sell. I was prepared for the same sort of children that we often see here: Happy laughing children in matching but shabby uniforms sing songs of welcome and simple pleasures.
I was not prepared for a small group of 15 students who sang songs abut AIDS, death, loneliness, the possibility that God did not exist and other horrible things, all while many of them wept themselves.
If that were not enough, the director of the Orphanage kept a running commentary. "That girl who is crying, her last parent died on Saturday. That girl in the yellow, she is HIV positive. That boy there, he is thirteen and is caring for 4 younger siblings on his own." Besides that, we met another woman who was caring for her own children and the children of her deceased brothers and sisters, 27 kids all told.
Travis and I had to have a serious discussion about adopting a child. Leaving them seemed too heartless.
People on buses, have actually asked me if I would take their child for them. All of the girls here have had babies thrust on them and been begged by desperate adults who cannot feed all their siblings children to take the baby back to America and raise it.
I was prepared, I think, for Annie. I was not prepared for actual orphans. It was the hardest day I've yet experienced in Africa.

Time is running short. Here is the third story.

Story Three; Freddy the Boda-Boda Driver
Today our friend Freddy's wife had a baby. She is a beautiful little girl (but little might not be the right word, she was nearly 10 pounds!) After driving Travis around this morning on his Boda-boda (motorcycle) to film around Mukono Freddy came back to pick me up to take us to his new house and make a video for Mr. Clint and Tammy, some of our mutual friends.
Throughout the tour of the house (which you can all see soon enough) Freddy would add "I love Mr. Clint so much," or "It is all to Mr. Clint that I have this," or my favorite: "I wish Mr. Clint to stay here one week, seven days and six nights and every day he will give me a new idea. I could use seven new ideas."
It seems that Clint gave Freddy his first lessons in business, teaching his valuable but uncommon ideas like "Spend money on what you need, not what you want."
Ever since they came 8 years ago, Freddy has worked on changing his life around. He works hard, and saves money. He can send his children to school, and now is building a new house. (If any of you are interested in helping Freddy, he's trying to earn money now for a water tank, about 400 USD.)
After the tour of his house and the meeting of his three sons and adopted daughter (his sister's) Freddy took us back to see his new wife and baby who were still at the hospital. Despite having been in several hospital-type places here I couldn't help but think "At least there will be an indoor toilet there. I've got to go."
We arrived at the hospital by traveling down a thin dirt-path (treacherous for motorcycles) and arrived at a shabby building no different from any other. There was an uneven dirt floor with an open ceilinged court. There was trash littered everywhere and a dozen doors leading to private rooms.
Private rooms without electricity, water, special beds for babies, without ice chips, without nurses to get you things, without even a fan or a real pillow for the new mother. They had to bring their own sheets for the bed.
I can't believe I expected her to have her own bathroom.
A legit bathroom.
Freddy told us the medical bills would cost 50000 shillings (25 dollars) so he had to go back to work.
We said, It is customary to give gifts when a baby is born in America. Stay with your wife today.
And helped him pay the doctor's fee.
I feel a little guilty, perpetrating the whites have money to spare stereotype.
But not very much.
That baby deserved to have both parents there. She was so stinking cute.

And that is all. Tomorrow we will be in London.
Wednesday we will be home.

Wish us luck, we love you

We're here

So we're in Uganda.

So far, I have to admit it... I prefer Kenya,

But I may be biased because in Kenya we had a bed, hot water, a full kitchen to cook in and only three roommates. Here we have 19 roommates in a house half the size. And 16 of them are unmarried sophomore girls.

But we have been having fun, and being sure to take many many pictures.

Today we visited the Nile.

It was very awesome.

Yesterday we went to school and talked with the students and built an adobe stove (until rain shut down the country... even though the kids were already in school they stopped teaching when the rain started.)

I would like to write more but we're being charged by the half hour and I have to go.

Uganda!

Can you believe it?
It's our last day in Kenya. I still can't totally take it in, but we've been here two weeks already.
Tomorrow we'll get on a plane for Uganda, where we'll stay for 8 days, and then off to England for 2 days (Oxford, hurrah!)
And then home, where I'll be thrust into the second week of summer school and work.

And suddenly I realized that we took dozens of hours of video footage and like... 6 pictures.
So today I'm trying to fill my camera.

Maybe I'll put on different shirts every few hours so it doesn't look like we were only in Kenya one day.

And friends at home... STOP.
Do not get married without me. Do not get engaged without me. Do not up and leave forever to New York without me.
Too many things are happening there that I don't want to miss.

I keep waking up very distressed by my dreams.
A dream where Suzie says they're leaving before we get back and we'll never see them again.
A dream where both the Haggen girls get married, but a terrifying Gollum-type creature tries to sabotage them and kill their new husbands.
A dream where a friend at home gets engaged and decides to get married while we're still in Africa.

I do not approve of all this. Just pause all activities at home until I can come back and be a part of them.
Deal?

Then I don't have to make Travis come snuggle me since I wake up suddenly and find that I'm crying.
I miss you all.
And I will try to write as soon as I can, but who knows what the internet in Uganda is like?

love
becky

Update on Africa

Remember how we're going to KENYA this summer to film a documentary?

Well NOW we're also going to UGANDA! We'll be filming two documentaries there as well for Help International. Travis did a doc for them last week for Tipping Bucket. (Check it out, and think about adding a drop to the bucket -- just a dollar donation is all they're asking for!)

Two of my friends will also be in Uganda with Help International this summer, Paige and Nicole and I'm excited to think I might get to see them working to change the world, and bring sight to the sightless. Check out the Help International Website, or just watch this three minute film and learn all 'bout what we be doing this summer.
YAY!


And if you've forgotten what we're doing in Kenya, then check out Komaza's website and learn a little bit more about micro farming. We'll be making a doc about them first!