More time at the baby elephant center...far less crowded on Monday, and so, far more fun. Hearing about the rescues is amazing...these little ones were saved from certain death, since elephant babies stay with Mom for 2 years, and the dedication and obvious affection of the keepers for their charges is a joy to see. "Our" ranger put in a pitch for eschewing all products made from ivory. "If you buy them," he said, "you are as guilty as the ones doing the poaching. Poaching will stop if there is no market." Simple economics...not so simple human motivation.
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Being a total tourist! This is called getting a giraffe kiss... sweet Daisy removing one of her treats from between my lips. This center was also far less crowded on Monday, which made the visit far more enjoyable. A busload of schoolchildren- primary grades- arrived while we were there and they stood in line waiting quietly for their turn up on the platform. There was no jostling, no shoving, no acting up at all...quite a difference from many American school children. The expectation of good behavior and total respect for the teacher is very strong here in Kenya- and I suspect the rest of Africa. And perhaps since school and getting an education is still considered such a privilege here, the entire experience is given much greater value, taken far more seriously. I don't know...I'm only reflecting on what I've seen of students so far.
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Went to a local fruit and vegetable market in the afternoon and got a marvelous fresh fruit salad of mango, banana, and pineapple. Saw some of the local cooking- lots of rice, beans, tomatoes, cabbage...and throughout the market, a mix of the familiar and unfamiliar... both bananas and plantains, casava, red onions, tomatoes (what we would call Romas), potatoes, carrots, and many other unidentifiable veggies. The variety of mango here called apple mangoes, I think because of their rounder shape and partially red coloration, are especially wonderful- amazingly sweet and delicious. Of course, it also helps that these fruits are grown here and can be picked ripe and juicy. I also had a pizza at a little place near our camp and it was amazingly good- fresh tomatoes and a thin, flavorful crust.
The best of all possible worlds...fresh fruit and pizza. Yum!
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And now it is Tuesday- back to the pre-school center in Kibera to see the children and the grandmothers. I'm taking fewer and fewer photos as the days pass, not because there is nothing new to see- indeed, my senses are overloaded with images- but because I would rather be IN the scene, IN the moment, than to stand back and view it through the camera's lens. Weird, perhaps, but that's the way it is. Seeing many more beggars here in Nairobi than in either Mwanza or Kigali- though street children are plentiful everywhere...how is it, I wonder, that as a species, we have such little regard for the world's children? that it is somehow okay that millions of orphans don't know from where their next meal will come? that exploitation by unscrupulous people is common? that these young ones are used and abused and, perhaps worst of all, are robbed of all hope for a future? I am so very happy that the Nyanya Project is changing that for at least a few children and their grandmothers...painting a picture of hope and possibility where before there had been only bleakness. One child at a time...one day at a time...tiny little baby steps, adding up to a giant step forward...and its name is HOPE.
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