Our mud hut at the orphanage is great, it has a shower, toilet, kitchen and a gas cooker, but unfortunately no dishwasher (maybe that's why Aidan brought me). We have an amazing view over Lake Nakuru and the city. Each morning the African sunrise is a spectacular display of burnt orange, flaming red and gold. And, if we are lucky we wake to the sound of chirping birds and not screaming children.
Caring for the children is really hard work but I absolutely love it. They are so full of energy and are happy to sing songs, listen to a story, jump on the trampoline or just look out the window and watch the tractors and horses go by. Aidan is hilarious with the children, particularly when he can smell poop, he alerts me and waits for my immediate action. I laughed so hard when he picked up little D (nicknamed the vaccum cleaner because he can be found under the table after every meal eating the scraps) who had "crapped his dacks" in semi-solid and liquid form, which subsequently ran down Aidan's arm. Aidan assures me that the pungent stench could not have come from a human. His frantic search for soap, disinfectant, hand sanitizer and any other chemical to wash himself with, left me to wash and change little D.
The volunteers have a weekly roster that roughly equates to 8 hours work a day. The daily duties include caring for the children, working in the school, assisting the cook in the kitchen, working in the yard and the dreaded laundry duty, which includes hand washing 80 dirty nappies a day! When we are not on duty we take walks to nearby villages, play soccer with the locals and play scrabble on the very dodgy hand made board we purchased from the Nakuru markets.
Nukuru city is about 16 kilometers from the orphanage. It is a bustling city with hawkers on every corner trying to sell you something "madam would you like a tie or a bookmark? Maybe a paper necklace? I will give you a good price... $2000 Kenyan shillings ($30 AUD!). We come to Nakuru about once a week to use the internet and do some grocery shopping. On average we spend about $30 AUD on groceries which buys 2 loaves of bread, 6 bread rolls, 1 doz eggs, pasta, rice, tin tomatoes, fruit, veg and 2 minute noodles. This works out to be quite cheap, but if we were to shop at the markets we could buy a bucket of tomatoes for $1.00 AUD. It would be a lot cheaper for us to shop at the markets but it would also involve a lot of 'negotiation'. As soon as the Kenyans see a Wazungu (white person) the price automatically doubles, even at the chemist I was charged double for some cough syrup.
Ah, reminds me of uni, back when Aidan used to deal with my little 'problems' as well by running for soap and hand sanitiser. You should have a sheep drencher just filled with water free hand soap, that would be awesome.
ReplyDeleteSounds like you guys are earning your rent, damn, but at least you have Scrabble. Of course you do...haha.
Miss you both heaps and hopoe your enjoying it as well as staying safe.