When moments collide

In today's gloaming hour I stepped outside a stranger's house and breathed in the scent of trusted northern Californian soil. The fragrance in the stillness of twilight was the same as the dirt and field and gravel that surrounds my home, and I paused in the comfort of such familiarity. A moment passed and I envisioned a future hour of soft and setting sun when I would stand a continent away and find resonance in the wind's same carried notes.

All my life I have packaged moments and memories in one of two ways - through scent or through sound. I have chronicled years of my life in curated soundtracks, able to return to an emotion or event with just a few notes. But it is smell that grounds me, scent that tells me whether I have truly opened my heart to a place.

Tonight I attended a fundraiser for a small non-profit whose founder, Kat, approached me last fall looking for a Kenyan organization to sponsor. She had already started raising money for children in need after visiting South Africa and Kenya in recent years, and was looking for a trusted organization to begin building a partnership with. I provided a list of about six groups I'd worked with or visited during my time in Kenya, and she selected The International Peace Initiative (IPI) in Meru after interviewing them all. IPI's founder and director, Dr. Karambu Ringera, started the home to demonstrate to her neighbors that AIDS orphans can be a resource to their community and deserve to be supported as such.

At least two years after I visited IPI in Meru to learn about a program designed to empower orphans, I shared about the place they call home with a group of people joined together tonight to raise support for these kids. The funds raised will help build a pig pen that will provide sustainable income for IPI, helping house more orphans and growing their impact in the community. One small project, by one small non-profit, based on one small trip over two years ago.

So there I stood, grounded in the scent of home while the evening's event wove it together with the far off soils of a place that also claims me. These are the moments in which I trust my path explicitly. Mungu yu nami.


To read more about IPI's vision, take a look at this article by founder Dr. Karambu Ringera in World Pulse Magazine. I am helping Solid Ground for Africa plan a visit to the project next summer - let me know if you'd like to join!

Hunger

I spend a lot of time these days trying to find peace...peace with personal choices, peace with other's choices, peace at the point of decision, peace as I reflect on the past. I have enough flux in my own life to sometimes feel peace is infinitely out of reach, and thus the lack of peace in the lives of those I love is sometimes beyond my ability to address. When my own plate is too full to take on the weight of another's, I try instead to send positive energy in their direction by investing good will, time and hope for change wherever I can. This approach led me to spend some time getting to know an organization in Seattle called Recovery Cafe over the past couple of months. Recovery Cafe is a "refuge for healing and transformation," existing to serve people dealing with homelessness, addiction and mental illness. The following piece was shared at an event celebrating the 1 year anniversary of their new space where strength and dignity are found in expertly prepared lattes and volunteer-led art and yoga classes (all of which complement recovery groups and other more traditional programs). It is one of the most beautiful things I've read in quite some time and I post it here as part of this chronicle of my journey to explore humanity and what it means to help and be helped.


Sonnet, with Pride

In 2003, during the Iraq War, a pride of lions escaped from the Baghdad Zoo during an American bombing raid.

Confused, injured, unexpectedly free, the lions roamed the streets searching for food and safety.

For just a moment, imagine yourself as an Iraqi living in Baghdad. You are running for cover as the bombers, like metal pterodactyls, roar overhead. You are running for cover as some of your fellow citzens, armed and angry, fire rifles, rocket launchers, and mortars into the sky. You are running for cover as people are dying all around you. It’s war, war, war. And imagine yourself as a lion that has never been on a hunt. That has never walked outside of a cage. That has been coddled and fed all its life. And now your world is exploding all around you. It’s war, war, war. And then you turn a corner and see a pride of tanks advancing on you.

It’s ok to laugh. It’s always ok to laugh at tragedy. If lions are capable of laughter, then I’m positive those Baghdad lions were laughing at their predicament. As they watched the city burn and collapse, I’m sure a lioness turned to a lion and said, “So do you still think you’re the King of the Jungle?”

I don’t know if the lions killed anybody as they roamed through the streets.

But I’d guess they were too afraid. I’m sure they could only see humans as zookeepers, not food.

In any case, the starving lions were eventually shot and killed by U.S. soliders on patrol.

It’s a sad and terrible story, yes, but that is war. And war is everywhere. And everywhere, there are prides of starving lions wandering the streets. There are rides of starving lions wandering inside your hearts.

You might also think that I’m using starving lions as a metaphor for homeless folks, but I’m not. Homeless folks have been used as metaphors far too often. I’m using those starving lions as a simple metaphor for hunger. All of our hunger.

Food-hunger. Love-hunger. Faith-hunger. Soul-Hunger.

Who among us has been not hungry? Who among us has not been vulnerable? Who among us has not been a starving lion? Who among us has not been a prey animal? Who among us has not been a predator?

They say God created humans in God’s image. But what if God also created lions in God’s image? What if God created hunger in God’s image? What if God is hunger? Tell me, how do you pray to hunger? How do you ask for hunger’s blessing? How will hunger teach you to forgive? How will hunger teach you how to love?

Look out the window. It’s all hunger and war. Hunger and war. Hunger and war. And the endless pride of lions. The endless pride of lions. Are you going to feed the lions? Are you going to feed the lions? Are you going to feed the lions? Are you going to feed the lions?

- Sherman Alexie, April 14th 2011, Recovery Café Capital Campaign Public Launch Event

It comes around

On February 11 last year I came home around 10 at night and was grabbing a snack before heading up to bed. Suddenly Maureen came into the kitchen with wide eyes saying, "I think my water just broke." I burst into a fit of nervous giggles before rounding up my housemates and jumping into the car for the two block ride to Nairobi Women's Hospital. Thankfully, Maureen was staying with us for just this reason - a late night drive into Kawangware would have been too dangerous and taxis don't really operate in the area.

I remember the distinct honor I felt to be driving this young woman to the hospital and the great sense of responsibility as we prepared for an event I had no personal experience with. I'll never forget the nurses a few hours later asking me and my housemates how many children we had as we held hands and focused Maureen on breathing through the pain. "None," we said.

Yet there we were, witnesses to a beautiful birth full of strength, faith, friendship and humility. Out of a forceful crime came this perfect little child, born to a girl who became a woman right before our eyes.

On Christabell's first birthday while friends celebrated in Nairobi eating Ethiopian food and cake with the birthday girl, I said a prayer of thankfulness for this experience and continued friendship.

Look at our growing girl - in a dress I wore myself as a baby sent with love from her auntie far away.

Breaking writer's block isn't always pretty...

I haven't gone this long without writing for quite sometime. For months I've turned words over in my head, jotted notes and ideas for posts and then sequestered them away as life's changing tides polished them into pebbled handfuls too fragmented or outdated to share.

I'm in Seattle now where the cloud cover isn't as bad as I was cautioned when I started sharing my intention to move here. Still, on a sunny day like today I realize how the weather these past two months has forced a fair amount of inside time, urging Seattle-ites (so many transplants like myself) to hibernate in the comfort of hot tea, cozy couches and if lucky, the care of a loved one or treasured friend. I'm halfway through an internship with Rwanda Partners (www.RwandaPartners.org), enjoying having a hand in a variety of projects and witnessing the grass roots devotion that the team puts into services for thousands of Rwandans in need of jobs, education and deliverance from the tragedies of their past.

As I learn about Rwanda's history I realize how much I've resisted engaging with the reality of the genocide and similar global atrocities that have occurred during my lifetime. While part of my desire to go abroad and immerse myself in the challenges facing the developing world is the need to bear witness, my ability to find faith in the face of evil has always been supported by a devout commitment to focusing on the good. As I allow myself to confront the atrocities of the genocide I am reminded that true faith requires an understanding of evil's existence - that this is where the choice to forgive and choose good becomes most profound. So many individuals in Rwanda have embodied this time and time again in forgiving the people who killed their family members (often neighbors and former friends) and it is humbling to be a part of an organization that gives voice to these incredible examples of faith and forgiveness.

These insights accompany near constant attempts in my daily life to turn over my own experiences, especially in the past three years abroad, and understand how they will inform my next steps. Most of this is messy and unpleasant, enshrouded in failed expectations, shaky dreams and a fair amount of guilt at not having a clear cut understanding of what I'm doing or knowing exactly how to put my energy to the best use. So I've stayed quiet (at least in the blogosphere) and shared these things in more personal spaces in the hopes that I could purge them and move forward into whatever comes next with confidence.

I think I'm getting there - each spoken word, shared conversation and idea helps me re-frame what could or should come next. I am revisited by a deep desire to focus on education and promote scholarship opportunities for Kenyan students. This stems in part from my own scholarship and the relationships it fostered but perhaps moreso frm my still evolving understanding of where economic development is rooted and what must be in place in order to move a country forward. At this point I'm not sure if I'll be able to focus on this professionally or not - but I know it is part of my story and will continue to be (and I've got 5 college-ready kids without school fees in Kenya who will hold me to it if I falter!).

As so much of this journey has simply been about evolving as a person I find things I once feared now resonate amongst some of my deepest desires. The open road still calls but I'm more responsive right now to the idea of shorter stints, craving above all the moment when the momentum of recent years stops bearing such weight and I can say with confidence I am where I am meant to be, putting down roots and simply living life to the best of my ability.

Day 13: Resilience

(This post was written on an airplane returning from Michigan two weeks ago.)

I am reading 'The War of Art' in an attempt to remove myself from the somewhat expected but no less devastating place of "what's next?" We all have our demons, or as the author Steven Pressfield calls them, Resistance. Mine is a fight for confidence and focus marked by victories big and small on the road to a life of meaning.

My return to Africa in 2007, the ensuing scholarship and the plethora of people and projects these experiences exposed me to made me feel alive. I had near daily opportunities to create links between communities and individuals, expanding the reach of a story and a reality bit by bit. All this was focused on experience - on gleaning from the trenches of a developing country where real changes were possible to enhance relationships on a global level and improve livelihoods for all. My two year odyssey came to an end while my understanding was yet beginning, though the call to base from my homeland grew stronger. So I returned and plunged into a place I thought I'd left behind, a place full of "What really matters?" "What am I really good at?" "How do I support myself and do the work I feel called to do?" The greatest of Resistance crept stealthily in until I found myself paralyzed in old fears, worn excuses and shallow professions of "it's just not to be."

Alongside this time I continued to meditate on my 30 days of Asante - a self-assigned desire to pinpoint the gratitude embedded in the last two years and the home I found in Kenya. And as I talk, read, pray and sometimes plead myself out of this dark place of self doubt and unknown corners I rest upon the resilience of my community and friends in Kenya and here at home.

I don't like to trivialize, capitalize or sensationalize other people's stories - but I do learn from them, and whether simple or severe my life these past two years was colored by the stories of children of the streets, women running shoe-string childrens homes, a brave survivor of rape, a number of post election violence survivors, former street boys trying to take responsibility for themselves and others like them, a woman starting an NGO, a recovering alcoholic, a displaced and abused mother and countless business people who started small, worked their butts off and now have the means to give big. All this alongside my family and friends at home, some getting degrees, other starting families, still others losing loved ones or facing the devastating impact of the recession.

Resilience continues to overcome Resistance in these lives, and I'm determined that as I confront my own doubts and downfalls I will find my own resilience and move forward with the strength, humility and focus to step through whichever doors God opens to claim my individual role in this global village - however big or small that role might be.

Day 14: Growing old gracefully

(This post was originally written three days before I left Kenya).

It's Sunday night (well, Monday morning) and I'm rounding off a a weekend of goodbyes that feel both perfect and out of place. Kenya has become a true home, and how can one ever say a firm goodbye to such a place?

Friday night I had a simple night out with friends in preparation for a Saturday at the Nairobi Arboretum for a family friendly picnic. The sun showed up as did some of my favorite Kenyan food and it was all that I had hoped - relaxing and full of people who have colored these two years with personality and friendship beyond what I could have hoped for.

Afterward my friend Anthony graciously drove a few of us home and we prepared for a night out with my Rotary club at a local restaurant. In a small room some of the people I have admired and fellowship-ed with in Rotary gathered to send me off in true style. I floated above it all trying to soak in the reality of departure, the understanding that this life I have built is somehow shifting to a new dimension. I am starting to understand.

Starting to understand that as I know returning to the U.S. and the opportunity to be closer to family and lifelong friends is exactly what I am meant to do, the reality that Kenya is now home stands firm. There is a version of me that I am able to embrace here that I have never quite embodied anywhere else, it feels tied to that arrival 20 years ago, when as a child I first opened my eyes to this land. I remember the smells, the people, the roads as we traveled. The small boy with a crutch by his side who smiled so brightly as we passed in our mzungu vehicle. And now 20 years later this place is home - those memories replaced by the reality of walking these streets, breathing this air, becoming the person who feels at home in this once foreign place. And the people - those friends who have swept me up when I couldn't make sense of myself, of my living here, of the choices that led to this path. Of the relationships that transcend being abroad and instead have taught me what it means to identify myself as a friend, a community member, a daughter, a sister or an aunt.

Last night my voice cracked as I tried to explain to my community here that this has not been about living in Africa for me - but about somehow learning those most basic realities of life and humanity and community that immersion in my own culture had kept me from. My desire to help, to make a difference - I understand now that if I were to limit this to the "African" context it would be without value on the cosmic scale - because we are all people, we all face the same struggles albeit in different scopes and different scales. These two years have not been about Africa, they have been about humanity - about understanding myself in relation to the world around me, and how that world calls me to be a part of it.

And so tonight I return home from a night out with my favorite guys - 4 men who have brought joy and friendship and support into my life this year especially. And as I walk into the room I see Cristabel's baby bag at the foot of my bed, left by Maureen today because she had too much to carry. And I think that when I add it all up, two years here in Kenya, it amounts to the most perfect of sums. It amounts to the reality of relationships, of new friendships alongside those richly held back at home. It has been a time of experiences that I still can't comprehend.

Just over seven months ago I welcomed this precious child into the world while I held the hand of her mother. Ever since I have watched the growth of this duo - the love of a mother and the blank slate of a child dependent on her parent. I realize I am just the same - a child of God gradually writing and rewriting my slate as I learn what it means to live and love fully, no matter where I am.

Day 15: An open table

On one of my last weekends in Nairobi I had plans to meet my friend Kevin at an open house for a local charity run by a Rotarian. Kevin was working so he had his brother pick me up with a plan to drop off some other relatives and then pick Kevin to continue to the event around 2 p.m. BUT, t.i.K...(this is Kenya) and at 7:00 p.m. I found myself still at the first stop (having already had tea, chips, sausage and cake) about to sit down to a prodigious feast. I didn't really understand until after we left at around 9:00 p.m. (mind you, without Kevin - who was still at work - even though he was my only connection to this group) what this visit was all about. It turns out that Kevin's aunt was visiting her granddaughter who was born shortly before her son was killed. The girl had just turned four and it was a day for her grandparents to come together, pray for strength as they raised their grand kids and celebrate the legacy of a life lost (and another, the mother, who lived far away in search of a better job in Singapore). I was a random visitor invited and encouraged because I simply happened to be there. I was welcomed in.

My mom hosts Thanksgiving every year in our family. I treasure this day because we celebrate an open table policy as well - each year there is always a person or two who is traveling through or finds they are at an overladen Thanksgiving table in our house for the first time. There are also the oldest and truest of family friends who share this holiday with us, and there are always a few spots where someone is missing (in recent years it has been me among others). This year I will relish in the warmth of a love-filled house and having many of my nearest and dearest within arms reach. I will also be soberly aware of those who are not with us for one reason or another and say a prayer that someday the following will ring true for all, "Forever on Thanksgiving day the heart will find the pathway home."