I don't want a husband

This weekend I went to my supervisor’s mother’s funeral. My coworkers and I kinda organized it. Friday morning we met at her house in Oyugis and loaded a truck with the catering stuff and some of the catering team. One of the groups we work with has a catering group and they do funerals and other events as an income generating activity. The family and friends went to a church service while we loaded a bus with 100 plastic chairs (not easy or fun) and we had to get a pickup truck to deliver the other 100. We also had event tents, which aren’t the easy to put together plastic ones like we have at home, more catering equipment, 20 live chickens tied by their feet on the floor of the bus, and a live ram (which we put in the luggage compartment under the bus). Some were worried about the ram suffocating on the way, but it was going to be killed later in the day anyways. It survived, was probably traumatized, but we ate it for lunch.

The bus took us and other members of the catering team to my supervisor’s mother’s home, which was in a very remote area about 200 km away. We helped set up the tents and the family/friends arrived with the body soon after. When people are grieving they scream/yell, so everyone was doing that when they arrived with the casket. There was an entertainment crew that played music and did a little bit of singing. They played music all night long on Friday night and people were dancing. Now, I’m used to people staring at me in Oyugis because I’m white, but being in this more remote location pretty much EVERYONE was staring at me, well except all the family members and people who already knew me. I especially noticed at dinner, being watched while you eat is a very weird experience. One of my coworkers told me he was eavesdropping on the children earlier in the day. They were calling me Indian (not even mzungu) because the only people close to my skin color that they’ve seen are people from India. He told me they were talking about me, asking each other why I didn’t yell like everyone else when the body arrived. So for this reason I decided not to dance. Although I’m sure people were wondering why I wasn’t dancing but I’m sure if I did dance they would be wondering why. Oh well. I do have to say, though, the children in that area are way more well-behaved than the children in Oyugis, who see white people all the time. Not once did any of the children ask me for candy/money or anything. They just wanted to shake my hand. And, when I was sitting with two Kenyan women, they shook their hands too, as opposed to children in Oyugis who usually just want to shake my hand.

Oh yeah, let me mention that there was no electricity in this area, but we had two generators (car batteries) to power lights and music. I’m not gonna lie, I feared we would all burst into flames due to the sketchy wiring they had set up. I’m glad to report there were no fires. I stayed up as late as I could on Friday night (a lot of people stayed up all night), took a sleeping pill and put on my headphones to try and block the blaring music out as I slept in a room full of foam mattresses with probably 20 women. I was able to sleep a little. However, Kenyans wake up very early so I was up at 5:30AM on Saturday. The funeral started at 10 and luckily one of my coworkers sat next to me and translated. Although, I was excited because this weekend a lot of people were speaking Kiswahili; there were people from other tribes around so I was able to practice. We realized we wouldn’t be able to pack things up and get back to Oyugis that day so we planned on staying another day.

My supervisor’s mother had about 20 grandchildren, many of whom were close to my age. So, I was happy to make some friends. Many of them live elsewhere or attend universities, but I hope to see some of them again soon. On Saturday a woman came up to me to greet me and then said some things in Luo I didn’t understand. I asked my coworkers what she said. They told me she said I am a beautiful lady and that I should marry her son. My coworkers told her the son should speak for himself and I used a phrase (which I used MANY times this weekend) “ok adwaro dichwa,” or “I don’t want a husband.” Oh yeah, let me add, this lady was drunk, she started a fight later in the night. There were some other men around and they were curious why I didn’t want a husband, when they asked how old I was and I told them, they said “that is OLD.” In Kenya I guess 23 is kinda old not to be married.

They played music all night long on Saturday night too. It was more for security reasons, they didn’t want to turn off the lights/music for fear somebody would try to steal the stuff. I stayed up for awhile sitting around a charcoal jiko (our version of a bonfire) with some of the grandkids. There were two drunk old guys dancing and it was pretty funny to see because at that point they were playing American country music. I wasn’t going to complain because everyone was staring at them instead of me, which was nice. I slept okay and Sunday morning we broke down the tents, stacked chairs, etc. As we were sitting around, a 70 year-old man came over to talk to me. He asked where I was from etc. and then he asked me if I was “coupled” I said no, which was probably a mistake. I told him I am too old to get married and “ok adwaro dichwa” he told me I would change my mind. I told him I am very stubborn and will not change my mind. Then he turned to some of the other people there and asked them to pray for him to be younger so he can marry me. HAHA. He kept coming over to me and asking if I would marry him were he younger. Then, one of the guys there had a digital camera so he asked for a picture with me so he could show his friends the beautiful mzungu he is going to marry. I took the picture with him to humor him.

I learned to eat sugarcane like a Kenyan this weekend too. They eat it like it comes out of the field and just use their teeth to break off the outer shell. The boys cut off the outer layer for me so I could just chew it. I’m amazed at how much sugarcane people can eat here. The only other time I’ve had sugarcane is from the mojitos at Sharky’s.

We got back yesterday around 3 and I was so tired I went to bed at 7:30pm. As sad as the funeral was, it was also pretty fun. I had planned on going to Kisumu to meet up with some other volunteers but when we stayed longer for the funeral, I wasn’t able to go. I’m happy I stayed though, it was a good cultural experience and I was able to meet some other young people.