Kenyan border, Mandela, and being a Mzungu.

On Thursday I went in the morning with my team to work on the latrines we are building at Miriam's school. We came home around midday for lunch and to rest for a bit. Saleh (the owner of our guest house) approached me and asked if I would come with him to a school they were currently working with. They are hoping that our team can come and teach some of the programs we have at this school. I agreed to come with him and Baker (the other house manager) out to Mandela school in the Busia district. After an hour ride we pulled into Mandela. It sits right on the border of Kenya and Uganda. The kids at the school go into Kenya to use the fields for soccer practice. The border offices sit right behind the school, but that small part of Kenya can be gone into without crossing through the office. I had a great time crossing over a stream into Kenya (can I now officially cross that one off the bucket list?).

After meeting with the school officials and taking a tour of the school I was able to meet all of the kids. It is a high school so everyone is 14-18 years old. I would walk into every classroom and would be given an introduction and was then expected to say a few words. Every time I began to speak the kids would break out in huge grins and many of them would start laughing. After two classrooms Baker reassured me that it wasn't because I was saying the wrong things or that they couldn't understand me... but that I was the first white person most of them had ever seen. Beyond that they also (apparently) found my accent to be very amusing. My accent? What?

Up to this point I don't think I have comprehended how much of an outsider I am. Everything about me screams difference. From my long blonde hair, to my white skin, to my blue eyes, to the way I talk. It is on the opposite end of the spectrum of anything they have every been familiarized with. It's intimidating and surreal. The way I act and associate with them will be how they come to know my culture and an altogether different way of life. I wouldn't say I feel pressure to be perfect, but I do feel pressure to be good. For them. I want them to know that there are people thousands of miles away that care about and appreciate who they are as a people and as an individual. I want them to know that it's okay to live differently and that my expectation isn't to change who they are, but to empower them to be better.

What I'm saying is that being a first has put things into perspective. If I'm the first, what type of first am I being? I think this can apply to all aspects of my life. What type of first impression do I give off to the people I meet everywhere I go? I hope that the way I represent myself can continue to improve because of experiences like this that make me more aware of who I am.

Just add another rock to my "bucket of lessons" I've learned while in Africa. It's starting to get really heavy.

Rachel