Never Grow Up

I haven't been writing much lately because I haven't been doing much. I've been super overwhelmed with school work and it's getting pretty frustrating. This past weekend was one of my last free weekends and I had to stay home to work on school work. Not fun. I thought this was supposed to be a slacker semester- that's half the point of study abroad. You go to another country, don't do a ton of school work, and get totally immersed in a new culture and new experiences and everything. Learning about the new culture is half of your studying. And I'm sitting in my apartment typing away at a grant proposal. It makes me slightly resentful of all of my friends in Europe who are doing all of this amazing traveling and crazy stuff. I know my program is different and that's why I chose it, I just wish I had more time to explore Kenya and hang out with my Kenyan friends.
We did throw a party this weekend, which was really fun. Teaching a bunch of Kenyans what fraternities are and how to play beer pong was pretty entertaining.

From Kenya Part 2

And we all know now to stay as far away from Sambuca as humanly possible-anything that tints your teeth when you drink it really shouldn't be ingested. Sitting in my apartment Sunday morning, all I could think about was how much I wanted some McDonalds breakfast. It was a rough morning. If I learned anything from the night, it was that I'm going to die on my 21st birthday. I will have zero tolerance built up and just be such a mess. Looking forward to it, though, TWO MONTHS TO THE DATE.
On a more serious note, yesterday was a rough one on the harassment end. Usually I can kind of get around without standing out too much, so people leave me alone. But for some reason, guys were just total assholes yesterday and it was kind of not fun. I had a pretty funny exchange with a guy on my matatu trying to get to a friend in Kibera, though.
him: "i love you, will you marry me?"
me: "no."
him: "but you are so sexy"
me: "exactly, so why would I marry you"
and then he walked away without bothering me anymore.
I just wish there was a way for me to totally explain how that feels when it happens 15 times in a day and everyone is laughing at you and making comments about you being white and just being really, really rude. I was talking to a friend last night and trying to tell her about my day and my frustrations. And she asked me an interesting question, "Do you like Kenyans?" And I thought about it and thought about it and told her that I have met some really, absolutely wonderful Kenyans (and people in Kenya that aren't Kenyan), and then there are people that are just very hateful for no reason except my skin color. As a whole, I think I like Kenyans who are open and receptive and nice because they become good friends, or even just good encounters on the street. But, like everywhere else in the world, there are mean people here too and they really suck. It will be so nice to come back to America and have concepts like "customer service" again, hahaha (but I'm not joking, there's no customer service here, the customer is always WRONG), and people not trying to rip me off everywhere I go since "mimi si fala" (i am not stupid). Being thought of as a constant tourist can be really insulting, but it's one of those things you gotta shrug off most of the time. I can't imagine how weird it's going to be to have white people around me all the time when I get back; that's going to be serious reverse culture shock.
But back to work now. We're going out of the city this weekend to stay at the base of Mt.Kenya in a beautiful lodge so I'm really happy about that and hopefully will have some good stories and pictures when we get back!


**EDIT: I want to play devil's advocate to myself for a minute. Some days in Nairobi are perfectly fine and some matatu/bus rides are pleasant. I just had one where the man across the aisle from me was wearing a "DC" flat-brimmed hat so I had this huge grin on my face and explained to him that his hat was from my city. Not sure if he totally understood, but he smiled big. Then the man sitting next to me starting asking me where that was and I told him, Washington, D.C. and he asked me how long I had been in Kenya and how I like it here (EVERY person you meet in Nairobi asks this, like they want confirmation that their city/country isn't terrible). I told him I liked it very much, and we left the conversation at that. No pestering, no harassing, just pleasant conversation. I felt that after this post this morning, for that to happen was the world's way of putting me back in a positive mindset about Nairobi men on transportation- just to remind me (and in turn, you guys) that not every day are things as bad as they were yesterday.