Adjusting Your Sails
“When you can’t change the direction of the wind — adjust your sails”
— H Jackson Brown Jr.
If I was to tell you Kenya was just like home I would be lying to you. The last month here has been a whirlwind, I’ve spent most of it running with whatever comes to me. It’s been a month of soaking in culture and taking in the little things that make me feel home. Life is all about adjustment, right?
Even though I’m on a whole different continent on the equator where everything looks and smells different, there are still some things that remind me of home. When I hop in a car and we drive we see these endless fields of green and gold that are very familiar. Yes, I am from Iowa and that familiar green stuff is corn! Some of my favorite memories from back home is the endless fields of corn, sadly they don’t have sweet corn or any corn festivals but the corn tastes almost as good as back home! The farmers here live off of maize just like we Iowans live off of corn. Lately though a pest has come to their fields all the way from the Americas and is killing off 50–100% of their product. Most of the farmers here have adapted to combat the problem, some are covering their crops with ash, or detergent or even a herbal concoction made from extra hot peppers! Even though it’s not my livelihood at stake I fear for these farmers as I try to understand the severity though my project.
Through my questionnaire I have had the opportunity to discuss the dangerous potential of this pest. Most have said things like its bringing famine, or poverty, but mostly mentioned food insecurity. Food insecurity is the state of being without reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable or nutritious food. It’s a companion that over 800 million all over the world live with day to day and a problem that the farmers of Kenya could be facing very soon if this pest isn’t dealt with. It’s not something as Americans I think we really grasp. Imagine yourself eating a cheeseburger, next your mom tells you that will be the only thing you will be eating for the rest of the day. In your imagination you probably started to eat that hamburger just a little slower right? The idea of food insecurity is a constant nagging thought in the back of the Kenyan farmers heads and a battle they fight every day. Their lives are filled with adjusting with climate, pests, and the world around them. The Kenyan farmers are a prime example of “adjusting their sails”.
Since I’ve gotten my project I have been off and running constantly. I have experienced the people, the culture and most importantly the food! So, my experience with food in Kenya basically goes like this,
- Do you have chicken?
- No sorry.
- Okay, do you have beef?
- No, but we have fish.
- Okay, then I’ll have the fish dry fry.
Twenty minutes later they bring out beef wet fry! I take the food with a big smile because I know it is as close as fish dry fry as I’m going to get. Unlike back at home you have about 3 options or 4 if you really enjoy cow intestine. The food consists of some sort of protein, cooked in something like a wok. Your options are either dry fry where it’s just fried in oil or wet fry which is basically tomato sauce and onion cooked in with your protein. Your options of sides are either chopped cooked kale or chopped cooked kale. Everything here is eaten with your hands, so a doughy ground corn and flour cake called Ugali is served as your food transportation vessel. Sadly, my favorite food in the world, cheese, costs about seven dollars for a tiny chunk so things like pizza, or grilled cheese are out of the picture! The food has been a big adjustment and a lot of “you get what you get, and you don’t throw a fit” as my preschool teacher Mr. Candy taught us!
I’ve really learned to appreciate the little things day to day like the roasted corn sold by the women down the road, the peace and quiet on the walk to work, the picture perfect sunsets, and the beautiful city on the water at night. Life is all about rolling with the punches and adjusting your sails, especially here in Kenya, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
