Last Diary !
Thursday
David and I get asd far as Corner before the Davidmobile starts making some very funny noises that a car should undoubtedly not be making. I know the Sounds Of the Davidmobile. I know the click and whirr of the dodgy wheel, the stacatto beat referred to as “it is the shocks, this one (POINTS RANDOMLY) needs to be replaced” , the grind of the clutch, the sound of the slipping fanbelt, the smell when something springs a leak and oil drips on a hot bit, even the scream of failing brakes. And, of course, the Chitty Chitti Bang Bang effect. We are not sure what that is, it comes and goes. This is something else. “The timing” says David and suggests we divert to ‘the mecanica’. I buy some acyclovir to send to Kibera for a lady whose HIV+ mum has had a nasty outbreak, give it to David in the hope that the Davidmobile will be back on its wheels soon and head to Junction for some admin, writing and a meeting with Jayne, in town from Awendo. Yet again I have not gone there this visit and I feel very bad.
Things are going well, apparently. She proudly shows me the GRADUATION photos from the end of term. This is a primary school. And a kindergarten. Most of the kids are abandoned or orphaned. None have parents able to feed or clothe them adequately, let alone educate without Jayne stepping in with her £1.00 per month community school. And yet here I am presented with a photo of dozens of tiny children in FULL GRADUATION GEAR. The full square hat and floaty gown. With tinsel. Tinsel is huge in all Kenya graduations. For Jayne’s sake I contain my anger. And frustration that she cannot see that the money or the goodwill expended in getting the dressing up gear would fund her school for six months. Grrrrrrrrr.
Businesses are doing really well in Awendo now. Proper shops are developing from roadside hawkers. All good. People taking advice on eating and the incidence of ‘ulsas’ (acid indigestion and reflux) is reduced to almost nothing. People taking advice on hydrating (more difficult and expensive than it sounds) and so fewer headaches and ‘kizunguzungu’ (dizziness). People taking advice on not cooking inside and so fewer kids being brought in congested and wheezing.
I add a load of HTC’s Miracle Cod Liver Oil to what I have already sent her, plus calcium and glucosamine for the shoshos, multivits for adults and the last of the gummy multivits for kids (a ton of ’em free from HTC as the entire consignment was labelled in Finnish !). She also gets more malaria meds, I buy some acyclovir (fact : you are never more than three feet away from someone having an outbreak of genital herpes in the Kenyan slum areas) and other bits and bobs.
There is a young Rwandan artist who paints Christmas Cards and I have arranged to meet him on the ground floor of Junction. The market is in full swing in the car park but I have spent everything I have plus a little more and I cannot cope with the people up there when I cannot buy stuff. I feel as if I personally am grinding their faces and the faces of all near and dear to them into the pest riddled mud of Kenya. So I meet young Mr Dieudonne at the gates and buy some of his lovely cards.
Back at the home of the fabulous Aroji, I bid him a fond farewell. It has been extraordinary living with him. He lives in a different Kenya from the one in which I spend my days and it has been wonderful sharing it. He is a delightful, generous man. And I am looking forward to seeing him again in the New Year. And thank you to the pillowy chested Sarah Chew for making the connection. Despite the fact that we disagree quite fundamentally on almost everything, she has been quite amazingly supportive and helpful and generally wonderful. And mad as a box of frogs, of course.
There are the last ditch meets with Felista and Doris (Pork Place, of course), the handing out of every single penny remaining and the drive to the airport where, after my affecting a hunch and a limp at the massive security area, a delightful soldier tells me I can stay in the car instead of walking out to the people scanner machine.
I am so far back in the plane I am almost in the toilet. I watch Florence Foster Jenkins and cry. And sleep.
