A Golden Opportunity!

Hello team!


I hope it doesn't appear like I've been neglecting this here blog of late, life has just taken over somewhat and seems to have gotten away from me a bit - however I am back with a vengeance now anyway.


Lots of really cool things have happened recently.  First of all, I was lucky enough to meet a couple of really rad dudes (who also happen to be brothers which is EVEN COOLER) called Tim and Chris Howe.  They run a night down at the Prince of Wales Hotel in Bunbury known as Fungalore (peep their Facebook page HERE).
The premise of Fungalore is that it's a super-friendly, drug-free, awesome night out with great bands and a charity raffle to raise money for different Australian charities.  Tim and Chris were kind enough to offer to hold a Fungalore to benefit The Vivid Foundation which I am so so grateful for.  It was a great night and I was pretty overwhelmed to learn that the guys raised $500 that night which apparently is really good going so I'm stoked and again so grateful to everyone who came out and dug deep.  
I highly recommend, if you find yourself on a Wednesday with not much to do, that you head down to a Fungalore sometime.  It's great fun and I don't know about you but I kinda love going down south and especially to FUNbury.
Anyway, that money is going to go towards some supplies for community health workers who can deliver ongoing care to people in far-flung regions of rural Kenya so the difference is absolutely unreal.


Another show of overwhelming generosity has come from my beautiful friends Sophia Brown, Anna Brown, (and the newly engaged!!!) Hannah McGrath and Cameron Etchells.  The girls run Two Bucks 'til Wednesday (you can peep their Facebook HERE and their blog HERE).  Cam is one of Perth's most talented photographers who has given up a lot of time to publicise what the girls are doing.
If you're not familiar with TBTW, they hold sales of vintage clothes every couple of months and the money raised is donated to the Cancer Council; which, as long-time readers of this blog will know, is also a cause very close to my heart.  To date, they've raised around $30,000 which is just the most unbelievable achievement.  So, you can understand how overwhelmed I was when the girls approached me earlier this year and told me that they wanted to hold a sale to benefit Vivid.  
A bunch of my beautiful friends gave up their Sunday to come and pose for some amazingly African-themed photographs (CLICK HERE TO SEE THE BEST ZEBRAS, LIONS, CROCODILES, ETC. EVER) demonstrating the op-shopped goodness that the girls have collected in time for the sale.


This is happening on Saturday (28/7) at 2pm, at the All of The Above Creative Studio in the 140 William building in Perth.  If you're into vintage, this is the place for you.  I remember the first TBTW sale I ever went to, at a hall in Mt. Hawthorn, and you could not move for the amount of people in there.  I'm pretty sure some poor souls even copped an elbow to the face in the chaos that followed the doors opening.  These stylish girls know how to op shop (a skill I have always been somewhat jealous of!) and on top of that they are some of the most generous, kind and best friends I could ever ask for so I would be so happy if they could get as much support as possible - not even just this time but in future as well.  They never ask for any recognition for the unbelievable work that they do and I cannot express how proud I am of them.


Anyway - that's the latest.  I've got one more announcement coming very soon, as soon as I get a few things organised.  There might be a sense of deja vu with this next one though...


Thanks all for your continuing support.  I remind myself daily how lucky I am to be surrounded by such amazing people.
x

something exciting;

I have some really exciting news coming soon!  Some wonderful friends of mine are doing a very special thing and I can't wait to share it with you all.  In the meantime, here's some sneak previews of a fun photoshoot we did yesterday in preparation for it...

Thanks so much to everyone who came down and gave up their time and faces!  I can't wait to hear what you all think of it.

Next on the agenda;

Hi! Long time no post, I know.  It's kind of hard to think of things to post about when significant events pertinent to this blog aren't happening on a daily basis, but there's probably been a bit of a collection now which is enough to warrant a new blog post on this humble situation.  I can't believe how many hits this has now - there's still a steadfast 10 or so people checking in every day to see if there's a new post so thanks very much to you!  I hope this lives up to your expectations.

After the Careers Without Borders talk, I was lucky enough to come into a few opportunities.  I made some really great contacts and have been in touch with people both here in Perth who have kindly offered up lots of services and further contacts, as well as people over in Kenya and the wider East African region who may also be able to help us realise this seemingly massive dream that's currently standing in front of me.  From here is heaps of fundraising and awareness raising.  I've got a few things in the pipeline so stay tuned.  One opportunity in particular has me really excited but I don't think I can talk too much about it yet.  All I will say here is that it's going to be quite awesome and hopefully be really helpful in getting things off of the ground!

I'm also in the process of appointing a board of directors for the Foundation which is proving to be more difficult than initially envisaged.  Having come from relatively nowhere, I don't have a huge amount of knowledge about international relations or the people to talk to in regards to it so it is quite difficult to put together a politically and culturally sensitive team as well as one that sort of fulfills the weird criteria that I've set myself!  Perhaps time to learn to be a bit more flexible...

I was also lucky enough to make a few new friends as well which was pretty awesome.  I managed to score a radio interview with the lovely Kendall O'Connor and Sarah Naughton.  I've managed to post the audio below here and huge thanks to the girls for having me and asking such challenging questions.  It was heaps of fun and it's always super nice to be able to sit and have a chat about Kenya, my feelings about it and what Vivid as a team is trying to achieve.

YOU CAN HEAR IT HERE >>> http://www.mediafire.com/?06lqkloulk4pdcz

So I've made a list of things that are priorities for Kenya at the moment and these are the things that the fundraising I'm about to once again embark upon will go towards.

1; Fencing off the land that we have for the clinic.  I'm really excited about this because it means that we'll be able to engage some of the young people in the community in (hopefully) paid work!  It's not going to be hugely handsome pay but it's pay nonetheless.  There's this initiative in Kenya known as kazi kwa vijana which translates to "work with youth".  I am a massive fan of this and I plan to get firmly behind it in regards to getting the land cleared, fenced and ready to be built upon.

2; Set up the office.  We need a place to work! I'm going back to Kenya in January and I think I'm going to need a desk.

3; Start training the community health workers.  When I was over in Madungu, we found the team of community health workers who had run out of first aid kits, bandages, medicine and all that jazz.  I want to give them all those things again so we can work on the primary healthcare in the community (because that's really the most important thing! You have to catch problems before they happen).  I think if the funds stretch to it, it might be worth buying them a bicycle each too because that place is pretty vast and going on foot around it all is a bit rough as I very well know.

4; Start off lots of training with the youth and women's groups to get them interested in financial empowerment, stability and freedom.  If they learn about group savings and small business enterprise then we'll be giving them tools to benefit themselves and their families whilst all of the tangible stuff is underway.

5; I want to lay the foundation for the health centre.  That's just more of a demonstration of my commitment to this project than anything else.

So - that's my little laundry list so far.  If anyone reading this has any ideas or (SHAMELESS CRY FOR HELP APPROACHING) might be interested in helping out with planning any fundraising or might even just have some ideas then please flick me an email or get in touch on Facebook or whatever!  I welcome all ideas with an open heart and an open mind as many of you reading this will know and am eternally grateful for any speck of passion that you wonderful people who read my blog might hold towards our project.

Anyway - until next time!  Hopefully more news coming soon.
:)

My Career Without Borders.

My beautiful friend Martina Ucnikova contacted me a few months back and invited me to be a guest speaker at the Careers Without Borders event in Perth, which was hosted by the Australian Institute of International Affairs.  I was extremely privileged and humbled to be asked to be a part of such a huge undertaking and I'm so happy to have been given the opportunity to start showing people the work that we do in Kenya.  A few people asked if they could see a video, but I don't think any were taken so I thought I'd post my speech here for you to read.  Just imagine it spoken in a slightly nervous British/Australian accent and it'll be just like you were there :)

The Vivid Foundation is a grass-roots non-government organisation based in Nyanza Province, Western Kenya, which I founded last year.  Our mission as an organisation is to facilitate provision of economic empowerment, education and a holistic approach to healthcare in severely underdeveloped communities.  We are also interested in advocacy and standing up for those who are not fortunate enough or able to stand up for themselves.

It started with an idea.  I went to Kenya last November as a volunteer with another organisation.  I’d always had some kind of attraction to African aid work, and initially the dream was to work for either the UN or Medecins Sans Frontieres.  I’m studying to be a nurse and am about three quarters of the way through my degree, which frankly is no use to anyone but I decided that I would like to go and use my somewhat limited skills to try and help care for some people who do not enjoy the freedom and privileges that we do as Australians.

So, armed with a handbook on nursing care, a t-shirt that read “Overseas Volunteer”, a donated stethoscope and very high hopes, I boarded a plane to Kenya.  I found myself in Nyanza, otherwise known as “Luo land” because the majority of the inhabitants belong to the Luo tribe.  I was living in a secure compound among many Kenyans and was working between a government hospital and a community clinic. 

Community work had always taken my fancy in Australia.  I felt, and still do feel, that community healthcare is the absolute nuts and bolts of our health as a society and it’s something that needs to be focused on, so I decided to focus more on this side of nursing as I felt that it was where I could make the most difference as opposed to being somewhat of another number in the government health system.  So I concentrated my energy on Simenya Health Centre, which sits right on the highway that connects Uganda and Kenya, and this is where my story begins.  I probably should set the scene – just like we sit along the coast, the big villages and towns in Kenya usually sit on the side of roads.  This is where all the hospitals, health centres, shops, carpenters, pubs, everything you could ever need is on the side of the big main road that cuts through the country.  When you leave this road and travel inwards, things get sparse and you start to see the real side of Kenyan poverty and tough African life.  One day, a lady called Jane came into the clinic that was suffering from a miscarriage, which had been very badly handled.  To cut a very long story short, I ended up taking her case on and making sure that she got some proper healthcare.  She came very close to death but luckily survived and is now well again.  I learned through my ensuing friendship with Jane that she lived extremely far away from the clinic, and that it had been very costly, not only financially but with time too, to make her way to Simenya Health Centre.  So I started to ask some questions – why is it that so many people in this region have to walk up to five hours to access healthcare, which is a basic human right?  Why hasn’t more been done about it? Kenya is flooded with NGO’s and other organisations that provide funding, healthcare and supplies to every corner of the country but for some reason the interior of Nyanza has been forgotten about.

So I started asking some more questions – and realised that a man who lived in the next room to me with his wife and baby son would be the key to helping me make a difference.  This was John Gero.  John’s had about ten years of experience working in the Kenyan NGO sector.  He sat me down and ran me through every single thing that I needed to know about NGO work here, the problems being faced by the Kenyans and what we need to do about it.  That night, The Vivid Foundation was born.

From there, John and I went and met with the chief of the area, and found that there was one massive region, Madungu, which is without a healthcare centre.  We went in and conducted a baseline survey of the area and found way more than we bargained for, not least our next partner in the Foundation – Professor George Odhiambo, a professor of health project management at Kenya Methodist University.  This brought the team to three, a dynamic leadership with each bringing something unique to the table.  I often feel very overwhelmed by the brilliant ideas my partners come up with, I’m lucky to have such a great team. The closest healthcare facility for the people of Madungu is over an hour walk away, and that’s for the people who live in the centre!  For the far-flung regions of Madungu people reported walks of up to five hours.  To me, this is completely unacceptable.  Unfortunately, in conjunction with this problem, there is an out of control situation of orphans.  We estimate that every household in the region is looking after at least two orphans as a result of HIV/AIDS.  The sanitation is below par and access to clean water is impossible for at least three villages out of the ten that make up Madungu sub-location.  Most of the people are living on or below the poverty line – unfortunately this year many of the crops failed so the location is looking at a massive famine.  For this reason, many of the children are suffering from malnutrition, and families cannot cope because of a clash between Kenyan cultural expectations and the means that they have to feed their families.  The more children you have, the “richer” you seem to people around you, but so many families stretch their means far too far and therefore can’t afford to feed all of their children, let alone the adults.  The dollar a day is alive and well in Madungu. There is one high school servicing a population of over 10,000.  So many people cannot afford to send their children to school so there is the cultivation of a forgotten generation of children between the ages of 15 and 25 who have been unable to access secondary education, and the worst thing for me is that so many of these kids have got fantastic ideas and they just want to share them, learn and grow.  I want to try and empower these young people just like you and me to have a place where they can try and change the world that they live in because it starts from the grass roots every time.  It is honestly just a sad place – as the rest of Kenya forges forward in an attempt to fulfill the Millennium Development Goals and Vision 2030, communities such as Madungu are being left behind as a result of poor planning, misappropriation of funds, lack of development and a lack of vision by the leaders to bring it up to where the rest of the country is currently sitting.  Whilst Kenya in general has a long way to go, they have noted definite progress over the last ten years but this has unfortunately not been reflected countrywide, especially in the interior communities.  But I fell in love with it – it’s got heart and the young people who live there are dying to try and make it better, make a difference and do something with their lives.

So, what does the Vivid Foundation actually do?  The initial goal of our work in Madungu is to build a health centre to address the immediate healthcare needs of the people and try and make their overall health better.   It will be built for the people, by the people.  The people will run it too, as I believe that by walking in and providing something with no groundwork and no long-term plan, it will fail, which is not an option for me.  We have secured some land for the facility and are looking at starting construction in the next year – with luck on our side of course. However within this, we hope to start to take care of many of the other problems facing the people of this region.  As I stated before, there is a major problem with orphans and vulnerable children so we plan to construct a respite centre for these kids where they can interact with other children, access support and information from trained professionals and more than anything else they can have a place where they feel safe and valued.  Parenting is not a priority and many children are growing up without the love and attention that they require to thrive and function as adults within the society.  A major part of our work in Madungu is economic empowerment and education, so we have already started this by creating links with existing youth and women’s groups to facilitate their registration with the government, allow them access to government funding and provide training on certain income-generating activities and small business.  In terms of education, we have been going into schools in the area and speaking to young people about such issues as HIV/AIDS, sexuality and family planning as well as providing some career counselling.  Our goal as The Vivid Foundation is to empower rather than give.  We believe that it would be counter-productive to constantly provide without any expectation on the community to provide for themselves because this encourages a culture of aid reliance, which is a major problem in Africa.  We work in the community with a mutual understanding that we provide facilitation and empowerment rather than grants, however this empowerment comes in many forms.  I realised that education means so much more than just throwing money at a problem and walking away.  It’s the same with education of school-aged youth – if they can access frank and factual information about sex, family planning, HIV/AIDS and relationships then it will lead to better decisions being made and growth of the community rather than the vicious cycles we are currently seeing.  I have so many ideas for ways in which I would like to try and help this community to become a functional, cohesive place where the people are happy, the crops don’t fail and the children get educated.  It all seems so easy for us here in Australia but for some reason that I do not understand that right has not been extended to so many people in this world and that’s a fact that breaks my heart.

So, how can people get involved?  The Vivid Foundation is in the process of registering to become a linked legal entity between Kenya and Australia.  From here, we hope to access donor funding to begin constructing the health facility.  We plan to do it in bits, so starting with a very necessary curative facility which will be very humble, but it will make the world of difference to the community who currently have to travel much too far to access healthcare.  We are looking at bringing on volunteers – we have an office facility that has been constructed and will very soon have a building, which will house volunteers.  There is so much that we can offer the community – any sort of skill set or even just a feeling of wanting to help will make the world of difference to the people of Madungu.  By talking about the situation in Africa as a whole, and about Madungu as an individual location, I feel that we can start to see great change in a part of Kenya which has been left behind so many times.  It upset me a bit to speak to some of the people of the villages and hear stories of the sheer number of times that government and NGO representatives had been into their homes and made promises which were never kept.  I refuse to be that person.  I’m not one to just say things and not do them – I feel that I’ve made a commitment to improving the life of these people and it would be a huge undoing to not see it through to it’s proper completion.

I don’t plan for Vivid to stay there forever – anyone who works in NGO’s would know that there needs to be a clear exit strategy, and we currently have a five year plan in place with the final stage being a handover to the Kenyan government with high hopes that they will uphold the work that we plan to put in.

But there’s so many hurdles that we face before we can execute the plan that we have.  We need funding, we need help and we need hands.  I firstly wish to create a group of people here in Australia who share the passion that I do for this kind of work and, among other things, lobby the government to start sitting up and paying attention to the situation in East Africa, and particularly Kenya.  The way to go about helping here is not to only give money.  The key is time.  Time to build awareness, to get people on board and thinking and talking about what’s going on and why it’s so unacceptable in 2012.  If every person in this room goes away and tells just one person about the work that Vivid does, and that person tells one person, and another and another, soon enough we’ll have the passion and the drive among a large enough group of people to bring about real change.  It is not acceptable that human beings have to live without the basic human right that is healthcare.  It is not acceptable that children every day are dying because of preventable disease and most of all it is not acceptable that there are tens of thousands of people who feel forgotten about by the governments who are supposed to take care of them.  And this is the change that I wish to make.   There are always opportunities to get on a plane and make a difference in a country like Kenya.  Personally, I never made such a life-changing decision and I encourage anyone considering it to do the same.

So that's it - I thought it was a pretty good overview of what I spent my 3.5 months doing in Kenya.  Lots of people have been asking me what I got up to and I think I'll just be able to direct them to this blog post now!  The best bit of the event was really getting to meet some greatly inspirational young people, it was a very worthwhile and interesting event which I'm very glad I had the opportunity to attend.

I'm still readjusting - lots of people got in touch after my last blog post and have sent lots of love which I really appreciate.  Having a routine has helped heaps!  I've got a few things in the pipeline in relation to Vivid over the next couple of months so stay tuned.  

 A :) 

Readjustment.

So it's been just over three weeks since my return to Australia, and it's been a bit different to what I expected (probably should have learned by now not to have so many expectations of things, hey) in a lot of ways. There were some tears but lots of laughs. I've seen my grandfather for the first time in far too long.
We sold our family home so are knee deep in removal boxes. I got a haircut, and went to Melbourne to see some gigs. I got lots of hugs, and was told a few times that people loved reading this blog and I thank you all for taking the time to read it. Thank you also for sharing it - I've had people that I don't even know contact me and that's been very rewarding. It was a very cathartic thing for me and I'm hoping it will continue to be now that I'm home. When I first arrived in Kenya, it didn't take me very long to feel at home. But coming back here...it's taken me a lot longer than I thought I would to feel "normal" again, whatever normal is. I think my perception of normal has changed a bit. At first, coming home was exciting and new, the novelty was fresh and I had ideas spilling out of my ears. Three weeks on, that feeling has been replaced by something that I can only articulately describe as the feeling of being in limbo.
I got a new job, but I haven't started properly yet. I haven't fully moved back into my house so it's hard to find a place to sit and commit to doing any work. I find myself struggling to talk to people at times because sometimes I just don't know what to say. I don't have a routine.
Worst of all (and I'm sorry but I've tried and no matter how hard I try I can't make it seem any less cliched) is when I look around, all I see is consumption. Left and right. I'm guilty of it too - you can't live here and not be! But the speed at which Western society expends not only it's own resources but the resources of others is disgusting me a bit. I'm struggling to accept again the realization that when we have so much, it's hard to be content with what we have. So that's pretty much the deepest insight into my psyche at the moment - but everywhere it says the same thing.
Readjustment is harder than the initial adjustment.

I reckon most of you reading this will have seen the video about Joseph Kony. If you've not watched it, I bet you've heard about it. At last count, 36 people on my Facebook friends list had posted the link. I posted it myself too. If you didn't see, I highly recommend a watch - www.kony2012.com. It made me cry because I know people just like Jacob. I spent every day with people just like him. There's invisible children in Madungu too, remember? Those kids who get stuck after primary school because they can't get to high school so they disappear into the community and can't ever achieve what they want to. His Swahili accent tugged at my heart and made me think about friends who seem a million miles away. That video resonated with me and it's stuck in my brain. All I want to do is talk about it. I have such a huge amount of respect for the people that made that documentary. That is what I want too. 10 years down the line, imagine being able to stand up and look at hard proof that the tireless work that you and others who shared the same passion and vision has paid off and you've made a tangible change in history.
Barack Obama sent American troops into Uganda because of them. That's miles better than having a million dollars in the bank and a fast car, for me anyway. I encourage everyone reading to have a look into Tri and, if you can, think about donating some money or trying to raise awareness through our government about the situation. As I've said before, East Africa needs to get onto the foreign policy agenda of the Australian government and not only when it's convenient for them.
It infuriates me that we will send troops to fight dirty wars in Afghanistan and Iraq over oil but when millions of innocent people die at the hands of dictators (such as Libya, Haiti, Zimbabwe, Chechnya, Egypt, Syria...) the diplomatic hats come out because we do not have a vested interest and it doesn't benefit us. But when the famine hits, oh do we sit up and listen.
Africa is a trendy topic after all - when Bono/Geldof paid attention, so did John/Tony/George. That's cooled off a bit though, hasn't it? Many of the crops in Madungu are about to fail; the famine's hit hard. I want to try and help but what can I do? I'm just me. I don't have the combined weight of a country behind me.

This post has a point, I promise. In said documentary, there is reference to a list of war criminals that the ICC has indicted for, usually, crimes against humanity. Kony was number 1, and rightfully so. But further down, there were a few Kenyan names that might have caught your eye. Muthaura, Kenyatta, Ruto...men who have held high office in Kenyan government but were recently indicted and will be tried for crimes against humanity in relation to the post-election violence in Kenya in 2008. Over 1000 people were killed in the riots and these men are alleged to be responsible for the inflammation of tribal violence between primarily the Kikuyu and Luo tribes.
Without casting aspersions on guilt or innocence, it is my belief that someone needs to be held accountable for what happened and it seems that the right people are on the list. But, innocent until proven guilty and all that. The violence ended as a result of a power-sharing agreement between the "elected" president, Mwai Kibaki, and the (in my opinion, which may be biased due to my time in Luo Land) "real" winner who was later made Prime Minister - Raila Odinga. Now, Ruto and Kenyatta have been caught and they're neither on the run or invisible like Joseph Kony is.
People know who they are. The concern lies in the very real possibility that Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto once again have political aspirations and nowhere in the Kenyan Constitution (hastily written post-2008) is it stated that people under trial can't run for public office. This is an election year for Kenya and the entire country is waiting with baited breath to see if it will be a smooth transition with no blood spilled. So, if things weren't already tense enough, let's throw an alleged war criminal into the mix, and there's nothing to say that either of them can't run for office. This would turn the ICC investigation into a laughing stock - what if one of them won? He'd be president. What Kenyan citizen would stand up on the witness stand and give evidence against the ruling president? Not a one. With even the lowest level of the police force unashamedly engaging in corruption of the highest order, there is no way that your average person would endanger their life or the lives of their family by speaking out honestly against the leader of their country. It'd be a death sentence. But this is a very real possibility.
In my opinion, any election in a country like Kenya with so many inherent corruption issues is a bit of a joke anyway. It doesn't matter who you or your next-door neighbour vote for. The richest man will win because he can. That's just the way it is - there's no-one to say that they can't so the cycle just continues.

It's important that they catch Kony. They will now, the people have well and truly spoken. He is the number one trending topic on Twitter and will be for the rest of the week. But this can't be like just another Live Aid - a flash in the pan - we have to keep talking about this and making our so-called leaders aware that this isn't good enough anymore. An example needs to be made and it is my belief that the Joseph Kony issue has the potential to open up the governments of the Western world to the realization that they hold a lot more than just a responsibility to themselves. We are privileged and therefore that privilege should be shared. There are a lot of names on that list that the ICC made. It scares me that there aren't only people on the loose committing these unspeakable crimes, one of them has the potential to be the leader of the country that I love. If this post can inspire just one person to start thinking and talking about the fact that so many people in this world do not enjoy the most basic of human freedom, then I've achieved what I set out to do.

Final Words from Mutumbu.

As my time in Mutumbu draws to a close, I’ve been thinking about what I’ve been through and the experiences that I’ve had since I’ve been here.  I remember very clearly my first few days here, how nervous I was and how eager I was to get into work and make a difference.  Three months on, I cannot believe how much I’ve learned.  I also can’t believe it’s been three months – the time has absolutely flown.  I said I’d fallen in love with Africa very early on in my time here and not a thing has changed.  I think that a lot of the time, mzungus come into Africa and think that they’ll be able to teach, educate and show people how different life is where we come from.  That’s definitely something that I feel that I’ve achieved here, but I’ve taught nothing in comparison to what the people of Kenya have taught me.

I’ve learnt that life is so precious, the little things really don’t matter too much in the long run and how important it is to wake up every day with a smile on your face, regardless of what happened the day before.  Some worries really pale in comparison to the concern over where your next meal is going to come from, or the fact that your baby has malaria and you can’t even walk to the clinic, let alone pay for treatment.

I have also learnt the importance of travelling with two bankcards and never quite trusting the Kenyan banking system, no matter how much they try to tell you how safe they are.  I’ve made amazing friends and encountered some of the most inspiring people I’ve ever had the privilege of meeting.  I’ve developed a new-found affinity for tomatoes (don’t get too excited though, I still think they’re a bit gross but they’re not so bad with some things).  I’ve visited the Kibera slum (definitely something to tick off of the bucket list) and driven on Nairobi roads (sorry Mum).   I’ve started an NGO, and been fortunate to meet some very influential and intelligent Kenyans who have jumped on board without a second thought.  I’ve (kind of) learned a new language.  Still a bit of a way to go but I’m getting there.  I’ve been humbled and moved as I’ve been trusted by young women; with them sharing the sometimes horrific stories of their past and watched with pride as they seek to find their feet and regain their self-esteem.

From a professional point of view, I’ve learned the importance of patient contact, how imperative counselling is regardless of whether or not it is in relation to a disease process or as assistance to someone who is traumatised.  I’ve learned to suture (thanks to a wicked afternoon assisting on male circumcision) and become a pro at giving injections.  I can diagnose malaria, too.

I’ve not been able to write down even a quarter of my experiences in this blog.  I’ve heard stories that have shocked me and at times moved me to tears, especially in relation to children who, very often, have to cope with situations which require maturity well beyond their years. 

I’ve had some of the best moments of my life and for the first time in a really long time have felt like I’ve achieved something great.  I’ve met seven amazing Australians who I’m privileged to have been able to share awesome experiences with and just learn so much from (Bec, Alex, Amy, Steve, Kylie, Jacqui and Henry, it’s been such a pleasure).

There are some awful sides to life in East Africa and that’s not something that I’m going to deny.  I’ve observed poverty, witnessed corruption (in particular in high levels of government which frankly disgusts me), collusion, nepotism and crime more times than I wish to remember but beside these things I have seen a raw human spirit that I don’t believe is very common in the Western world, compassion, generosity and true friendship through the very thick and thin of life.

I am truly honoured and privileged to have had this experience.  The decision to come here was one of the best ones I’ve ever made.  It has changed my life, and not only in relation to the commitments that I have made to come back to Kenya – I honestly feel that I am a changed person after these three months.  I’ve made many decisions about things that I think are important, the way I would like to live my life and obviously my career in general.   Most of all, I did not expect to come to Kenya to do some aid work and leave with an organisation with my name on it.

One of my wonderful friends asked me the other day what the most inspirational moment of my trip has been and I really struggled to answer him.  From the change that I’ve seen in Beatrice (she is now selling maize at the market and looks beautiful, she’s got a huge smile permanently on her face), to the fact that Jane is now firmly on family planning and completely well, to the miraculous recovery of Mary, the girl with the burns, to the change and inspiration I’ve already seen within the Lala Youth Group (by the way they raised enough money themselves to register as a legal entity.  I felt like a proud mum when I heard!) – I can’t pinpoint one moment.  I was on a matatu the other day, watching the breathtaking Kenyan scenery go past my eyes and all I could think was “I’m home”.

I want to be here and continue to work hard, hopefully inspire some others and change lives through my ability to provide healthcare.

I could go on forever about this, but I have to stop eventually.  I’ll tell you about it when I’m home.

From here, I’m off on safari through the Masai Mara, and then going to Zanzibar for a few days.  After that, I’m coming back to Perth so this will be the last blog entry for this trip, but not my last blog.  I’m planning on blogging the entire process of the launch of the Vivid Foundation so I’ll link you all up some time.  I think now would also be a good time to let you all know that thanks to my beautiful friend Martina, I’ve been invited to speak at the annual Careers Without Borders event which is hosted by the Australian Institute of International Affairs.  I’m to be one of three speakers presenting on the day and will be talking about the Vivid Foundation and our activities in Kenya.  I’m very excited but also nervous to have been given such a massive opportunity and I’m crossing my fingers that it goes well and pays off! Stay tuned :)

Lastly, I would like to thank every single person that’s reading this for the unbelievable support that has poured out from every angle in regards to my time in Kenya.  At times it was very overwhelming and so reassuring to know that I have people back home in Perth behind me.  I’m not exaggerating when I tell you that I’ve felt the love the entire time.  I’m lucky and blessed to have such amazing people in my life and I wish I could articulate what all the support means.  There’s a few individuals in particular who have been there on the end of the phone/email when I most needed you – you know who you are and I love you all.

See you soon, guys.  I can’t wait to give you all huge hugs.

Erokamano kabisa, ou.  Wanere bang’e gi aherou.

Kibera.

If you look at the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade website in relation to Kenya, there’s a few places that they recommend Aussies don’t visit.  Now, I don’t agree with this very much and have for a long time been extremely interested in visiting the Kibera slum of Nairobi – the second biggest slum in Africa – the estimate is that two million people live there.  You can type Kibera into Google and come up with thousands of websites dedicated to the place, from NGO’s who operate there to cautiously written news features detailing the desolate sense of failure and depression that hangs over the slums of Africa.   I’m probably going to tell a different story to them though.

Today, John took me for a walk through a place that I honestly could not believe was in the same world that I live in.

The first thing that really gets to you when you enter Kibera is the smell.  Open sewers line the streets on either side with children either stepping aside or walking straight through them.  These sewers join up to a main sewage creek (I reckon it’s more like a sewage river though), which runs straight through the centre of the slum.  You can barely see the dirt on the road at some parts anymore due to the sheer amount of rubbish that has piled up over the years.  When you walk on the streets, your feet sink into the mounds and mounds of refuse that has collected across all of the streets through years of no sanitation or waste collection system which is mainly at the fault of the Kenyan government.  The smell chokes you – and it’s not something that you can get used to in a hurry.  

We walked down a big hill into the centre of the part of the slum that we went to (it isn’t really safe for us to have gone all the way in.  Sometimes residents of Kibera can be a bit hostile, especially towards white people after years and years of empty promises) and it was all that I could see for miles.  Thousands upon thousands of corrugated iron and cardboard shacks crammed in so close together that they reminded me of terraced houses.  Illegal power lines snake across the streets from sly attempts to siphon electricity from the grid.  In the rainy season, I was told that this often leads to disaster as they fall down and then children step on the live wires.  They also cause horrific fires because not only are the shacks all piled in so close together, they’re made of generally flammable material.  I’m fairly convinced that I saw a dead body lying in some grass, and a particularly haunting image was one of a little girl who would have been about three, walking through the rubbish picking up things that she wanted, either to play with or to potentially sell.  We stumbled across a political rally as well which I was quite keen to get away from – it’s a volatile environment and tempers can flare quite easily (anyone that knows anything about the post-election violence in Kenya will probably agree with me) – but it was okay.  I encountered the first “mzungu, how are you?” enquiries; something that I had not heard so far in Nairobi, it is usually a question reserved for the kids in the village. 

There are countless NGOs working in Kibera trying to make life better, and to be honest they do seem to do quite a good job.  Apparently healthcare is effective and the people seemed healthy.  The thing I could not believe the most was just how happy they all seemed.  It was almost like there was oblivion to the situation of the slum – which I suppose there really is as not everyone is coming in with biased eyes such as my own.  No one that lives in there would think it was as bad as I did because our perspectives are different.  Even though it’s dirty, smelly and crime is pretty rampant, everyone I passed had a smile on his or her face and the air was full of the sound of children playing.

We then walked down the railway track, which divides Kibera.  People stand on either side of the tracks selling all kinds of things, which is just inconceivably dangerous to my mind.  Trains go down there frequently and I dread to think of the occasions when there have been accidents.  One thing that I haven’t got used to, and I don’t think I will ever get used to, is how open the African people are about death.  It is talked about like the weather – and worst of all are the people who sell coffins and headstones on the side of the road.  I don’t think I will ever be comfortable with looking at that.

I have quite honestly never seen anything quite like Kibera and I was a little bit shocked by what I witnessed.  Millions and millions of shillings get poured into Kibera each year but to absolutely no avail.  Political leaders use the slum as a place to drum up votes – they stand there and swear black and blue that under their government the slum would change, people would be given homes and would no longer have to live in such conditions.  But, interestingly enough, it seems that a lot of people actually want to live there.  Rent is ridiculously cheap; sometimes as low as 100 shillings a month (about $1) and most Kenyans have a rural home where their family lives.  The intoxicating sense of being in the urban centre is just too much for a lot of these people and it drives them to consenting to live in complete squalor when, more often than not, there are alternatives to a life within Kibera.

It was one of the most interesting and worthwhile, as well as confronting, things that I’ve done during my time here.  I plan to go back hopefully at some point during the week to meet with a couple of NGO’s who are doing work in the slum and see a bit more of it.  I’m glad I chose to go there and see a part of Kenya that is so defining.  The majority of Nairobi residents live in Kibera and I feel like I’ve seen a really important part of Kenyan life and history.

Our big meetings start tomorrow, and very soon you’ll be receiving my final blog from the village.  I can’t believe how time flies.