Installment 34

Installment 34
Let’s talk about today…..but first I must answer a question I posed at the end of 33. Who will fill my shoes??.. Are you aware that if you leave your shoes outside in a Kenya rain that…..well, now I know who, or maybe what will fill my shoes….good thing they are Crocs.
This morning, after getting Fundi lined out, I was thrilled to find out that Jeff wanted me to go to town to get some water pipe and a few other essentials for the building project. I needed to go and get the pipe that is going to come last Friday…“in fact it has already been delivered”…which might be true, but not here. So Eliud and I headed for town, and darned if Eliud isn’t just as good at hitting potholes as Jeff is. I asked Eliud why he hit so many. “This ‘road’ scares me so much that I drive with my eyes closed and just feel my way to town” he said. “I ‘feel’ my way to town also” I replied. Once in Kitale, Eliud and I went to the hospital and picked up some TB medicine that is given free there. Standing in a 6’x12’ room, a desk at the end Eliud was arguing with the “lady” about why we needed the medicine. “You use too much of this medicine” she says. “We have 93 children and some need the medicine” E counters, “Do you want them to die?” “OK, you win, take some and leave…besides, I get paid by the amount I give out.” she responds. So we left and headed to look for water pipe. Now you may not know it, but Kitale has about 10 ‘hardware’ stores, and I soon found out how they continued to stay in business. All of them are owned by 2^nd and 3^rd generations of Indians….no, not the casino types, but the Junglebook type. By now, I have learned a few Swahili words, and I know some English, but my Indi is pretty much non existent, so I was glad to have E with me to interpret every 3^rd word, as the shop owners all spoke SwaIndiLish. All the shops responded the same,,,”We need some water pipe” I would say. “Are you wanting the good stuff or the cheap stuff?” they asked. “What is the difference?” I would ask. “The cheap stuff keeps us in business because it has to be replaced often.” was the response. “How about the good stuff?” was my next question. “We don’t carry it…because we are liking staying in business.” And so, shop after shop we continued our quest, until we finally found one shop that had mistakenly stocked some good stuff. “You must be new here” the owner said, “and a foreigner, but I am thanking you for saving my shop. So a little later, I left with the last of the good stuff in Kitale. Meanwhile, E had to leave and so not wanting to leave me alone in public, Jeff came in and we went to see Carla and Dorcas at the good hospital. Dorcas has been doing really well and I hardly recognized her, but the Dr wanted to keep her until the blood infection subsided. So, you know me, I can’t keep my hand off of babies, so I was holding her and trying to feed her something. That all went well until she looked up at me and puked just short of 5 gallons of ‘you don’t want to know’ stuff all over me. Of course, it couldn’t just stay on my shirt…..it headed south and made a fine deposit just about where everyone would look to see if I had made it to the bathroom in time. Lucky for me, I am a mzungu and the locals pretty much think I do strange things on purpose….so was able to proudly exit the hospital with minimal stares. I know that your concern is for me, but you must not forget about Dorcas. She is still under observation, and will probably not come home tomorrow….or for that matter neither will Carla…..dang!
It was time to head back and so we headed off down the ‘road’. About 1/3 of the way there, Jeff’s phone rang and he was told that # 94 was waiting at the ‘courthouse’ for us to come and pick up. “This is fun” I said, “at home we have to wait 9 months for a baby, and here you just wait for a phone call.” Back we went, as if we didn’t spend enough time destroying our kidneys. Lucky for us, the paperwork was all done and baby Alvin was just about ready for transfer……well, remember, TIA, and so it only took about an hour. Alvin is about 6 months old and seems quite healthy. I personally know that he can pull about 26 atmospheres vacuum on my finger while chewing on it. It reminds me once again why I won't nurse a baby..that and another reason……so he seems to be pretty well adjusted and is spending his first night in training to be a Babu hunter. I’m sure that you will hear more about him as I learn the facts. All I know is, for a guy that came to Africa to NOT do babies, I sure DO a lot of babies.
Good things happened with the building projects, but that’s for later.