Kenya

Kenya, Miscellaneous

A funny, temporary website...Most of you should recall that this website used to be located at sarainkenya.org, but when I returned to Kenya without Sara I relocated to alaninkenya.org. I designed a cheesy placeholder for the old website just in case any stragglers dropped by.

The site features a funny picture of me “hunting crabs” while on vacation in Kenya’s coastal city of Watamu. Sara is pictured with some fancy bread and a cute hat, taken during her dietetic internship at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo.

Well that website expires on May 14th, 2008, so go check it out before it’s too late. Now is a good time to update your bookmarks as well. If May 14th has already passed you can now find Sara’s personal website at: http://barefootdietitian.com.

Until next time, adios!

Kenya, Miscellaneous

I was walking past a large crowd in Tala’s market the other day when I heard a man yell…

“Hey! Yesu amerudi! Habari yako, yesu?”

It means “Jesus has returned! How are you, Jesus?”  Haha!  The large crowd had gathered for some small entertainment (juggling, music, traditional medicines… who knows) but they all stopped to look and laugh when their front man stopped the show to point me out.  I just said, “Mzuri sana” and my friend and I walked off laughing.

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Kenya, Miscellaneous

Last week I did a little handiwork around the house, adding curtains to a few bare windows. This week I added some Tibetan prayer flags to the overhang on my front porch, check it out:

I know it’s not much, but they really look pretty when the wind blows. Randi found them at the “bins” in Portland (a place where everyone’s old crap goes, and you can sort through them, pick out what you want, and pay by weight). I can see them through the trees from clear across campus when I look towards my house. As always (well, most always), Wikipedia has something very nice to say about Tibetan prayer flags, and as usual it’s better than I could do:

Traditionally, prayer flags are used to promote peace, compassion, strength, and wisdom. The flags do not carry prayers to ‘gods,’ a common misconception, rather the Tibetans believe the prayers and mantras will be blown by the wind to spread the good will and compassion into all pervading space. Therefore, prayer flags are thought to bring benefit to all.

I’m not a Buddhist but I’m down with compassion. Have a nice day. :)

Alan