More Field Notes

Western Kenya; The scenery is beautiful. Picture hills green with lush grass and plains carpeted with lime-green sugarcane and tea farms. Incidentally, the spiky look of sugarcane plantations reminded me of one girl in my university days who colored her spiky hair electric-green. Maybe she's from Western and she got homesick.

The people here are so polite that it is amazing. Ask someone for directions and in a jiffy, every passer-by who heard your question will engage in a noisy chorus of instructions. They argue heatedly between themselves at the slightest difference of distance or bearing. All the while I'm smiling and wondering how there are still some helpful people alive for free.

In related news, I've spent the first week in the field on motorbikes for the most part. now I know travel writers who go the whole powerbike way and tear along highways for adrenal floods, but in my case, for the most part, the pace was, let us say "civilised". And my view was obstructed by the riders' big round helmet. Spending the whole day in the back of a Chinese motorbike does things to your lower back that a weightlifter would shiver to contemplate. But I'm not complaining, coz in Western Kenya, Chinese motorbikes mean access. And they're not so sophisticated that repair takes much more than pliers. Often I passed masses of youths with their Chinese motorbikes waiting for passengers under trees. Those machines could be the main economic activity quite soon.

Nothing beats travelling the countryside on an open bike. Another plus about Western Province, the roads are smooth and they roll and swerve over hills and turns, so the element of surprise is sure to keep the traveller awake as each bend unfurls a new vista. There are many odd rock formations that engage the brain, for example, "How did that giant rock manage to get atop and balance above that tiny rock?" You can try to figure such a thing out for hours.

Mad props to the Constituency Development Fund people in Butula, Nambale and Hamisi. Good work is happening especially in education, roads and electrification. That CDF stuff is changing lives and you can quote me.

Still, there's an all-pervasive rural feel to Western Kenya that often gets funny. Like seeing a ten-year old boy playing barefoot soccer in a pink fluffed-up ill-fitting "Barbie and Friends" shirt. One Riley would have said "That's gay!" but the kid probably wouldn't understand, or care. And I only thought it strange unti I saw the school uniforms! HAHAAAAAH! Clowns. Generally, people dress to conceal nakedness. The fashionable ones are the exception rather than the norm. Patches cover tears. Life continues.

The only let-down was in the meals. All over this here Kenya of ours, vegetarians uniformly attract a raised eyebrow from waiters and waitresses. You'd think we are third-class citizens.

Hungry Me: *ignoring menu if any* "What do you have? I don't eat meat."
Comely Waitress: "We have fish and we have chicken."
Hungry Me: "That's meat."
Comely Waitress: *sneers* We have matumbo. (Direct translation = stomachs)
Hungry Me: "That's meat."
Comely Waitress (exasperated): "We don't have chips!"

Seriously?

More good news, I managed to play some soccer. :) In Butula. :)

More field notes to come.

Frustrated Parents

I know; sometimes, parents can be a real turn-off to think about. But think about it: parental frustration is a widespread disease that threatens to tear apart the social fabric at the family level.

As a generation, Our values are not our parent's values; in fact, our generation rejects their morality as "utiaji." They grew up in a less favorable era and many who have made it had to strive from harsh background against stacked odds to get to where they are today. They look at us, we who are spoon-fed since childhood and have learned to expect everything easy - and they just weep inside. They look at our fashion, music videos and choice of friends and wonder "where we are headed in life" - (they like that phrase). Parallel value sets cannot sustain relationships. Thing is, our parents see this mismatch between their generation and ours - and a frustrated and panicked parent attempts to resolve the impasse by throwing the rulebook at the deviant kid. And the kid rebels the more. Here comes more frustration both sides.

Today, consumerist culture exclusively regards parents in their role as breadwinners first and foremost - the people to aim advertisements at. To hell with life lessons, get me a PS3. In other words, we value them to the extent that they can buy us things, educate us, feed us, house us. And while they feel the obligation to provide for their children, our parents certainly do not feel the appreciation for it, taken for granted as they are. Combine this with all the sacrifices they undertake and you can see why they are not just frustrated but also bitter. Lord knows the rat race ain't no weekend derby. And for what?

Increasingly, our peers and mass media misinformation are stronger influences on our lives and choices than our parents. Think about the growing boarding school enrolment rate. Is it really in the interest of a fine grade or a quiet house? No, really, though our parents love us with that instinctual love that's bound to come with raising a child, but in the face of piling obstacles, how far can unrequited love go?

Let us talk. The rift exists.

SUMMARY

The generation gap today has evolved into a mostly invisible but real phenomenon that is widening fissures in societies today. There has been a generation gap throughout history, but today it is a bigger threat to the family. Culture is dead at the altar of consumerism, and its values are shortly to die of asphyxiation.

To quote Wailing Souls (song: "Shark Attack")

Better stop this cultural diffusion

spreading fear and confusion

Playing cloak and dagger wars

Losing what you fighting for

Back back, coming with a double attack

Step back, here comes the shark attack

From the Field

Professional pursuits dictate that I prepare to travel to Western Province of Kenya for field work.

As I write this I should be packing up and heading out to leave for the field, but I have to take the time to forewarn blog visitors of my potential absence for a while to come. Feel at home, feel free to read old posts! And comment! Still, I pledge regular updates.

Little Sister is giving me those "sad you're leaving" looks. Awwww.

Ah, Western Kenya. My idea of ample preparation is brushing up on my Luhya accent - not the actual language, just the accent will do. The eve of travel is too late to start learning a whole new language in any kind of depth.  I'll just refine the accent, misapply it to Swahili, unfold my map and it should go swimmingly on from there.

Roaming countryside villages in public transport appears in my head to be an idyllic pastime, historically reserved for Western Missionaries given up on their West. But I'm working here. It won't be all fun of course. Some people I know value an internet connection and cable above their own well-being (Good bye Twitter! Adios Facebook! yeah right!). While I'm out there in the boondocks I plan to be plagued by thoughts of my friends and worries of events in the big bad world and self-conscious of my perceived ignorance.

I'll try and get some soccer played. Also, I have to confirm if Western Kenya's famed night-runners-cum-witchdoctors really run naked at midnight. Which might take sleeping with my running shoes on. Yes, I'll try to give chase.

Adios, y'all.

For Passing Time

As the title readily confesses, this post is a way of passing time. I'm waiting to meet a Sister-in-Christ, after which I'll meet an ex-best-friend-in-Christ for her amazing company over late lunch and a music critique. Rather than waiting passively I have seen it fit to foist a frivolous post upon my faithful followers. For which reason all will be forgiven who stop reading this post right now.

One clarification about my blog: I never intend to preach, but it's not my fault if the world we live in easily lends itself to sermons (I admit: I have a lot of "shouldness" and "oughtness"). Shoot me; I'm an idealist, and I also say it how I see it, so there.

Now, the story.

When I was a kid, we played energetic games in the hood with agemates. None of that indoors PlayStation business. Brick Game was the most advanced bit of tech in those days. But Brick Game was the exception: the main feature of child's play was the exertion of sweat and loud exuberant noisemaking. So we chased each other up and down, fought (and fought again to avenge losing the first fight), played soccer even in high noon, protected younger siblings from bullies, ran from the bullies ourselves after a mostly symbolic punch, climbed fences and ripped the seats of our pants, played marbles till the index finger was sore, ran alongside passing trains declaring "CHU-CHU-TRAAAAIN!!!" over and over again. For some reason or other, amidst all the excitement and rough falls on tarmac, a kid would lose a shoe.

(Alright. So the post is really about childhood reminisces.)

When a kid lost a shoe, it was trouble. He had to troop all over the estate, crying, bawling, his plenteous tears blurring his search efforts while his bare foot treaded hot tarmac. It was pitiful. His friends (it was always a boy - girls hardly ever lost a shoe, not even the tomboys) would help his search with the incessant reminder that he would be whooped at home if the shoe wasn't found. At the end of a fruitless search, during which some jerk-ass adult invariably told a kid "A dog got your shoe," the tiny tot went home crying shrilly in preparation for a sound beating.

One day the bully lost his shoe. He came along when we were particularly bored, and started messing with the tiniest of us. The bully's weapon of torture was a large brown cockroach he'd tied on the end of a string. Most chillingly, it was still alive, and it seemed to fly when he whirled it around his head. When the psychological reign of terror neared the "pissing in your pants" threshhold, I and others present started giving the bully earnest heartfelt sermons about bad manners. He laughed in scorn and popped the cockroach into his mouth. And then we his victims  ran screaming in all directions. I ran faster than them all and disappeared early, with my lil bro hot on my tail. We lost him.

Next we saw of the bully, he was missing one shoe, minus the cockroach also. Probably he swallowed it. But the shoe factor was oddly gratifying.

"Utachapwa, Utachapwa!!!" We sang victoriously and mercilessly at the now panicked, searching bully. He would be beaten at home by his mother. That's what mothers did to kids who lost a shoe back then. Our band of kids regrouped, following Bully around the neighborhood as he searched high and low, tormenting him with our repetitive and boisterous Utachapwa song. Some of us even danced with unfeigned glee, busting spontaneous moves to the tune of repeated "utacha-pwa!".

Eventually, Bully gave up on the search for the "golden shoe;" his salvation from a sure beating had proved elusive.

So he turned on us. A different idea had entered is head. He couldn't find his shoe, so, he figured, everybody would have to lose their shoes. (I'll skip the part about how he obtained all our shoes without a real fight. It involved a brief chase and a futile scramble in a dead end ally.)

Let's just say that day nearly all of us were beaten by our mothers. There were many tears but I can laugh now, especially recalling that my mother simply flat-out REFUSED to swallow the line that a bully took my shoe and threw it to the dogs to eat. My lies, according to her, were growing more desperate by the day.

Cheap Love is No Love

Emerging artists strike gold when they embark on love songs. But they never declare the "love is patient and kind" line of reasoning. They become famous on the back of thrill-seeking roller-coaster love-is-a-battlefield rationale. They make it by proseletyzing instant gratification.

"Sex sells" is an ambiguity that should be clarified to become "People sell sex to get rich."

For this reason, today's movies place the cart before the horse. Chick flicks (okay, "romantic movies") begin with torrid, no-strings attached sex between the main protagonists, only to throw in emotional fondness just in time for end credits to roll. And musicians sing the aesthetic and hedonistic praises of real and hypothetical targets of their lust. A viewer/listener searches high and low in vain for the place of values and character, but finds everything else but these in overabundance. Even "heroism  of the wine bottle" trumps moral qualities as a desirable trait for romantic partners. Meanwhile, consumerist preoccupation, visual appeal, sexual athleticism and even sarcasm and antisocial tendencies are hyped to the point of oversupply. Don't even get me started on the barely-dressed dancers assaulting the viewer with neurotic crotch-thrusting displays.

These are not the foundations of stable societies. Clearly.

Of course there's an agenda behind all this. The Powers That Be recognize the threat posed to their New World Order designs by true love. (Elsewhere I have discussed all all-out attack being targeted at the church, the state and society at large in the interest of One World Government.) Mass Media 'entertainment' is but one weapon in the enemy's arsenal.

The family's foundations sit squarely in the scope of these revolutionaries, a target for destruction. To destroy the family means to destroy communities and societies eventually, based on the building block theory of Individual > Family > Community > Country > Humanity. their chosen method for destroying the family takes the dilution of real love or its replacement entirely with something else that can be made to pass for real love. 

But take it from 1 Corinthians 13, and live it:

4 [Love] suffereth long, and is kind; [Love] envieth not; [love] vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things

Adios

Sometimes I’m stoic, but occasionally I become a ‘feelings guy’. Whenever this happens I am more likely to detect and recoil at the rancid stench of a bad break-up. Conscience nags like a college girl as I stare at the associated phonebook entry and wonder why I’m not calling it. I regret things I did, said and neglected on purpose or absentmindedly. An itch of sadness accompanies the idea that I could actually have squandered the big L-word experience for real this time, a feeling magnified by the stale half loaf The Ex turned out to be.

(That introduction is not an invitation to shrinks to start naming psychological complexes and disorders.)

Without leaving room for a debate on what I was not smoking those days, let us just accept that I suddenly and inexplicably became very courageous and got down to texting Ailis. It was a disinterested text for all intents and purposes, but there was real concern hidden in there somewhere.

“howyadoin” Out of character. I don't use shorthand.

“LOL go hang” the elaborate reply.

Talk of a mixed message. Women! But at least it was a message with a LOL somewhere in it. Lots of love. Right? Think BIG, they say.

The World is Ending!

One tranquil evening, amidst slow walks amidst paths that led through the quiet of nature, I took a break from flooding my nostrils with the smell of flowers, and looked up for once. The most beautiful orange sunset astounded me. A solitary bird flew towards a sun ensconced in a pillow of clouds (according to my point of view). Various species of birds sang an uncoordinated symphony in the trees nearby and afar, and my hypnotization was complete.

It was hard at that moment to believe that the world is ending, with all the beauty in it and all the good things it has and all its charms and breathtaking moments. Even so, we all know that the world is not all beauty and goodness.

In case the title has not already warned you, I am an avid reader of the signs of the times – events that were predicted to portend the end of the world as we know it today. Earthquakes, wars, crises, famines and pestilences combine into one real-life cliff-hanger of a thriller called “The End of the World is Nigh!” It’s got high crime and grand corruption and sleaze in it too. You bet it ought to be rated something strict, considering just the war and bloodshed thereon. It’s more dramatic than any Latin American soap opera. Blow by blow updates, albeit grossly inaccurate ones, are available in newspapers and televisions. And it gets more gruesome as the stakes increase each passing day.

Yet this is not sufficient occasion to give in to despair. The end of the world will be the climactic finale of the age-old battle between good and evil. Today, evil attracts, seduces and advertizes itself as progressive, liberal, fun – it’s all just plain old deception. But Good will win in the end and will be justified then. The Creator of the universe will end this corrupted order of things and “make all things new.” You want to be there.

Take sides, then. There is no middle ground. It’s either the good fight or the bad fight. Just you remember: it’s a fight to the very end. And I know one thing: God is good, thus, good is immortal!

Life over Death

If I may quote Ernest, “you need life to enjoy things, not things to enjoy life.” That statement neatly sums up my philosophy of life in one simple clear witty statement. It gives me a good vibe from just being alive.

Now I set out fully intending to proceed with my usual regular declamations of the evils in the world today. But that releases a lot of negative energy, which often leaves me feeling drained and down myself. While it’s true, at least from my perspective, occasionally it becomes therapeutic to turn my glance to the more positive aspects of life, to consider the good things and simple pleasures which give me hope to fight the good fight, because all is not lost; to count my blessings and revel in losing count and smile again. It keeps hardships in their correct perspective. Shreds of beauty lie scattered amidst gloomy wastes. They give me reason to press on when I would otherwise have given up, when all things seem to have failed on me.

Once, after an exceptionally stressful turn of events in my personal and academic life, details withheld, the resulting all-pervasive depression refused to be shaken away by all my usual pick-me-ups. It lasted days. Not even the “Churchill Live” stand-up act was doing it for me – rarely does anyway. I could even feel myself infecting people I met with malevolent breeds of existential unease. Someone truly caring even ventured to suggest I visit the Student Counseling Centre (I thought that was uncalled for, an extreme case, “too manual”). But everywhere I turned for distraction, I just happened to find more reasons to give up on everyone and everything. A vortex of depression was swallowing me whole into its vacuous centre and everything I could find to hold onto was headed into it as well...

Suddenly, I can’t fully explain how good it was, but I got a very good feeling straight out of nowhere - simply because I remembered doing ONE tiny thing right. I wasn’t high. The memory was a random moment in the middle of a soccer match a long time previous. I had received a pass, dribbled past someone and passed the ball on to someone else. Simple and routine. Yet somehow, the mere memory of that fluid moment washed away all the dark gloom that had settled on my whole being. I could smile again - just because I once dribbled past some guy.

The mere fact that I was still alive and could still enjoy such insignificant moments was weirdly beautiful encouragement. Real tears of joy came to my eyes as the depression collapsed into itself and vanished instantly. It was a load off my shoulders a cold drink and a breath of fresh air all at the same time. Some might say I wasn’t depressed enough if such a stupid memory is all it took to set me straight, but that’s not the point.

While I have life, I thank God for it and enjoy its moments. The enemy cannot take EVERYTHING away after all. Things happen, life’s like that. Better that than death by far.

Faith is not Ideological

One does not ask of one who suffers ‘What is your country and what is your religion?’ One merely says, ‘You suffer, that is enough for me.’ – Louis Pasteur

Look at the world today. All it would take for the complete degradation of societies is for people who know the truth to fail to stand for the right. And it’s happening right now: widespread failures by individuals and societies to undertake simple stating of truth, speaking out against injustice, helping in any small way to aid the downtrodden, ACTING out faith instead of making a pompous theory of it and looking down on others from atop imaginary artificial vantage points.

Organized religion has repeatedly replicated ideological zeal in many of its proponents. Today ideologies like capitalism have gone so far as to straddle the line between religion and ideology. With the rapid decline of religion in Europe following the so-called Enlightenment era, SOMETHING had to fill the gap! Psychological experts say one habit is only eradicated by replacing it with another; thus, today, especially in the first world and its satellites, we see faith replaced by any number of highly variant ideologies. Arrayed types of capitalism for one to choose at leisure, including liberalism and its distant cousin nihilism, are freely to be mixed with whatever remains of culture, party loyalty and individual expression.

You see, ideologies are limiting - because they simply do not admit that there are unknown variables and plain old random events. By every indication, nor even do they recognize “acts of God” as real causes or terminating agents of events. They presume to be able to explain everything. MEMO: Only God is all knowing, “omniscient”. True faith, in contrast, knows just enough to get along and does not quite “know” all what will happen as much as trust that God is in charge and that is enough.

The thing about lies is that eventually they are uncovered for what they are. A little fib may do little harm, but the problem becomes critical as more little fibs are added to the original little fib to cover it up. Eventually we have a mega-ideology constructed entirely of lies and backed up by loads of misapplied data and sustained at high bio-ecological expense to maintain vested interests of every shape. The cracks show. However, when the inevitable truth exposes the foundational lie, the financial vastness and complexity of the system of supporting lies constructed around it will count for nothing, however hip, weaponry-skilled, technologically advanced or globally interconnected. It will be a great collapse, the end of lies. However long it seems to take, it is only a matter of time before the lie and the truth confront each other once and for all. Only one must win, right?

Do unto others what you would have them do unto you. At the very least, it is very fair. Light is better than darkness; the difference is openly apparent. Believe! Good actions are the manner in which faith is completed. Actions speak louder than words. Beware then of those who would reduce good and evil to merely intellectual multiple-choice preferences, claiming one to be as futile or pointless a decision as the other. Because when we come right down to it, good is better than evil, life better than death, light better than darkness. It don’t take no intricate ideology to figure that.

Walk in the light, people. Our times require it of us. Though truth is unpopular, “a hard teaching”, only truth has staying power. Pay no attention to the father of lies. He and his spawn shall be forgotten.

IQ tests soon to become irrelevant

What if I said that there was an intentional international conspiracy to make the world’s inhabitants dumber? Would you call me a “Conspiracy Nut”? Nevertheless, I must take that risk and blog the possibilities.

Why would anyone intentionally make us dumb, you ask? Short answer: the world is run by mad men.

That is not an insult to your governments and presidents, though you might think so. These merely supervise the world for elites. Many of them are glad to absorb the blame for whatever goes wrong; it gives them the opportunity to play fireman and look important. If you’re in the developing world, simply forget the possibility that your leaders will take stated elites to task about a fast-declining national average IQ, as if anyone has noticed at all. (The political heads are still busy with dodging questions about their campaign promises to this day. And they were sellouts to start with.) If you’re in the developed world, your governments’ policies are in the very handwriting of corporate lobbyists, evolving in season into campaign donors.

The world’s real and shadowy elite generally makes decisions beyond the reach of parliaments and legislative authorities, which are only occasionally called upon to provide their tacit complicity as elected rubberstamps of exploitation of the not-so-equal.

As for the title of this post, if we do become as dumb as the elites plan to make us eventually, IQ tests will quickly become a relic of the past, a CGI FX prop in tales of legend. They will have been rendered useless by our own ready willingness to suspend our intelligence to the equivalent level of sheep,
and to operate contentedly at that level where we would perform as well in our sleep,
in which we have chosen to trust ourselves to wolves to keep.