Flannel

As I'm writing this, I have a purring bundle on my lap. Her name is Flannel.

I was going to get a kitten this afternoon when I got back to Kipkaren. But at breakfast, I found out that there was a kitten at the children's home. Joyce (one of the kids) had found it near their school yesterday, and they were keeping it in the rabbit cage! I went over right after breakfast and enquired about it. They were happy for me to take it since they didn't quite know what to do with it.

The kitten is in pretty bad shape. When I went to get her, she was totally wet because the rabbit cage she had been in all night provided no protection against the rain that had been falling most of the night. Even as I brought her back, holding the wet kitten to my chest, she was shaking. I wasn't sure if she'd make it through the day.

I gave her a quick, warm bath, which she hardly fought. She was so full of mud from the rain! It's only after I had been drying her for a while that she started biting, fighting the dryer. She had some spunk left in her after all.

I put some medicine on some places that needed it. It looks like she had been burned, perhaps. Her ears look scorched, and her whiskers are mostly gone. After she was dry, I put her down on my flannel PJ pants on my bed so I could find her something to eat. The moment I put her down on the flannel PJs, she started purring. So I called her Flannel. She digs her nose into the material, probably still wanting to nurse...

When I fed her, she gobbled down the food to the point that she gagged! All morning, I kept her warm under a reading light in a carrying basket until she stopped shaking. She slept all the way to Kipkaren, happy to be in her little basket. Once we got here, Flannel explored my home and didn't like it too much when Davis and Jen's new kitten stopped by, but the two will soon be friends. She just gives a little squeak when I pet her, then purrs.

So, I have a new little roommate/travel companion. Trusting she'll be well soon, healed from whatever caused her little ears to look scorched.

Random thoughts on a rainy Saturday night

I just wrote a long update on the team blog. I'd love to upload photos of the past few days, but just realized that my USB cables were left in Kipkaren. I hope this doesn't happen too often now that I'll be juggling life between two places--having the wrong stuff in the wrong place. Oh, well.

So I can't upload a picture of my new chameleon. He is asleep on my plant. Barra Barra passed away recently, so John (who took care of him) found me a new chameleon. This one's the same type (side-striped chameleon), but it's far more yellow than Barra Barra was. And it's not yet as sociable. Nor does it have a name yet.

Some things I learned the past few days:

• In the late 1800s, the British government disarmed all the tribes of Kenya as they continued invading the country under colonial rule. The Nandi (the people of Kipkaren and a sub-tribe of the Kalinjin) provided the most resistance. In fact, I'm learning a lot about the Nandi Resistance as I'm spending time with my new friends in Kipkaren. One of my colleagues, Richard, told me how his last name (Birgen) means warrior in Nandi. His grandfather was one of the warriors who tried to fight off the British, including shooting the trains with arrows!
• In 1905, the last Nandi King was assassinated. The Maasai helped the British to kill the Nandi king. I'm told that due to the fact that the Maasai helped the government with killing the man-eating lions of the Tsavo in 1898 (the movie The Ghost and the Darkness was based on these lions' story) as well as with the assassination of the Nandi King, they were never disarmed by the British government.
  

Other random thoughts/facts:

• I'm starting to think of more and more Swahili phrases in my mind as I do other things. Now I must just use those phrases whenever/wherever I can--a critical part of language learning.
• At the campaign yesterday, I volunteered to get tested for HIV/AIDS. It's hard to try and convince others to be tested if you had never been tested. My results were the same is 99% of those tested. Negative. Not that I wondered!
  
• Yesterday, I was actually craving Kenyan-style grilled corn, that is field corn grilled on an open fire. On our way back from the campaign, I stopped on the side of the road to buy everyone in the car an ear of freshly-grilled corn. It tastes a bit like burned popcorn (except it's good, while burned popcorn tastes terrible!)
• It's been raining every single day since I've been home. Many days, there are some heavy rains around 2 pm. It has rained much of the night every night. This makes for some pretty muddy shoes and even muddier roads. It also makes for some challenges in getting laundry dry. I have a retractable clothesline inside my house which helps a lot.
• Duchess hasn't been seen for a few days now... She may have fallen prey to a snake or an eagle. Or maybe she just found another home. I'm hoping it's the latter.
• Today, I was at a 25th-wedding anniversary celebration that was supposed to be "starting at 11 and ending no later than 2." I have learned that with functions like these (including weddings and funerals) Kenyan 11 is usually 12 at the earliest. I showed up at 12. I was the second guest. We finally started at 1:30 and finished at 5:45, after 17 speeches. (Yes, I counted.)
  
• There's a long-crested eagle that nests close to my home in Kipkaren. I watched it for a while the other afternoon, sitting in the trees really close to me! It's a good thing to have around since it eats rodents. But it'll also eat chickens, so that's not good. The birdlife around our base in Kipkaren is amazing!
• Today would've been my Ouma's 96th birthday. She passed away 5 years ago, just short of her 91st birthday. She was a wonderful woman who loved Jesus!
  

On that note, I'm going to pop in a movie and relax for a bit. It's time to switch off this mind of mine.

In Memory of Barra Barra

My pet chameleon has passed away. How, I don't know. I just got a message from the family who took care of him, saying, "Barabara was replaced by another one after it developed some health problems."

That's it. Nothing more. I can't help but wonder what caused his death. But I won't ask too many questions. I don't want to make my petsitting friend feel worse.

Barra Barra was probably the easiest pet I had ever had. Didn't shed. Didn't cause allergies. Didn't cost me a thing. He was a great conversation piece, and a master flycatcher. He could zip his tongue out faster than any creature I had ever seen. And then reel it in just as fast. He kept my house free of flies.

I'm not sure how I feel about the new chameleon. It's most likely one that's been living in the bottlebrush tree by my front door for the past year. Will have to see if he's as tame as Barra Barra had become.

Such is life.