Africa: Reflections and Narrative Story

I typed this up shortly after returning from Kenya and Tanzania, but hadn't posted it here yet. Enjoy:



We touched down in Nairobi around 9:30 pm. After traveling most of the way alone, I had been joined by Ely, a fifth-year biomedical engineering student, in London. She would become my travel partner for the rest of the trip. As we waited for our bags to come around on the carousel, I thought about the things that could have broken or fallen out along the way. An hour or so later, I found that I didn't need to worry about it, because the luggage never came anyways.

Before the months of planning that went into this trip, before I began to allocate my monetary resources, I made sure that I had the mental resources to get the most out of my time in Africa. Dambisa Moyo's Dead Aid informed me that conventional aid models have failed to alleviate poverty and in many cases, have made conditions worse. Paul Polak's Out of Poverty taught me to learn everything about the context, leverage notions of ownership and entrepreneurship, and that designing for the developing world without speaking to my "market" face to face is an exercise in futility. The Bottom Billion, by Paul Collier hit me in the face with a lot of economic data that may or may not have been ingested by my brain. Perhaps most importantly, though, my peers who had made similar travels warned me to expect everything to go wrong, so that I might be pleasantly surprised if nothing does.

We phoned the man who would be picking us up and driving us about for the next day or so, Gabriel, who had been waiting outside. We hopped into the 90's compact sedan and Gabriel phoned the advisor of the Engineers Without Borders group we would be meeting in Otho Abwao, a village of about 500 in western Kenya. Immediately the phone was handed to me without explanation, and I was informed in a familiar American accent that not only did the solar pump and several panels required for the implementation of the Otho Abwao water system not arrive in the village, but I would need to travel to the supplier in Nairobi tomorrow morning and raise hell to try to get them. I was laughing, but the man on the phone was not. Shortly, I was not either.

We got some much needed rest at the Mennonite Guest House, and I woke up naturally at 6:30 AM, as I would continue to do for the whole trip.

Nairobi is hot, dusty, but an unmistakably modern city. The drivers on the roads continually bulldogged their way around aggressively, but when someone cut us off, Gabriel let them in, because we were doing the same thing. When we arrived at the supplier's headquarters, we met a man by the name of Mr. Nawir. I postured to intimidate, but predictably failed. Instead, I pulled a 180, and asked for a tour. After all, I had things to learn, and the equipment was held up in customs, so any efforts on my part would have been fruitless anyways. I immediately understood why I had been asked to take the yoke rather than the obvious choice of Ely, who had been to the region for several months before. Everyone we spoke to together always seemed to address me. The culture is male-dominated, only noticeably in the city, but profoundly in the villages. Throughout the trip, even when Ely was doing all the talking, technical questions would often be directed to me, at which point my mouth would awkwardly fall open, and I would turn and gesture to her.

Gabriel drove us to the airport to inspect the carousel after the last British Airways flight. Along the way, he explained why he was blowing through multiple red lights:

"We can be ambushed or hijacked while sitting at a red light"

I asked if that actually happens or if it's just the news blowing things out of proportion, to which he replied, "It is common." Gabriel's English was pretty good, but I'm not sure he meant exactly that, or rather, I hope not. Fortunately we found the bags sitting in the middle of the baggage claim when we arrived, and had to slow to a stop for a small group of Zebra to cross the road on the return trip. Obviously, I was floored by this.

We gracefully rose the following morning at a bleary 5:00 to try to make up for lost time. The "Easy Coach" was our means of transportation for this leg, bouncing us energetically over the nearly 200 miles to Otho Abwao. The roads in this part of Kenya at least are riddled with doze-inhibiting potholes, and a plethora of speedbumps. Along the way we passed countless small aggregations of colorful storefronts, selling everything from Coca-Cola to computer parts. I found it continually inspiring that even in remote places with much more precarious road conditions than this street in Kenya, the indomitable resourcefulness of the entrepreneur still stocks the shelves, even if the product is delivered by a bike with a crate and a bungee strap.

We passed through Kericho, where massive tea plantations stretched across the highlands. I later learned from Treehugger.com that Lipton gets much of its tea from these fields, and employees make around $4.00 a day. With benefits, their wage exceeds the national average three-fold.

After staying on the bus longer than we should have, we were picked up in Kisumu by the family that we would be staying with, the Akulos, and one of the engineers, sitting in the passenger seat. The van made a quick stop at a market for Mrs. Akulo to pick up some mangoes. The engineer in the front seat with a wide-brimmed hat and sunglasses on asked me, "Is this chaotic enough for you?"

I glanced out the window at the colorful, flourishing market and replied, "Looks pretty serene to me."

It was exciting to arrive in Otho Abwao, finally feeling like I was where I needed to be. One of the first things I noticed was that a foot-pump had already been installed in a bore-hole in the center of the village, which was surprising to me. Accepting an invitation, I hopped up and began to pump clean water up from the water table. It came out in quick spurts of pressure relative to the depression of the pedal. The pedal itself was too small for a grown man to use two feet, so the motion quickly becomes tiring and repetitive. Sometimes I would come down to see two children jumping up and down on the machine, filling water buckets or "jerry cans," often surrounded by a group of other children. Not only did the device provide safe and sanitary water, but the location had appeared to become an impromptu social gathering spot. The solar pump would be installed in the place of this foot-pump, and upon asking I found that the engineers nor the village had any plan for what to do with the original pump, which I found a bit disconcerting.

Myself and the group of seven engineers laid some HDPE pipe in the trenches that had been dug by the residents of the village. At one point I had the brief opportunity to dig (read: hack) away at the "soil," which was unbelievably dense. I had to ask if I was breaking up rocks, at which point I was assured that that was just the consistency of the dirt during the dry season. Digging the hundreds of yards of trenches required by the EWB-designed system was truly an impressive feat of perseverance.

Nearly everywhere we went, a veritable entourage of children followed the "mzungu," as they called us. We had fun taking pictures and showing them to the kids while we worked. One little girl even helped us as we passed along parts of the assembly. At one point I diverged from the group to take some photos of the cistern at the nearby school. Half of the school appeared to be made out of bricks, while the other half was constructed like a typical house out of sticks and sisal with mud and dung packed onto the walls. As I knelt down to take the picture I heard a squeal from behind me, and a group of three children that had been following us crowded together to be in the picture. I snapped the shot and showed them the picture, which induced a fit of giggles. One of the little boys had a piece of notebook in his hand.

"Do you go to school here?" I asked.
They nodded.
"How do you like it?"
They stared blankly.
"What are you learning?"
More blank stares. I extended my hand and he gave me the sheet of paper. It was filled with neatly printed numbers, although I do not remember exactly what kind of math it was. I had to smile, because I was impressed, but also because you couldn't pay me to do the math on that page without throwing up first. The only thing I could think to do that they would understand was to nod enthusiastically and say "good!"
The little girl in the group scrambled to pull out her homework too, which she handed to me. I did the same thing, at which point they started giggling again, mimicking me, "good, good." I wasn't sure if they thought I was an idiot or just liked the sound of the word, but I had to laugh too.

Africa: Reflections and Narrative Story (Part II)

Most of the children in Otho Abwao had clothes that were in relatively good condition, as well as sandals, although not all. They seemed to be pretty healthy and certainly had a great deal of energy. Perhaps my favorite find on the trip was a ball that some of the boys would kick and toss around. It had been made out of scraps of plastic and tied together with twine created from the fibers inside the abundant sisal plants.

At night in the village we would typically take bucket-showers. I eventually learned that postponing showering until the morning can be a pretty brisk experience, since the water we used was drawn from a 55-gallon bucket outside the latrines/bathroom. I slept on a mattress with a mosquito net suspended over it, which was quite a luxury in the area. I was informed that no part of my body should be touching the net, because the mosquitoes could still bite you this way.

The air inside the home was thick and hot, but the windows were left open to allow the breeze to waft intermittently inside. I would sometimes end my night by writing. Under the mosquito net with my self-powered LED lantern, listening to the foreign sounds of the east african insect orchestra, it felt like I was in a vast cocoon of otherworldly stimuli.

Unfortunately, I'm quite a restless sleeper, and every morning found that only about 1/5 of my body was covered by the mosquito net, the other 4/5 naturally being covered by mosquito bites. The first night I had passed out at a reprehensible 8:45 PM, so the little bastards had plenty of time to find the tastiest bits.

Breakfast generally consisted of chapatti and jam, and a lunch and dinner of rice, vegetable mchuzi, and some type of meat, whether it be chicken, mutton, or beef. I also relished in a little gem I discovered called Peptang Chili Garlic sauce, which made everything better, even though it was already quite delicious. Mrs. Akulo had the resources to hire some exceptionally kind women to cook and clean for her, one of which I later interviewed for her unique perspective.

In the afternoon, two of the engineers and I headed up the hill to meet with a group of people from the neighboring village. The temperature hovered around 80 in the afternoons. After spending three months sitting in various chairs in upstate New York, I had no shortage of perspiration. The setting for our rendezvous would be a giant church, which had been funded by a man from Tampa. We waited outside the church as people steadily filtered in. We noticed the existence of a very large rainwater cistern next to the church, and asked Joshua, a man who would act as our translator for the day, about it. He said that it had been built along with the church, in the mid-nineties, and was no longer functional. When we pressed him about it, he said that the pipe leading down to the tap, which was also visible, was too narrow and had become clogged. There was a brief silence, and then Ely asked what we were all thinking: "Has anyone tried to unclog it?" Joshua laughed and essentially repeated his answer to our previous question.

"Couldn't a couple of men take a day or two to try to fix it?"
"The pipe is buried much too deep," was the response.

I thought that this was an interesting insight. Even though water is incredibly scarce, and as a man would soon tell us "it is the thing that is killing [him]," attempting to repair the otherwise viable cistern did not seem to be an option. Based on first-hand empirical evidence and several books on the subject, I think this could be indicative of several things, but is most certainly at least one of them:

1. One mechanical error, design flaw, or output shortcoming can result in abandonment or non-adoption of a given technology, in favor of traditional methods. This phenomenon has been observed outside of Africa as well, most ostensibly in Central America.
2. When something is donated, no one assumes ownership, and thus the responsibility for maintenance is never assumed in a classic example of Garrett Hardin's "tragedy of the commons."
3. As a result of decades of colonialism and virtually indiscriminate aid practices from western civilizations, an overall sense of dependency has been created.
4. The men may simply not have enough time and energy to expend because of their daily responsibilities in obtaining the necessities for survival.
5. They do not have access to the necessary tools.

Soon an old man with a fedora cap and a cane approached us. We were informed that this man was known as the bishop, and that he had roused himself from bedridden illness to come meet with us. He shook our hands vigorously, and led us inside to his office, or whatever you might call it. We sat down in the chairs arranged around the small room and the bishop, through Joshua, thanked us for what we had done. When the bishop spoke, he spoke with dramatic gesticulation: clutching his heart and pantomiming as if he were wrenching the heavens from the sky and casting them about the room. In fact, I was quite convinced at several points that he was completely pissed off at us, but the translation always turned out to be something benign.

When the assembly had filled out, we entered the room, confronted by an anticipating audience of adults, about half men and half women, automatically segregating themselves to their respective gender group. What followed was a very unfortunate state of affairs which was not fair to either of us.

Our presence in the meeting was to gain the necessary information to apply for a project on the village's behalf. Apparently the word had been spread that we would begin implementation of a similar project following the Otho Abwao implementation, so hearing that we were only in the very first stages of the application process and we could not make any guarantees, the people were understandably agitated.

It's an unfortunate circumstance to try to resolve when you want to help. Telling the group that we would certainly be returning with a water distribution system designed specifically for them may give them hope in the short term, but if the application was rejected, they would find themselves waiting in vain. If we tell them we can make no guarantees, we look like petty bureaucrats and the people may be temporarily incensed, but they will have realistic expectations. Rightly, I think, we chose the latter. There was some very tangible tension, but they were clamoring to help when Ely told them we could get started on gathering health information immediately (regarding the incidence of water-borne disease).

That night I glimpsed some lightning on the horizon and I wished that we might wake to find there had been a downpour. The land desperately needed the moisture, and I would have loved to have seen how the village reacted. Alas, we had no such luck.

The following morning the EWB group packed up their things and left after a breakfast of chapattis and juicy mango, leaving Ely and I the only mzungu in the village. I have to admit, I didn't do an incredible amount of work toward the implementation of the water system, due in part to the fact that we simply arrived much later. Regardless, I felt a sense of freedom which I indulged by wandering around the village with Ely, poking and prodding at vegetation, asking questions and generally entertaining my unbridled curiosity. At the end of our wandering, we had to pass behind an old woman's house, who was asleep in her yard. A radio next to the cloth she laid on played colorful tunes while her head rested on a rock.

Ely had created an agenda for herself, which involved teaching a lesson about germs to the children in the school. I had no predetermined plan, and thought it might be fun and educational for myself, so we split up the lesson between the two of us and headed down to the school.

We stepped through a gate into the dry and cracked dirt of what might have been a playground. Some of the children craned their heads to look at us through the windows. I sometimes wondered what I might have looked like from their perspective - my bed-head crammed into a brown cap, forcing my hair to stick straight out from beneath it like a great stringy mane with a goofy pale face in the middle.

Soon we were standing in front of the remarkably attentive class, delivering our lesson with the aid of some nasty pictures of bacteria. Earlier we briefed the teachers on the agenda, and had encountered an interesting dilemma that I still don't fully understand. The younger children did not know enough english to understand us, so the teachers would translate into Luo. Apparently because there was not a proper translation, at least not that the kids would understand, whenever the teachers spoke about germs, they would use the word for "dirt." So, when we told the children that "when you play in the dirt, you can get germs on your hands," the teacher may have very well translated it in the "mother tongue" as "when you play in the dirt, you can get dirt on your hands." Overall though, the teachers seemed to do a great job of explaining everything, even the concept of microscoping magnification. To reinforce the retention of their lesson, they would repetitively ask for the class's input, to which they would promptly recieve an answer from the class in unison. When we were finished talking, we asked for questions. Ely went outside for a moment to take some pictures through the window, and a girl stood up and asked me how many liters of water she should drink in a day. Naturally, I stuttered a bit and looked to Ely, who swooped in with decisive grace to salvage my credibility.

We then moved on to the younger kids, grades 4-8 I believe, where we gave a more simplified version of the lesson. This time when we asked for questions, a little girl at the front of the class posed one to us. In fact, I may not have known it, if the teacher didn't call attention to her. The girls were often more shy than the boys. When she spoke it was barely audible, and as she did so, she shrank lower and lower in her seat, until she had literally crawled beneath her desk. The teacher laughed, and appeared to reassure her. I don't exactly recall what she asked, but it was nice to see that she was returned to her seat by encouragement rather than scolding.

As we left, I turned to see a little girl in a torn dress shuffling alone about the yard. Some things are just hard to wrap your mind around. Ely told me that, because of HIV, many of the children are orphans, and the sharp decline in attendance over the years that we'd witnessed in the school records betrayed a harrowing message that I had previously failed to understand: The insidious multitudes of disease conspiring against the futures of so many children.

She went on to tell me a story about a girl whose family could not afford to buy her shoes to conform to the dress code, or rather, uniform, for her school - she was denied the ability to take classes. Every school we had driven by had had a uniform, and I wondered how many kids were denied education for similar arbitrary infractions.

We returned to the Akulos' home, and after lunch I interviewed one of the housekeepers, named Judy. At one point, we were talking about applications for the fibers of the sisal plants, and she excused herself to go retrieve a basket. When she returned, she held an intricate basket of green, yellow, and magenta woven fibers. I pawed the bag curiously, examining every side, and expressed my admiration for the craft. She later gave it to me as a much-appreciated gift. I must admit, though, I felt a bit uncomfortable, because not only would it see better utility in Otho Abwao, but I really didn't do anything to deserve it.

In the afternoon, we were to finish our makeshift lecture circuit with the adults, which, appropriately turned out to be mostly women. Seats and benches were set up in the back yard, and, much like at the church, our audience filtered in one at a time. I'm still a bit skeptical, but at one point as a beaming old woman approached us, Ely told me that she was over 100 years old. She certainly looked old, but not quite as frail as I would expect someone of that age to look.

After what seemed like an hour, we asked if we should begin or wait a bit longer. The women suggested we wait another fifteen minutes.

It was a funny scene. Ely and I sat in front of the slowly growing crowd, and for the most part no one talked. Everyone stared about and seemed content to sit and wait in the shade provided by the two great trees at our backs, blossoming with vibrant blue and purple flowers. The sky was clear and the temperature comfortable, and from time to time a light breeze would blow through. I picked up seed pods from the ground and broke them into bits in a fidgety way, and was amused to see that I wasn't the only one doing something of the sort. I thought that someone who abides by a strict, quickly-paced schedule would lose their mind here, and was glad to not be one.

Once the group had sufficiently filled out, we talked with them about ways to keep from contaminating containers, and other general topics around the concept of sanitary water. Ely was presented a gourd as a gift from one of the women, who explained that it could be used for drinking soup or water, but could also be painted and hung for decoration.



Afterwards we retreated to the porch, where Mrs. Akulo, who was usually very blunt, asked, "Can I make for you, some popcorns?" We graciously accepted, and relaxed for the remainder of the night, trying not to dread the travel to Tanzania that awaited us the next morning.

When that time came, we had breakfast, packed up, and loaded our few things into the Akulos' mid-sized Toyota SUV. Both Mr. and Mrs. Akulo accompanied us the relatively short distance to Katito on the characteristically bumpy roads, at one point coming to a dead stop because of a cow loitering in the path. When we arrived at what, to me, looked basically like an intersection, the couple got out and helped arrange a ride for us. I had no idea exactly what we were in for, but we most assuredly would have been ripped off without their help.

We would be taking a matatu to the border - a 14-person van that is operated by a driver and a guy who hangs out the door and shouts after potential fares, who I'll call the "hawker." Each of the matatus are decorated differently by their owners, and the one we were soon being ushered into was called "The Roots," as indicated by a big green decal on the front window. The hawker slung our bags on the roof and hastily tied them up with some rope that extended into the cab. The interior had obviously seen a lot of use, but I had definitely seen worse conditions in some that we had passed. The floorboards were bare and covered in dirt, but the seats were well in tact and there was a truck speaker rigged just above the windows in the middle of the driver's side.

In a stroke of unbelievable luck, a family friend of the Akulos by the name of George was taking the same matatu to the same destination, and would come to act as our advocate throughout the many miles to the border at Isibania. Shortly after we clambered in, we took off at a pace that may have exceeded reason. After a few stops, we moved to the back with George where he would intermittently drop some knowledge on me about our surroundings, which was a great bonus.

Much like semi-truck drivers, we would crawl up hills and rocket back down them without using the brakes. Like so many things I'd experienced and would come to experience in my journey, the ride required that I surrender to fate. If we were to be crushed into a neat little package of flesh and metal, it was simply going to happen.

From Katito we traveled through Sondu and Oyugis, beginning the ascent into the Kisii highlands, where we had to switch to another matatu. George took some issue with the driver in what I assume was Swahili, and our fare was arranged to continue with the other. We followed the direction of our new hawker, pointing with his fistfull of Kenyan shillings. Ely crawled in the back and I joined two others in the first row behind the front. My knees were crammed against some sort of console and I soon had to smash farther over so that George could occupy the six inches of seat to my left. After a bit longer, and just as my legs were losing all feeling, the passengers in the front exited, and George and I moved to the front. Before I got in, I mentioned Ely, and George seemed to rethink the configuration, beginning to climb out. The matatus rarely stop for more than a few seconds, and the driver hit the gas to make his point, so we climbed in. I don't think I saw a single party get in or out with the vehicle fully stationary.

The Kisii highlands are much more lush and are home to acres and acres of sugar cane. I soon found myself enjoying the ride more than I could help feeling guilty for, my elbow out the window and the wind on my face. I saw some interesting stuff - bustling outdoor markets, endless fields, and a couple of women in otherwise traditional dress, one wearing a Ramones T-shirt, and one wearing a shirt with "BEAT USC" emblazoned across the front of it in huge letters. I had to laugh at the driving technique, when, after I was quite sure we would plow into the back of a bicyclist on an otherwise empty road, we overtook him with a gap of no more than a foot.

Eventually, more and more people poured in, and at one point, in the 14-person van there were 20 adults, one live chicken, two babies, and a man hanging off the side.

Africa: Reflections and Narrative Story (Part III)

We hurdled through several more towns in our multi-ton sardine tin. First Rongo, which marked the end of the highlands, then Awendo, and finally Migori, which was a well-populated town. It was here especially that having George with us would pay off.

Apparently some drivers will only take you a short distance and then ask for more cash, and some go to the wrong place entirely. We were pushed and pulled in various directions in a crowd vying for our business. Eventually, once we were inside the Matatu George had selected, the crowd subsided, and only much-less aggressive people selling pineapple or ice would come by the van.

Before departing for the border-town of Isibania, we picked up a few more passengers, including a man with dreds who smelled distinctly of fish and cigarettes. The hawker, who initially had told us we'd pay 50 kshs for each of us caught sight of the bills in the pocket of my notebook, and said "1000 each, for luggage." I knew that he knew he was bullshitting us because he erupted into a wide grin when he asked, despite himself. I asserted that we'd paid the price and wouldn't pay more, but we might have still been screwed if George hadn't chimed in. The man resumed his post at the door, visibly displeased.

Soon after we took off, we were flagged down for a police checkpoint, at which point I started sweating bullets. I wasn't sure whether to look placid and cooperative or assertive and confident. As he walked over to the side of the van and began to talk to the hawker, I think I settled on "confused and possibly insane," in trying not to betray my worry about the fact that the man I'd just spurned was laughing it up with a cop with a giant rifle. I definitely heard "mzungu" a few times, America was mentioned, and I'm almost positive the officer said, "they are very far from America." But it could have just been my nerves playing dirty tricks. Either way, to my relief we were soon allowed to pass.

The van continued to fill up, and, though it didn't seem quite as full as last time, since all the seats were occupied, the last fare to get in did so through the driver's door. The driver allowed him to situate himself, and then proceeded to jump in and essentially sit on his lap.

Arriving in a vehicle, we were required by law to stop in a particular area of Isibania, probably 1/4 mile from the border. Before we could even extricate ourselves from the van, our bags were already loaded onto bicycles, their owners urging us to let them deliver the bags. Like in Migori, there wasn't just one person who wanted our business, and they could get really aggressive - not afraid to put their hands on us. To be honest, I'm not sure exactly why we wouldn't just let one of them push the bike alongside us to the border, but I guess maybe people have taken off with the bags before. In any case, George was fighting them off like a horse swatting flies with his tail. I had to literally force my way through the crowd, having been virtually pinned against the hatch of the van, and sweeping my bag off the bike, the three of us took off in a fast-paced walk.

Our rowdy escorts naturally followed us along the road to the border. Occasionally a few would drop off, and two new men hop in. At one point a little boy showed up to our right, eating a potato like an apple. Every time I denied help from someone, he would appear just ahead of me and say, "Good thing, he was thief." I was so amused by him disappearing and reappearing whenever I looked away to respond to someone, that upon probably the fourth time he'd done so, I had to ask, "Well which one is not thief??" But he just grinned and disappeared again.

At the border, Ely and I were so grateful to George that we wanted to give him something for potentially preventing the derailment of our plans. We only had 1000 ksh bills, and obviously we weren't going to ask him for change, so as we said goodbye I slipped it in his hand. I was truly grateful and, after a short amount of protest, he was ecstatic. I was relieved because I thought he might be insulted.

At the immigration office, I was annoyed to find that the Tanzanian visa had been raised from 50 to 100 USD. But, what are you gonna do? I coughed it up.

We turned to see a giant Coca-Cola stand shaped like a bottle, like a great shining beacon, standing 20 feet tall at the other side of the road. Ely and I bought some cold(!) cokes, and sat on the curb to enjoy them, which we did to the fullest extent. Soon Josiah Kawira, one of the founders of the Shirati Health Education and Development organization (SHED), arrived in a nice grey Toyota crossover pickup, which I later found out had been donated by Dan Oerther and Village Life Outreach Project (VLOP).

After greetings had been exchanged, we set out on a wide dirt road he called the "superhighway," and I watched as the scenery became more and more green in comparison with the bleak vegetation of southeastern Kenya. Here any remnant of modern materials seemed to have disappeared, in favor of relatively consistent but widely dispersed mud and thatch homes. Many were built in a circular shape, which I had not seen in Kenya.

As we approached Shirati, where we would stay for the next three nights, we picked up some kids who were walking back from school, and they piled in the truck bed. It would have been quite a far walk, as we reached the town in probably 15 minutes, although maybe less. In town we picked up Sara Kawira, Josiah's daughter. She was around the same age as Ely and I, and had braided hair and an American accent. I introduced myself and the two girls talked, Ely having lived in Shirati for six months before.

Passing through the town, we finally reached some beautiful flat property with a sturdy, modern house on it. Getting out of the truck, I took a look around. The grass was relatively abundant and several big trees dotted the area. A little boy in a bright green cap enthusiastically pushed a tonka-style truck around the yard, making exceptionally loud engine noises. I soon learned his name was Asubuhi, Kiswahili for "morning." The cap on his head was apparently to protect the scar of a burn that had covered half his scalp when he was a baby in Nyambogo. The Kawiras had helped to send him to Cincinnati Shriners for treatment, and he had been living with them since, to my knowledge.

Sara picked up the keys to the SHED hostel from inside the home, and we walked across the lawn to where it stood. Like the rest of the buildings on the property, it was a sturdy one-story with a row of hedges below the windows and a "security light" on the corner. She opened a screen, then a metal grate, and unlocked the door behind it. Inside was a kitchen, living room, and a long hallway with bathrooms on one side and bedrooms on the other. At the end of the hall was a large master bedroom with it's own bathroom. Ely deliberately and insistently chose a room with two twin beds, because it was the room she had stayed in during her work with sand filters in the past. So, I dragged my stuff down the hall to the master bedroom.

The bathrooms were set up for showers, but the electricity had been knocked out and there was a shortage of water in the tank. So, I cut the top off our water bottles, and Sara retrieved some water in basins to dip our bottles into, and we took showers that way, which I had become accustomed to anyways. After dressing we gathered at the home with Josiah, Sara, and Asubuhi, where we had an excellent meal of rice, beans, and meat. As usual, Ely and I were exhausted after eating, and, after attempting to restore electricity to the hostel, we passed out.

I awoke as I usually did around 6 AM, and resumed my daily ritual of unsuccessfully trying to sleep for another 30 minutes. A group of people were singing somewhere in the distance, although not loud enough to have kept me from sleeping. Around 6:30, though, an unbelievably loud insect, which Sara later referred to as the "fire alarm" bug, arrived outside my window and sealed the deal on my continued rest. If you've ever heard one of the newer fire alarm systems with the flashing white lights and uninterrupted high-pitched buzz, you'll understand what I mean. I had to literally exit my room because it was so loud.

After a tasty breakfast, we prepared some cheese sandwiches for lunch and met the man who would act as our translator, Killian. We bought some water bottles in the town and continued on our way, soon turning off the "superhighway."

If the roads in Kenya were rough, the roads leading to Nyambogo were absolutely brutal. I never came across a paved road in Tanzania, but the path into the village became so narrow that we had to roll up the windows to avoid a slap in the face from the branches reaching out to us from either side. They scraped along the car like nails on a chalkboard, and the road beneath us had been ravaged my runoff in the rainy seasons, as well as offering some pretty sizable rocks for us to navigate between. It was more like whitewater rafting than driving.

Soon we arrived at the center of town, where, glad for the opportunity to be still and on my feet, we got out of the truck, and tried to lose my "sea-legs," if you will.



We were introduced to Veronika, a woman in a beautiful dress and matching head wrap, topped off with some knock-off Adidas Superstars. I can't recall her title, but she was an influential person in the village. We moved inside to her small office to begin the proceedings. It was a typically constructed room with the most questionably constructed benches I'd ever seen. I fought the urge to swat at the flies that buzzed regularly about the room. Three men joined us from outside - Nyambogo's water committee, who sported matching VLOP t-shirts. They informed us of their continued work with the sand filters Ely had helped to create, and we stated our intentions of interviewing families about water use. We would also be recording GPS points, to get an idea of the size and topography of the community.

We took a short walk uphill, where we stood on some rocks in order to get a view of the whole village. The water committee pointed out the edges, and then our translator related the details to us. This resulted in a lot of:

"You see that hill? The one behind it."
"Not those roofs, but those."

After a while we had a general picture, and suffice it to say that it is an extremely large and widely dispersed village of over 3,000 residents.



We continued to the first family we would be interviewing, which was preceded by a ritual mimicked at every successive visit - The family would set out chairs in the shade for everyone to sit in, and Killian would introduce us. The man of the house emerged and shook our hands. His clothes were torn to rags, and like most others out beyond the city center where our car was parked, his skin was cracked and extremely dry. We soon found that the procedure for the interviews would progress very slowly. Essentially, Ely would ask a question from our survey, Killian would relate it, the entire group would all talk in Kiswahili, and then the women, seated on the stoop outside their home, would answer the question. At least, it seemed that way to us.

We found that the trek to water was an hour both ways, there were hours of queuing up to fill up jerry cans, and at least ten minutes to fill one bucket at a time. At one of the later visits, we spoke to a woman who had already made the trip 4 times by 2:30 PM.

After our first interview, Ely asked if one of the committee members could draw a quick map of the village on a piece of paper in her notebook. This turned into an extremely long affair, as the men huddled around the notebook, pointing in various directions and intermittently sketching. I enjoyed the opportunity to drink in the surroundings. We sat in the shade of a big tree, and the hill that it's roots stretched into tapered off quickly, presenting a remarkable view of the landscape. We all sat still and silent, and Killian even dozed off, his head propped up with his arm slung over the back of the chair. Finally, it seemed the men were content with their map, so we continued on.

We met several more people before I began to think about the cheese sandwiches in the truck, which had to have been quite moist and hot in the ziploc bags...and not in a good way. Although we had a pretty well-defined agenda, Killian insisted we stop by a homestead where Asubuhi's grandfather lived and requested our presence. Apparently in his gratitude to Josiah, and probably to Ely as well, he had killed a chicken and cooked it up. As we took seats around a table in the shade, a girl of about thirteen placed it in the center. She then came back with some water for us to wash our hands, and afterwards Ely and I discreetly used some hand-sanitizer under the table. Along with the chicken was some brown ugali, made from cassava and millet, which had a crusty outside and chewy inside. It was meant to be dipped into the broth which we spooned into our bowls. I was advised against eating the broth, but seeing Josiah and Killian enjoying it, I tried it anyways. The combination didn't have much flavor, but the chicken was delicious. I even had the distinct pleasure of orange Fanta in a glass bottle to compliment the meal.

We visited several more families, eventually stopping among some banana trees, where an old woman sat on an "african chair" as Killian called it - a small, low stool. A bundle of millet was laid out to dry before her, and chickens pecked at it interestedly. A toddler with a swollen belly watched us take seats around the woman, and an older boy stood next to the adjacent house. A ragged looking dog emerged from the trees and began to sniff the millet, and the woman feebly swung a stick at it. The older boy took that as his cue and swatted the dog sharply with the stick and the dog yelped loudly, loping away with the boy chasing after it and swatting it. Killian told us that the woman had recently lost several family members - daughters, if I remember correctly.

By the next interview I was becoming a bit restless and distraught because I couldn't think of the questions I needed to ask, or my shame would not permit me to think of them. I came to rural Africa to look for what was missing - what needs the people had - the problem was that if everything is missing, where does one begin? At the same time I had to remind myself that pity and shortsightedness have resulted in so many failures in the past, so I had to keep my designer wits about me - immersion, but not submersion.

Anyways, to clear my head I excused myself from the meeting and walked towards one of the nearby committee members who had spoken to me before. He had picked a lime off a tree and was eating it.

"Could I try one of those?" I asked.
"You want to try? Do you know what it is?"
I looked closer, but, before I could respond, he said, "It is a lemon," and handed it to me at the exact moment he started digging in his nose. I peeled off a section and tried it - probably due to the fact that it was not yet ripe, it left a terribly persistent bitter taste in my mouth.

One of the pieces of advice that I gleaned from a book I read about designing for developing countries was not to make assumptions. Sometimes the questions that seem obvious can hide cultural differences or other insights, although it must take some practice, because our translator had a good laugh at my expense a couple of times. For example, I asked, "Why do you carry water on your heads?" (Because they can't carry it with their arms) "Why do you grow flowers?" (Because they look nice). You get the idea.

After quite a few interviews, we headed back to the village center. Upon reaching it, a little boy of about 4 or 5 ran up and grasped my hand from my side. At first I thought he wanted my attention for something, but I looked down to see him staring straight ahead. So, I walked with the group with the little boy in tow. They turned down an alleyway and into a house, and I said "OK, I have to go this way now," releasing his hand. I entered into the building and was told that we were now in the village chairman's house. Apparently he was sitting in front of the window, but I couldn't see his face because of the back-lighting. Ely told me that he had told her and another girl that they should marry him the last time they met. I wondered if he was serious or not. One of the committee members distributed cokes, and though I was full of sugar from the Fanta, I accepted. For the most part, the African men talked amongst themselves.

We navigated the bumpy road back, having discovered the cheese sandwiches predictably mushy, the bag condensating on the inside. The road caused us to crush them continually, until we got smart and put them between us on the floor.

Rice and beans was waiting for us when we arrived home. Josiah and I had an interesting conversation about the American media and recent middle-east conflict. It's always interesting to hear the opinions of people outside the states, especially with regard to our institutions. In our after-dinner comatose state, I seized on the opportunity to try some sweet chai tea, which was nice, but not really my style.

We took a shower, and, after having discussed seeking out some night-time activity and showering up, we snuck out of the hostel. We traveled down a dirt path to the superhighway, where we eventually approached a figure standing in the road. I was secretly apprehensive, but it turned out to be a friend of Sara's. The four of us came to a building with a sign on the front that read "The Green Villa." I'm not entirely sure why it was in english. We entered an alley on the side of the building and walked into the back. The building itself was small and resembled painted mud-bricks, but in the back there was a large outdoor patio kind of area. It was fenced in with what looked like split lengths of bamboo, and divided into big booths with thatched roofs, leaving an open middle area.

A waitress brought some plastic chairs to the back booth and we sat around a circular table while she took our orders, which Sara took the liberty of conducting. The waitress returned with four packets of Zed, a pineapple flavored liquor in a pouch, along with three sodas and glasses. The scissors that accompanied the pouches were broken and rusted, so I opened them with my knife, and we mixed the first round with Fanta. The bar had only a few people in it, the majority seated in the middle section facing toward a tiny TV, which looped a tape of Luo music videos.

We went through three rounds of the Zed cane spirits, the second of which I mixed with Coke, which tasted horrendous. Just as we were beginning to buzz, Sara's friend presented a gift that he had brought - a tub of roasted(?) termites. A drunk man who had been taking turns between lingering and dancing repeatedly asked me for handfuls of the insects, to which I obliged, interested that someone could enjoy them so much. At one point the girls left, leaving me with Sara's friend. It was my understanding that he didn't speak any english, so I was surprised as I was vibing to the music and heard him ask, "You like it?"

I turned to him, looking confused.
"The music."
I replied in the affirmative, and asked, "You know english?"
"Little," he said, making a gesture that indicated his response. I made some asinine comment, and he tried to understand, but eventually he threw up his hands and smiled.

When Sara returned, she passed along a message from him, which was: "Luo girls know how to shake it."

I walked outside to the "bathroom," which was just that: outside. I looked up at the sky, the upbeat tunes and voices drifting through the fence and imagined that the sky looked somehow different, so far away from anywhere I'd ever been before.

Finally, after switching to Tusker, an East African beer, I decided it was time to try the termites. Sara told me they taste a bit like potato chips. I went straight for three of them, thinking it was likely to taste better than one, and less obviously a termite. The tougher exterior gave way as I chewed, releasing the still-mushy inside, which is not one of my favorite sensations. The flavor, though, was not bad. The potato description was pretty apt, despite a kind of acrid aftertaste that you would expect from an insect.

Eventually we paid our bill and began the walk home. As we neared the SHED property, small lights were visible just below the horizon, dozens of them. I asked Sara what they were, and she said that they were boats on Lake Victoria. It was quite a spectacle.

Once we got inside, we were immediately confronted by a nasty cockroach in the middle of the hallway, about three inches long. I smashed it with a rock, which was a much more comfortable experience than smashing one with my bare foot, which I had done the day before.

The next day we awoke to some more eggs and chapatti, and jumped in the truck to go back to Nyambogo. We tried unsuccessfully to sleep in the back seat, until we arrived to conduct more interviews. One of the women we interviewed had just had a premature baby, and it was so tiny that its arms were practically no bigger than my finger. She bounced the baby on her lap with an enthusiasm that made me cringe - wondering if this frail baby should really be shook like that. It wore a permanent expression of bewilderment on its face.

We took a walk down to a couple of water sources, where we conducted some tests. The turbidity was so high that the water was totally opaque. A woman washed her clothes in the pond, laying them out on nearby bushes. It kind of made me wonder what the point was, when the water is this dirty. But then, it certainly didn't make sense to allow the cattle to drink from the same pond they retrieve drinking water from, either. If it's the only water available, it's the water you use for everything.

At the end of the day we met in one of the committee members' homes, where we were again served food. The man thanked Ely for the work she had done, particularly with the sand filters.

On the ride back, I finally fell asleep for a moment, but awoke to a loud sound and what sounded like swearing. I found out that we had hit a chicken. I don't think we killed it.

In Shirati we did some shopping for buckets to make sand filters, eventually settling on one vendor. Josiah opened up the SHED office and retrieved some kind of burner. We sat on the ground, heated up a bicycle spoke in the burner, and poked holes in the lids of the buckets. Someone fetched us some sand in a wheelbarrow, and Asubuhi immediately jumped on top of it and continued to jump until sand spilled off the side. I brought over a window screen in an attempt to divert his attention, which worked, and he helped us strain sand through it to get the filters started.

After dinner and another trip to the The Green Villa, we packed our things in preparation for the next day when we would travel to Burere, and then on to Isibania.

We woke a little late, but still had breakfast in Shirati before mounting up for the drive to Burere. In the truck on the way, we stopped because we spotted some monkeys on the rocks. I had previously stated that if I could see some monkeys in the wild, my trip would be complete, so obviously I was extremely excited. Killian corrected us, saying they were babboons. Just as good though. A man was stalking around the underbrush, and Josiah waved him over to the car to ask what he was doing. I saw he had a slingshot in his hand, and apparently he was going to try to kill the monkeys because they were tearing up his fields.

We pulled into Burere and parked at a newly constructed dispensory, which carries medicines, but cannot provide the treatment one would recieve from a doctor. We met with a round of gentlemen, including the chairman of the village, who Killian gave the front seat in deference to his title. We traveled along the dirt roads leading to the school where some of UC's architecture students focused a project around recently. Much like in Nyambogo, the roads became increasingly impassable, until at one point the branches extended too far into the road for us to pass through. The whole group got out of the truck and spent half an hour hacking away at the mess with a machete. Even after we could clearly pass through, they were still chopping away. While they wrestled with the foliage, a congregation of kids appeared at the car window, peering in. Seizing the opportunity, I pressed my face against the glass and blew on it. Most of the kids were sufficiently amused and ran off, but a couple stood by with a quizzical look, apparently not entertained by my performance.

Finally the men piled back into the truck and we continued to the school. Part of the building was made of large, pale bricks, while the other part was smaller, crumbling reddish brick. The point where the two met left an open gash down the middle, and cracks and scars traveled across various vertical lengths of the walls. A whole classroom on one side had collapsed and remained unrepaired. I walked around taking pictures, occasionally seeking out Killian with a question. An old broken truck wheel mounted on a pole was particularly puzzling to me, and I soon found out that it was the school bell, to be struck with a stick.



I walked up the hill a bit to look at the latrines - their walls seemed well in tact, but the roof on one was almost completely blown off despite a myriad of rocks and sticks piled atop. After we had scoped out all the classrooms, we got back to the car for our trip to the border.

Isibania seemed a flurry of activity compared with the destinations of the past few days. Josiah dropped us off after helping to arrange tickets for the night bus to Nairobi, and we were left with several hours to kill. Four, if I remember correctly. We sat in the station for a bit before confronting the sun again to walk up and down the sides of the street that ran through the town. On either side was an array of colorful storefronts selling a diverse selection of products. The ground was dry and dusty and it felt good to have the freedom and confidence to walk around a semi-urban place as two mzungu. We spotted two bars and decided to create a miniature bar crawl out of the time we needed to kill. Our first stop was the Paparazi Bar. I walked onto the porch that was surrounded by latticed wood and a big Tusker banner. Ducking inside through a sheet, I saw that there were a few people sitting at tables facing each other, and a shelf at the back which displayed several beverage choices. After awkwardly standing in the middle of the room and scanning around, I wasn't sure who to order from, so I just held up two fingers to the people who were already looking at me and asked for two Tuskers. A woman got out of her seat and returned with two warm bottles, and Ely and I went back out to the porch to sit in two chairs we had seen there.

We were soon faced with the inevitable: finding a bathroom. Since it didn't appear that there was one inside the bar, we returned to the bus stop, and asked for the key to the choo. The man behind the desk searched around for about five minutes before telling us he couldn't find one. He said something to one of the other employees, and came out from behind the desk, saying there was one across the street at the hotel. As he escorted us across the street I was impressed at the pains he was taking to deliver us to the bathrooms, which weren't terribly close. We walked into an alley, and then into a side alley, which opened up into a larger alley with a latrine at the end. It was an odd scene. The man said something to a woman standing outside with a young boy, and the boy walked into the side door of what looked like a house and emerged with a set of keys, which he handed to the man, who handed them to us. Then the boy went over and sat next to the latrine while we took turns using it, finally returning the key to the boy.

Continuing our bar crawl, and resolving not to trouble that many people the next time the need arose, we got another Tusker at a place with a name like Bakida Bar. Eventually we got a little nervous that we were going to miss the bus, and we finished our time-killing at the bus station. Around 7pm the bus arrived and we threw our bags underneath and climbed in. It was a lot like the "Easy Coach," although all the seats were filled this time. We found two near the back and sat down. The joints on the chairs were so loose that the man in front of me practically had his head in my lap, but I assumed I would be sleeping too, so it wasn't really an issue. Once we started moving, a teenage boy in front of Ely's seat turned around asked where we were going. He was returning to school in Uganda. He saw my headphones and asked us what type of music we liked. I told him I liked reggae, to which he was surprised, and quizzed me on some artists. He then proceeded to tell me he didn't like reggae at all, and began talking to Ely about hip hop, which was his their mutual preference.

Believe it or not, the bus ride into Nairobi trumped all of the preceding transportation in sheer discomfort. The road felt like it was made of giant gravel and the bus sailed through potholes, creaking and bouncing, and driving rain onto us from the leaking window. If we nodded off for a moment, we would awake the next to a 'BANG' and a the whole bus would shudder, finding another pothole. I would not have been the least bit surprised if all of the screws on the bus simultaneously popped off and the whole thing fell apart like in a cartoon.

At one point we stopped. Looking outside, I couldn't see any sign of civilization, so it wouldn't be one of the routine stops. People that apparently had heard what was going on were filing out of the bus, so Ely and I followed suit in our curiosity. We were in an area with some pretty dense vegetation, tall grasses and a forest on either side 100 feet ahead. By this time it was dark. We followed the procession up several cars ahead and arrived upon the scene of a crash between two cars. One was facing toward us on the side of the road, the front face smashed in, and the other was on its side across from it. A crowd of people had just pulled a woman from her car, who was bawling uncontrollably. There were no police or EMTs, and it didn't appear that we would wait for any. The crowd of people that had emerged from the cars behind the wreckage were clearing off all of the debris from the road. An entire windshield, bits of metal and glass, books and papers, all being swept aside by the milling crowd. After the road had been sufficiently cleared off, everyone got in their respective cars and we drove on as if nothing had happened.

When we arrived in Nairobi it was morning, but still dark out. We retrieved our bags and slumped into the bus stop, which was at least 50 times bigger than the one in Isibania, and completely packed. Finally we got the chance to fall asleep on our bags for a bit before Gabriel had to physically wake us up. We purchased a day room at the Mennonite Guest House, took a (hot!) shower, and napped for a bit.

We were fortunate enough to be in Nairobi for the 1-hour window of opportunity allotted for visitors to the Elephant Orphanage, so we had Gabriel pick us up and take us, arriving at around 11 o' clock. We entered the orphanage and continued to the back, where there was a large congregation of tourists and schoolchildren gathered around to see a group of baby elephants. The EWB group had time to pull off a mini-safari on their way back to Nairobi, so I was glad for the chance to see some native wildlife, even if in captivity. I was even more excited to have the chance to see something they hadn't: a baby rhino.

After cautioning the audience against spooking the rhino, they brought it out in what looked like a cape, which was amazing. It was a black rhino, of which there are only a few hundred in existence, but it was premature, and thus smaller than it should have been, and had been abandoned by its mother. Against the handlers' warnings, the younger members of the audience could not contain their admiration for the little guy. It was relieved of it's cape/blanket like a boxer entering the ring, and came over near where we were standing, where the British woman who was introducing all of the animals initiated a mud and dirt bath. The little rhino received it like a dog getting a belly rub - kicking its legs and rolling around with joy.

After the elephant orphanage, we had only one more thing to accomplish before our departure for the states: buying gifts at the "Zebra Market."

The scene was kind of like an indoor flea market, although everything but the wares was outside. The process was a lot of fun, and I had the chance to hone (read: christen) my haggling skills, as the initial prices quoted are always absurdly high, by any standards. It was, however, exhausting, because whenever we stepped into an alley, there were droves of merchants vying for our attention, and by the halfway point in our perusing, much of the objects were the same.

Finally, we picked up some parting samosas, and were dropped off the airport. I had a flight to Paris, a six hour layover, a flight to Chicago, and a flight to Covington to look forward to. The trip itself was an incredible adventure, and an invaluable learning experience. But I also discovered just how much I still have yet to learn, if it's possible to discover such a thing. Not that I necessarily wanted to end this with a quote from an '80's dancehall band, but in the words of UB40,

"Every hour of every day I'm learning more.
The more I learn the less I know about before."

A Brief Tirade on Degrees and Barriers to Entry

I was talking to a friend of mine today about college and the like, and I actually got a little worked up about something that I will now allow to spill onto the pages of my unsuspecting blog.

I've been told I can get long winded, so if you wanna get to the point, it's at the bottom in bold.

When I first started going to college as an industrial design major, I was 19 years-old, and I had figured out that in my 5-year program I would be 23 by the time I could graduate and become a fully-functional human being. It freaked me out a little, but I didn't sweat it because that's what I had to do. Now I'm 23, and what I didn't take into consideration is that by the time I actually graduate and become financially independent, with a job, I will be turning 24.

Now, this may not be a big deal to some, and I'm probably being a little too dramatic about it, but to someone who has never turned 24 before, it's a little weird.

So then I started to think about the fact that I will have spent almost 24 years in 'preparation.' 24 years! Populations in the past might have been fortunate enough to merely live this long. If I were one of many people who had to pay their entire tuition, I would have several more years of indentured servitude just to pay off the damn loans, either that or I just would not have been able to go into the program I did.

What pisses me off are the standards we've set up for ourselves. The degree is a pre-requisite, and not having it is just an opportunity for discrimination. The attitude is "show me the degree, and then we'll talk." Sometimes it doesn't even matter so much the grades you've recieved, as if potential employers just want to see that you threw a lot of money away to prove you are responsible (what?).

Seriously, the past two, if not three years of my own education have been a joke. I'm not only saying that because the work experience has has given me a different perspective, but simply because we haven't learned a god-damn thing, and if I were supposed to, it certainly didn't make any difference in the outcome of the class. When we return from internships and co-ops, we essentially are made to do the same thing, designing something as students for a real client, except now we're not getting paid for it. Returning to college from working is like going back to high school from college. It all seems so narrowly-scoped and petty.

The first two years? Yeah, totally worth it, virtually no complaints. The last two? Utter bullshit.

So what happened to these guys like Raymond Loewy who come over on a boat with change in their pockets and become one of the most (deservedly) famous designers in the world? Well, now we've got fifteen layers of bullshit and bureacracy built up (and not just in my profession), to where there's no precedent for getting by on sheer skill and hard work anymore. Not, of course, that companies can hire on sheer skill anyways. The experience gained and the pace of things learned at work is out of necessity, and GREATLY overshadows that which can be learned in school.

You might say, like my college (DAAP at University of Cincinnati) alludes to, that in structuring the industry like this, we're ensuring the best, brightest, and most capable become the designers of tomorrow. If I were a mindless leftist drone, I would piss my pants and just start shouting about unfairness. Since I'm not though, I'm going to reasonably suggest why this really is unfair bullshit.

It's like opening a business. Do massive taxes, restrictive zoning laws and convoluted rules and regulations ensure better businesses? I would argue that it ensures more mediocre businesses. For the most part, anyone really willing to make a risk has to already be wealthy enough to be able to fail, which means they won't necessarily work as hard, and all the guys with great ideas that can't scale the giant barriers to entry are totally screwed. Just like the structure of many other instututions of society, risk, ingenuity, passion and conviction take a back seat to bureacratic nonsense. Likewise, giant tuition fees, compulsory dorm residence, stubborn professors, and in some schools an inability to practice in the profession until graduation, screws over all the people who could be great designers, but will never get the chance because the professor is always right, apprenticeship is dead, and working hard toward such a goal is at odds with making enough money to eat.

I'm not trying to say that I'm one of the people with potential getting screwed, I'm saying I think it's bullshit and it makes me sad that if someone thinks they can work hard to break into the industry without a degree, they're going to get laughed out of their next interview. But then, what do I know.

Where I've Been

In an act of consummate boredom, I've decided to map out where I've been for about the past 6 years, mostly so I don't forget, but also just because it's fun. The markers denote places I've lived, while the tacks are places I've visited. Everything is color coded according to where I was living at the time. I now wish I had done it in reverse chronological order, but oh well.

It's a little poorly formatted, but alas:


View Larger Map

Art and Reality As It Relates to Contemporary Society: A Reactionary Examination

Although it may affect the lucidity of any message I may be attempting to convey, I feel it is a more valuable exercise for me to run with a thought, and try to work it out in text (as in my most recent article). My mental processes may be more apparent, but after all, though I naturally believe in pretty much anything I'm going to be writing, I certainly don't want to come off too pedagogical, since for the most part I will be only writing my opinion.

While I was making some less-than-satisfying eggs this morning (read: afternoon), I had a thought about art and music as a reflection of society. Since I am not an art major, and because I inadvertently slept through a good deal of art history, I'm not entirely aware of the discourse regarding "art reflecting life" or "life reflecting art." From my perspective, the two go hand in hand, and I am not overly concerned about the degree to which one reflects the other.

One of my favorite artistic movements (and one that is inspiring a painting I am currently working on), early 20th century Italian Futurism, is an interesting example of art as a movement, to not only reflect the ideology of the artists, but also to influence the direction of the future of society (in a way that I don't necessarily agree with, for the record). However, like all artistic movements, it arose as a reaction to something observed in society (and/or artistic sensibilities at the time). Futurism particularly, emphasized speed, brevity, technology, and a disdain for tradition, seeking to uproot society from the past. This excerpt from the Manifesto of the Futurist Painters creates a pretty clear image of this sentiment:

"The cry of rebellion which we utter associates our ideals with those of the Futurist poets. These ideas were not invented by some aesthetic clique. They are an expression of a violent desire, which burns in the veins of every creative artist today. ... We will fight with all our might the fanatical, senseless and snobbish religion of the past, a religion encouraged by the vicious existence of museums. We rebel against that spineless worshipping of old canvases, old statues and old bric-a-brac, against everything which is filthy and worm-ridden and corroded by time. We consider the habitual contempt for everything which is young, new and burning with life to be unjust and even criminal."

It is extremely interesting to me that in observing movements in the history of art that there is a trend that tends to move away from the static and all of the notions therein, and into the realm of the dynamic, the youthful, and transient, as well as delving more deeply into the human condition. Additionally, art has transitioned from a rare and commissioned service, to a universally attainable commodity, often directly involved in the goingson of society, aided in part by a gradual deconstruction of the definition of art. Likewise there has typically been a parallel in music, if not a trend toward convergence of many different artistic formats and media. Of course, there were counter-movements to these, but I am merely highlighting the manifestation of departures from convention that were previously absent.

For example, impressionism broke away from the conventions of academic painting, focusing on conveying motion and the passage of time by painting outdoors, fully engaged the subject matter - a feat enabled by advances in technology which yielded paint in tubes.

Expressionism, though not perhaps a proper movement, distorted the image of reality to evoke a snapshot of the emotional landscape of the artist and his/her subject matter.

Art Deco, shared Futurism's admiration for technology, speed, and 'progress,' and was widely popular during the 'Roaring Twenties,' an era characterized by the vibrant spirit of modernity.

The emergence of Pop Art and Dada (related only chronologically) emphasized the artist's ever-present ability to take the familiar and make it unfamiliar, or show us an image of our world in a way that we otherwise may not have seen it. Pop Art isolated the most transient products of our consumption in a way that removed them from their utilitarian context. Dada, a convoluted informal movement, acted as a means to criticize war and approached aesthetic with a deliberate disinterest, diverging from art in a way that causes some to label it "anti-art"

Bauhaus and Modernist art reduced the visual aesthetic to it's most fundamental elements. The pragmatism and relative static nature of this movement may stand in contrast with the aforementioned, but the truth reflected in it's reductionist practice reflects, to me at least, a kind of objectivism that has overseen the advancement of secular society.

Postmodern and contemporary art represents the culmination of the amalgamation of art, design, architecture, music, literature, performance, and perhaps other forms of expression. One of the more recent artistic mediums that has gained mainstream popularity is graffiti, which speaks to the emphasis of youth, transience, and the human condition, as well as (although perhaps not quite as recent) performance and installation art, which serve to inspire a response or create an experience for a short period of time, as a departure from the otherwise "real world."

Within the realm of music experimentation and creativity have exploded into a variety of genres, cross-genres, and undefinable genres.

Of course, the advancement of technology has had a profound influence of all elements of art and society. Within the realm of computing, there is a phenomenon known as "Moore's law," which describes the roughly exponential advancement of technology's complexity.

Personally, I have been tossing around the idea that this might be applicable not only to technology, but to the whole of human society. This cannot, of course, be measured mathematically, and in truth I don't believe it to be an exact corollary, nor am I necessarily referring to the idea of the Omega point. But, in general terms, it seems we are continually broadening that which we find acceptable, enjoyable, or at least tolerable.

When people refer to our "modern lives," (typically marketers) they give the distinct indication that life is more complicated and hectic than ever. Part of this, as I alluded to, is a marketing ploy, but part of it seems to be true. While I don't think we necessarily work more than previous societies, both sexes are more involved in the workforce than ever before, our tasks are certainly more abstract, and there is a tangible disconnect between our efforts and our rewards. Priorities are sometimes juggled back and forth, and our relationship with the concepts of family, happiness, religion, nature, sex, and civilization are constantly changing. It is undeniable that our lives are more fast-paced - we often have to physically be in many different places, but more importantly there is a vast amount of information and stimuli that we must inevitably process on a daily basis.

Not only is our concept of labor and reward abstracted as we've transitioned from agrarian to contemporary metropolitan life, becoming more like cogs in a machine that spits out our fruits rather than the machine itself, but our notions of reality itself are abstracted. People will anxiety disorders now have an outlet for interpersonal communication through instant messaging, social networking websites, and virtual chat. Feelings of real-world adventure and discovery is now emulated virtually, and has become widely popular in the form of MMORPGs, and the two intersect with software like Second Life. Videoconferencing has advanced with Cisco's TelePresence to a point of remarkable accuracy, and realistic haptic technologies are just around the corner.

My roommate was recently involved in a studio that poses the question: "will virtual interaction ever replace real human interaction?" My initial response was that each new generation embraces technologies and societal trends that the last rejected. In fact, in many cases they are not only embraced, but taken for granted. Moreover, i think the question is a bit simplistic, in that it assumes that there will always be a definitive line between reality and virtual reality. The concept of genuine and meaningful human interaction varies from culture to culture and over time. It is likely that not only will our concept of reality be abstracted, but our concept of self will follow suit (and seems to have been on the way for some time now). I suppose the real question is whether physical proximity will ever take a backseat to virtual proximity. Again, I believe that technology and advancements in the understanding of the human mind will eventually blur the line between the two, along with notions of tactile and sensory feedback and perhaps intimacy. In a way, it scares the shit out of me, but I'm willing to bet that won't be the case with my children, and each successive generation. Even electric light was recieved with superstitious revulsion at it's inception.

But what does all this (admittedly tangential) talk have to do with art? Well, there are aspects of postmodern and contemporary art and music that seem to operate under the idea that "anything goes," and intentionally or unintentionally seems to reflect a sense of societal disillusionment. Of course, if I am to be a responsible thinker, I must remind myself how subjective and myopic my perspective is. The generation that grew up with big band and crooners like Sinatra I'm sure viewed Rock and Roll with a similar sentiment. Hip Hop, even without it's obvious 'controversial' subject matter, rebelled against one of the most conventional elements of song - melodic vocals, as well as being produced sometimes without conventional instruments. Consequently it's acceptance was relatively sluggish. There is also the question, regarding some types of postmodern art and music, of whether they intend to shock with the intention to make any communicable point, or simply to get noticed?

Regardless, I personally see a connection between my own observations of societal disillusionment and contemporary art, resulting from many elements of contemporary society - an inundation of marketing and pop culture, growing popularity of pornography, abstractions of traditionally recognized notions of life, growing awareness of global issues and suffering and farther reaching government and industry (which may result in feelings of powerlessness), continuing environmental degradation, aversion to a political climate with no significant means of recourse, and infinite possibilities for distraction, among many other phenomena. Consider the wildly popular art of Kaws, a former graffiti artist, who now sells canvases painted with depictions of spongebob painted with his characteristic 'cross-bones' around the head and X-ed out eyes. From another artist, say Banksy, this might be a clever statement about a variety of questionable societal practices, but I get the distinct impression that that is not the case here.

I suppose the question I'm trying to get at, though it may not be all that evident, is thus: Are there undeniable elements of our nature and our psyche that are adversely affected when our reality is abstracted and the paradigms (and aims) of human life and interaction are so drastically shifted (over such a short period of time)? Or, are we merely clinging on to remnants of the past for our own sense of comfort and familiarity, and the world is better (or at least no worse) off with each new paradigm shift and tradition jailbreak? Either way, although I think it worth rumination, questions of this nature have been proven moot time and time again throughout history. Humanity's progress, if it should be referred to as such, is as perpetual as the dawn of each new day, lending validity to the old (or perhaps only old to me) expression "lead, follow, or get the hell out of the way."

Ah, what an appropriately nihilistic conclusion.

Update!

Well, it's been...a long time. I really have to wrestle myself down and strap my wrists to the keyboard to make myself write. The problem is, I have a lot of subject matter, but I moll it over in my head so thoroughly, that when the time comes to write it, I'm already worn out on the subject.

But enough of that. I am currently residing in Skaneateles, New York. Every day I wake up, get ready for work, and by the time I'm out the door (inevitably a few minutes late already), I see my car windshield, and realize that I'm going to be later. For some odd reason it's impossible for me to remember this simple fact.

Fortunately, I live less than a mile from my work, so when my car battery committed suicide about a month ago, I could walk to work in only moderate discomfort. In fact, I rather enjoyed the walk - I would listen to Gogol Bordello in the morning and evening travel, and imagine that I am in some bizarre tundra in Ukraine, rather than a hibernating village in upstate New York.

This quarter has been an alarming lesson in my own willpower. After my car began working, I wanted to continue walking because of the enjoyment I derived from it. However, the convenience of the car almost always wins. I bought an expensive keyboard and brought along painting materials because I'm tired of wasting time in the ways that I normally do, and thought it might be beneficial to hone some skills. I would spend hours banging away at the keyboard, and finished an entire painting in one night...before my internet and cable starting working.

When I arrived in Skaneateles, I had an apartment set up already. It is one of those corporate housing-type arrangements, which, upon first encounter, looks identical to a hotel room. I immediately shifted around some of the furniture, hid all the brochures, and consumed the complimentary foodstuffs. Three weeks later, I recieved a note on my door that made it very clear that the landlord was not pleased with the way I was treating the apartment. I found this pretty surprising, considering the state of the apartment was about one tenth of the deterioration factor that I allowed to plague some of my previous residences. Apparently, my stray reciepts and papers were interfering with their dusting though, so I resolved the problem.

Overall, living by myself for the first time has been quite what I expected. I absolutely love it, and absolutely hate it. I'm pretty sure my life has never been less exciting, which was something to be excited about in and of itself, initially. I have time for reading, writing, and artistic endeavors, and I can do precisely what I want at any given time. Had I things to do on what I like to call "the outside world," this setup would be ideal. Home has never been the kind of reprieve that I've always heard it should be, although living with only my roommate in Cincinnati is pretty damn close, because we tend to share a wavelength.

Before this, there was Seattle, which was fine, but I lived with two other guys in what was essentially in student housing with apparently paper-thin walls. The noise alone would have kept me awake but it didn't help that I slept on a box spring for half of the quarter.

California wasn't bad, but an unstable, pill-popping roommate made for a nerve-racking experience.

In Atlanta, I lived with a guy who called the cops without telling me because he thought I was smoking weed in my room (I wasn't). He also habitually turned the thermostat to like fifty degrees in the height of summer. After moving out of there, I shacked up with a guy who lost all sense of ...sense when alcohol touched his lips, and his "girlfriend" down the hall would come ring the doorbell at all hours of the night and start crying and wailing as soon as she entered the apartment. Naturally, I spent many undue wakeful hours on my oversized bean-bag.

In Rhode Island, I lived with an utter sociopath who could not understand the concept of being alone for a moment.

Every time in between I lived in Cincinnati with five other guys in a filthy, dilapitated and chronically loud apartment.

Of course, before that I was living with the parents, who are perhaps the worst roommates of all.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled that I was able to live at all of these places. I revel in discomfort and a certain amount of chaos, if merely for the learning experience it inevitably brings. But as far as homes go, these don't exactly describe the quintessential elements. Which brings us back to my original point, which is, as an apartment, this place kicks ass. As a lifestyle, not so much. If you think I'm just being dramatic, consider this: There is not a single bar in town. No shitty little pool hall, no bowling alley, no seedy local haunt. The village consists essentially of one intersection, and there is no foot traffic to speak of at any given point. Oh well.

I spent a weekend (and change) in Canada, two weeks after my arrival here. Myself and two other co-workers spent four days working overnight to put up displays in a newly opened Wal-Mart. I can say unequivocally that this was the least rewarding work I have ever done, but considering the overtime I was paid for it, I'm ecstatic I was able to do it.

I was later employed to take down a similar display at a place called Mack Studios in Auburn, New York. While we were taking immense custom pieces of Plastic, Cintra, and Aluminum and throwing them into makeshift dumpsters, I asked a co-worker how long the display had been up in the Target store it was designed for. He replied, "Oh, this one has been up forever...probably about five months."

This statement confirmed the sick feeling I had in my stomach while I was installing the Wal-Mart displays. Not only was all of this stuff transient and virtually meaningless, but it would be carted off to a landfill in a matter of months. This was only one store, and this does not even consider the enormous amount of plastic garbage that these meaningless displays would help to sell. We were in the cosmetics aisle of all places, too. If anything can make a person with any semblance of a conscience question his or her profession, it's putting up wasteful and meaningless displays to sell wasteful and meaningless packages full of wasteful and meaningless product. The whole process has no real value. Of course, you could argue with me over the value of makeup, but regardless I think my point is clear.

It feels absolutely stupid that I should have to deliver a caveat to explain my position, but I am not, historically speaking, an eco-crusader. But this profession (industrial design), really makes you consider your impact on the earth. You don't even have to care about nature to be concerned about it - the sheer volume of garbage with no intrinsic value that we generate is mind-boggling. Just the other day I was working on a product that would be licensed with Disney characters. My fellow designers told me that there is typically about a three day turnover for projects like this one. I couldn't help but consider the irony that this "bang-it-out" job would produce MASS QUANTITIES of stuff that in likely a matter of months would be discarded and replaced with something new.

Unfortunately it is a fantasy to think that if I didn't participate that it wouldn't happen. The environmental crises we face parallel that of the political, in that our own individual efforts are overrun by the madding crowd. It is no wonder why the political machine is referred to as just that. It's like a locomotive, either hop on, or get the hell out of the way. Sure, I could protest the government in a way that makes sense to me, and end up in jail, or have physical harm visited upon me. Likewise, I could protest the manufacturing industry, and end up penniless.

Basically, I have narrowed my life goals into two options, dictated by not only my political and social ideology, but also by my own nature. My first option is to try to find a consultancy that shares my concerns and only designs products that have real value, as well as submitting to the force and violence of the government as much as I need to in order to survive, while attempting to slowly convince people of it's evils. My second option is to make some money and tour the world until I find a place that speaks to my heart and is devoid of all the soul-crushing consumerism that becomes more and more offensive every year.

Even as I write this, in the back of my head I can picture myself doing what is "reasonable," which is to find the least offensive job...eventually, and traveling the world as a tourist. I believe that if I don't get out of the states while I am young, preferably in a less-than-responsible manner, I will be stuck here, and fall into the rut known as life. It seems that so many people had wild aspirations as a youth, but abandon them as they become more of a "realist." Well, it seems the door is closing on the era where Americans have the means and the privilege to travel the world - though I've been wrong before - but I certainly don't want to be another bitter xenophobic man sitting in an armchair somewhere talking petty politics to his disinterested progeny.

Seattle, Greensburg, Kansas City, and Cincinnati

My roommate and I just hooked up the internet in our new apartment in Cincinnati, so I can finally throw a new post on here.

Leaving Seattle was an ordeal. I was working my ass off to try to prepare for a presentation that summarized all of the work I had done at T-Mobile, while simultaneously trying to get ready to fly to Greensburg, Kansas on Monday. I found out that my roommate, Evan, was in Greensburg to help rebuild the town, which had been destroyed by a massive tornado. Given my construction background, and figuring it might make sense for us to drive to Cincy together, I decided to join him for a few days to help out.

But first, I had to get out of Seattle. After recieving some duffels in the mail from my parents, I stuffed them full of my clothes: some dirty, some clean, but all smelling funny afterwards. I packed another bag with general stuff, and a backpack with my computer, some clothes changes, and toiletries. The remaining stuff I had no idea what to do with, but fortunately a friend offered to hang onto them and send them once I had arrived in Cincinnati.

Next, I had to put my car in storage. I was originally going to drive it across the country, but my parents suggested I keep it there as they would be in the area sometime in the near future. I don't really know why, but I didn't ask questions - Two cross-country trips in one year is enough for me (I had driven to and from L.A. in the winter for a co-op at K-Swiss). I found a place next to the Ballard bridge, and drove over and stored the car. I found a bus stop right next to the bridge, and waited for the bus. As usual, it did not come at the time it was supposed to, and I had just turned to begin walking when I heard it approach. I waved my arms like an idiot, but it just passed me. The driver gave me some kind of hand signal I didn't know how to interpret. This was the last of many moments with Seattle public transit that pissed me off. It was a beautiful day though, and I was hungover, so I decided just to walk home.

I stopped for some much-needed food at some place called China Box or something like that, and then continued along what I guess is Lake Union. Since I was in no hurry, I walked through Gasworks Park, which looks like something out of a steampunk illustration. In the picnic area there was what I think was a man in a ridiculous dress sitting behind a microphone while sound equipment was being set up and people stood around smoking weed.

I continued on through Fremont and paused at Troll street. After some inner deliberation based on the hill I would have to walk up, I decided to walk to the place where the bridge over my head met the earth, where there is a gigantic statue of a troll emerging from the ground below the bridge. It actually might have freaked me out if I didn't know it was there...and if it was night.

Eventually I made it home. Some people run miles and miles every day, but for me, it was a damn long walk, and hot.

After a successful presentation on Monday, and then another for the VP, I hopped into the car of a very helpful friend, and headed to SeaTac for the flight to Kansas at 2:45. The flights were pretty nice, actually. The first one had comfy seats and the second one had a bunch of characters on board. No upset babies to speak of.

Evan greeted me at the airport by pissing in the urinal next to mine without a word. We walked out of the airport, and then remembered that I didn't have my bags. After correcting that situation, we drove to Greensburg and had a beer in a small gazebo in "volunteer village." The sleeping arrangements were shipping containers divided into four sections which each contained two bunk beds.

I spent three days there, working from 8 to 5 on homes - painting, siding, and insulating. The community had come a long way since the initial tornado. My previous experience with construction had been with my dad, which I was paid for, and hated, although I'm glad that I now have that knowledge. I loved working in Greensburg, the days were beautiful and the meals were free.

On our last night there, we went into a town called Pratt to watch Kansas State play Louisville. We enjoyed some casual beers and greasy food until some of the locals started ordering rounds of Patron. After four rounds and two pitchers, we decided it might be time to leave. As we paid our bills the waitress informed us that Evan and I were the only ones who had been drinking Patron. The rest were taking shots of water...a novel trick. A fireman from Jersey who had been working with us drove us home.

I fell out of my bed that night, which I had been fearing the entire time.

The next day we worked until lunch and then prepared for the drive home. As a measure of courtesy to each other, we showered in the portable trailers that housed the bathrooms and showers. The showers had a button that you would have to press every two minutes or so to continue a very powerful and direct stream of hot water. The first time I used the shower, I wasn't prepared, and I delivered a straight shot like a pressure washer straight to the worst possible area of the body to recieve a straight shot like a pressure washer.

Evan and I spent the night in Kansas City, in an area called Westport, which was surprisingly awesome. We did a little bar hop, beginning at an outdoor patio with a live band, and ending at a place wedged between two buildings that served PBR tall-boys and played hardcore punk music.

We reached Cincy on friday night. As usual for this time of year, Clifton was a mess of noise and drunkards, which is always exciting. The next day was devoted to Oktoberfest and UC v. Miami.

Now, classes are about to start and everything is about to get a lot lamer.