I have arrived.

After a very long bus ride, I arrived in Kisumu. Kisumu is Kenya's third largest city, but once you get past Mombasa and Nairobi, the towns become very small quite quickly. Kisumu is located on Lake Victoria, which supplies fish to the area. Unfortunately, you can't swim in it due to various diseases...

It's always very frightening to meet a new host family. Every time it has happened, I feel sooo scared and like I'm about to cry. I never actually cry, but I'm always on the verge. It was this way again. But this host family is so nice. Right away they showed me around the house and the surrounding area, which is something my Nairobi family never did. In Nairobi, I was left to figure out the way things worked, which took about a month. They also asked me right off the bat what I did and didn't eat (no liver, no intestines, prefer vegetables to meat) - again, something that has never happened in any host family I've stayed with. This relieved a lot of stress for me during meal times, knowing that I won't refuse anything. My new mama told me that if I didn't like something she wouldn't be offended and that she would even cook me something else. So nice!

The family is BIG, so let's do introductions. There is my mama, Herine. She is a nurse, although she is taking amonth or so of leave. She is strong and very direct, which I appreciate. She is married, but he lives and works somewhere else so I haven't met him yet. She has in total six children, four of which are at home. The oldest is Velma, who is 22. She is an occupational therapist and very nice! I think we will be good friends. The second is Winnie, who is 18. She is waiting to go to college (arranging it usually takes quite a bit of time here) so now she just works in the home. Then there is Alan, who is 14. He is in school pretty much all the time. The youngest is Fidel, who is 11. He's very playful and I think with time we will develop a friendship.

Now there is another family entirely of animals. Four sheep, a goat family with twins, countless chickens, two full grown dogs, a puppy, and a kitten. The kitten is my favorite. They all hate it but I love him! They gave me the great honor of naming him, and I named him Odo, after a Star Trek character I like a lot. Shut up, you non-trekkies!

The home is about a ten minute matatu ride from Kisumu town. It's build in the traditional Luo style, where there are multiple buildings. There's a certain order and rhyme to why they're built, but I don't understand that yet. Anyway there is a main building with the sitting room, dining table, and then my and my mama's bedrooms. There is a small building for the kitchen. Then another for the children. Last but not least is the hole in the ground for going potty and another small stall for the bucket bath that I have become such a pro at. These buildings are actually quite high-quality for the area; they are concrete with tin rooves and concrete floors. They are open air though, so it's sort of like camping. There is no running water or electricity.

I'm quite happy with this placement and I think it will work quite well! I will post again later today (after lunch and a bathroom break) about my internship - that's an entire essay all by itself.