Doxa in Kenya: Independence

Tuesday, July 18.

I moved into my new apartment today. That meant I had to start cooking for myself. Well, I thought I could work something out with Richard so we could cook together or take turns, but apparently he'll be very busy for the next two weeks wrapping up the trimester. I was a little bummed, but I figured I could just cook rice and soup or something. To my surprise, my new apartment was already equipped with pots, pans, utensils, dishes, cups, etc. I thought, "Great, I guess I'll survive after all." But there were a few hurdles before I could eat my first dinner alone.

Here we have three kinds of water. One is tap water that comes from a deep well within the school. We use the tap water for shower, brushing teeth, and washing dishes. But it's not suitable for drinking because it contains a little too much calcium. Second is the drinking water that we get from the market (in one of those big plastic containers used for many water dispensers). The third is a water we get from the city. There is one tap behind the main sanctuary that we can get the water from the city. We use this water for cooking and rinsing cups and utensils. Since I didn't have any bottles, I had to borrow them from Richard. I filled up two ten-liter bottles and carried them back to my place. I had to carry both in my arms, and it was not fun at all.

The second obstacle was the rice cooker. I had brought a small rice cooker from the States. But since in the States we use 110V-120V, I also brought a voltage converter. It turns out that the converter was broken, so I couldn't cook my rice using the rice cooker. It was a brand new converter too... Warranty (in US) means nothing when you're in Kenya. So I had cook rice on the stove with a little pot. I found one with a metallic handle - one of those that we use for camping, I guess. I was going to cook some instant ramen to make myself feel even more pathetic, but I decided it was easier to cook instant curry (the pre-packaged ones) and I would feel less pathetic. (I like ramen, but there's something about instant noodles and being a college student that makes people pathetic... Oh, but I'm not a college student anymore. Hmm...) I always relied on automatic rice cookers, so I was a bit concerned about the rice, but it turned out quite nicely. Now I think I can survive even in Lenkijape... maybe. They have no electricity, and people live in huts made of cow dung.

Overall, my first dinner in my new apartment turned out pretty nicely. The only thing I lacked was somebody to eat with. It's times like these that make me wish I was married... Or at least had a roommate.

After dinner, I washed the dishes (this is also when I wish I was married - not that I would make my wife do the dishes, it's that we would do it together), made my bed, and took a shower. The bathroom in this apartment is on the same floor (as opposed to being on the third floor like in the other one), so the water pressure was a little better. But I don't have any shower curtain, so I had to shower while sitting down in the tub. After the shower, I got to dry myself completely in my room before I put on my clothes. It's times like these that I'm glad I didn't have a roommate. If you come from a "bath culture" (or you go to public baths), you would get out of the room with baths and showers, and dry yourself completely before you put on your clothes. You just can't get fully dry in the bathroom or in the same room that you took shower in. Anyway, it's nice to be able to be naked whenever I want to... jk.

Now that I'm all on my own, I have to get more groceries. Previously, I depended on Richard since he had all the necessary ingredients to cook. He would also share all the meat with me, but now I have to get them on my own. I need to learn how to buy meat now. Err... I should make a shopping list, because I never know what to buy when I'm actually at the store.

I'm running out of time to finish my med school application. If I don't finish by the time I come back from Kilhani (where the clinic is), I won't have the chance to go online for at least another 3 weeks while I'm in Lenkijape. Then I'm most likely going straight to Tanzania, where I probably won't get internet access either. Also in Lenkijape, there's no electricity, so there's no way to recharge my laptop. That means if I don't finish in the next two weeks, I won't get to submit my application till late August at the earliest. There's no problem with the deadlines though, since the earliest deadline is October 15. But I need time to do secondary applications and submit them early enough so that I could get interviews when I come back in late November. Of course, nothing is for sure. To get the interviews, I would also need to have all the letters of recommendations ready, and some how contact individual med schools to schedule interviews. So I don't even know if I'll get any interviews between November 22 and early January. I guess I'll have to schedule the interviews as early as possible in January, and get a plane ticket back to Nairobi after I set all the interview dates. It's like a huge gamble... I feel like I'm putting so much at risk because I'm in Kenya. But I must keep my faith in God, and do my best with the application.