Bring on the Calculators

Today was an exciting day for me as I finally got the right electricity converter plug for my laptop and I was also able to dive into TICH's financial records for the first time. From my preparation courses I was prepared to be patient in diving into things and much more tactful in dealing with people. That lasted about 3 days. Today I told my boss the Reverend, that I had nothing to do, I wanted to look at the financial records and, oh yes, I wanted to take over his office so that I could sit with the accounting staff. The Reverend is a great guy and holds an excellent prayer session. However, as Directors of Finance and Admin he doesn't have any background or interest in Finance. The Admin side of things is still to be determined.

This past weekend started off quickly as Cindi and I met with two Americans, Steve and Rachael, who are presently working in the region. The took us to an interesting local place for dinner and then hooked us up with Julius, their favourite taxi driver. That was certainly a hilarious adventure. Firstly, when we told him that we lived near the Hindu Temple he thought we meant the Hare Krishne centre. Not only were we lost, but his car was without doubt the most beat-up but working vehicle I've ever seen. The car couldn't come to a complete stop without stalling and was something that a homeless person wouldn't reside in. I now have Julius' cell phone number so that he can provide me with his excellent service the next time I need a cab.

On Saturday we took another transit option, the boda boda. This is a one-speed bicycle with a cushion on the rear. For about 30 ksh ($0.50) we got a 15 minute ride from the town centre out to a nice restaurant on Lake Victoria. We spent quite a while there with Steve, Rachel and two other VSO volunteers living in Kisumu: Ed an accountant from the UK and Milika a very, very excentric woman from Holland. We also got out to markets on Saturday and Sunday which was certainly enough stimulation for me for one weekend.

I've gone for one 45 minute run so far and got no more weird looks and calls than I normally do around here walking around. Kenya is a world power in distance running, but it doesn't appear that anyone around here is a runner. I was saying to the Reverend that Kenya seems to have 20 runners and they all go to the Olympics and Canada has many runners and no-one goes to the Olympics. There was a big sports day last week at the school behind our place and it was fun watching the hundreds of kids cheering on their school teams in soccer and volleyball. Although nothing too exciting, there always seems to be something going on.

The season of the long rains is upon us and although its still hot by my standards its a lot better than it has been. The rain has mostly come at night and I'm certainly sleeping a lot better thanks to it. We're still getting settled into our new place and have a few bathroom related issues to get the landlord on (the shower drain doesn't really drain and a toilet pipe is leaking. Its been to hot to eat in the evening so my only kitchen duties have been to boil water to put into the filter. A mosquito net is definitely necessary and I think we're going to be spending more time on roach reduction.