Ramblings

I am in Maralal these past couple days now but wanted to post my Ngurunit thoughts of the last week I was there.  One note to add about traveling there on the 25^th October 2017.  It was my birthday that day and we were traveling late.  About half way through the last 18 kilometers between Ngurunit and Illaut it was around 8 pm and dark.  The Universe gave me a wonderful birthday present in the form of seeing a beautiful leopard cross the road just in front of my car.  I was able to follow it with the headlights and shine on it as it disappearing into the trees on the side of the road.  So Amazing!!!  A leopard!! So rare.  Anyway, here are some random, rambling thoughts from  a couple days during that week in Ngurunit…

27 October 2017 ---  I’m sitting in Ngurunit on a sort coolish yet hot night.  Humid really.  It has finally been raining here.  The cows are still living in our compound to be given supplemental feeding.  Even some sheep and goats are living here at the moment also.  But with the rains and hopes of good pasture growth, eventually herding life will go back to normal and the livestock will all go back to their normal living camps in the pasture areas.   Currently, every morning and evening are quite busy here at the house with different family members coming to milk, feed and take the cows out in the morning or bring them back in the evening from grazing.  The calves stay here all day long, walking around and getting into trouble trying to drink water out the tap or get into the feed storeroom.  Every couple of days they are taken to the river to drink.  It is interesting to have them around.

I paid the basket weavers for their October order that I sent off to Swahilli Imports in Eugene Oregon at the beginning of the month.  They are working on the second half of the order which is due in mid-November.  It is so nice to see people happy with their income.  I need to try harder to sell as many baskets as possible in order to increase the amount of money each woman can make in a month.  It is such a challenge though.  How to do it is a bit beyond me, but I keep up the struggle. 

30 October 2017 --- continuing on my thoughts of life in Ngurunit.  It is Monday and the day we were supposed to go back to Maralal, but as usual, the only firm plans I make are that plans will change.  So our plan changed and we decided to spend one more night here.  We are giving the outcome of last Thursday’s election exercise one more day to materialize in some form before we head back to ‘civilization’ to see what is happening.  It is nice to remain in the peace of unknowing for a bit longer.  We of course hear bits and pieces of what is going on.  It is not yet very encouraging.  What will happen to Kenya in terms of democratic future is a mystery still. 

It is raining here today in Ngurunit.  Such a lovely sound on the roof.  Though at times when it is a heavy downpour, like at this moment, quite deafening.  I am actually trying to watch a movie but hard to hear when the pounding of rain on the roof gets too much.  So, thought I would babble on ‘paper’ during the heavy showers.  This rain has been long awaited and everyone is happy, including the birds.  It is so fun to watch them be so active and sing so loud.  They are reveling in the time of plenty.  Plenty of water.  Plenty of food.  The birds also suffer a lot during drought.  Whenever I was here in the past dry months, I would put out pans of water for the birds.  Oh, how they enjoyed drinking and bathing in them.  The bees also were always looking for water.  I often put out pans of water for them too or I would come into the kitchen and find a swarm of them in the sink getting drinks.  Not a happy situation for me when trying to cook or wash up, so I would put water outside the door to entice them out. 

Rain cleared up for a bit.  Maybe more in the evening.  I finished watching my movie.  Kong: Skull Island.  The epitome of the human way; if you don’t understand it and it scares you, try to kill it, if you can.  If one can’t actually kill it or eradicate it in the bodily way, then ‘kill it’ by censoring it, locking it up, banning it, barring it from participating in normal society, preaching against it, trying to convert it or simply ignore it and hopes it goes away.  That is what humanity has done to everything thing since the beginning of existence to most everything it encounters that doesn’t exclusively benefit their specific unit of understanding.  All levels of existence included; environment, animals and even other humans. 

I am jumping from one thought to another, aren’t I.  Random thinking.  That’s okay.  Sometimes one just lets the mind wander and then wonders at what appears in it and what weird associations are made.  It’s just that sort of day.  I think I’ll go do some random activity now.  I have a beaded hippo to finish.  Signing off till another less random day!!