September 19, 2005

Stress mounts. I send Chris an email to the VSO office, telling him what has happened, informing him the robbery is causing me to rethink my purpose for being in Kenya. I also tell him I want to work through the trauma of the robbery without losing time at work, but the stress is getting to me and I need to talk to someone. Chris tries to get through the one phone line at TICH without success and finally he calls me on the fax machine in Walter's office. He suggests the VSO counselor, but she’s in Nairobi and I absolutely do not have the strength to ride on a bus for six hours then switch to a taxi to find this woman’s office. Visiting VSO’s counselor would require a night’s stay in Nairobi and because of the high crime rate in Nairobi, I can’t imagine even being in the hectic city.

For the last few days, I’ve just wanted to be behind the gate at home or the gate at TICH. When I step outside those gates, even on a sunny day, I don’t want to see people on the street. Don’t want to look them in the eye. Don’t want them speaking to me. I resent them. They only want to take from me. They won’t help me. I can’t face them.

“What about Dr. Sokwala?” Chris asks.

“That’s perfect,” I say, having forgotten about her. “I’ll talk to her. She won’t let me get away with any bullshit.”

We agree I should take the rest of the week off to talk to Dr. Sokwala and heal. Chris is aware I’m thinking about leaving Kenya, but he wears two hats in his role as program manager for VSO. The first is to take care of me as his volunteer, to make sure I am mentally and emotionally well. His second role is as guardian of the VSO/TICH partnership, which I will put in jeopardy by leaving. But I mustn’t think about these things as I make my decision. Everyone has a personal stake in me staying, or going, so I can’t view things from their perspectives, I must do what comes from my head and heart. Toward this end, I decide not to tell any of my family or friends in the U.S. what has happened, until I make a decision.

It’s only fair that Dan, director of TICH, know where my head is these days so I go to talk with him. He listens while I tell about the robbery and my thoughts of going home, of needing to speak to a professional and take time to heal. He agrees graciously that I should take the next three days off. He keeps shaking his head and saying, “terrible, terrible.”

Wednesday morning, my first day off, I’m not strong enough to go into town. It would require walking or taking a boda boda, and being out among a lot of people and noise and traffic, which I can’t bear right now, so I plan to go the next day. This will be a free day and I’ll stay inside and sew and licks my wounds.

“Sandy!” Mrs. Ruprah sings through the open windows of my house. “Sandy, are you okay?” It always makes me smile to hear my name pronounced as “Sandy.”

“Yes,” I say and open the door.

“I’m going to my friend’s house. You come! It’s not far, we’ll walk and we won’t stay long.” She’s pointing toward the gate, toward the street. I’m scared.

“It’s not far?”

“No,” she says. “Come!”

“We’ll walk?” I ask, unsure.

“Yes, it’s very close.”

She’s so authoritative, I agree to go.

We walk about two city blocks and enter the drive of the house with the huge “B” painted on the front. I’ve seen this house many times and wondered about the people who would paint their initial on their home. Inside, three Kenyans tend to the yard, the gate and the poodles running around. Only Sikhs have pets in Kisumu. No one else can afford to feed pets they’re not going to sell or eat themselves. The poodles have tiny poodle puppies rolling over each other on the green lawn and they make me smile. I walk closely to Mrs. Ruprah as we go to the back of the house. It looks like a hotel with a deep verandah full of cushioned furniture. The kitchen is open to the backyard, too, and two young ladies whom I’ve never met are wearing jeans and t-shirts, with their dark hair in pony tails, as they tend to boiling pots. It’s a lovely surprise to see the elder Sikh priest here. Oh, and the younger priest, Lucky, is here, too. They’re going to read scripture over lunch.

I’m still feeling a bit raw. A bit open. I just want to melt into the background and watch the ladies interact. Mrs. Ruprah, however, immediately tells them about the robbery and they respond with logic rather than compassion. That’s okay. They tell me what I should have done differently. That’s okay, too. Mrs. Ruprah is talking and talking until a lady next to me says Mrs. Ruprah is worried that I will shut myself away in my house and become depressed and will want to go back to the U.S. She is partly right, this very smart, very caring lady.

They serve us sodas and snacks, handmade crackers which are delicious. When I comment on the tasty crackers, an older woman tells me cooking is the first thing a Sikh woman learns for her husband. The older women sit and visit while the younger woman, daugthers and daughters-in-law, serve us.

One young woman has sewn a gorgeous red silk jewelry case with white trim. It’s quite elaborate with a zippered pocket and a tube for holding rings. We admire her handiwork and Mrs. Ruprah wants to duplicate it, so they put the silk case in a zippered bag. It feels strange to sit under this lovely pavilion, with ladies serving us while Kenyans walk about the yard, carrying water, tending to the plants, unloading groceries from a truck. Five families live in this house. On the back wall hangs the usual giant picture of the original Sikh guru.

When it’s time to go, another visitor offers to drive us. Instead of going home, however, we drive to another house that looks like a hotel belonging to the Sokhi’s. Their name is on the gate and the garage. Inside, just beyond the open kitchen (where several ladies are busy cooking chappati), is a huge living room with a wide circular staircase. Three families live here and there are two small children, though the staircase has no hand rails. It’s just suspended pieces of lovely, dark wood steps. The living room is divided into six seating areas. Six! Like a hotel lobby, each seating area contains three couches facing in, a center table and a rug. Down the center of the room, large ceramic pots hold green plants.

Mrs. Sokhi sells fabrics sent by her Mother and sister from India. We look at the fabrics and everyone talks. Mrs. Ruprah tells them about the robbery. They tell me what I should have done differently. I’m starting to feel less sensitive about it, to let things roll off.

We return home and as I enter my house, Mrs. Ruprah says, “Come. Come. Help me make lunch. I’m going to a friend’s later. You come.”

“Okay,” I say and smile. “I’ll come.”

In Mrs. Ruprah’s large kitchen, with Grace washing dishes in a big plastic tub outside the window, she places a metal bowl in front of me. Opening a bag of meal, she tells me how to mix the chappati dough. I sprinkle water and knead. More water, more kneading until the consistecy makes the bones in my right hand work. Mrs. Ruprah is busy cooking rice and heating up stuffed peppers. I’m totally concentrating on mixing the dough, enjoying the process, noticing how content it is to be in the kitchen preparing food. Just like sick days as a little girl and staying home from school with Mama. I watch Mrs. Ruprah prepare the pans for cooking chappati and marvel at her ability to have three dishes going at once. Her goal is to have lunch on the table at 1pm when Mr. Ruprah and Raju arrive home from the workshop. Food is spooned into bowls and I carry them to the table. Grace has set out plates and small bowls for dahl and drinking glasses.

Mr. Ruprah arrives promptly at 1:00pm and sits next to the back door. Raju drives home in his own car and sits at the other end of the table. Food is passed and placed on plates. Chappati is torn to scoop up dahl and mixed vegetables of varying spiceiness. No one talks. By 1:15pm, Mr. Ruprah rises, takes two steps to the sink on the wall and washes his hands and leaves, returning to the workshop. After every meal, I try to clear the dishes, at least to carry them to the back patio where Grace will wash them, but Mama always yells, “no!,” even though she doesn’t speak English. It doesn’t feel right eating their food and not contributing in some way.

That afternoon, we visit Sikh friends who live only two blocks away. Nonni is very pretty and seems much younger than her husband. She came from India 14 years ago to marry in Kisumu. Their house is large, the living room immense with shelves containing wooden African sculptures, elephant figurines and photos of their children. Each chair and sofa section is covered by an embroidered doily, as are the chair arms. Very neat. Our hostess makes tea and brings in homemade crackers. She serves each of us one at a time, passing over the cup and saucer and offering up the crackers. They exhange cake recipes and talk in Punjabi. I enjoy the tea and crackers and imagine what life trapped inside this house would feel like. Not a good sensation.
It is often hard to watch the Sikh women in their daily roles. Their schedule is set around their husband’s work schedule. Rarely do the women work outside the home. They keep house, entertain guests, cook food, work on handicrafts and attend temple, where they cook for the entire group in the temple’s kitchen.

I went to temple with Mrs. Ruprah a few weeks ago. The building is square, taking up a city block. Mr. Ruprah’s father was one of seven men who laid the first stone during constrution of the temple, so his name is on a plaque as we enter. A flight of stairs leads to the temple itself. I must keep my head covered inside the sacred room. Mrs. Ruprah has loaned me a black and brown scarf for this purpose. At the top of the stairs, we stop at two sinks to wash our hands before entering the shrine. The elder priest sits in an altar setting, surrounded by candles and artificial floral arrangements, singing the prayers from the sacred book. The floor is covered in a soft matting, so we remove our shoes and walk to the preist, where Mrs. Ruprah signals for me to kneel, touching my forehead to the floor and placing 20 shillings in the offering plate. I follow and mimic her. She moves to the back of the room, against the wall, and sits with several women. They whisper for a few minutes while I check out the room. There are only perhaps five women at the back. No men. Suddenly, she says, “Let’s go,” and we rise and leave the room, replacing our shoes and washing our hands again, for we’re now going to the kitchen to help prepare chappati.

There are several workstationsin the temple’s kitchen. One group mixes the dough and smooths them into balls. The second group rolls the balls out into perfectly round and flat chappatis. The raw dough is then transferred to a large metal griddle where a gas fire is burning. Two Kenyan men stand next to the griddle, flipping the chappati and removing them. The final station is another large gas fire with an open grill on top. Ladies sitting in chairs place the chappati over open flames, until their slightly browned, then they take a pound square of butter in their fist and run it over each surface of the chappti. The round bread then goes into a large metal container lined with cotton cloth. There are hundreds of chappatis being made through this process.

Mrs. Ruprah and I first visit the rolling table, but it’s clear I can’t roll out a perfectly shaped chappati, and no one is laughing with me at my failed attempts, so I’m moved to stand between the rolling table and the griddle, picking up raw chappatis, flipping them between palms as I swivel to plop them on to the black, hot griddle surface. That’s all, just flip, swivel and plop the bread into an open space without overlapping chappati and without have them fold on themselves. With six women churning out rolled chappatis, I had a time keeping them moving onto the griddle surface. I dropped one once and got looks of disapproval when I giggled. Even the black men were serious about their duties and they didn’t smile or laugh. The food was excellent and plentiful, but it wasn’t a joyful place to be.

Many of the ladies bring a large, empty containers to temple, which they fill with dahl and vegetables, etc., to take home and feed their families for two or three days. Mrs. Ruprah always brings food home for lunch the next day.

Some of the ladies drive, but most are dependent on others to take them places. Their primary concern each day is feeding their husbands and children. Very few seek higher education or build careers. These women often do not fulfill any of their talents, skills or interests. Society is much the poorer from this lack of self-actualization. Expanding our view to include other cultures where women are not able to venture beyond their roles as wives and mothers and we see a large percentage of women the world over who could be contributing to research, business, medicine, the arts and many other areas of knowledge. But they don’t. Aren’t able to. In the U.S. in the 50s, it was called the feminine mystique, this strange ailment from which women suffered, this urge and desire to do more with themselves. They felt trapped and miserable, useless and depressed, and didn’t understand why. This is the life of a Sikh Indian woman in Kenya today. And the life of women in countries the world over.

Mrs. Ruprah cries often. She recently sat next to me on her couch as I ate the lunch she prepared. She was crocheting a black scarf for her daughter in London and she said, “I’ll make one for you. What color do you like?”

“You don’t have to do that,” I say. “I know how much work it is to make one of those. But I really like white!” I smile and she laughs.

“Would you really make one for me?,” I ask, still not believing how generous she is.
She says, “You are like my daughter,” and her eyes tear up and soon her whole face is red and wet.

“Ah,” I say and touch her shoulder. She puts the scarf and crochet hook in front of her face and cries. Then she removes my hand and says, “Eat! Eat!” She uses the ball of her hands to dry the tears. Every time I’ve seen her cry, she puts both hands to her face and strokes downward from her red eyes. It tugs at my heart.

Mrs. Ruprah is lonely.