Humor Along the Way

Here are just a few of the interesting things people have said during our time in East Africa:

A young child gently holding and caressing my hand with his little fingers, looked back at his mom and curiously asked, “But what is wrong with her? Is she really white all over or are there some parts of her that are black?”

On our arrival at John’s house in Kenya, “Ah, my good, good family friends! Welcome home to Kitale. where Jesus lives!” – John Wanyonyi

In response to moments of silence during an early morning training session, John Omondi said, “You see in the morning we are not very much bright!”

Noting the very commonplace occurrence of the electricity going out, Mary said, “We have no idea why it goes off or why it even comes back on. We only just know that it does.”

Trying to understand African culture and our increasing awareness of the Kenyans’ acute desire to say what they think we want to hear, John informed us, “Well, there’s the Pentecostal truth and then there’s the truth. Pentecostal truth, for example, is that there were 1,000 people at the crusade. Real truth is that there were 100 people there.”

We were sitting around with a few American missionary friends we continue to cross paths with here in East Africa visit after visit. One young man was telling us about his upcoming wedding back in the States and details of his courtship and plans for the future to continue to teach in an orphanage in Kenya with his new bride. Desperately trying to be a part of the excitement of the conversation and the “20 questions” we girls were bombarding the poor groom with, one middle aged man abruptly interrupted us all and asked, “So, what color are the bridesmaids?” Not realizing what he had asked when we all laughed hysterically, he kept saying, “But I thought that was the right question to ask about a wedding…what color are the bridesmaids …. Oh, uh, duh….I meant the bridesmaids’ dresses!” (the bride and the groom are both white, by the way!)

Omdoni, “OK, you see we cannot live in extremes. For example, in our place in Kenya it cost very much money for a lady to have her hair done, perhaps even 1,000ksh. This is very expensive, but she must have it done. One day we were at the church and they said this lady has come with a demon because the person who has fixed her hair put a demon inside her. You know they even wanted to shave that lady’s hair off. They pushed her down and were doing whatever to her head wanting to shave it all off. I told them to just call the demon out. You know the man wanting to cut off her hair was not even married and he doesn’t know the cost of that hair. It was very simple and now the demon has left her and the hair is ok.”

Wondo, “I want to say thank you to our interpreter, as he has been photocopying Roger.”

John waited patiently, intently reading, as every Kenyan male religiously does, the Daily Nation (the national newspaper). When I slid into the car, he announced, “Ah, Mama Brooks, I see now you have become almost half Kenyan. You are greeting someone and taking time and now you are not worried to be on American time. You are just now very comfortable with our African time, so I believe you must be adjusting in your body so that now you are half African and half American.” I told him it was true, that now I just relax and take the day as it comes. If I meet someone I know, I just stop and know that we will exchange information regarding children, husbands and work. The challenge is that now when I go back to America, I find I am late for everything. Relaying this to John, he explicitly told me to tell you, dear friends, that you must “just have some grace for this person who has been so traumatized living here in Africa!” So, there ya go, grace, please, both Africans and Americans for this poor schizoid traveler!