Guest Post from Laquita

Patience…I don’t know which one of you is praying for patience for me,
but I kindly ask you to stop as God keeps giving me ample
opportunities to grow in this area. :) I’m only joking…well, half
joking at least, but both Jess and I agree we have room for growth in
patience as we face the laid-back culture here and of course, the
Internet.

Speaking of the Internet, Jess and I would like to officially declare
the lack of Internet access to be the reason for Africa’s ignorance in
some matters. We both rely so much on the Internet to discover new
information and stay up on world matters. Its speed has now limited
us both to only using it for email and having to pull from our
knowledge alone on certain matters. It’s hard to compile lesson plans
here like I do in the US since I am somewhat limited to the books
around me and the know how I already possess. If the poor here could
google things as easily as the poor in America can, we are convinced
things would be much different here (maybe not in the way we are
thinking, but things would be bound to be different in some way).

Thank you Texas! You have thoroughly engrained it in my head that
Littering is unlAWFUL!!! Jess and I always hold onto our trash no
matter how small it may be, but everyone else just throws it out the
window or to his/her side, no matter where he/she are. In fact, today
was the first day I’ve ever even seen a trash can out in public!
Although, I must admit that some of my trash has ended up helping to
fill the streets of Nairobi. The Kenyans here like to take my trash
from me and chunk it out since they know I will hold onto it until I
can throw it away properly in my trashcan at MITS. I guess it all
ends up in piles getting burned anyway since that’s all they do with
my collected trash at MITS, but I just can’t make myself drop even a
small wrapper.

This week I discovered that there is no differentiation between love
and like in Swahili. They are both represented by the word penda.
This is VERY weird to me since it would sound as if I had the same
appreciation for sweet peas that I do for God. I also feel as though
it could be very confusing if you are in a dating relationship; you’d
never know when you were getting more serious because the guy would
still like/love you. Oh well! I’m not up for rewriting Swahili, so
it’ll do for me! People can just decide for themselves what they
think I mean…