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The majority of last week was spent taking field trips around the area to exemplify the unequal land and wealth distribution in the country. Yesterday we went to visit the industrial district, a slum in Eastlands, the UN, and the neighborhood where the UN workers live. The slum was huge and garbage took up the majority of the space, the smell was horrible. The river running on the edge of the slum was so polluted it glowed, then we drove down the street to find the beautiful two story homes of the UN workers. The contrast was unbelievable. On Wednesday we took a trip to Thika where Del Monte has a 50,000 acre pineapple plantation....pineapple fields as far as the eye can see. It was amazing to see how just a few people could own so much land while other common Kenyans are fighting and dying just for a small plot. After we arrived at Del Monte and they found out we were American students we were not allowed to go in. These big companies are very secretive and I think they thought we'd go back and tattle on them if we saw some "improper" business practices. Our professor told us that often the workers are bleeding in the fields because they are not given the proper clothing or equipment to pick the pineapples. It seemed like a pretty sketchy operation, but the pineapple I bought was delicious. All along the road from Nairobi to Thika there are people selling carts of pineapples that didn't make the cut and were rejected for some reason from further processing. Of course Del Monte discourages buying from these people because they want you to buy theirs. so there were signs up everywhere urging people not to buy from the pineapple sellers on the street because they could be dangerous thiefs and robbers. It was pretty amusing! The next day we visited the ministry of health and talked with the chief public health officer to see what was being done to address the public health issues in Kenya. From what it sounds like there are a lot of good plans, but nothing is being done.
Next Wednesday I will be leaving for my internship. I will be working in a mission hospital in Meru on the Eastern side of Mt. Kenya. It is about a two hour drive from Nairobi. I will be staying with a new family there. The dad is an accountant, the mom is a secretary for an NGO, and three kids. The two girls are 15 and 6 years old, and the boy is 11. Internet access will be quite limited from what I have heard since it is in rural Kenya, so I probably will not be blogging as much or be able to reply to emails as quickly, but I will try to get to a computer every once in awhile if there is one available within a reasonable distance.
While in Meru I plan to climb Mt. Kenya during the first week of April with a couple of people who have their internships in the Mt. Kenya area as well. I will return to Nairobi at the end of April for final exams and term papers. The program is officially over on May 3rd, but I will most likely be staying an extra 3 weeks and returning to the states on May 23rd.
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