teaonthestairs (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
teaonthestairs) wrote2007-07-30 08:09 pm
teaonthestairs) wrote2007-07-30 08:09 pm
Entry tags:
After Kenya (or how Rosie is NOT dealing 15 months on)
After Kenya (or how Rosie is NOT dealing 15 months on)
It's been fifteen months since I left Mombasa, Kenya, in body at least - I confess, I walked through Mombasa airport with a sigh of relief, because I was leaving and I was tired and sick and more then a little heartbroken, I never really felt any kind of passion for Africa - it was never somewhere I talked about going, in fact I told myself I wouldn't go at all - I just wasn't interested. Not like Asia, not like Europe and Russia and the Americas. I've always known I would travel through Asia - I would experience India, and eat my way through Vietnam, and sun bake in Thailand. Europe was always on the map - how could I not want to explore the Greek islands and dance my way through Spain and write bad poetry in the UK? Africa was never a dream - I didn't want to go on a safari, I was not interested in the food and the sheer size and need of it scared me, I never thought of volunteering there until I accidentally did.
Don't ask me why, or when I decided it was Kenya I was going to go to - I don't know. I joke that it was exams that did it to me - never book a holiday when you are studying for exams right? Or maybe it was because the travel agent priced a trip to Kenya for me as an example, and I held onto that as something to hold on to. I don't know...
But somehow I ended up there, flying into Mombasa airport at 2 in the afternoon and getting knocked over by the humidity, the poverty and the homesickness. I didn't function at any kind of level for days - and it was a week before I could eat, two weeks before I really unpacked my bag and four before I stop counting the days left to go. I nearly left early - I nearly didn't stay at all - my dad told me I wasn't allowed to shorten my trip for a week, 'get over the jet lag, see how you feel later, we love you, we miss you.' I cried, in a stinking back room of a dodgy Internet cafe that smelled like shit, literally, and said I would wait.
and because I did I had the best time I have ever had - it wasn't perfect, it was fantastic and breathtaking and unbelievable, but also it was horrifying, and crap and awful. I would never take it back - but maybe, just maybe I would change things.
But that’s not the reason I'm writing this, well it is, but I'm not talking about then - I'm talking about now. Because it's the aftermath that’s been the hardest to deal with - because it's been fifteen MONTHS and I'm still an emotional wreak over it – from my own guilt, from my anger with i-to-i. They say Africa gets into your blood - you can't just GO - because it eats you whole and spits you out and stays with you forever, that’s true - but it also takes your breathe and won't give it back - or it did to me.
I still dream of my kids, the BeeHive kids, and they aren't nice dreams, they're dreams that make me hurt - they start horrible and end worse and I wake up feeling like I have failed them, this awesome kids who took my heart, and maybe I have - I don't know where they are now - we think Unicef took them out of BeeHive, some of them anyway but I can't get any information about that, at all. I know that one of the teachers took the older boys out of there - but no one can get in contact with him. I left it so long to DO something about it, get the information, and see if the kids were all right, hoping the one of the other volunteers would because I was scared - and now it's too late.
I have so much anger, and so must fear and love and bitterness in me because of Mombasa, and I don't know if I'm ever going to let it go.
Most of my emotional fuckupage is about i-to-i. The company I traveled with that screwed me over, that made me scared and wary to volunteer again, who promised us SO much but, in the end, gave us nothing. My bitter anger at i-to-i comes up in a the weirdest movements - it's not just me either, Tricia and I had a breakdown when traveling in India about it, Carley and me talk, rage, about it every time we see each other
it come up tonight...
I was ' watching' getaway, it was an African special and I was doing some channel surfing when I came into a middle of a segment about Volunteering in Africa - they were doing a special about working with children in orphanages - the orphanage they showed was clean, it was brightly painted with a heap of new toys, the kids had proper clothes and shoes, they had a bed each and FOOD and WATER whenever they wanted - they got to go to a proper school, the house they stayed had working bathrooms and electricity, it looked like a perfect place to volunteer, it looked like what you would expect if you paid a company to place you in an orphanage to volunteer, I was envious at the volunteers opportunity - and then I found out the volunteers where from i-to-i. I felt sick, I felt like screaming and crying and I felt rage - because that was meant to be me! I was meant to be in a place that was actually beneficial to the children - where they had a CHANCE, where they weren't abused, where they had food and clothes and healthcare!
I loved BeeHive - I love the kids there, I'm not saying I didn't want to be there, with them, because I wouldn't change that for anything but I shouldn't have been there. i-to-i screwed the Mombasa volunteers, they sent us to places that weren't registered with the government, that had basically kidnapped the children off the street - who couldn't afford to run, who were corrupt and abusive and shouldn't of been there.
I PAID i-to-i money I worked 5 years to earn, I paid them on the expectations that there were going to place me in a orphanage so that I could help responsibly, that would give me an experience but not put me in daily danger, that would be an actually proper place - run FOR the children, helped the children live a better life. I'm not saying Beehive didn't need me, or didn't deserve the help it got - but BeeHive was just a guy’s house, and this guy had GRAND dreams but no resources. Mr Paul was trying to do the right thing, but he wasn't doing it at all - without Mr Paul and BeeHive I dread to think were my kids would have been - but BeeHive was not a place for i-to-i volunteers, it didn't need a couple of 18 year olds, a big headed American guy and a Irish firewoman, it needed Unicef to come and take the kids away - it had no running water, it had no electricity and no security, it had no records, there was no healthcare available for the kids, there was no proper school, no school books, no chairs and tables, no pens, most days there was not enough food, some weeks they did with very little water, there was no working toilet - there was one bathroom for over 30 kids, there was one bedroom, no beds, no blankets. They had very little clothes, not everyone had shoes.
Placing volunteers at BeeHive is just a stopgap - Beehive should not have been open, it should have been closed down and the kids placed somewhere that could afford them, it was an illegal operation and the volunteers could have been ARRESTED for being there – BeeHive had been told to shut down by the government – it did not have the resources to be open, or the paperwork – it was a health risk to the children and it was ILLEGAL. WHY were volunteers placed there?!
i-to-i offered us all these great things, they made there package sound like a something worth doing, it sounded professional and experienced - it sounded safe. They show you places like they did on getaway but you get there and it's just steam - because they can't be bothered following up your promises - they have your money, they don't care about anything else. The Mombasa branch was a crock of shit - the in-country leaders were ignorant, idiot, selfish, pigheaded horrible arseholes - they did the bare minimum to get by - they didn't research the places they put volunteers, they didn't think about the impact those volunteers would make. At one school 3 teachers were fired because the volunteers were doing there jobs - for free, that’s NOT responsible volunteering. One volunteer spent 3 weeks without a placement, another moved out of her homestay and paid for a hotel for 4 weeks because the father at the homestay kept coming into her room WHILE SHE SLEPT. The in country leaders ignored this.
I didn’t want to be put somewhere that didn’t need me, I wanted to be somewhere were I could make an impact responsibly. I trusted i-to-I, I trusted them and they spat in my face.
There were some awesome orphanages in Mombasa, places that could have used volunteers, that were government registered, we discovered them and we were strangers in a foreign country. I want more then anything to go back, one day I will, I want to volunteer again - but I'm scared. I'm also NOT dealing with the Kenya situation - 15 months on, and I don't know if I ever will.
I'm tired, and angry, and (once again) teary eyed. I have a written guide to volunteering I'm going to post soon. But not tonight - tonight I'm angry and upset and feeling useless.
It's been fifteen months since I left Mombasa, Kenya, in body at least - I confess, I walked through Mombasa airport with a sigh of relief, because I was leaving and I was tired and sick and more then a little heartbroken, I never really felt any kind of passion for Africa - it was never somewhere I talked about going, in fact I told myself I wouldn't go at all - I just wasn't interested. Not like Asia, not like Europe and Russia and the Americas. I've always known I would travel through Asia - I would experience India, and eat my way through Vietnam, and sun bake in Thailand. Europe was always on the map - how could I not want to explore the Greek islands and dance my way through Spain and write bad poetry in the UK? Africa was never a dream - I didn't want to go on a safari, I was not interested in the food and the sheer size and need of it scared me, I never thought of volunteering there until I accidentally did.
Don't ask me why, or when I decided it was Kenya I was going to go to - I don't know. I joke that it was exams that did it to me - never book a holiday when you are studying for exams right? Or maybe it was because the travel agent priced a trip to Kenya for me as an example, and I held onto that as something to hold on to. I don't know...
But somehow I ended up there, flying into Mombasa airport at 2 in the afternoon and getting knocked over by the humidity, the poverty and the homesickness. I didn't function at any kind of level for days - and it was a week before I could eat, two weeks before I really unpacked my bag and four before I stop counting the days left to go. I nearly left early - I nearly didn't stay at all - my dad told me I wasn't allowed to shorten my trip for a week, 'get over the jet lag, see how you feel later, we love you, we miss you.' I cried, in a stinking back room of a dodgy Internet cafe that smelled like shit, literally, and said I would wait.
and because I did I had the best time I have ever had - it wasn't perfect, it was fantastic and breathtaking and unbelievable, but also it was horrifying, and crap and awful. I would never take it back - but maybe, just maybe I would change things.
But that’s not the reason I'm writing this, well it is, but I'm not talking about then - I'm talking about now. Because it's the aftermath that’s been the hardest to deal with - because it's been fifteen MONTHS and I'm still an emotional wreak over it – from my own guilt, from my anger with i-to-i. They say Africa gets into your blood - you can't just GO - because it eats you whole and spits you out and stays with you forever, that’s true - but it also takes your breathe and won't give it back - or it did to me.
I still dream of my kids, the BeeHive kids, and they aren't nice dreams, they're dreams that make me hurt - they start horrible and end worse and I wake up feeling like I have failed them, this awesome kids who took my heart, and maybe I have - I don't know where they are now - we think Unicef took them out of BeeHive, some of them anyway but I can't get any information about that, at all. I know that one of the teachers took the older boys out of there - but no one can get in contact with him. I left it so long to DO something about it, get the information, and see if the kids were all right, hoping the one of the other volunteers would because I was scared - and now it's too late.
I have so much anger, and so must fear and love and bitterness in me because of Mombasa, and I don't know if I'm ever going to let it go.
Most of my emotional fuckupage is about i-to-i. The company I traveled with that screwed me over, that made me scared and wary to volunteer again, who promised us SO much but, in the end, gave us nothing. My bitter anger at i-to-i comes up in a the weirdest movements - it's not just me either, Tricia and I had a breakdown when traveling in India about it, Carley and me talk, rage, about it every time we see each other
it come up tonight...
I was ' watching' getaway, it was an African special and I was doing some channel surfing when I came into a middle of a segment about Volunteering in Africa - they were doing a special about working with children in orphanages - the orphanage they showed was clean, it was brightly painted with a heap of new toys, the kids had proper clothes and shoes, they had a bed each and FOOD and WATER whenever they wanted - they got to go to a proper school, the house they stayed had working bathrooms and electricity, it looked like a perfect place to volunteer, it looked like what you would expect if you paid a company to place you in an orphanage to volunteer, I was envious at the volunteers opportunity - and then I found out the volunteers where from i-to-i. I felt sick, I felt like screaming and crying and I felt rage - because that was meant to be me! I was meant to be in a place that was actually beneficial to the children - where they had a CHANCE, where they weren't abused, where they had food and clothes and healthcare!
I loved BeeHive - I love the kids there, I'm not saying I didn't want to be there, with them, because I wouldn't change that for anything but I shouldn't have been there. i-to-i screwed the Mombasa volunteers, they sent us to places that weren't registered with the government, that had basically kidnapped the children off the street - who couldn't afford to run, who were corrupt and abusive and shouldn't of been there.
I PAID i-to-i money I worked 5 years to earn, I paid them on the expectations that there were going to place me in a orphanage so that I could help responsibly, that would give me an experience but not put me in daily danger, that would be an actually proper place - run FOR the children, helped the children live a better life. I'm not saying Beehive didn't need me, or didn't deserve the help it got - but BeeHive was just a guy’s house, and this guy had GRAND dreams but no resources. Mr Paul was trying to do the right thing, but he wasn't doing it at all - without Mr Paul and BeeHive I dread to think were my kids would have been - but BeeHive was not a place for i-to-i volunteers, it didn't need a couple of 18 year olds, a big headed American guy and a Irish firewoman, it needed Unicef to come and take the kids away - it had no running water, it had no electricity and no security, it had no records, there was no healthcare available for the kids, there was no proper school, no school books, no chairs and tables, no pens, most days there was not enough food, some weeks they did with very little water, there was no working toilet - there was one bathroom for over 30 kids, there was one bedroom, no beds, no blankets. They had very little clothes, not everyone had shoes.
Placing volunteers at BeeHive is just a stopgap - Beehive should not have been open, it should have been closed down and the kids placed somewhere that could afford them, it was an illegal operation and the volunteers could have been ARRESTED for being there – BeeHive had been told to shut down by the government – it did not have the resources to be open, or the paperwork – it was a health risk to the children and it was ILLEGAL. WHY were volunteers placed there?!
i-to-i offered us all these great things, they made there package sound like a something worth doing, it sounded professional and experienced - it sounded safe. They show you places like they did on getaway but you get there and it's just steam - because they can't be bothered following up your promises - they have your money, they don't care about anything else. The Mombasa branch was a crock of shit - the in-country leaders were ignorant, idiot, selfish, pigheaded horrible arseholes - they did the bare minimum to get by - they didn't research the places they put volunteers, they didn't think about the impact those volunteers would make. At one school 3 teachers were fired because the volunteers were doing there jobs - for free, that’s NOT responsible volunteering. One volunteer spent 3 weeks without a placement, another moved out of her homestay and paid for a hotel for 4 weeks because the father at the homestay kept coming into her room WHILE SHE SLEPT. The in country leaders ignored this.
I didn’t want to be put somewhere that didn’t need me, I wanted to be somewhere were I could make an impact responsibly. I trusted i-to-I, I trusted them and they spat in my face.
There were some awesome orphanages in Mombasa, places that could have used volunteers, that were government registered, we discovered them and we were strangers in a foreign country. I want more then anything to go back, one day I will, I want to volunteer again - but I'm scared. I'm also NOT dealing with the Kenya situation - 15 months on, and I don't know if I ever will.
I'm tired, and angry, and (once again) teary eyed. I have a written guide to volunteering I'm going to post soon. But not tonight - tonight I'm angry and upset and feeling useless.