Chapter Three
Do not go to an African country anytime near a political election. Kenya had a presidential election in August of 2017 and I spent September and October there. I should have been fine, right? Wrong! Due to voter irregularities a re-vote was scheduled for October.
Politics in Africa are extremely volatile. People do not just protest, they hold rallies where they burn the street and throw tear gas. I didn’t think the re-vote would affect my time in Kenya. I was not going to go to any big cities or go to protests. Unfortunately, you do not always have a choice when it comes to these things. Especially when you are living off the grid without a SIM card and haven’t checked the news lately.
Volunteering on Mfangano Island
I’m getting ahead of myself though, the story starts on Mfangano island in Lake Victoria. After my hostel gig in Mombasa, I went inland to volunteer at an orphanage. Workaway is a marvelous platform and it has a search feature that allows you to filter out hosts that charge a fee. I did just that and still had many options for volunteering.
It is a myth that you can only volunteer in Africa if you pay/raise thousands of dollars. Workaway charges about 40 euros for a year long membership and then you can choose from hosts all around the world that usually offer food and lodging in exchange for 5 hours of work a day.
I reached my host on an extremely remote island with no wifi, store, or ATM. To my surprise my host had tricked me and was now requiring me to pay them a daily fee. I turned down other volunteering options with no fee and there wasn’t an ATM on the island in order to pay them.
Despite leaving after four days due to this bait and hook scheme, the children were amazing. They were so curious and would count my tattoos and ask the name of anything they saw on me. I put on some music and at first they watched and giggled as I danced. Soon enough they were feeling brave and showed me their moves. I still to this day feel disappointed that my physical labor was not enough for my host and that I had to leave those little angels.
A Dangerous Situation
I had planned to stay for a month on this island so I suddenly had to wing it in Africa. I looked on a map and decided to go to Kisumu. I chose this city only because it was in the direction of Uganda which was my next destination. I took a three hour matatu in which I became very car sick. As we neared Kisumu I noticed more police checkpoints and there were a few times we had to drive into the other lane because patches of the road were on fire. We were near the center of the city when the driver told me the road was blocked and I would have to get out where we were.
I stumbled out, nauseous, and sat down against the side of a building as I tried to settle my stomach. I was so overwhelmed by my motion sickness that I failed to realize how chaotic my surroundings were. A man approached me and warned me that it was not safe to sit there. I groaned about being sick. He told me I could sit on some benches outside of a gas station as I recovered.
Shortly after reaching the benches a bomb whizzed through the air and smoke erupted. I had no idea what was happening but followed as I was told to hide behind a partition in the autobody repair area. As the smoke reached us my eyes began to burn, my skin felt irritated and my lungs were on fire.
The owner of the gas station told me to come inside. He gave me a seat and we all washed our faces in a bucket of water. Later his wife gave me a bag of milk. I am so grateful for the workers of this gas station for looking after me for three and a half hours as we hid from tear gas bombs.
Not everyone was as sensible as the people that took me in. We were taking cover and trying to avoid the tear gas but there were people that intentionally came to that street to experience this havoc. They screamed, cheered, beat the ground with sticks and antagonized the opposition. Then the crowd would suddenly sprint down the street as a bomb was launched at them. They would cough, tears ran from their eyes and they jumped and hooted as their adrenaline pumped. A tear gas bomb was thrown right to the gas station window and seeped through the cracks leaving us all gagging inside. How could some people enjoy this?
The scariest part was when the street suddenly cleared. All of the cheering antagonizers were gone. A black jeep with tinted windows slowly drove down the street. A muscular man with a gun walked beside the van. The man in the passenger seat handed him a bomb and he loaded his gun. He looked around, his eyes passed the gas station where we were hidden and not seeing anyone, he moved on. A few minutes later a line of police hidden behind shields walked up the street, followed by a police tank.
The gas station owner was so worried about me that he tried to get a police escort to take me to my guest house. Clearly, the police were busy, so I had to figure it out on my own. I’d usually take a motorbike, walk, or take a matatu because they are cheaper but was advised to take a tuk-tuk. A tuk-tuk is a three wheeled motorized vehicle with open sides. The driver pulled down the leather flap over the door in order to partially hide me.
Although the rally was political in nature, at this point everyone was high off of adrenaline and people were afraid of how they might react if they saw a white girl. We had to carefully navigate through the streets. They were still partially on fire and occasionally there were boulders blocking the road.
I made it to my guest house, stayed inside for two days and considered leaving Africa. In the end I didn’t want a continent to defeat me so I decided to stay. However, my time in Kenya was over. There were still 20 days until the election and the rallies were only going to get worse.
I later found out that Kisumu is the home to the Luo tribe which the opposition, Raila Odinga, is a member of. The re-vote was happening after Odinga was defeated by Kenyatta in the original election. Undoubtedly, this area would have more tension than most. Also, they announced beforehand that every Friday and Monday until the election there would be political rallies. During the rally on the following Friday police shot and killed two protesters.
Advice
I’m not saying Kisumu is a bad place. But you certainly don’t want to be there around election time. Despite the negative things I have mention in this passage, I did have some nice times while in Kenya, especially Mombasa. Kenya was my first stop in Africa and I think a lot of my misfortune is due to cultural shock. I have a thing called “three month theory” and it states that you need three months to fully adjust to a place. As it turns out, at my three month point in Africa (Malawi), I was having an amazing time and couldn’t picture ever leaving.
You should definitely travel to Kenya but I strongly urge you not to go immediately before or after an election. Honestly, give it a wide window. Plane tickets are expensive to reschedule and you never know if the election will need a re-vote, or if mass murder will ensue (election 2007). Moral to the story: go to Kenya, possibly stick to the coast, get a SIM card and check the news, avoid an election year, and don’t be afraid to wing it if your volunteering gig isn’t what you expected.
Chronicles of a Wandering Soul 