HIV/AIDS Clinic

Yesterday, we started our HIV/AIDS training.  There are still a lot of stuff I need to learn so I can start using the right vocabulary or be able to explain better, but I wanted to post these pictures that I took while we visited an HIV/AIDS Clinic in a hospital across the street from our training center at the Tea Tot Hotel.

A lot of hospital care in Kenya is free or cost little.  However, there is always this problem where people live far, not afford to travel to a hospital, or have to work on whatever they do to feed their families that many either come initially then stopped coming or not come at all.

The hospital from outside seemed like a modern facility with several stories tall and several buildings, but when we came in, they all still look "Kenyan style" with dirt roads, concrete floors, and old falling apart stuff.

Waiting Room (outside with roof)

KSL Terp Monica explaining stuff in their records room -- lot of manual work with no computers.  Files of those that are deceased or defaulted (stopped coming in for treatment) are moved to the other room behind the windowed wall.

Seems that they focus on checking for and treating those HIV/AIDS that may or already got TB.  It seems that because the HIV/AIDS have much lower immunity, so they get TB easily and often. The Chest Clinic focuses on TB with exams and xrays.

Click on picture to enlarge to see better.  See that all counseling and services are free.

HIV/AIDS Pharmacy.  They screen patients to determine if they are reliable with their visits and medication, they would supply medication for 30 or 60 days between refills.  If they find some patients not reliable, they require them to  refill every 2 weeks. They cannot afford seeing scarce medication go to waste.

Patient Counseling and Examination room.  The bed behind Monica is a Gyn bed with leg stirrups.  I am not used to seeing such private space be so public -- windows are open and people can look in from outside.

Nutritionist.

Doctor Office in a tent outside.

Click on picture to enlarge.  You can see a "menu" of services with their prices.  Also see the "wait times".  I was told this is full of crock.  Oh well.

My First Final Exams!

No the exams are not for me.  I developed two Term III final exams for Form I (Freshmen) and Form II (Sophomore) Chemistry.  My Deaf Ed coordinator in our Pre-Service Training (PST) informed Davin and me that we would develop final exams, give them out, and grade them. Davin and I are the only ones in our group that teaches in the secondary education while the rest of my group teach Primary education.

So, last Thursday I was given Form I and II Chemistry text books (very thin and they contain the curriculum for the whole year), a note from a teacher indicating what page to start from, and what page to end to, sample exam used previously, and two student exercise books (which are pretty much about to crumble).

So my journey toward the examination are eye-opening but yet not that surprising.  Its more of "seeing it for myself" than "believing what others say" kind of enlightenment.

There were only like 15 to 20 pages in both Form I and II that they are to be tested -- the material that were supposed to be covered for the entire Term III (two months or so).  So, thinking, with such a little amount of material to study, the questions and their answers should be simple and straightforward.  

So I developed questions that are straight from the text books, and some questions are simple.  I did realize its hard to test if I was not the one who taught the context.  

My Form I and II Chemistry exams.  Both are two pages (front/back), Form I had 10 questions while Form II had 12 questions.  Some questions have maybe 1 to 3 parts (like A, B, and C).

I was also told to come to Machakos Secondary School for the Deaf at 10am yesterday (Saturday).  I was a little perplexed that the class have to meet on a Saturday and do my exam.  But later I learned that  there are other teachers who made them take their exams yesterday as well so that the teachers can do other plans on Monday.  Furthermore I learned that my exam was "practice exam" and that the scores do not count.  So I am double-perplexed for them to make the students take two exams, especially when mine was on a Saturday when they could be playing football (soccer) and volleyball.  Oh well.

Anyway, I came to the school at 9:45am promptly and chatted with the students for a while.  But by 10am all students went to their classrooms to wait for their teachers politely.  I went to the teachers' staff room and waited there until 10:45am.  I have heard often that teachers are not prompt and are often late,  but not "late according to our standards" but "late according to Kenya's standards".  So I experienced it first hand.

Finally she came, and simply allowed me to enter the classroom and start doing my thing.  Its quite an experience to see how classroom culture here is different than what you see in America.  All students are very respectful.  They were very serious and focused on their exam.

Form I (Freshmen) taking my Chemistry Term III Final Exam

They look focused and serious about the exam eh?

Later on, in a different classroom, I gave out Form II exams to these students.

Form II (Sophmore) taking my Chemistry exam as well.  

After they were done, I chatted with them some more, and I learned some things that made me feel bad about the exams I developed.  First, they do not even have the textbooks.  They said for Chemistry, they have only one or two, and sometimes they are shared by the class, or not.  So, some questions I used for the exam was from the textbook, so there are several questions where they simply haven't clue how to answer because they never saw them.  Secondly, in their exercise books, they pretty much copied the text from the textbook that their teacher wrote on the blackboard.  Of course the teacher would not write the whole textbook, so they missed out so much knowledge and examples that exist in a textbook.  So, had I known that, I would have tested them using their student exercise books so I know exactly what they were taught, but then, how would I know they understood them when they were simply copying text into their books.

Second eye-opener -- as you see in the picture below, Kenya has a different grade scale.  If you get only 75% correct, you receive an A.  In America, you have to have something like 90% to get the same grade letter.  Furthermore, if you only get the entire exam half right (50%), you earn a C while in America, you simply would have failed.

So, comparing grades between American and Kenyan children is like comparing Apples and Oranges.  Also if a student actually aced an exam with something like 90%, the kid would not be noticed as s/he would be grouped with others that earned A by getting their exams at least 75% correct.

Kenyan's Grade Scale -- notice that earning at least 75% gets you the best letter grade A while earning only half correct (50%) gets you a C.  This is not just for the deaf schools, but all schools in Kenya.  So, we cannot compare grade scores with American kids, since they have to earn at least 90% not 75% to get an A.

So, for Form I class, only one kid got 81% while everyone else fell below 75%.  One interesting observation I had for Form I was that the girls in the class performed better.  Five girls were in the top six.  I was under the impression that girls in Kenya tend to perform poorly when compared to boys due to their culture and responsibilities (with their families, not at school which tend to treat both sexes equally).  But then, this is only one exam with one class and of course cannot be generalized across other classes and across schools in Kenya.

Form I Exam results. Column from left to right: Number students, earned marks out of max marks, percent, letter grade, number of girls in that group, at bottom on left shows class average, and bottom on right shows average for girls, and average for boys.

I believe if I had an opportunity to do an experiment -- where I would do the SAME exam on SAME class, but I sign the questions (not give answers of course) in KSL, they would have scored better.  I also am confident that if I (not being egomaniac here, but any fluent KSL teacher with positive attitude) taught the class myself on this same context, I think I can bet my Harley that they would have scored much better.  

More on this stuff later when I am situated in my own school site for the next two years.  I look forward to start teaching.  I will be moving into my new (old) home on or around December 15th, but the first school term of 2013 starts sometime in January 2013. 

Hakuna Matata!

VISA? Nah Go M-PESA!

Everywhere I go, mostly in small to medium sized towns and villages, you will notice the words M-PESA splattered on so many walls and signs at many shops all over.  Looking at the pictures below, can you tell me how many M-PESA words can you find.  Note: You can click on the picture to enlarge them.  From four pictures below, I found 20 M-PESA words.  Agree or disagree?

So, whats with the M-PESA?  M-PESA stands for Mobile Pesa, and Pesa is Swahili word for money, so in other words is mobile money or mobile wallet.  So hows that mobile? They live in your phones instead of your wallets.

I read somewhere that its like 1 out of every 3 Kenyans have a phone.  I think I agree based on what I have observed but I think maybe its gaining ground to where maybe its more like 1 out of every 2 Kenyans got a phone.

Furthermore, currency is often hard to get -- for example when you are in a supermarket, you will often find cashiers trying to get currency from the next cashier or ask you for other bill or coin amounts so that they can change your total successfully.  Can you imagine same situation for even smaller shops and open-air markets, or even for Maasai tribe out in the open safari trying to buy or sell their livestock and not able to carry cash.

Although I have not yet used my VISA but I have seen other volunteers trying to use their VISA at places, even at a large supermarket, they will find it a challenge to have them accept the card.  Some places will require you to head over to their customer service desk and do the VISA transaction there (the manual way I assume) as I have not yet seen any places with VISA card readers.  I assume its probably easier to use VISA in Nairobi, the capital, and Mombasa (the beach city).

M-PESA was brought to Kenya by its largest cell carrier -- Safaricom.  People can go to any Safaricom agents to load money into your phone M-PESA account. First timers will need to apply and show Kenyan national ID or a passport, but after that, you can go to any of them to load (or withdraw) cash into your phones.  No need to go to banks or branches and wait in line for your financial transactions.

Once you have a balance on your M-PESA, you simply go to any shops or even to individuals, and pay by using your phone, sending an amount to the other person's phone number (along with safeguards like pin, etc).  Once the other person phone receives a SMS confirming the transaction, your business is successfully done.

This method spread across Kenya and other surrounding countries like wildfire.  I read somewhere that theres like 17 million M-PESA accounts are already floating around.  There is like 38 million Kenyans, so thats like half of them got a M-PESA account already.

I will open my own M-PESA account once I get my "red book" (residency document) when I am sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer next month.  So I do not have to carry too much cash in my wallet, and be an easy Mzunga (white foreigner) target.  

ABC Deaf Trade School

Near my home stay site, there is a placed called ABC Deaf Trade School (they actually just say ABC, and I added Deaf Trade School).  ABC stands for African Brotherhood Church.  ABC has been good to the Deaf folk by providing them with a building on their main campus east of Machakos for their Sunday worships, and this school for the Deaf adults learning trades for future life work.

There is about 12 students/residents at the school. they all are either too old for high school, or have already graduated.  A few of them never went to school at all. I have visited them several times and met with them when they played football (soccer) at a nearby field.  But today the entire group of trainees came to visit them formally as part of "socializing with the Deaf to be immersed into KSL and Deaf culture.  It was very beneficial for others, but for me, I feel I am already ahead of the game on that.

The school offers pretty much sewing and carpentry.  They also include ironing and "computing" but there is only 3 computers with only one working, and none of them are connected to the internet.

The building behind these folks are where the two classrooms are.

Sewing samples and the manual sewing machine (the one you operate with your feet rocking the platform).

Jamo, a Deaf deputy to the principal, manages the place.  He gave us a tour.

In the carpentry classroom, these two old yellowish posters are pretty much the only resources they got.

They make furniture such as the couch below, coffee table (below), and small furniture such as meal trays, stools, etc.  The teacher takes the furniture and sells them in the town, and uses the proceeds to purchase more wood and materials for the class.

This is where the residents live -- typical Kenyan "quarters" -- males are on the far right side, and females on this side.

Their kitchen, and if you look at a "window" opening on the left, is their dining room.  This Deaf lady comes in and cooks 3 meals a day for them M-F and just breakfast and lunch on Saturday.  The residents tend to themselves for dinner on Saturday and all meals on Sunday.

They tend to cages of rabbits, but they say they do not eat them, although Kenyans do elsewhere.

The students gave us a cute skit.

They were carrying a dead guy that passed away due to AIDS.

All Deaf students, their teachers, and of course me (pretty obvious -- must be my orange shirt -- or being a Mzungu (white foreigner)).

Chapati Baptism

Chapati (also called different names by different parts of this country and other close by countries in Africa) is among main staple eaten by the people here.  They are quite good, but a little greasy.  You will always find the need to wipe your hands after eating it -- but the irony thing is that almost never will you find a napkin or paper towel to use.  You sometimes would have a bowl with a water pitcher to wash your hands though.

It takes a lot of work to make them.  So, if you made them at least once, I consider you baptized as a Kenyan (well, maybe after you make their other staple called Ugali).

It all starts by mixing a whole bag of flour with some water, some animal fat (shortening), and little salt. You knead the dough.  Leave the dough covered for about 10 minutes to let it rise (?) or set. Note the outside kitchen environment -- all done on the floor and stool by the firepit.  The animal fat is melted on the jiggler (charcoal grill pot).

They are then broken up and rolled thin.  Then cut them up into about two inch strips, then spoon on more animal fat on it.  Fold up the strips then curl them up into batches.

See the batches in the bowl on floor.  Roll the batches thin, then put it on the jiggler to toast them light brown on both sides.

Can add more chapatis on top of each other and we flip them around so all sides are toasted.

Add more animal fat on the sides and toast them even more.  We use our hands to spin the chapatis around the pan.

Finished Chapatis.  Note the container.  These containers are always used by almost all homes -- for all meals not just Chapatis.  We spoon our meals out of these containers into our bowls.

Yummy.  "Soup" of grams (small tiny beans), carrots, potatoes, onions with of course Chapati.