Releasing the inner kenyan

I feel a little bit like Carmen Sandiego these days--have the sunglasses, just need that red jacket. Greetings from Eldoret, Kenya, which, as the sign on the highway says as you enter, is home to "#1 runners in the world"! Funny thing about Eldoret, Kenya, it's like 9,000 ft above sea level! I didn't quite realize what that would mean until I tried to go running, and found myself gasping like a fish out of water after five minutes and one little hill. I even was thinking about quitting halfway (sometimes loops are a poor choice!), until this teenage guy in nice clothes--leather shoes, jacket, etc.--walking along sees me coming up beside him and decides to run the last two miles with me. I push through the side stitch, struggling not to gasp too loudly for air lest he get worried, and run the last 2 miles. We finish--he is of course not out of breath and barely sweating--we shake hands, and we go our separate ways. Not a run I'll forget soon. Beautiful landscape too--fields of corn and something that I vaguely recognize, milo perhaps--dirt roads, cows and sheep grazing. Semi-hilarious signs (totally unintentional I'm sure). Hard to beat.

I'm studying AMPATH--a medical partnership between Moi Teaching Hospital and Indiana University. If you can imagine a place where a midwestern accent seems totally out of place, this is it! And yet, the program is amazing. They were one of the first to treat HIV in Kenya and have grown into one of the largest providers in the country. Recently they started a home-based counseling and testing program, and I'm going out with a social worker next week to learn more about the community presence. They are also transitioning to primary care--so will start serving the entire catchment area, not just those with HIV. They've built income generating program, provided leadership opportunities for very talented Kenyans, and brought a lot of resources to the area. Not to mention, built a heck of an electronic medical record that they use for just about everything imaginable!!

Not a bad life here. Living in the IU dorms--get up for a breakfast of toast with Nutella every morning; have a nice cup of chai at the hospital mid-morning. If I'm lucky I can get into town for lunch or dinner--they make some mean grilled goat and beef here that one eats with ugali, a sort of white polenta-esque food that you mush into the shape of a spoon and use to scoop up the meat. Mmmmmm. Just finished up a game of soccer--again, the Kenyans that played with us smoked us completely in terms of speed and style. Karaoke is on Tuesday night; I'm very excited to see how this goes down. Given the amount of singing that I've seen on the dance floor the past two nights (my favorite so far was a club full of Kenyans singing Thriller!), I need to do a bit of practicing in front of mirror in the next two days!

The time is going quickly--hard to believe how much has happened in the last two weeks. I've yet to see a McDonald's/KFC/Starbucks/etc, so I'm kind of forgetting my cultural roots. If it weren't for the Obama quotes and pictures everywhere, I would have no grounding. Last tidbit: when obama became senator, a beer came out called Senator. Guess what it's called now :)