Natasha Seitz
Leader.
This afternoon, our Moi University colleagues treated us to dinner at the Moi Guesthouse across the street from Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital. We had the honor of not only dining with our Kenyan classmates and friends, but other leaders of Moi Universiy’s communication department, including the dean and Vice Chancellor Richard K. Mibey. Adoration [...]
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Room.
Day two of walking around a Kenyan slum proved just as interesting as day one. Lucy and I traveled to another, more rural area of Eldoret with Lois, a community health worker from AMPATH’s Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC) program. She took us into so many houses that the faces and stories started to blend [...]
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Slum.
I just finished showering, and I still feel dirty. My reporting partner, Lucy, and I commuted to Langas this morning–the largest slum in Eldoret–with a community health worker, Margaret, from AMPATH’s Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC) program. Our new story is about homes run by child orphans because their parents died of HIV/AIDS. The information [...]
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Ear.
Every afternoon, when I walk the dirt path from the AMPATH building or Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital, I pass a women. Dressed in nearly the same outfit each day, she sets up sticks and stones to create a handmade roaster for corn-on-the-cob, or maize as it is called in Kenya. Her product cooks over [...]
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Gatekeeper.
In a previous post, Pack, I mentioned our guard at the front gate, which opens to the neighborhood IU House is located. Mr. Michael Okonda Ongaya, or Mike, controls traffic in and out of the entrance each morning until around 4 p.m. His warm smile and hearty laugh greats each visitor as if they were [...]
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Connections.
As a journalism major concentrating in public relations, my professional life centers on developing relationships: networking is essential to succeed in the field. After spending a week in Kenya, a country shadowed by post-election violence and ravished by the HIV/AIDS pandemic, I’ve determined that connecting with people here will make connection with people at home [...]
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Panorama.
A characteristic ingrained in a majority of the human race is appreciation for a good view. After the excursion my classmates and I embarked on today, I don’t think another view will ever compare. We began traveling at 9 a.m. to our first destination, Kruger Farm. I’ve become accustom to deep potholes and bumpy roads, [...]
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Income.
For three days, my partner, Clive, and I have been traveling around Eldoret conducting interviews, taking photos and recording audio and video about the income-generating goals of AMPATH’s program known as FPI. FPI, or the Family Preservation Initiative, began in late 2002 as an initiative to empower AMPATH clients who were living with HIV. Divided [...]
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Pack.
As I sit down at the desk in my room at IU House, I can still feel the permanent weight of my pack, even though it has been off my shoulders for 20 minutes. The side-strap bag is roughly half the size of a regular backpack, yet I manage to fit the Flip camera, Zoom [...]
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Standard.
One of the lessons my classmates and I learned during the two weeks of pre-departure for Eldoret was how lively the print media is in Eldoret. And is it ever. Vendors walk down every side path and median selling copies of the Standard and the Daily Nation, Kenya’s two largest newspapers. By 10 a.m., the [...]
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Rafiki.
Not the vibrant colored baboon from Disney’s The Lion King, but our 12 Kenyan classmates have quickly become just that–rafiki, the Swahili word for friend. We were introduced yesterday morning to the students and Professor Okumu Bigambo at the IU House and walked the 15 minutes to Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital (MTRH). The commute [...]
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Forty-four.
My checked bag is currently weighing in at 44 pounds. I’m trying to decide if the right wording is “a mere six pounds” or “a whole six pounds” below the 50-pound limit. I guess that will be determined tomorrow morning (or, rather, this morning) when the rest of the equipment is somehow forced into my [...]
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Adventure.
At this time in one week, my JOUR-J 460 classmates and I will be patiently (or, rather, anxiously) sitting on an airplane en-route to Kenya. I can hardly believe how fast time has expired before we leave–I can still remember the application essay questions. After attending class every morning at IU in Bloomington this week, [...]
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