Don’t get me wrong. I like my dogs very much. They are loyal, playful and they offer genuine friendship as well as protection. It is because of this, that I have developed a genuine emotional tie with both of them. I feed them good nutritious food, bathe them in clean water with doggie shampoo, make sure they are immunized, and protected from ticks, fleas and other vermin that get under their fur. However, I would rather kill my dogs than allow them to live in the slums of Nairobi.
The infamous slums of Nairobi reportedly contain over 50-70 percent of the 3-4 million souls who inhabit this capital city of East Africa’s most economically prosperous nation. Personally I am inclined to think twice about taking my dogs to the slums, lest they see some of the frightening scenes and living conditions. I am not sure they could handle it. It might offend their sensibilities.
There are scenes like five foot high garbage heaps of rotten food mixed with plastic bags, broken bottles, and empty cans. The children who live here have great imagination and ingenuity. To them, these are not really garbage heaps. These are playgrounds and places to hunt for hidden treasure. Treasure is where you find it and how you name it.
Some of the treasures are things like food. Well, my dogs would not eat it. However, these children are not as picky. They are much hungrier than my dogs and quite frankly, they are used to eating from this putrid pile of other peoples’ refuse.
There are some convenient things such as the pit latrine which is within walking distance. That is convenient for you and the other two to three hundred people sharing the outhouse. Don’t fall in. It may be hours, or even days before they find you. On a rainy night, many people have been known to resort to the ‘flying toilet’ which consists of wrapping your waste in paper or plastic and tossing it on to the path outside your door or window. Well, it beats getting rained on, robbed or raped in the dark.
The houses are not quite the caliber of my dog’s abode either. Even the chicken we got as a gift recently has cleaner and, safer living conditions. The houses in which these families live are made of pieces of rough hewn board, mud walls and tin roofs. There is no electricity, except that from a charged car battery at the home of the more prosperous neighbor. He is the one with the radio and television, which provide him with a source of income as he charges people to watch football games, black market videos and DVD’s the latest soap operas and of course everyone’s favorite; ‘Oprah’s on!’
Going inside one of the houses is a lot like entering into a cave, or coal mine. There is a small tin can with a cloth wick saturated in kerosene giving off smoke, fumes and even a small amount of light. This light is just enough to keep you from tripping over the pieces of rudimentary furniture, pieced together from discarded wood and twice used nails. You can’t read by this small lantern, but many of the people here don’t read anyway, if they had something to read. It is very important if you are trying to read, to not let the paper or your clothes, or the curtains get too close to the lantern. The curtains act as walls separating the 10 feet by 10 feet room into kitchen, and bedroom. Privacy is a luxury a man and his wife and five children don’t have here.
Fire in the slums notoriously destroys homes and displaces hundreds of people at regular intervals, much like urban renewal, or better yet, innovative renovation. There is plenty more mud, sticks, and tin to re-render its splendor. So be careful where you place that lantern. If one house catches fire, well, there goes the neighborhood! My dogs like to lie on the rugs near the fire place, not in the fire place.
If a fire does erupt, it will be near impossible to extinguish as the few watering points have one faucet for every 500 people and you have to wait your turn with your own bucket and walk the five to ten minutes back to your house with the 20 liters (25 pounds) of water without spilling too much of it. There are no roads big enough for the city’s very few fire trucks and even if they could make it down the tortuous mud and stone paths, they would have to push people aside for water too.
You could dip from the generous flow of sewage flowing a few feet outside of your front door. However the particulate matter would stain the very clothes and other valuables you are trying to salvage.
Amidst this ambience of sewage effluent, there is the wreaking ambivalent affluence of the landlords who collect rental fees at regular intervals. They have no problem evicting those who cannot afford the equivalent $10 or $15 per month rental fees and will do so without the slightest notion of nicety. No pay, no stay is the order of the day.
Yes, I truly would rather kill my dogs than have them live in the slums of Nairobi. I think that even their fleas would flee from this down side of life.
haven't read any posts here lately, but was thinking of your writing as I was reading some over at
www.purechurch.blogspot.com
take care, friend!
Posted by: terryb | August 28, 2006 at 08:01 PM