“Muzungu! Muzungu!”
We heard the shouts and felt the stares as we drove down market street in our forest green open backed
truck. Toto, we’re no longer in Kansas. Street children attempted to climb into the
truck bed with us asking for money.
Women whispered from their fruit and vegetable stands. Men gawked openly, shouting greetings and
making their intentions towards some of our girls known. The brave venture to stretch out their hand
in greeting and are met with a warm smile and “hello” to which they reply, “I’m
fine.” I wonder if this is what a
celebrity feels like; constantly aware of their surroundings and the curious,
awe-struck stares that follow. Some of
the children declare in Kiswahili, “I’ve seen them before on TV.” We are some of the few muzungus to ever
venture to Motosiet, a small rural town 20km outside of Kitale.
Muzungu is the
Kiswahili term for “white person.” And
while I’m really a muhindi , the
Kiswahili word for an Asian person, the majority of Kenyans outside of Nairobi
have never encountered an East Asian like myself, so to them I’m just another muzungu. Unfortunately, history, stories, and
teachings in Kenya are not favorable towards muzungus. In fact, a recent conversation with Meshach,
a young disciple apprenticing under Pastor John at Kitale Growth Church, opened
my eyes to the prejudgments that have been indoctrinated into young Kenyan
minds.
Many Kenyans have a rich tradition of tribal witchdoctors
and wizardry practices. So when muzungu
witchdoctors came into their towns they paid heed. Many of these witchdoctors took photos of
their children, cursed them, and cut up the photos. Soon their children began dying. Even today, Kenyan parents are vigilant and
wary of the muzungus coming into their community and taking pictures of their
children. Cameras can appear threatening
and evil. (No, this is not why I haven’t
posted pictures. Our internet
unfortunately is quite expensive and hard to come by, so I haven’t had a chance
to upload pictures lately. I promise as
soon as I am able, I will post some pictures.)
In addition, western medicine is seen as inferior to their own herbal
medicinal practices because of side effects and ineffectiveness to prevent
death. Unfortunately, this results in
many children suffering needlessly, while their parents refuse to seek doctors
at the local hospitals.
Based on a history of many black market adoptions of Kenyan
infants into America, Kenyans believe that Americans have a population shortage
and are solving this problem by stealing their babies. Babies mysteriously disappeared from
hospitals from unsuspecting mothers shortly after birth. Some babies were bought from their mothers to
be sold to Americans. Jokes about taking
this cute baby home is met with serious, concerned looks from parents. Initially, some Kenyan children hesitated to
even come near us and would cry when we attempted to hold them. But over our two days in Motosiet, the
children warmed up to us and even satisfied their curiosity at our apparent
differences, giggling while jiggling the fat on our bones and playing with our
long, sleek hair. Even though verbal
communication was a challenge, the language of love was spoken and
received.
Americans are also known in Kenya as only working 2 hours a
day for a total of 6 hours a week. Now,
I’m not sure how that math adds up, but regardless, we are known to be lazy and
wealthy, relying on machines to do most of the work. While fetching water from a nearby spring to
manually mix with the sand and cement, Oliver asked Sammy, “Do you do things
manually?” Initially Sammy thought he
was talking about the transmission of our tractors and trucks, but once all
that was sorted out, he assured Oliver that people do not always rely on
machines and in fact, much manual labor is done in America as well. Austin and Sam also broke down the stereotype
of Americans working very few hours by tirelessly working alongside them
without a lunch break until the work was completed.
While we thought that we were on a construction mission to
Christian Growth Church at Motosiet, God had another mission in mind. He brought us to this rural town to change
the face of muzungus for these Kenyans.
He brought us to demonstrate that Christian brotherhood prevails over
color and history. Our mission was to
write a new story of Christian muzungus, who love on their children and sing
over them, and of Christian brethren, who physically labor alongside them to
accomplish the vision of hope God gave them for their church.
