Saturday, February 5th
A vegatable stand in the slum
A family
I found this info online, so I just did a copy and paste as I feel it was able to describe it in much more detail than I could.
Until 2003 there were few official facts about Kibera, as the government didn't recognize it as housing at all. Most statistics about Kibera are based on the estimates of outside organizations.
- Kibera occupies 630 acres.
- 800,000 to more than 1 million people live there.
- There are more than 100,000 orphaned children living there, the majority orphaned by the AIDS virus.
- Official documents referring to Kibera call it "informal settlements," although the area has been occupied since 1912 and under government control since 1948.
- Overcrowding in housing is so bad that parts of Kibera average only 12 square feet of housing per person, or the equivalent of floor space per person about 1 meter wide by 1 meter long.
- 60% of Nairobi's residents live in one of its many slums. Half of those residents live in Kibera.
- There is no running water to most homes in Kibera. To obtain water, residents pay two to ten times what is paid by a Nairobi resident outside the slums. The water is carried back to their houses in jerry cans. However, water flows inconsistently throughout all of Nairobi, even in the plumbed neighborhoods.
- To use a toilet, some residents must pay 4 shillings (about 6 cents US) to use a filthy private latrine. Those without other means use a plastic bag which "disappears" over the roof tops at night (otherwise known as "flying toilets")
- Webster's dictionary defines a slum as a heavily populated area of a city characterized by poverty and poor housing.
- Kibera is the largest slum in Africa - one of the largest in the world.
For 10 Kenyan shillings (about 15 cents US), a vendor sells a customer a small bucket filled with charcoal - about a day’s worth. The same amount of charcoal, purchased in bulk, costs the vendor 8 cents. Everyone in the slum cooks with charcoal, so a vendor who lives in Kibera and has a good location without too much competition can make a living. According to one source, 60% of Nairobi’s population lives in the various slums of Nairobi, of which Kibera is by far the largest. It is a city within a city, complete with its own districts, services, schools, churches, shopping areas, medical clinics and bus stations.
Garbage is often discarded on the paths or in the streets. The bulk of it is collected in huge roadside piles and left for the scavengers and goats to search. Vendors line the main roadways, many with booths running side by side along the sidewalk, sometimes two deep, space allowing. Others lay their products out on the ground along the edge of the road. Most of the property in Kibera is actually government owned land, on which occupants are technically squatters. But though the land isn't owned by the inhabitants legally, they take "ownership" of its structures, which are bought, sold and rented just as in every other neighborhood in Nairobi.
The homes, most of which are just shacks, are either made out of mud, plastered over sticks and boards, or made from mabati (corrugated iron sheets). A few are plastered over with cement.
The roofs are all made from mabati (corrugated iron), which, looking out over the top of Kibera, gives it a great rusted checkerboard texture. Some of the homes are divided into two rooms, often by a sheet, each room approximately 8 feet by 8 feet. Each home may house anywhere from two to a dozen people.
The paths leading through the homes are narrow, so narrow in places that you can actually touch the buildings on both sides of the path if you stretch out your arms. Many of the pathways are divided right down the middle by a smelly ditch which helps carry the water away, both rainwater and waste water. After any amount of rain, the paths turn to mud for a few days. The walkways become very slippery, and shoes and clothing quickly become splattered with mud.
The pathways consist of a mixture of red dirt packed down together with all kinds of the refuse used in human habitation: plastic bags, clothing, rocks, foam rubber, wood, pieces of metal, broken glass, plastic, worn shoes, empty lighters, cardboard and anything else you can imagine. Trying to maintain balance on these pathways can be a challenge. One must often hop from side to side and from mound to mound in order to support your weight and keep from slipping into the ditch as you walk along. Often you also need to duck down to pass under the low eaves of the metal roofs and wet laundry hanging from lines strung diagonally along the path. Occasionally, an open space appears, next to which is a tiny duka, a mini-market (the size of an desk) or just a stand selling soft drinks, soap, candy, cigarettes, cooking oil, ugali (corn flour), or fresh vegetables and fruit.
The smells in Kibera are also constantly changing - generally either from the smoke of the burning charcoal and the food cooking upon it, or the smell of human waste.
To enter a home, one doesn't knock, but instead calls out, "Hodi…Hodi." The response is usually, "Karibu" (welcome). Inside most of the homes, everything is clean - worn, old, and falling apart - but freshly washed. The floor is washed once or twice a day. But, more importantly, inside most homes is a family that provides the warmest welcome. Be prepared to be overwhelmed with respect, attention and appreciation of your visit from everyone there, including every neighbor who just happened to see you enter the home. It may not look like much, but it's their home, and one can't help feeling good about being invited in.
If you are invited into a home, you should feel privileged, as most visitors to Kibera never get the chance to see the real living areas there and the routines of daily living. If you are invited in, you may be invited to enjoy some "chai" (boiled milk with sugar, lightly flavored with tea) and slices of white bread. If this is the case, you have made a friend. They will introduce you to all of their children and ask you to return. And you will return, if you can. Kibera is not attractive from the outside. But on the inside you'll meet men, women and children who, given a little of your time, will open up to you and invite you into their lives. Individuals you will come to love and who will love you back as they become your friends, moja moja.
We learned that many women eat soil when they are pregnant for calciu. James tells us that they eat solid soil and maybe about a handful a day. Sunda said sometimes, the homes fall down if the women eat too much soil from the floor or the walls. Those who have HIV eat more soil ... it's the red soil that is best because it's higher in calcium.
MIRIAM'S JOURNAL
We are introduced to Sunda and Fredrick who will be our guides for the tour. They both live here and the only safe way to tour and walk through the slum is with locals (those who live there). We are the only mzunga (white people) that I see walking in the slum. Walking around, there is a feeling of hostility towards us being there and taking pictures. The people that live here are here because this is what they can afford and this is their home. They are proud to have a home and there has been such negativity and unacceptance from everyone - including other Kenyans that do not live in the slum. Our guides were wonderful and Sunda told us that he has a goal / mission to help educate people about the lives and homes of those that live here ... both those that live in the slum and those that don't. The stream you see is a sewage stream; there are black bags (the "flying toilets" that were mentioned) and garabage everywhere. In general, the people and the children did not appear dirty - they use water that is sent in by government trucks to bathe. Instructions are posted on how to "purify" the water for drinking. We saw some "sock" gardens - because there is no open areas for gardens, some people use burlap bags for gardens. In the slum, there are both private and public schools, medical clinics, hotels and churches. Many homes are constructed with sticks, dirt and metal roofs.
Our tour guides
SARAH's JOURNAL
This morning we were picked up at MCF and taken to Nairobi for lunch. After a traditional Kenyan meal of kale, fried fish and chipata, we headed off to the Kiberian slums. Our tour guide, James, picked up the owner of the tour company (his boss) and two other guys - Sandy and Fredrick - and we were off to the slums. Both Miriam and I felt safe and in good hands. Sandy and Freddie both live in the Kiberian Slums and give tours to show what life is like --- and it's truly not what I had anticipated ... although it's the poorest area of Nairobi, to those who live there, it's home to them in every sense. They do not like or accept it when looked down on or considered to be be dirty and rough. Many do not like their photo being taken and we needed to ask before using our cameras. There are different areas in the slums, depending on the income and rent amount (yes, everyone pays rent to live in the slums). The working class live in a "nicer" area and, as Sandy explained, those who live there are always working to improve their life. Both Sandy and Freddie are part of the youth center to help show the young people about life outside the slum and help them. Sandy is also part of a website that is called voiceofkiberia.org where the goal is to start dialogue with those living in the slum. It's not about negative issues, but also to show what is good and positive. I left there thinking that we are all really not that different - the more we have, the more we want.
I asked if there are police to help keep order in the slum and what happens if someone is caught stealing, for example. Frederick answered that the Nairobi police would be called. Theft is a very serious offense and the punishment is often that they are set on fire, on the spot. The offenders only hope of survival is that the police would arrive in time and arrest them instead of them being killed.
