Stories of life on Rusinga Island

Karibu Kenya, karibu Rusinga!

Welcome to Rusinga Island, on the shores of lake Victoria, where we had the pleasure of staying with a local family for around 10 days.

With a community of around 30.000 people of the Luo tribe, Rusinga Island is where we chose to do our first workaway (www.workaway.info) experience where we volunteered to support RCBO (https://rusingacommunityba.wixsite.com/rusinga) in improving the quality of life of the local inhabitants (A actually re-designed their webpage). Doing so is both a privilege and an eyeopener about all of the things which we take for granted.

It is perhaps pertinent to start with sharing a few words about the Luo people.

Originally from Southern Egypt or Sudan, this tribe has for centuries had to continuously re-settle after conflicts with stronger and usually Arab foes. It would then be fair to say that they are no strangers to hardship, struggle and making due with what is available.

With no running water, no electricity beyond a solar panel feeding the main house lighting and no plumbing at our adoptive family’s compound, they surely live a life filled with difficulties which most westerners no longer understand.

It was because of these difficulties that we decided to specifically come to this community and share their life experience. To understand the challenges that so many millions still face and the way that they choose to face it.

Spanning three generations, our adoptive family gave us insight into the struggles and particular challenges upon the people of the island. These are their stories.

The father, or indeed grandfather I should say, is a very friendly and inquisitive man in his late 50’s or early 60’s.

Baba (that’s swahili for dad) as we called him, is a quiet and pensive man who for 20 years was a park ranger in Tsavo National Park and at Hell’s Gate National Park where we had previously been. From the very beginning he made an effort in welcoming us, in understanding us and in sharing with us, perhaps more so with myself as a man, the history of his people.

Though he shares it with a broad smile on his face, his was surely a life of struggle to provide for his family by spending very long periods of time away from his beloved Rusinga. In the course of his work Baba had many extraordinary episodes in which he was chased by buffaloes, chased elephants away from banana plantations, ran from angry hippos and even shared an office with a large snake. All of this until disease took one of his legs above the knee.

Now he spends most of the day contemplating the blueness of the lake in the distance and in the evening watching the animals he so loves and used to protect on TV (what to us seemed like the biggest luxury in a house without a single electrical socket to charge any appliance). All of this while receiving a minimal pension for his disability.

Boss Mama, on the other hand, is loud, bossy and cheerful. She is the Ying to his Yang.

Filled with energy at all times, she is the heartbeat of the place and for the 2 days she was not there, things were simply not the same. With constant commands to everybody, she is the one that manages the house and keeps everyone in line. As I creep closer to 40 I can only admire her energy as she approaches 60 with such vitality.

For her, life is certainly not easy.

Everyday she needs to make sure the younger kids are ready for school regardless of the temper tantrums they throw, that the floor is washed without even having a mop, the dishes are done even without direct access to water or anything resembling a sink, the wood or charcoal for the fire to cook are available and a myriad of other things that always pop up.

Among the many difficulties in her life, I imagine the lack of access to water is the greatest one.

Daily, donkeys carrying water make their way to the different houses and provide lake water for those who can afford it. At 50 Kenyan Shillings a donkey, it may not seem much to you but for families without a steady income, trust me, it isn’t cheap and the family required 2 donkeys per day to cover the daily needs of the extended family (about 160 litres). It is either this or carrying water from the lake themselves in the blazing sun.

This water is then used for cooking, cleaning, bucket showering and, if properly cleaned with chemicals and boiled, for drinking as well. It is not, however, used for doing the laundry.

About every second day the ladies carry the family laundry (shoes included) in big buckets on their heads and take it to the lake for a thorough scrubbing on the left side of the lake access.

The reason for it being on a specific part of the lake is because women wash the laundry at the same time that they wash themselves (and with the same soap mind you) and they tend to do it together. This is done in the afternoon so as to not pollute the water taken to the homes. As if the pollution didn’t stay in the lake…

With temperatures soaring, spending some time in the lake may seem like a refreshing idea but the ladies need to work hard to do all the laundry without any shade and, as A can testify, by the time you get back to the house with the clean clothes you will be utterly exhausted. She did it twice and both times I had to prepare electrolytes to speed her recovery up.

How Boss Mama does it at her age is beyond us.

The men at this time may choose to go bathe in the lake on the opposite entrance. Making the afternoons in the lake into a kind of communal showering experience.

Come lunch and dinner times, the matriarch promptly directs the sons and daughters to prepare the food and this way she gets a bit of a break from the daily grind.

In a place like Rusinga, to make it through, you either work hard, move out, become slick or you are smart.

The 5 children of this couple perfectly showed us this spread of options as well as the implied consequences.

The eldest, “Amigo”, a stern looking man who quickly transforms into a friendly character after a quick exchange of words, chose, or needed to choose the path of working hard.

Without a steady job or income, most nights he goes out fishing only to return in the morning with whatever fish he could get and his cut of the share from the money made during the evening.

Fishermen here gather in teams of 5 people to fish. Of these, one is the owner of the boat and the remaining ones are just a sort of hired help to put out the nets, something they manage to do 3 to 4 times a night.

Most of the fish are sold to intermediaries who gather fish at the lake to sell to larger importers to Nairobi and other major cities with the profit being split 50% to the boat owner and the rest between the other 4 crew members.

With Nile Perch and Tilapia populations suffering from excess fishing, often times the crew brings home nothing more than 50 to 100 Shilling and a handful of fish for an entire night of work. Think about it, that is as much as the daily water consumption cost.

When possible, he also takes construction and other odd jobs in order to increase his income and afford himself any kind of luxury beyond fish and water.

Even though he is in his early 30’s, “Amigo” is single and looking at his income level, getting married may be a struggle. You see, it is Luo tradition to offer about 5 cows and some money as a dowry which typically costs anywhere between 50.000 to 100.000 Shilling. A value he can only reach by endebting himself with his own and the future wife’s family.

On a brighter note, “Amigo’s” fried fish was absolutely amazing and he is a fine cook that convinced A that fresh fish can indeed be delicious.

The second child chose to leave the community to search for a better future.

Though we never met her, she lives and works in Nairobi with her husband and sends home some income to support the family while searching to make a little money herself.

This may seem like a comfortable option but the price for it is very high as both children of this couple are left with the grandparents here at Rusinga and compose the younger generation of the house. Not a choice I envy in any way.

Child number 3 is the slick one.

Perhaps somewhat privileged to have finished his highschool education, he has decided to dedicate his efforts in supporting the community and is the one who invited us to visit Rusinga.

Unencumbered by the need to hold a steady job, he has managed to bring several volunteers to the island and we can only imagine he has managed to generate some income for the community and to a smaller extent for himself this way.

He is currently working together with a French association on a project to bring potable water to up to 5.000 people in the community and this will hopefully be a life changing project for both him and for all involved. We sincerely hope the end result will be a great success for the people and that the process will help him become the kind of leader the community needs.

“Dudu”, the younger sister, is studying public health in Kisumu, the country’s 3rd major city.

Though this may seem like a road of privilege, and it certainly is when compared to the older brother, it must be noted that she does so while living in a place without water, electricity or plumbing in Kisumu. Her future may yet be bright but the mountain she has to climb is still very steep.

“Dudu”, as her family calls her, had a week off school during our time in Rusinga and during her time off back home she proved to be a tireless worker.

Everyday by the time we woke up she was already helping in the house and every evening she would spend hours preparing the wood, lighting the fire and cooking for the family. All of this without a hint of attitude or complaint.

Often times, either during doing the dishes or during our time cooking by the fire, A would bond with her and learn about the difficulties that women have in such conditions. It takes perseverance to live like this and she was the face of tenacity.

Her chapati on the other hand were simply amazing and we cannot wait to try and make them on our own once our trip ends.

The younger child, probably in his very early teens will soon have to choose his path as well.

For now both he and the two grandchildren are a constant help around the house and together with “Dudu” get ordered around every 2 minutes to do all sorts of menial tasks.

“Arturo” as he has been nicknamed, is an inquisitive child and during his time with A he took the opportunity to bombard her with a million questions about all kinds of things. “Who is the president of Poland?”, “What kind of animals do you have?”, “Are the stars really that big?”, etc., etc., etc….

Though his curiosity is on par with any other child his age, his capacity to find answers for himself is severely hindered by the disproportional access to information that children with access to the internet have versus his.

Knowledge is power but without proper access to it, without even proper understanding of the sources of information, we wonder what kind of future the new generations will have. We wonder how they will empower themselves to leave the cycle of poverty they were born into. We wonder if they can.

He did, however, show flair around a shaving machine while giving me a beard trim so points for that and hopefully his path will not have to be the one of arduous work for mere cents.

Rusinga is a powerful experience for the both of us. It has made us think many times about the difficulties our own parents had growing up and the struggles that our forefathers had before us.

There is something about relieving yourself in a hole in the ground with cockroaches escaping it in the middle of the night that reminds you about all the commodities that westerners, even the poorer ones, have. It reminds you that we are privileged and for us, it made us want to share some of our time, expertise and knowledge in making this island a slightly better place.

Asante sana!