Nagasaki U./Gembe East Football Match 2014 (in Kenya)
I’ve been tasked with resurrecting and project that has been languishing in the world of neglect for years. As I was brainstorming some ideas to revitalize and reconnect with communities we work in, I invited the chief of one of them out for choma, to discuss some options. Somewhere in the conversation, the idea of sponsoring a football match came up.
Gembe East is a community of approximately 14,000 people just east of Mbita Point in Homa Bay County, Kenya. It is quite poor and filled with numerous challenges, but it’s a mostly pleasant place to be and the Chief of the area has been incredibly supportive of all of the Nagasaki and JICA activities.
We met a couple of times, had a few discussions as to what should happen and who should do what, set up a budget for the event and proceeded to pull everything together. It was a lot like putting on a rock show, but with considerably more politics.
Gembe East is divided into four sub-locations, each of which has a soccer team. It was decided that the four teams would play and the winner would receive a new set of uniforms, some money and a trophy.
In addition, we’d have a match between Nagasaki U. and some older folks from Gembe East, a band and a few speeches from “opinion leaders.”
For the two days before the match, we strapped a sound system to the top of a Land Cruiser and drove around the area making announcements. I love seeing trucks like this do political speeches. It was great to be in the car driving around in the bush on awful roads announcing a soccer match (over Luo music) to people tending their farms.
The day of the match came yesterday, things fell unsurprisingly behind schedule, there were a few planning problems and some usual chaos, but in the end everything kind of fell into place.
The first of rounds went smoothly, though one of the teams was late. At first, the spectators were just a few old ladies, but soon the place filled up. We probably had about 2,000 people over the course of the day.
The old man team from Gembe East turned out to be guys closer to their late 20’s (though there was one guy who must have been 60). I haven’t ever played soccer in my life. Unfortunately for the team, the ball came into my vicinity a couple of times.
A real highlight was the Omena Jazz Band, a four piece outfit who have been together since 1970 and whose members were all born before 1950.
I did some speeches on the meaning and nature of our research and presented some simple results to the community. It’s incredibly satisfying to present research results to the people who are actually being surveyed. We can’t do this research without these people. They have a right to know.
Overall, it turned out to be a great day. It was great to meet so many people from the area and have the chance to interact with them. There were some challenges, but there always are when putting on big events. I hope we can do it again in the future.
After all of the negative stuff that’s happened recently, this was a welcome change.
Sick animals in Gembe East
I went on a hunt for some sick animals… and finally found some! We were visiting some families in Gembe East, and area close to Mbita Point in Homa Bay County and found a man who had more than 50 goats and nearly 20 cows. In Maasai-land, that’s a tiny herd, but in Luo-land, its gigantic.
He had a sickly goat which had just aborted, vaginal discharge, was feverish, emaciated and had a hard coat. A friend suggested it might be Brucella, but without a test, we’ll never really know. Either way, I suggested that it might not be a terrible idea to make choma out of it (as he said he was going to do) and get it away from the pregnant lady in the house. He reported that there had been a couple of other abortions in his herd.
The cows in Luo-land don’t look very good. It’s possible that the scant rains recently are having an impact on the vegetation. Pink-eye is everywhere right now.
So much is made about potentially zoonotic diseases in giant pastoralist herds, but the issue goes mostly ignored around Lake Victoria. Though animal possession per household is low, there are more households living in more densely populated conditions, meaning that there are potentially more animals per square kilometer in Nyanza than in Northern Kenya.
A combination of high human and animal density, poverty and a shared water source could create perfect conditions for a zoonotic disease outbreak.
Yesterday, someone gave me a live chicken
I am the owner of this chicken.
We were having choma with the chief of the area a few weeks ago, and we came up with the idea of having a regional soccer match. Yesterday was the first meeting of the planning committee. (Turns out that putting on a soccer match is like setting up a punk show, except that people will probably turn out.)
We discussed the particulars of the football match, and then ate a great chicken dinner from the chief’s mother. We also met the chief’s father, an 87 year old ex-school teacher who had his last child 12 years ago and learned of that gentleman’s mother who died two months ago at the incredible age of 105. In an area where the average life expectancy hovers just around 40, these are some tough people indeed.
After eating, we went and checked out the soccer pitch, which has an amazing view of Lake Victoria and some nearby mountains. It’s going to be a great day.
The roads out there are terrible. I was getting sea sick on the way back, when the guys in the car suggested that we go an visit on of our staff members. I reluctantly said ok since I was just hoping to get out to the main road as quickly as possible. (Plus the Iran/Argentina game was about to start.)
We arrived to his house and it was already dark. The staff guy is there standing outside holding a radio. His wife looks like she’s just come from church.
Everyone suddenly jumps out of the car and proceeds to run around greeting one another. I talk to the staff guy for a moment. He’s exceedingly friendly but looks somewhat impatient. I figure out that the radio means that he’s waiting for the game to begin.
Silas (another staff member) asks me if I like watermelon. I say yes, and the wife comes up behind me and puts a live chicken in my hands. “This one will be very sweet” comes out in a really confident, educated brand of English that’s somewhat uncharacteristic of the area.
I’m not sure what to do. I’ve never held a live chicken before. I say thank you and carry it over to the car and put it in the back with the watermelons. We quickly say thank you, get in the car and drive on.
On the way back, I have to keep making sure that the chicken doesn’t get crushed by a rolling melon. After we get home, we put the chicken in a box and set it in the food pantry with some corn and rice.
We’ve resolved to have the house lady transform the chicken into dinner tomorrow, which gets me off the hook, because I have no idea how to do such things.
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- I am the owner of this chicken.
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- Uwi Paradise Centre, est. 2003
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- Katie has found a new friend. He was insistent on taking a picture with her in his boat.
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- Cow.
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