fireworks and a good dinner

I want to start by saying that on Wednesday night I had the most amazing dinner. Chipa roasted a chicken and Monica made spinach (I love her spinach) and Chipa also made chips! (French fries). Then I had fresh mango for dessert. Oh man…so good. I came home from school and Chipa was on the couch and when I sat down he got up and said “ugh, I have to baste!”. He’s a funny guy.
Wednesday’s class was cancelled because the professor didn’t show up. So was Tuesday’s. So I have had no classes this week, except Swahili, where Whitney and I are the only students. This is the third week! Oh well. So Whitney and I walked around the city a for a while. I decided to try out yogurt for the first time since I’ve been here. I usually eat a ton of it in the U.S., but here it comes in cardboard cartons (like milk cartons in the U.S.) and for some reason that intimidates me. But I got some mango yogurt, brought it back to school, and took two bites before confirming that it had gone sour. I thought it might just be flavored differently than I was used to in the U.S., but no, it was sour. I will try again soon.
Wednesday afternoon I went to a debate about whether bride price was modern slavery. I was nervous it was going to be like the gender and sexuality events I had recently been to, and Whitney didn’t even come because of the past two events. To my surprise it was actually very calm and orderly and there were actually men who were speaking for gender equality! Where were these men when the other forums were happening?! It was really interesting to hear all the perspectives. There are some women who want a bride price because they would never want to be given away for free. There are some women who say they don’t want a bride price because they consider themselves priceless. There are some who want a bride price as a sign of appreciation from the man, but they don’t want the man to view them as property that he has paid for. One woman talked about how some men have to spend all their money to give to the woman’s family, and then he takes her back to live with him and they are very poor because he has spent everything he had on the bride price. Another person said bride prices are used to keep poor men from marrying a family’s daughter. My favorite quotation from the discussion was one woman’s response to a man who said “If a man beats a woman there is something wrong.” She responded by saying “I think you didn’t say enough. If a man beats a woman there is something wrong with that man.” I clapped for her : )
In other exciting news, Chipa and I were watching TV, when out the window a transformer in the power lines started sparking and exploding. It was like the Fourth of July…lots of sparks and colors. It only lasted about 20 seconds. Also, in the real news on TV, they have been showing film footage of MP’s (members of parliament) who have been sleeping during sessions. There are at least 10 different MP’s sleeping in these clips and local people are very upset because they have voted these people in and now they are sleeping! One guy they interviewed on the street said in Swahili that they should make the room colder. He’s on to something. I think the leaders should get more colorful wigs : ) They all wear those white powdered wigs here. It’s pretty silly looking.

That is all for now. I hope this post finds everyone well.