siku mbaya

On Monday Monica wanted to be sure I didn’t get to my exam late like last time, so she told Njenga to come at 8:30. He came at 8:20, so I got to school at 8:30 and that is when someone told me our exam was at 10 and not 9. Apparently the professor had changed it the night before and told select people (not me). So I killed some time before 10. I felt really confident about the exam because I had spent a lot of time memorizing all the material. 10:00 came and the classroom was packed with people ready to take the test, all with little pieces of paper they were using as cheat sheets. One of my friends called me over to sit in front of her because she had a paper she didn’t want the professor to see. Sheesh. So it became 10:30 and the professor finally walked in with no apology for being late or explanation and asked the class to spread their desks apart, which they didn’t, so he walked out of the room and said “when you are ready to take the exam you let me know.” So then everybody moved their desks and we waited another 15 minutes but he never came back. We waited there until 11:30 and the professor’s assistant came in to tell us the exam was moved until next week on Wednesday. I was really frustrated at this point, but thought I could take the exam next Wednesday because I would be getting back from South Africa on Tuesday afternoon, no problem. Then the exam got moved to Tuesday morning! This school frustrates me so much sometimes!
To de-stress I snuck into the Sarova Stanley, which is a five star hotel in Nairobi and they have a 5th floor outdoor pool with yellow cushioned lounge chairs. I swam and sunned there until 2, when I went to Swahili. For our homework we had to write 50 sentences that had to meet all these different criteria. This took me 3 days to do, including the re-writing, and when my professor didn’t show up I wanted to give up on this school altogether because I had spent so much time preparing work for this day and I wasn’t able to show anything for it. Finally my professor showed up though and I turned them in.
When I got home the power was out, which meant the TV was not on, and Chipa and I had a really good conversation about all kinds of things. He has his driving test tomorrow and he’s really nervous. He is also really frustrating with his whole driving experience because had had to pay a lot just to take the classes and each time he goes to drive he has to give the teacher a bribe or else they refuse to teach. He also has to give them a bribe tomorrow or he won’t pass his test. Poor guy. Also, we were having a conversation about homosexuality in Kenya and I came out to him, which was cool. I was hoping that he might come out to me too, but no such luck : ) I really hope I can get him to Philly sometime, I really think he would enjoy himself.
I’m headed to the airport to go to Capetown and will share those adventures when I get back.