Update 5

I am having a leisurely afternoon with time to write. This is why: Last night as I mentioned we took our friends Vincent and Phyllis out for dinner. Oh, before that we went to their house and met their two adorable little kids who loved to growl at our kids and "scare" them and we got updated on all the current issues in Kenya from Vincent who works with a development agency and knows all about how free school lunches from the UN affect HIV rates among girls ten years down the road. And I had a little mom-to-mom with Phyllis about how to survive morning sickness. Then their kids stayed with a sitter and we drove out to a lovely restaurant by Lake Victoria and had a nice dinner and Steven was over the moon with joy because he could order a whole grilled fish, complete with eyeballs, and a pile of ugali.

As Amy says, we were at a classy restaurant with two forks apiece and fancy cloth napkins--and geckos on the walls and ceiling.

It was beside Lake Victoria, as I mentioned, but the ambiance was lacking severely because almost as far as we could see, the lake was covered two feet deep in a lush green plant called water hyacinth. Apparently it grows on the surface and moves around when the wind bloweth it where it listeth, and it all got blown into this arm of the lake. This all meant that no hippos came ambling by either, which Vincent thought was nice but I disagreed.

Our plates came with a lettuce leaf and cooked carrots and green beans. I told the family they can choose for themselves with the fresh lettuce--it's fresh and Kenyan which is dangerous but from a nice restaurant which probably means it's ok. But I didn't eat mine.

Then on the way home, as mentioned earlier, we hit that speed bump and I hit my head.

When we were here seven years ago, the orphans' learning-to-read class was taught by a young man named Francis who took his work seriously and tried to teach the kids phonics from an American supplier even when it meant twisting his mouth around to say with the cassettes, "R. Rrrrr. Run." He also went to the local museum with us once and taught me more about Kenyan culture in half an hour than I had learned in weeks from others.

A while back Francis moved out to the Yala Swamp about an hour and a half from Kisumu and opened a school, continuing his passion for teaching kids to read. Recently I was told that now he has students who go home and read to their illiterate parents, and that is very satisfying.

So the plan today was to go out to visit Francis, in a hired taxi, accompanied by Sammy the best guide around.

However.

Ben ate the lettuce last night and woke up feeling awful. "I don't want to go, but I don't care if you leave me here alone," he said.

I gave him activated charcoal to try to ward things off.

Meanwhile with my painful head I was still walking around like the floor was made of thin ice and debating about whether I wanted to spend three hours in a taxi on Kenyan roads with a Kenyan driver and my head flapping around like a bobblehead doll.

"How about you go, but then if after two or three miles you see you can't handle it, we can bring you back," said Paul.

Ok. Cool.

I got ready to go.

Ben threw up.

Not cool.

"Mom, could you stay with me after all?" he asked, suddenly much less tough and independent.

Ok, I said, that's my sign.

I did three loads of laundry at the neighbor lady's house and then Ben and I hung it up together. He dragged himself out bravely and I would hold the garment and clothespins up as high as I could, like shoulder level, then he took it from there, and it looked odd but it worked.

He is doing better by the minute.

I am able to sit still which is the best therapy of all.