Where Has All the Water Gone?

One thing that you don't realize until you live in a rainy/dry climate is how quickly things dry up. The rains which had continued through most of May have now stopped and the land is now thirsty. The grasses are dying, the dust is once again thick, and we see a lot more dust-devils, which are a sign of the dry season. Its as if the rains that had made the land so lush are already irrelevant and gone.
How come the rain has such a short-term impact? A variety of factors come together to dry the land. First of all, the sun is strong and with such minimal tree-cover, the ground is often bare to the sun's direct rays. I heard a saying that you should treat your soil like your child, never leave it sit out in the hot sun naked. Well in our community, a vast majority of the soil, especially farmland is left uncovered and exposed to the sun.
A second factor is the nature of the rain itself. Very little rain actually gets absorbed by the ground because of how heavily the rains pour. Instead of absorbing into the dry soil, the water quickly puddles and starts to flow in small rivers. This washes away top-soil, and generally carries away from the community. A final factor is storage. The rains that come are difficult to store here. Most households have traditional homes which are not suited for gutters. People don't have large tanks to hold water into the drought. Instead, most families (women) must go to the piped water which comes from far away and carry it by hand to their home. This again minimizes the impact of the rains we get to the point where after an abnormally rainy first-half of the year, we are started to go dry.
So what can be done? The normal response from the West has been to dig wells so people have to travel less to get water. But this response does not address the fact available water is flowing away from the community in the form of runoff. Wells simply suck more water from deeper in the ground, causing the land to dry even more. Instead, methods to maximize the % of water used productively per rainfall would be more helpful. Finding ways to collect water at traditional homesteads, like making home-made funnels to catch and collect water in cans, covering agricultural land with leafy crops or mulch helps the land absorb more water and reduces runoff or, our favorite, sand dams in dry river beds to collect water during floods or all ideas we hope flourish in this community.
Where has all the water gone? It has gone away from this community and instead of reaping the benefits of bountiful rains we're reaping the fruit of our lack of preparation. Pray for us in Najile and Maasiland that we can find ways to use the “more than enough” blessings we receive.

Enkaputani: (Mother-In-Law)

Isn't the word Maa word, “Enkaputani” a great word for Mother-In-Law. It sounds like “el capitán” and gives the impression that your mother-in-law is the captain of the household. I'm imagining mother-in-laws marching around with Castro-style army fatigues giving orders in the kitchen. Anyway, my mother-in-law and sister-in-law (esintani) have come to visit us for almost the entire month of July. So far the visit has been thoroughly enjoyable.

Last week we picked up the Kleinert women at the airport Saturday morning and headed for Najile monday morning. The roads were their normal horrendous, but it was much more fun to share the pain with others. I felt a sense of validation hearing other people complain about how bad they were. Since then we've done lots of relaxing, card-playing, reading, and traveling. We went to the MIDI demo farm on thursday where the Kleinerts climbed a small mountain and then to Ngong and Nairobi Friday to pick up some Maasai books we ordered for the church. We've done laundry together, cleaned the house together, ate goat together, and have borne the stink of the latrine together (which we had stopped using during the rains but resumed now that water is more scarce). Tomorrow will be an all-day church extravaganza which should be unbelievably tedious, but at least I have enkaputani to share the pain!