A Sad Day

Well, we have some sad news to report. Our nanny, Pamella, has a 20 year old son who while returning from Mombassa last week on a Matatu bus was in a bad accident involving a Mac truck and he was killed. There are no words. She being a single mom, had really had high hopes for a better life for him. A senseless death. But then there are so many senseless deaths here.

Matatus, if you don’t know, are these Nissan mini vans you can driving all over Africa. They are used like public transportation and there are thousands of them on the roads. They can usually seat up to 12 passengers in a sort of sardine can fashion and are notorious for trouble. Usually in bad condition and typically speeding or/and driving recklessly. I would never ride in one unless it was an emergency. But some people have no choice.

So couple the bad roads and these speeding reckless vehicles and you got a daily recipe for disaster. It’s just so sad. I have only seen Pamella once this week, when she came to tell us. Pamella is a usually full of energy and laughter. She was pretty torn up about it as you might imagine and that day she couldn’t speak to me, she needed Rueben, our gardener, to talk for her. Since her English isn’t that good to begin with guess it was just too hard to get it out.

We are paying to transport the body back to Kisumu and buying a coffin and probably other things, as we learn about the tribal funeral arrangements, guess we’ll be going to a Luo funeral soon…