Kijabe Wind

Actually, I'm told Kijabe actually means wind in Kikuyu. And it is fitting, because year-round we are blasted with high speed winds every evening, and sometimes during the day. This is especially noticeable when it is dry and dusty. It is dry and dusty right now as we have had very little rain. This is fantastic when your laundry is out on the line - nothing better than to watch a giant plume of sand rise up off the road and coat your freshly washed clothes. But really, that's not a big deal . . .

Just this week Gladys was telling me that she goes home sometimes and doesn't know what to cook for dinner. I was a little confused by this (I mean, I definitely run out of dinner ideas, but I had a feeling that wasn't what she meant). She explained that the lack of rain means her garden isn't producing and the food prices have gone up too high to buy much. So she really doesn't know what to fix because they don't have much to fix. Meanwhile, she was cutting up a host of fresh vegetables for me and making salsa . . . humbling. Embarrassing. Reality.

Anyway, this is supposed to be about wind, not rain. The Kijabe wind was really going to town last week. I was standing in the doorway when the wind blew the door out of my hands and banged it against the wall. This had the very negative affect of splitting the wood near the top and middle hinges. I couldn't get the door to close after that and, being incrediby independent and resourceful . . . called Matt. He devised a lovely system to tie me in for the night and I went to bed with the wind whistling through the 1/2 inch crack all the way around the door.

In the morning I propped the door shut with a chair and placed a call to maintenance and explained to them my dire need of a new door. You'll notice in the above picture the strange "dead bolt" above the handle which is not really a dead bolt at all . . . thus my only lock is a skeleton key, which can be opened by the same key that unlocks the inner door of the piano building. Ahem. So I was thrilled about my new door that I was sure would be installed by lunch. Well, true to form, I forgot my gradebook at home and ran back to get it while the kids were busy.

I threw open the door . . . and it ripped off the hinges completely. So we went from this:


to this:
in a few short seconds. And I was NOT strong enough to lift the door into the frame and my kids were up in the classroom without me and I was starting to panic (not really, I was laughing and grabbed my camera to document) . . . when the women's basketball coach walked by and with a heave, stuffed it in place. Later I heard the satisfying noises of drilling as we walked to chai . . . and returned at lunch to see . . . the same door. Reinforced with a steel plate at the top. How resourceful.