master chef

i am an amazing cook. 

the cookie factory

 the cookie factory may make everyone insane, but it does produce good results.

COOKIES

crazy

COOKIES!

crazier

thanksgiving. asenta sane

salad growing ready for picking

getting work done before the festivities

pauli is very serious about his decorations

 

candle lit thanksgiving meal with just the basics of life. what can be better?

do what you love

Batik artist and painter, Samey's studio

At some point, when I have battery and connection, I need to write about the artists I have visited this trip to Moshi. As usual, I have spent most of my time working for various projects between KCMC, Duke Global Health, and KIWAKKUKI. However, I have also been keeping up with my "day job" at www.welcometocompany.com and as such the life of artists hasn't been far from my brain.

Not that it is unusual for me to think about *my* life as an artist when I am in Africa. But in the past those feelings have often fallen into an "either/or" situation.  I think this is maybe the first time that I have been pushed into truly evaluating artists living with in their art *and* africa.

Samey's goats.

Meanwhile, i am just completely kichaa. I always look a mess, perhaps because I have no problem spending a few hours in terribly pathetic running clothes. And yet, it doesn't bother me near as much here.

improvisational cooking.

One of my favorite african activities is cooking straight out of the backyard. Note that these kuku did *not* come from our backyard! We love our chickens and treat them as rafiki. (As far as we can tell, there is no word for "pet" in swahili, the closest words all mean "friend". This may explain why we can't quite communicate to africans why we love our kuku and give them names.)

The only downside to taking such joy out of messy cooking is that it pretty much forces you to either have a few glasses of wine or enjoy a large east african beer.

researching Lorena Bobbit...

in my current show (come tonight! 7:30pm!), i play a manic-depressive, psychotic actress on the edge of a nervous breakdown. yeah, big stretch, i know.

my character goes to some extreme lengths to get her point across. she does not, however, pull a "lorena bobbit." thankfully.

i am rather disturbed to read about Brigitte Harris, who researched the bobbits in order to attack her abusive father and "keep him from hurting her neices." hey, i'm not judging her. years of rape and abuse will do that to a person. she was just convicted of manslaughter for castrating, then strangling her father. but not only did she castrate and strangle, she admitted to cooking the evidence on a stove because she had learned, via the online research, that a penis can be reattached.


wow.

human food, good to know

it took two of us several hours to make zucchini bread from scratch. pole. ("poh-ley" sorry)