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The Gift of the Pregnant Cat
We got to Rangi Saba the night before the harambee. We were told ‘rangi saba’ is Swahili for ‘seven colors’.
‘Harambee’, we were told, means “let us all pull together.” The post-independence Kenyan motto is also what many community fundraisers are called. Everyone comes together to support a cause.
This harambee was for the primary school named after my friend, the longtime executive director of Friends of Kenya Schools and Wildlife. She was one of the most humble people and her joyful laugh was contagious. It’s been less than a year since we lost her, and it still stings all over again to talk about her in the past tense.
Of course, I never knew a community named a whole school after her. I saw her faded name painted across the gates as some teachers closed it behind us. She always called it Endonyio Sidai, but it was actually the Gwen Meyer Primary School. Endonyio Sidai is the location, not the proper name. I smiled to myself, quietly admiring her humility. I had heard them talk about that school for almost 10 years. So many donors and NGOs had matched the funding raised by this community, high atop the escarpment over the Great Rift Valley. And I was excited to finally see the school with running water.
But the water wasn’t running.
