The Curious Incident of the Thieves in the Night (August 20, 2006)
Since coming to Busia, our house has been hit three times by mystery night-thieves. Looking back on this about a month after it all began, it's easy for me to be cavalier, but from what others have told me crime is fairly rare in Busia. Unfortunately, when it rains it pours.
The first theft took place in late July; in the middle of the night our watchmen (askari) had fallen asleep, and someone reached through the window of the annex (an addition to the main house) and stole money that someone had left in a purse on a bed right under aforementioned window. While I thought this exhibited a lack of common sense, it was still scary, and it taught us not to leave windows open, regardless of how hot it gets at night. We changed our locks, changed our guards, and we figured everything would be ok.
Until the following weekend, when Anne had malaria. Despite the previous incident, she put my laptop (borrowed) under the same window [keep in mind Anne was delirious with fever, and this is not outside the realm of reason]. While the window was closed, it didn't latch and lock properly. That same evening, with watchguards asleep (again) my laptop with all my project work was stolen.
This time, because it affected a project, the response from the housemates was more swift -- the lock on the window was fixed that weekend, we changed the bulbs to the floodlights around the house, and we demanded new guards. I had my first experience with the Kenyan police when I had to spring our guards out of jail. The police do this great thing where they round up fake suspects and your guards and put both sets of people in jail. When I went to go pull out the guards I asked what their charges were. Apparently it's a felony in Kenya to fail to prevent a felony, which was why they were there. I understand the general logic, but in this case it didn't follow. Despite the ludicrousness of this entire debacle, there was the added insult that the police had decided they were going to fully prosecute our guards and put them in Kenyan prison. Having seen the jail, I didn't really want to think about what the prison was like. The entire time I could help but feel exasperated; I kept thinking this was a true Keystone Kops situation with a real kangaroo court right next door all prepped and ready to go. It made me wonder about who ends up on the receiving end of "Kenyan justice" and about what circumstances contribute to certain populations being more at risk.
When our staff later asked what the jail was like and if it was way worse than American prisons I couldn't help but think that no, for the most part it is just as bad as American prisons. We've just figured out a "better" way to build the building and routinize the machine.
Since then we've had two more theft attempts, both times thwarted by a combination of better locks on the windows and more alert guards, but I've found all of it incredibly tiring. Aside from the literal weariness that comes from being up every week at 2AM to talk to the police... again, there's the weariness of feeling unsafe in your home, of dealing with authorities, and with feeling like a target. To a certain extent we're just that -- a target. What else would a house full of U.S. expats be, especially after 2 successful attempts? At the same time it's incredibly frustrating -- why now?
The first theft took place in late July; in the middle of the night our watchmen (askari) had fallen asleep, and someone reached through the window of the annex (an addition to the main house) and stole money that someone had left in a purse on a bed right under aforementioned window. While I thought this exhibited a lack of common sense, it was still scary, and it taught us not to leave windows open, regardless of how hot it gets at night. We changed our locks, changed our guards, and we figured everything would be ok.
Until the following weekend, when Anne had malaria. Despite the previous incident, she put my laptop (borrowed) under the same window [keep in mind Anne was delirious with fever, and this is not outside the realm of reason]. While the window was closed, it didn't latch and lock properly. That same evening, with watchguards asleep (again) my laptop with all my project work was stolen.
This time, because it affected a project, the response from the housemates was more swift -- the lock on the window was fixed that weekend, we changed the bulbs to the floodlights around the house, and we demanded new guards. I had my first experience with the Kenyan police when I had to spring our guards out of jail. The police do this great thing where they round up fake suspects and your guards and put both sets of people in jail. When I went to go pull out the guards I asked what their charges were. Apparently it's a felony in Kenya to fail to prevent a felony, which was why they were there. I understand the general logic, but in this case it didn't follow. Despite the ludicrousness of this entire debacle, there was the added insult that the police had decided they were going to fully prosecute our guards and put them in Kenyan prison. Having seen the jail, I didn't really want to think about what the prison was like. The entire time I could help but feel exasperated; I kept thinking this was a true Keystone Kops situation with a real kangaroo court right next door all prepped and ready to go. It made me wonder about who ends up on the receiving end of "Kenyan justice" and about what circumstances contribute to certain populations being more at risk.
When our staff later asked what the jail was like and if it was way worse than American prisons I couldn't help but think that no, for the most part it is just as bad as American prisons. We've just figured out a "better" way to build the building and routinize the machine.
Since then we've had two more theft attempts, both times thwarted by a combination of better locks on the windows and more alert guards, but I've found all of it incredibly tiring. Aside from the literal weariness that comes from being up every week at 2AM to talk to the police... again, there's the weariness of feeling unsafe in your home, of dealing with authorities, and with feeling like a target. To a certain extent we're just that -- a target. What else would a house full of U.S. expats be, especially after 2 successful attempts? At the same time it's incredibly frustrating -- why now?
posted by Camille @ 6:43 AM
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