CRAFTING BEAUTY

KITENGELA GLASS EXPERIENCE

Dear gentle readers, we are back with another day in the life and this time we tapped into our creative sides. First and foremost, let me address something wild, Kitengela Glass is not in Kitengela. It is actually located near Ongata Rongai, still in Kajiado county but not Kitengela so whoever named it needs to share the thought process behind his choice. That aside let’s dive into our fantastic day as creatives. 

On arrival to Kitengela Glass we went to watch the staff make some glasses. One side of the studio was doing glass bottles for the Precera Gin company and it was enticing to watch. The other side was where visitors could get a taste of being glass blowers for a minute and create their own glasses. The temperatures were so high in there and Charles even joked about that being the temperature in hell which had me wheezing. When we got to the other side, we were able to watch two ladies do their glass pieces and as much as it was interesting to watch the idea of me doing that myself was not really giving. But then I still decided to do it, took a bit of convincing but yeah, I still agreed to try. They gave us contracts to sign before having our glass blowing experience and making our own glasses. Well contracts are nice most times when they involve earning you money but this one said they won’t be liable if we got hurt and all that which had me second guess my choices for a second, I was like pump the brakes, I can get hurt?  I’ve had quite the track record with getting hurt weirdly so yeah not taking chances that would jeopardize my safety. I almost went for the hills at this point but as they say Mama raised no quitter so yeah had to put my big girl pants on and go to battle. We picked the items we wanted to do and the color that we fancied most, Edyta and Effie decided on bowls, one red and the latter picked a yellow. I picked a glass tumbler with as many colors as I could and off to the studio we went. The men were a bit scared of tapping into their creative sides 🙂 so they opted to sit this one out. 

Finally in the room where the magic happens, I went first of the three of us. You’d think I am crazy for going first owing to the fact that I think I was most scared and didn’t want to participate at first but I wanted to get it done with. Had I not gone first, I’d have to be the one panicking while watching the others do it before me and I couldn’t handle that. So yeah, our amazing guide first taught me what I was required to do and how I would do it then we proceeded to the actual glass blowing. We took our molten glass from the furnace (more like he did as I was too scared to go near the furnace) then we put the colors to it, melt them again then move to the shaping and blowing. No one prepares you for the fact that sometimes your mouth stops functioning when blowing into something. I was blowing with all my might and best believe nothing was happening. At this point I’m like yeah, I’m just making a tumbler we don’t need to blow that much, all this pep talk to control my frustrations cause why is it not working?  Other than that, everything else went well and I had a pretty chill experience I loved ever minute of it even the blowing that wasn’t blowing, and my tumbler came out so cute. You know that moment in life where you want to shed a tear cause of how proud of yourself you are, this was that moment. Effie went next and made such a cute bowl. The process was quite similar to the one I did only difference was at the end they had to swing the molten glass to make a bowl shape. Then finally Edyta went, fun fact, I made the perfect choice by going first because she was a bit worried before her turn and I was like yeah with how scared I was if I had waited for them to go before me, I would have definitely been the next Kipchoge because I’d be running for my life. I’ll have to admit, Edyta’s glass was my favorite color out of the three, the red turned out so great, I was mesmerized by it. After that our glasses were put to cool for 23 hours and would be delivered to their village market shop the following week. 

Holger and Charles at this point realized they had missed out on all the fun and decided to go to the bridge. I don’t have a fear of heights but I don’t like dangling in the air none the less so the bridge was a definite NO from me. We, the ladies, decided against joining them on their journey to heaven or hell (depending on how you are looking at it) and opted to sit that one out. You see the memes that say men live dangerously, they are actually true cause why did they willingly decide to go dangling on a bridge? I should have been born a mind reader, maybe then I would be able to understand men, how their brains function is so peculiar to me. That being said I have seen photos online of ladies going to dangling bridges and I just wonder maybe I am the weird one, but you know everyone to their own.

After they came back from their bridge experience, we went to get something to drink and you realize how old you getting when you start to prefer your tea or coffee with minimal sugar. I did one and a half tea spoon of sugar to my cappuccino and yeah that was too much sugar for my young self, and the whole time drinking it I was like wow I’m getting old.

At this juncture we set out for Kitengela town for a little visit to Effie’s home. It always amazes me how our mothers operate almost the same. They welcome you and try to stuff you to the maximum level possible. After the greetings and the catching up, we started eating and let me you when I saw green peas there, oohhh my days, I was like Mungu bariki wengine. I love green peas but my family not so much therefore it is a rare meal at home, so understand a girl, my love for food is the only thing that makes life so much better. The food was amazing shout out to Effie’s mum. After we all had our fill, we breathed for two seconds and some tea and mandazis were served. As I said mothers are the best and they try to feed you to a food coma every time. This is a trait I love and in future if I’ll be a mother I want to be exactly like this. As we took our tea we discussed matters of serious business. From project ideas to advice here and there on how to improve in different aspects of our lives and activities then afterwards we called it a day.