Shereef’s Kiva Blog

Posts Tagged ‘wtf’

This I did not foresee. Not one, but TWO incidents involving chickens…in a sack. Vocal chickens trying to escape their respective enclosures.

Between 4pm and 6pm EDPYME is the busiest. People come to solicit or repay loans, ask questions and tend to general business. Where I work upstairs, all the chairs are taken and people even stand on the steps right beside me while waiting to see a loan officer. On one of these busy afternoons all seemed normal. A low murmur of conversation and typing filled the warm sleepy room. Then, the clucking started.

Beneath the chair immediately to my right there was a rainbow colored bag made of woven plastics. Not only was it clucking, but twitching. I barely stifled laughter and could do nothing to prevent a look of utter amusement from spreading across my face. Then the chicken fell silent and still.

Most people in the waiting room are not sure who I am: an accountant, a government official, an American evaluator. And I generally sit in silence staring intently at my computer. So when my formal composure breaks, the borrowers immediately bristle in fear that I may think less of them and they will not get a loan. Normally, I respect the dynamic. In this case, it all went out the window.

After a few minutes the room was still full, but I looked over at the chair and noticed that the bag was gone. Same woman sitting above, same faces staring at me all around, but the chicken had escaped to my total bemusement.

A few days later Manuel (the Kiva Assistant) and I headed off to do some interviews for Kiva profiles. We normally take a colectivo (a collective taxi, but actually just some guys car waiting in a lot) and this morning was no different. When I sat in the back seat my foot grazed a bag on the floor belonging to the woman next to me.

And then all hell ALMOST broke loose. The bag’s top burst open and two teenage chickens tried to make a break for it through the colectivo. The women caught them by the neck and stuffed them back in. After a few minutes of struggle the defiant poultry submitted to their incarceration and I, once again, could not restrain my look of childlike joy.

Sadly I have no pictures to share but from now on I will keep my camera close at hand, constantly vigilant for the antics of live animals being unexpectedly stored in prosaic baggage.