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Or, A Time to Fast

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Reader,

Ramadhan Mubarak and Happy Lent to all who observe!

Last week, I went for Ash Wednesday service too late to get ashes. A group Zoom call with a Catholic priest later in the day made me feel better about it (plus my fellow Kenyan Anglicans have only recently come into Ash Wednesday, despite it being mentioned in Our Modern Services) so Lent was a go.

This year, I’m almost a week in and have no plans, despite reading all sorts of guidance about Lent, and downloading the Kenya Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Lenten Campaign 2026 Booklet. I know the 3 things I need to aim for are praying, fasting, and almsgiving. Light on the prayer on any given day, trying to fast from the internet, and trying to figure out almsgiving in the midst of (un)(der)employment. Please send any and all Lenten ideas!

I have been thinking about libraries for years and a recent dispatch from Mariame Kaba has me thinking about libraries in Kenya and their funding. When last I was at KNLS Maktaba Kuu, I was shocked to learn that one can no longer take home books. We’re engaged in such different fights — folks in the US speak of libraries as the last commons, we are charged 20KES (16 US cents) to access libraries from which we cannot borrow books and which sometimes do not have toilet paper — and yet I think of the power libraries still have in Kenya. They are places to study, to pause indoors inexpensively, to get wi-fi, to discover books that are sometimes out of print, to attend events, to introduce children to new environments.

One of the things I miss now that I am in the village is library access, even as I acknowledge how far one had to go to visit a public library when they lived close to Nairobi (Macmillan, for example, or my dear Maktaba Kuu, which brought me up in the days when it was the Nairobi Area Library) and I keep thinking about how to bring the particular joy of libraries to my community. I’d love to hear from folks who have started community libraries, participate in their administration, or are in a “friends of the library” group for advice on how to create a similar space where I am.

The thing that strikes me about the demand being made of Mayor Mamdani is that he sticks to his commitment to assign at least 0.5% of the city’s budget to libraries. Looking into the situation in Kenya, I cannot find any budgetary floor for funding or mandated minimum and maybe 2026 is the year I act on my perpetual joke that if I ever run for political office, libraries will be my sole platform. Part of me thinks the popular narrative about Kenya’s poor reading culture (it’s mentioned in the KNLS 2022-2027 Strategic Plan so you know it’s true!) and the low per capita numbers (less even than the 20/- a day one is charged for entry) in the budget are an indicator of where libraries lie in the national list of priotities.

Either way, reading about libraries has - in the words of my country people - left me with more questions than answers. Is this an animating issue? Can one work with others to make it so? How do we get a library within walking distance of every Kenyan?

Not much (else) happened last week (not least because of menorrhagia) so there’s not much to report (not much reading or writing was done either. See: the blog) but I’m hoping for a better week and some progress (finally) on the Personal Curriculum front; maybe even a zine. Wish me luck!

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Quick news/ things that may be of interest:

Ending this Saturday:

This Sunday:

Ongoing:

Next month:

• Treat someone you like (me, for instance, I have a Switch) to the Tiny Bookshop Game (which is also on Discord)

• Subscribe to my WhatsApp channel for texts I find while I spend time online

• Film folks: Solidarity Cinema, for your consideration

• If you’re in the Global North and would be open to engaging in the North-South solidarity that is sharing a library card, please email or message me so we can figure things out. Thank you!

• The Queer Liberation Library 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️, which is free to join here

• Digital Library of Korean Literature, which is free to join here

• Film folks: Check out the Japan Foundation’s JFF Theater online streaming platform

• How to Write Alt Text and Image Descriptions for the visually impaired

• An interactive self care flow chart

• Links to Reading Lists, Free Books, Book Recs, Book-related Items, and Calls for Submissions in this document (most recent links at the top)

• Since Elon seems to want (some of) us gone, I’m trying to post more often on Bluesky. Follow me there if you’re on it!

• You can send me books, postcards, letters, and assorted items via PO Box 102439, Jamia Posta 00101, Nairobi, Kenya (I write back!)

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I have finished two books since I last wrote to you: Democracy in Retrograde: How to Make Changes Big and Small in Our Country and in Our Lives by Emily Amick and Sami Sage (e-book and audiobook narrated by Nikki Massoud) and How Democracies Die by Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt (e-book and audiobook narrated by Fred Sanders). I’m primarily using Storygraph now (passively updating Goodreads as I read most e-books on Kindle via the library) and I hope to get back to making videos soon.

As ever, please write back to me and tell me what books you’re reading or looking forward to reading — it’s always a great time talking about books.

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Thank you for reading 🙂

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Enjoy the week ahead and have a lovely time reading. Talk to you soon!