This is me and a piece of shit. Now calm down, this post is not going to be inappropriate. The painting you see is seriously shit. No, you misunderstand. Darlene and I really like this painting. We purchased it in Rwanda at the Caplaki market. The price for this artistic crap started at 8,000 shillings but I got it for 3500 shillings. Bargain baby.

Anyway, it's of a colorful bird and the woman who said she made it said it was "this year's design." It doesn't matter that every other stall at the market sold something similar, nor does it matter that the Kigali airport sold these as well (but only "last years design" which was zebra striped). So you see, it's a beautiful, must have, one of a kind, lovely, picture of shit.

I can see this is offending people. The bird painting is made of cow dung. Someone took a pile of cow poo, molded into the shape of a bird, let it dry, and then painted it. I wasn't too excited about this item when I saw it at first since it's just a picture of a bird. But when I found out it was a picture of a bird made of poop? Then I went to the negotiating mat to get a fine price for the thing.

You may notice that my nose is perched right at the top of the painting. Yes, you can smell the dung. Not from far away (rest assured future visitors to our DC apartment), but up close like the photo and wow, you can only take so much. At first I was nervous that the painting could chip easily, but the poop hardens.  Darlene and Travis reminded me that some people in Africa have houses with walls made of cow dung. If hardened cow dung is tough enough to withstand wind and weather, I'm sure it can stand the pressures of coming home in my suitcase.

Many jokes have been made already about the piece. For example, me to Travis in Kigali when he asked to see the painting, "Don't touch my shit." Darlene and I in conversation about having the painting on our wall at home, "Hey, we've got shit on our wall!" Me wondering where we should put it for the time being in our apartment here in Nairobi, "Where should we put this shit?"

Juvenile? Perhaps. But we soon will be one of the few people to be able to claim that when someone molded cow poop into the form of a bird and painted it, that we proudly put it on our wall at home. One of the few indeed, unless someone reading this wants painted shit of their own. Let me know!