It’s hard to believe that I’ve been here an entire week. Sometimes it feels like I’ve been here for much longer. Sometimes it feels like I”m not really here at all and it’s all a hazy dream!
My hope was to take you along with me as I talked through my adventures – but there has just been so much to take in, so much to see and so much to write about. I feel like my brain is full. Even two or three days of solid sleep may not help me to process it all! But for today let me at least try to share a few of my observations in the hopes of giving you a glimpse into life here.
This week we have spent getting settled in and prepared for the real week of work that begins on Monday – a week of leading a children’s bible camp program for 200 plus children in a large slum in the eastern part of Nairobi.
I am very thankful to Dale and Aaase, the two women I am with. They have made a connection with a church denomination in Nairobi and have helped them both with finances and time to support their work with children in the slums. Each year or two they have helped a different church begin a VBS (vacation bible school) program which includes bible teaching, songs, games and a large midday meal for the children in the area. This is Dale’s 5th summer here – Aase comes every other and stays additional time at a children’s home in the west part of the country. Dale is a school teacher who, this year, taught at a rural high school for July before coming to Nairobi to join us. I tell you all this so that you will know what good hands I am in – I am learning a lot, am totally safe, am able to ask a lot of ‘dumb’ questions and they are very aware of my need to rest, to reflect and to sleep!
Dale and Aase very wisely give the team one week to settle in. In many ways it has been a week of firsts for me and one day I just might make a list to share with my grandchildren (!!). At the top would be – first time sleeping under a mosquito net and first time kissing a giraffe (really!) – I could go on and on. And every day I try more and more things – Dale calls me a ‘trooper’. All those years of camping have paid off!
Seriously, though, this week has helped me to gain a small understanding of life in Kenya and, specifically, Nairobi. The people, the places, the politics, the food and water (or lack of it) …. And at every turn there is another new sight to see, another person to have a conversations with (my ear for the Kenyan accent is slowly improving), and another new image and all that it represents to add to my full-to-bursting brain.
But don’t worry – hakuna matata. This sensory overload feeling is not a bad thing at all – this, in fact, is the only way to have the realities of Kenya truly touch me. Looking in from behind the window of our car is safe but is not enough – I really am loving the chances I get to be immersed in it. So, for this fabulous opportunity, I am so very thankful.
So what am I seeing? What am I hearing? What am I wondering about? If I was writing a book (and, one day I just might) here are some of the chapter titles that would be part of it.
- sharing the road – traffic, traffic and more traffic
- schools – the things we could learn from each other
- the land – where has all the water gone?
- the people – patient, wise, hard-working, sincere
- scraping out an existence – literally
and, on two personal notes:
- where is all the Kenyan coffee?
- washrooms – the good, the bad and the (*_&+ !!
Th last two days I had the delightful chance to head into the countryside as we drove around Mount Kanya. Our first stop was a coffee plantation – the last stop was a safari around Lake Nakura where saw a dozen varieties of African animals and birds. In between – I crossed the equator (several times!), ate traditional roast meat, visited a small village high school, passed by lush farms and dry desolate homesteads. It was a feast for the eyes, food for the brain – and a photographer’s dream. I’ll post some soon after I arrive home, I promise.
Tomorrow the 4th member of our team, Kendra, joins us and then our ‘real’ work begins. I can make not promises but my goal is to blog again at the end of week 2.
Until the next time … Cathy
