Kenya, part 1 - into the back country
The day has arrived, at last - the Bristol Kenya adventurers set off in a minibus that was easily half full of bags! Because we had a near 200kg baggage allowance for our family alone (2 bags of 23kg per person!) I had drummed up local support from Bristol mums, who had given me enough gently used shoes to fill four suitcases!
At the airport, check in went pretty much without a hitch... and then the long night flight! The kids managed a few hours sleep. Us adults, not a wink. I did however manage to watch The Greatest Showman at last, and loved it so much I watched it again - definitely my new favourite film! Charity, his wife... oh wow she challenges me so much. In terms of what I want to be like as a wife.
Arriving at our Nairobi house for one night, the roads were... challenging. But, at our friend's house we straight away found a friend, and a home educated kid as well, which I'd never have expected!
A long, long drive
Today we've seen quite a bit of countryside, taking the entire day to reach Navakholo. The journey was supposed to take six hours but ended up closer to 15: first the van in our convoy broke down (easily fixed within the hour) and then the car we were travelling in blew a tyre.
And somehow, between torrential rain that reduced visibility to a few metres and slow lorries going up hills painfully slow and a million risky overtakes on single carriage roads, we arrived just before 9pm. Having set off at 7am.
It's all part of the adventure. The kids were helpful as ever, and we looked at it as a scenic trip to see and experience this place.
Thoughts on Kenya so far, after a day's drive: it's in many ways exactly as expected. Fertile, red soil, lush vegetation. Nice houses and ramshackle ones. Food market stalls by the roadside, hawkers in the road, crazy driving particularly by the people carriers called Saccos (and correspondingly bashed up cars). Free running donkeys and donkey carts. Goats, cows, ducks, dogs, monkeys by the roadside. Zebras too! Beauty. Poverty. Breathtaking scenery, terrible roads due to corruption.
And I notice that Kenyans have a flair for grandiosity. Ramshackle corrugated iron shack: "Executive Barbers". Hole in the wall shop: "Change Your Life Beauty"...
The next morning after breakfast, we set off for Navakholo. The short journey there - 42km - took us ages because of the bad roads. When the tarmac ended, we were on deep wet red mud sliding along at 5 miles an hour. Apparently, the tarmac roads only go as far as the funding does so because there's so much corruption, the roads just stop where the money ran out. So many roads here were funded to be double carriageways, but ended up only single because so much money was siphoned off.
And at last, there it was - the school building site! We walked the last bit to the site and planned to get stuck in as soon as we arrived. Alas, last night's torrential rain had a knock on effect in that we couldn't do much at the main building, however the pit latrine building needed a roof so we got busy there.
At first the kids were very reluctant to engage with the local kids, who simply stood and stared silently at us! Trying to speak to them got no response, so the kids felt rather self conscious and clung to me. After a while, they started playing by themselves... and by the afternoon at last the ice broke and when we left we had to tear the kids away!
So we saw some of rural Kenya, and poverty. Mud houses amid lush vegetation, men sitting around idly because there is nothing to do, no jobs or work other than growing crops for sustenance. Sugar is the main crop for money here but it takes 20 months to grow it, during which time no money comes in; so when time comes to sell the sugar, they have so much debt that there's only just enough money to start another crop. And borrow money again to live. And on it goes.
People are friendly. Kids stand and stare. White people stick out so much, just driving along if someone got sight of my face they'd stare and possibly shout to tell others. I was told some kids may never have seen a white person in the flesh before...!
Finally, the journey back to the hotel was much quicker as we used a different road... which did require us to get out three times to get the car unstuck. That night it rained torrentially again now as I was in bed with D, thunder and lightning!
Community day
What a day, the best day ever! Today we all really felt that this is what we've come here for, this is the purpose of it all. It was a brilliant time of serving the local community and getting to know people!
Because our fundraising had gone beyond the school building target, we were able to use £1,000 to put on a community clinic - doctors, nurses, pharmacist and medications. Over 100 people were seen today. Friends were made, and fun was had. We even got to put our own mark on the building!
So not even the slight inconvenience of having to get our car hacked out of a major hole in the road on our way home could dampen our spirits.
N getting ill
N(5) hasn't been well since we arrived; when we touched down at Nairobi, just before we got off the airplane, she was sick. She hasn't felt well since then: although I managed to keep her constantly high temperature somewhat in check with three doses of paracetamol per day, in the hours before each dose was due she'd deteriorate again. Yesterday during the community clinic she went very pale and had to lay down... she's spent so much time in the last few days on me sleeping or being clingy - she's just not herself at all. Now as it's been six days, this fever has obviously made her quite weak and so when the doctors were at the school site again today, they actually checked her over and now she's on antibiotics as there's clearly some infection going on. Please pray she'll recover soon. As I write this I'm in bed with her, she is pale and weak and clearly unwell.
Pomp and circumstance
Earlier today, as it's Sunday, we joined the local community at the school village at their Sunday church service. This service was to start at an unspecified time (various people in our group were told various starting times ranging from 9.30 to 11am) and we left with the intention to arrive at 9.30, which of course didn't happen; by the time we actually managed to leave we were looking at an arrival time of 10.30 or so, and then at the main village we saw the local senator's car, who grew up with our travel group's leader Emmanuel, so he stopped for a chat and invited her to visit the school site. She agreed, so we carried on and made it there just after 11.
Just as well, as the service hadn't got going yet, although Sunday school was in full swing as we arrived. When we got there, the church service commenced and our pastor Jim preached while Emmanuel translated.
After the sermon, every single item we had brought along was unpacked and ceremoniously handed over... I did wonder why such a lengthy ceremony, so Emmanuel explained it was to protect the teachers from accusations that they had pocketed some of the material to sell for personal gain, as well as to protect the teachers from the temptation to do exactly that!
And then at last, the senator arrived. With her entourage - two local councillors, a media team (all female!), and a large number of men in black suits: security. As I later learned, the briefcases these guys carried were filled with money, which was later - after our departure of course - handed out as gifts. Because a senator needs votes, of course.
I don't want to be cynical, though it's hard not to be; the local councillor did express her embarrassment that there was no school in this area and that foreigners had had to come in to help, and both the senator and the councillors promised to support the school's ongoing running. We'll stay in touch with the local pastor from now on so we'll see if those promises are kept.