Tanzania, Rain, More Rain, Some Pictures, and a Video

This Friday is the one year anniversary of Margaret's husband, Naftali's, death. Margaret closed the school and allowed all of the workers a day off. We will be having a program to remember him. There will be prayers and sharing and probably a lot of meat. It should be a somber day and we hope Margaret is able to stay strong. This morning she asked me to help her prepare one of his pictures for an announcement in this Friday's paper. While doing so I stumbled upon the pictures of the funeral that Moses had put on her computer. She said she had no idea that they were there. In those pictures we found a picture of Naftali in his uniform. She said that was the picture she wanted, and she was glad I found it. I told her I was glad I could help. We made the picture her desktop wallpaper. She said it would help her. This Friday, remember Naftali in your own way.

This Saturday, however, due to exams all next week, Tammi, Kelly and I will be bussing our way to Mwanza, Tanzania to visit Sister Jennifer at her school there. It will be nice to see Montessori in a primary school setting. Also it will be good to get away for a little while. What won't be good is a 12-13 bus ride in the dead of night. Please envy us, I know you want to! We will be seeing Lake Victoria, which is exciting, but we are a little nervous. We have travelled extensively in the U.S. but there is something about a roadtrip in Africa that takes a bit of getting used to, I am sure we will fare well, though!

In other news: the wet season is among us! I never thought I would miss dry so much. You get to know yourself when you base the importance of something against having to put on your gumboots (RAIN BOOTS!). The blasted mud! Not that I want their crops to wither and die, but a few days of dryness and sunshine would be nice. What about God? Do me a solid!

Along with the rain a smell has made itself known near the stair to our homes. Initially I chalked it up to the rain causing the sewage to back up, but as of late itself, it is smelling more and more like death. It kills me and everyone who has to walk that way. Thank you rain for making dead things moist enough to throw off a mighty stink.

One good thing about the rain:

Tammi's smoking gum boots!

Dear Michael's Dad:
This one's for you:


Love-
Michael's Colon

And finally, my favorite picture lately. It's Sarah at the Boy's Dorm Party. Try not to smile:


Now here's a video from the boy's dorm, yes those are girls:



If you have time look at the new pictures. They include our trip to the slums in Kibera, the boy's dorm party (with more meat), and nuns playing volleyball. Don't miss it!

Here's Tammi:

11/7/06

We have been here 3 months today or maybe we left 3 months ago today, it does not really matter I guess. Who is counting any ways?

Michael is in the kitchen cooking spaghetti and I am at Kelly’s place typing this journal entry. I think of all the things I have not shared with you and I could blame lack of time but that would be a lie. I am really not sure why I have stopped sharing so much with you. I think because it is not so new any more, don’t get me wrong there are many moments that are strange and still very hard to swallow however that happens more times then I could keep up with and it has also become not so new.

Our Fieldtrip with House of Hope
I did not really say much about the fieldtrip with all the children, I think it was because we had just come back from being with Margaret’s family that the field trip was just too much to process. We had a great time and the children really seemed to enjoy themselves. We left somewhat early, not as early as Margaret would have liked but early none-the-less. We really did not know where we were going we just knew Rift Valley and well the Rift Valley is huge, it is a Province of Kenya, west of Nairobi. So off we went on what felt like the longest road trip of our lives, it could have been because the bus was full of 44 children and 11 adults. Either way we got to Rift Valley and it was amazing, again I wish I could described the beauty but I come up empty every time, I think all I can say is God is amazing (also I am sure you have seen the photos). It is just amazing that you can go just a few hours outside the city and everything comes alive and it is green and fresh and the air is sweet and cool and people are here and there all quick to wave to you. So still clueless of our final destination we can tell the kids are needing to go to the “choo” and well when you have a call you go wherever you can go. Right before we stop to go to the restroom on the side of the road, I noticed that George has fallen asleep in the seat behind me and he is preventing Beth from sitting down so I pick up George and hold him in my lap to allow him to sleep and Beth to sit. So all is well except George has horrible gas and well when the time came for us to stop to let the kids go pee I thought maybe George needs to go #2 so I wake him up to go with the other boys to a big bush to pee and when he comes back he goes right back on my lap and we are off again. So a few minutes later George starts to look like he is going to cry and I ask him what is wrong and he will not tell me so I get a teacher to help that was sitting across from me and he tells me that George is not feeling well and well I think I best take him to an auntie so Agnes wins and she gets George and not 30 minutes later, at most, we all smell something pretty gross and low and behold George has pooed all over her and all over him self and on the floor. We have to make a stop at a market place so Margaret can buy George some clothes and Agnes can clean him up. We thought George would feel weird for the rest of the trip but nope, he was quick to show off his new clothes. Man was I lucky! If I have not said this before Agnes is an amazing women!
So back to our trip, we finally get to our destination, Lake Nakuru National Park. We park the bus and Margaret goes in to pay for the park entry and then Cyrus comes to get us, we go to the office and find out that it costs about $1 for the kids and $7 for the adults except if you were white, it was $40 and we were all a little overwhelmed with the price. At first we thought, well we don’t need to be here, we can just go into town and explore but Margaret was not having it, so off inside the park we go. We drive and we see all kinds of animals, it was pretty amazing and I am glad I did not miss it but still it sucks sometimes to be white. So I am sure you have all seen the photos and well that about wraps the trip up. We did think that Michael’s parents would love it, I hope they get to see it one day. So we do not really ever get out of the bus, we get to stop at one place that was a cliff that over looked the lake and it was beautiful but it was a short stop, we could not eat there because the baboons were crazy intense and would have ran off with Nicholas or Loise. So back into the bus we go and back home we make our way.


We tackled the city by ourselves
Margaret leaves for work really early and well it has been raining and so we did not want to risk not being able to go into the city so we suggest that we leave with her in the morning and we go where we need to go in the city taking the public transportation. She agrees and we are excited. So we wake up and leave at around 6ish and all the males in the community push the van out to the semi-main road. They had to push because the van was a little broken. So off we go and we drop Margaret off at work and we head to the Westlands because we are hopeful that Kelly will get her package and she does!! So we head back to downtown where the main post office is and Cyrus drops us off at a random place that we had seen before but was not 100% sure of how to get to the post office but we say “when in Rome” and off we go. So we are a little hungry since we got up so early so we enjoy a really large breakfast for 180/= which is a little over $2 and we eat and get full and are ready for our adventure. Before we left Cyrus points us in the direction of the post office and we have been to the post office before and it is on a rather main road in the city so we head that way and low and behold we find it or rather Michael finds it! He is amazing in any city, he makes tons of mental notes and he is great at finding his way around. So we go get Kelly’s package that should be noted as a funny situation because she had to go to about 5 different people just to pick up her package, we kept thinking that someone has got to be watching this on video. So we go to find a way to Westlands where the Sarit Centre (aka fast internet and lots of white people) is. So we go to the bus stop or Citi Hoppa and are told that no Citi Hoppa go to Westlands that we will need to take a Matatu aka a very small van that goes really really fast. So we find one and are told we need to hurry up since they stop in the middle of the road to pick us up and we head down the Uhuru Highway to the Westlands. We quickly discover that the music is hip hop and really loud for that matter, I totally think of Kimberly because I know that she would have been dancing in the aisle. Oh and the best part of the Matatu, and I know you were thinking the music was the best part, is the price, it was only 40/= which is less than $1 so you get a ride and music all for $.50 can’t beat that! So we go take care of our internet needs at the Westlands and we see that time is telling us to head back to the Nakumatt Mega to do our shopping and to meet up with Margaret and head home. So we think that the Matatu should be just as easy the second time around so we hop on another one this time we are in a mini bus of sorts and we have not just music but we have a TV that is playing hip hop videos, I call it soft porn but to each his own. So we dance in our seats and ask if this bus takes us where we want to go and we get a “yes” until we find ourselves lost and in the middle of the city (part of the city we had never been in) and we are told if we go somewhere we will find a Matatu that will take us the rest of the way. So we are lost and not wanting to look lost because well we were the only white people for miles and we were also running a little late by this time. So again Michael’s beard saves the day and a man comes over and ask if we are lost and we humble ourselves and say “yes” so he takes us where we need to go and we get on another Matatu and find ourselves safely at the Nakumatt right before Margaret gets there! Little side note, we hope to go back to the part of town we got lost in because we saw some great shops we would like to look it, I think it works to get lost sometimes!