The long-delayed account-of/reflection-on my time in Kenya.

It's a long trip, from Salt Lake City, Utah, to Nairobi. Longer still when you have to contend with JFK airport, which is a terribly confusing airport for someone who doesn't know it, and the signage doesn't help much.

I did finally arrive in Nairobi with my group... but without my luggage. I didn't know it at the time, but this turned out to be a blessing...

A little backstory: went to Kenya to work with a group called the Kenyan Children Foundation (KCF), started by Joanne LeClair, a lady from Colorado.

We spent our first day sight-seeing, visiting, for instance, Karen Blixen's farm (Out of Africa, for those of you keeping score).

The second day we were there, I went with Murithi, Joanne's driver, to pick up my luggage from the airport. After navigating police stops, getting permission to enter the airport, and collecting my luggage, I spent the rest of my day running errands with Murithi around Nairobi. Got to cruise around and see what day-to-day life is like. Had lunch in the Westland markets - real African food. There was a line of structures, corrugated metal roofs, and we picked one and went in. It was dark, crowded, smoky, and wonderful. Had a lunch of nyama choma (roasted meat) and ugali (made from maize flour, dough-like consistency).

We spent time working at Nyumbani Children's Home ( [link] ), an HIV/AIDS orphanage. These kids are just so bright and lively... was expecting a heartbreaking experience, but the kids are all just so fun and hopeful. The organization has been quite successful in recent time getting sufficient funds to provide for the children, so they have access to ARV drugs. The children are doing quite well, there was no one in the hospital wing the entire time we were there.

I'm not generally great with kids... I just tend to be extremely hesitant when engaging with them, I really like kids, but I never really know how to start with them. These kids, though... once you take the first step, they totally open up to you. It's a strange but heart-warming experience, having a small child come stumble-walking up to you and just kind of collapse into a hug around your waist.

Perhaps my favorite memory of Nyumbani was as we were leaving one day, several of the kids (who didn't want us to leave) decided to walk with us to the gate. A little girl, couldn't be more than fiv, probably more like three or four, fell over in the middle of the driveway and started to cry. The girls in our group were trying to get her to stop crying without success, we were trying to get home, and there was a car coming into the gate, so I knelt down and scooped the little girl up into my arms and started walking back towards the main building. It didn't take her very long at all to quiet down, though, and she just looked up at me with her big eyes...

Now, I have to be honest - we played a lot while we were in Kenya, more than most of expected. The first weekend we went to the Masai Mara, a huge preserve, and went on game drives. I probably had an idiotic grim on my face just about the entire time... cruising around on the African savannah, how can you top that? The air, the freedom, the wind and the sun... fantastic. And it was astounding the number of animals we saw, the only member of the "Big Five" that we didn't see was a rhinoceros. We also visited a Masai village... you can check out my photo Globalization for some of my thoughts about that experience.

We visited Kibera, the largest slum in Africa, to teach at St. Secilia's Academy, a pre-primary, primary, and secondary school being run right on the edge of the slum. It's quite an amazing story... the director, Angeline, used to be a schoolteacher at a private school in Nairobi and basically a slum landlord, a class of society that is generally not well thought-of, probably for good reason. For whatever reason, though, she started converting dwelling-rooms one by one into classrooms, and eventually quit her job and sold nearly everything she owned to pour into the school. It was quite an emotional experience (I will try to put some shots from the school in my scraps in the next weeks), particularly when we left the first day and drove through the edge of the slum for a way - it is a nearly indescribeable place, and unfortunately it is not a place where it's safe to take photos of random people on the street.

(If there was one regret I have in terms of my photos from the trip, it's the places that I wasn't able to take photos, for reasons of safety (cultural sensitivity) or etiquette - namely the streets of Kibera, the markets in Nairobi, and the markets of Lamu.)

That weekend we spent on Lamu, an island on the coast of Kenya. It was a beautiful, isolated place, just there on the beach with the sun and the sand and the ocean. We took a tour of the town of Lamu one day, which was quite fascinating for me - most of Kenya is very British, having been a British colony, but the coast of Kenya is very Arab, and the town of Lamu was very much an Arab coastal town. I fell absolutely in love with the dhows - small sailboats of Arab design. I want to own one of my own someday - I will build one if I can.

One of our last experiences was visiting a home in Meru for street children that KCF supports. It was brief but great for me - these guys who came out to meet us are 16, 17, 18, and it was fun to just chill with them and chat about life a bit... they are all working hard in school, very concerned about getting into university, because it is very competitive. One of the many legacies of President Moi's 23 years of running the country is a lack of universities - the capacity of existing universities is greatly outstripped by the need. They sang for us... these guys just practice together because they live together and it's something to do, and let me tell you, they are fantastic... it's hard to believe that seven or eight years ago, they were living on the streets. Without the home, they probably still would be, brains fried from glue, provided they were still even alive.

Reflections on the trip... it's amazing how much a small group of people can accomplish, despite difficult situations and challenges. It also strikes me that Kenya as a whole is better off than many African countries. Though there is still widespread poverty and unemployment, the country has been blessed with a lack of conflict since its independence, and has had a stable (though for many years very corrupt, still struggling to reform) government. I was struck by the joy and hope of the kids, whether they're living with their "mamas" at Nyumbani orphanage, getting to attend school on the edge of their slum, or coming home after a day of high school to the Meru Children's Home.

There is of course so much more I could write about the trip, more stories I could tell, more thoughts, more joys, more heartaches, more hopes. It is really quite amazing how fast you can fall in love with the red soil and broken roads and the people that you meet there.

...

When I heard the news
My heart fell on the floor
I was on a plane on my way to Baltimore
In these troubled times its hard enough as it is
My soul has known a better life than this

I wondered how so many could be in so much pain
While others don't seem to feel a thing
Then I curse my wiseness and I get so damned depressed
In a world of suffering why should I be so blessed

I heard about a woman who lives in Colorado
She built a monument of sorts behind her garage door
Where everyday she prays for all whom are born and all whose souls have passed on
Sometimes my trouble gets so thick
I can't see how I'm going to get through it
But then I would rather be stuck up in a tree
Than be tied to it

I know
There is so much more

I don't feel comfortable with the way my clothes fit
I can't get used to my body's limits
I got some fancy shoes to try and kick away these blues
They cost a lot of money but they aren't worth a thing
I want to free my feet from the broken glass and concrete
I need to get out of this city
Lay upon the ground and stare a hole in the sky
Wondering where I go when I die
When I die... - Brett Dennen, There Is So Much More